Metal and Hardcore

Five '70s Metal Bands Who Are Better Than Black Sabbath

Ok, we get it. You like Sabbath. Everyone does. But there's a whole big world out there of '70s metal bands that goes beyond Sabbath -- even beyond Sir Lord Baltimore, if you can believe that. The '70s offered so much in the way of doom-and-gloom heaviness that it's criminal so many stop with Ozzy, ... More >>

The Best L.A. Metal Concerts to See in December

Sun, Dec 9 Gravehill, Behold! The Monolith Cheetah's On December 9th the spiked leather armband crowd and the bearded denim vest crowd will gather together...at a go-go club. Orange County's Gravehill plays to the former with uncompromising, blackened thrash metal with a bludgeoning focus on brutali ... More >>

Lamb of God - The Palladium - 10/31/12

Lamb of God with In Flames, Hatebreed and Sylosis Hollywood Palladium 10/31/12 Better than... a candy sack full of strychnine-soaked raisins wrapped in razor-blades. See also: *More photos from the show *Top 20 L.A. Metal Albums *Randy Blythe, Ahead of His Manslaughter Trial, Talks About Losing a ... More >>

Steel Panther: Hair Metal Cover Band Goes Legit

See also: Top 20 Hair Metal Albums Of All Time: The Complete List Story by Clay Marshall Steel Panther guitarist Russ Parrish sports leopard-print Spandex and a tiger-striped ax when the group plays in concert. If all goes well, he'll climb atop the drum riser and stomp on the kick-drum pedal, ac ... More >>

The Craziest Danzig Stalker of Them All

Fred Harper​Story by Alex Distefano Glenn Danzig brings his Danzig Legacy show to Gibson Amphitheatre on Halloween. On this short tour, for the first time he's performing his solo material and songs from Samhain and Misfits all in one night. This got us really, really excited. But it turns ... More >>

South of Leavened: Top 5 Metal-Themed Cooking Show Videos

Sometimes, we like to test the Internet. We so thoroughly enjoyed the video of a metal-themed cooking show a friend posted on Facebook yesterday that we wondered if it didn't epitomize a larger trend. We took a two-minute jaunt through YouTube and humanity's e-presence came through loudly, hungrily ... More >>

EXCLUSIVE: Metallica's Lars Ulrich On Surviving the Big 4 and the Roots of Thrash

Warner Bros.Metallica's Lars Ulrich​Months of anticipation came to an explosive finish in the California desert on Saturday night, as Metallica closed their "Big 4" thrash-fest with a thundering "Seek & Destroy" for 50,000 weary headbangers spread across Empire Polo Field in Indio. By acknowle ... More >>

Big 4 Recap: Backstage, Onstage and Caught in a Mosh at Metal's Biggest Event

Paul HebertDesert Thrashers: Metallica's Kirk Hammett and James Hetfield​Thrash has become the music of brotherly love. Backstage at the Big 4 fest on Saturday, all four of the day's speedy metal acts gathered for a quick group portrait with photographer Ross Halfin. And standing tall at the c ... More >>

EXCLUSIVE: Slayer's Kerry King Reveals How Thrash Survives

Photograph by Steve ApplefordSlayer guitarist Kerry King​ Thrash metal musicians are not always the most social of animals. The guys in Anthrax do tend to get along with other bands, but Slayer, Megadeth and Metallica have famously traded insults across the decades over slights big and small. ... More >>

EXCLUSIVE: Megadeth's Dave Mustaine On Embracing the Big 4 and Finally Getting Over Metallica

Stephanie CabralFlame-haired shredder Dave Mustaine and Megadeth​ Of all the musicians onstage at Saturday's epic Big 4 Festival of thrash, Dave Mustaine arrives with the most complicated history. He is an essential figure within this loud-fast genre of metal, and the originator of a certain ... More >>

EXCLUSIVE: Slayer's Tom Araya Talks Moshpits, Spider-bites and the Big 4

Steve ApplefordSlayer's Tom Araya​ For Slayer's singer-bassist Tom Araya, thrash-metal has been a 30-year mission. On Saturday, his band joins Metallica, Anthrax and Megadeth in Indio, California, for the Big 4 Fest - invading the site of Coachella while continuing a collaboration that began ... More >>

Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax Play Coachella April 23

EXCLUSIVE Interview: Why Anthrax's Scott Ian Hates Coachella and Loves the Big 4

Steve ApplefordAnthrax guitarist Scott Ian​ Guitarist Scott Ian has been metal's No. 1 fan ever since his first whiff of Kiss back in the '70s. He's also been the one constant in every lineup of Anthrax, now one of the "Big 4" originators of thrash-metal set to land on the site of Coachella i ... More >>

Rock Out With Your Doc Out

Guitar Hero is Dead, Long Live the Top 10 Songs to Play on Guitar Hero!

Top 10 Songs to Play on Guitar Hero

'RACH & ROLL

Who Is the Biggest of the Big Four?: Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer and Anthrax in Size Standoff at Post-Coachella Thrash Metal Fest

zme music​So the Coachella organizers had an empty slot between the Coachella festival itself and the much more chill Stagecoach "Americana" festival and, as everyone knows by now, they offered it to Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax and Slayer for the first American version of the Big Four festiva ... More >>

Top 10 Strangest Rock Star Action Figures (In Honor of the "Hard Rock Barbie" Lawsuit)

Tiny Rockers! 10 Best Rock Star Action Figures (Not Including HorrorPops' Lawsuit Lovin Bassist)

Top 10 Metal Shows in LA in 2010 (with Bonus Video Evidence!)

Timothy NorