The MetalSucks Podcast

Soilwork and The Night Flight Orchestra vocalist Bjorn “Speed” Strid is our guest this week. We discuss reigniting the fans and legacy of the band after 11 albums, how the Swedish bands and American bands of the mid '00s influenced each other, the rediscovery of the Scandinavian sound on The Living Infinite and how that journey has influenced the band's new album Verkligheten, being able to focus...

This week we take The Black Dahlia Murder's Trevor Strnad down memory lane with a discussion of important anniversaries that are coming in 2019. Ten years since Disney’s Up and Alice In Chains' comeback album Black Gives Way to Blue, 15 years since the Ozzfest where Hollywood Undead were hired to throw eggs at Iron Maiden, the anniversary of the death of Dimebag and Trevor's memories of the event,...

This week on our final show of 2018 we give you a special double episode as we celebrate some of the great music that left an impression on us in 2018, counting down our top 15 albums of the year. The poetry of sadness, the lovely brutality of our senses and the essence of joy and peace that heavy metal brings people like us daily -- we cover it all and gladly present our list of genuine and beaut...

Alan Robert, Life of Agony bassist and the creator of The Beauty of Horror - Ghosts of Christmas coloring book, is our guest this week. We discuss the initial idea behind the adult coloring book series as a way of completely dismantling Christmas, his history as a comic book artist and author even prior to joining Life of Agony, how Twitter helped him get his first comic book published, an update...

Rob Trump of the political parody grindcore act Anal Trump joins us for a special in-between episode of The MetalSucks Podcast. The guitarist/bassist/drummer shares with us the origins of Anal Trump, his love for Anal Cunt as a catalyst, the inspiration Brujeria provided, how the charity angle became an important part of the project, his future vision for the band, if they will disband when Trump...

Sigh Mastermind Mirai Kawashima is our guest this week. We discuss why he felt listeners would dislike the band's new album Heir to Despair, what the critical reception has been like in reality, how his dislike for previous album Graveward influenced the new one, Phil Anselmo’s guest appearance on the new record and working with Necrophagia frontman Killjoy, why he choose to sing in his native ton...

Johan Hegg of Amon Amarth is our guest this week. We discuss Amon Amarth's new live retrospective and documentary The Pursuit of Vikings: 25 years in the Eye of the Storm, his feelings on live albums in general, whether it's possible to capture a band's connection with the audience on video, the importance of Europe’s “The Final Countdown" to the origins of Amon Amarth, the 8-bit video game the ba...

Our guest this week is Nita Strauss. We discuss her recently-released debut solo record Controlled Chaos, her work with Alice Cooper and her appearance on Wrestlemania earlier this year. We also talk about the first time she picked up a guitar at age 13, the lesson and power of showing vulnerability as a public figure, knowing when to abandon a song and walk away, the passing of Jill Janus (Huntre...

Todd Stern of Psycroptic is our guest this week. We discuss his role in the latest record As The Kingdom Drowns, the addition of female vocals over choruses, if there was a hazing process when he joined the band, the logistics of him living in the States and the rest of the band living in Australia, switching from guitar to bass to be in Psycroptic, acclimating to the Australian lingo of his bandm...

Trevor Phipps of Unearth is our guest. We discuss the message behind the band's new album Extinction(s), how the American political puts a strain on relationships with friends and family these days, his tips on how to best consume the news, the modern presentation of opinions as facts, which band from the New Wave of American Heavy Metal he was surprised called it quits, his thoughts climate chang...

Highly regarded producer and Hate Eternal mainman Erik Rutan is our guest this week. We discuss Hate Eternal's new album Upon Desolate Sands, his goals for the record production and guitar-wise, whether he would ever have someone else produce a Hate Eternal record, the importance of preserving the performances during the recording process, what his approach would be if he were hired to record a ne...

This week we host The Ocean mastermind Robin Staps. We discuss recording parts of the band's new album Phanerozoic 1: Paleozoic in Iceland, what it was like laying down tracks in a studio that used to be a swimming pool, why The Ocean always release double albums, the reason he gives listeners the option to listen to an instrumental version of his songs, how Phanerozoic is the end of an era for ba...

This week Tony Foresta vocalist of Iron Reagan/Municipal Waste is our guest. We talk about Iron Reagan’s new EP Dark Days Ahead, working at a t-shirt printing factory in the early days of Municipal Waste, his affinity for playing shows with pop punk bands, the never ending meme thread that he has on his phone, a prank he pulled on Earache Records when Municipal Waste first signed to the label, and...

This week our guest is Adam “Nergal” Darski of Behemoth. Nergal tells us about the pressure of following up The Satanist, why he is proudest of the modern era of Behemoth, the amount of energy he puts into the visual aspect of the band, how his music belongs to the fans after it's been released, and why he still spends thousands of dollars on records. We also chat about how he was recently banned...

Scott Vogel of Terror is our guest this week. We discuss the rage behind the band's new album Total Retaliation, working with Producer Will Putney, why Terror shows are one of a kind, his least favorite Terror record, when reviewers don’t give records a fair shake, the importance of lyrics in hardcore, the difference between a fashion statement and the mentality of going against the grain, his pas...

This week our guest is Xasthur mastermind Scott Conner. We talk about what led him to alter his sound from black metal to "doomgrass," how he felt about his final black metal release Portal of Sorrow, how the doomgrass style fits into the metal world at large, his thoughts on separating the art from the artist, the importance of writing songs in an isolated setting, the different kinds of fans his...

This week we speak with Aborted vocalist Sven de Caluwé about the band's new album TerrorVision, including how the decision came about to name it after the '80s thriller, how awful that film was, how the title isn’t a direct reference to the movie but to the state of the world today and the cheap scare tactics modern-day horror films utilize. We also discuss how people often forget that metal is s...

Blake Harrison of Pig Destroyer guests this week. We discuss the lengthy break between the band's new album Head Cage and Book Burner (2012), if the title of the record contains any messages about modern society, how a Pig Destroyer show has become an event for our genre, how they got on the Showtime promo for the new Twin Peaks series (while we fanboy hard on David Lynch’s career), playing “Natas...

Mike Muir of Suicidal Tendencies is our guest this week. We discuss the band's new record STill Cyco Punk After All These Years, a reimagining of his 1996 solo album, and how the lyrical content is still relevant today. Mike also talks at length on a number of topics including how being a victim is a choice in some peoples' lives, how a surefire way to be miserable is to make other people happy, h...

Our guest this week is Revocation mastermind David Davidson. We discuss the band's new record The Outer Ones (which Dave describes as the band's "most death metal album" to date), how the world of H.P. Lovecraft influenced the album, studying the language of jazz and its effects on Revocation, which jazz artist he is most impressed with and the importance of knowing the history of the genre you lo...

Our guest this week is legendary drummer Mike Portnoy. We discuss Metal Allegiance and the massive amount of input that goes into a supergroup collaboration, getting Andreas Kisser and Max Cavalera on the same record again, the various vocalists on the band's new album Volume II: Power Drunk Majesty and the process for writing lyrics, the metal drummers who influenced him, an update on Sons of Apo...

On this special "half" episode of The MetalSucks Podcast we share a never-before-heard interview with Huntress frontwoman Jill Janus, who tragically took her own life earlier this week. The interview was conducted by MetalSucks Podcast host Petar Spajic a few years back at a Huntress headlining show in Las Vegas and has not been published anywhere until now.  Explains Petar:  "When I got the oppor...

Roy Mayorga is our guest this week! Join us as we discuss the special edition of Stone Sour's Hyrdograd (out August 31), their new single “Burn One Turn One” not making the cut on the original release, the challenge of covering Rage Against the Machine's “Bombtrack,” winning Loudwire’s Best Hard Rock Album of 2017, getting to spend six weeks playing support for Ozzy on his final tour, the first re...

Rob "Blasko" Nicholson -- Ozzy's longtime bassist, successful artist manager and founder/host of the A New Level podcast -- is our guest this week. We start out by talking about his latest endeavor and the preparation his guests go through prior to recording the episodes. We transition into a broader music industry conversation: how people consume music these days as opposed to the past, how the n...

The legendary Dee Snider is our guest this week. We discuss his new solo record For the Love of Metal (which was written and produced by Jamey Jasta), his fears he wouldn't be able to deliver on a contemporary metal record, the inspiration Game of Thrones had on the effort, why he feels no need to make a new Twisted Sister album and how he landed a spot on Chappelle’s Show. He also updates us on t...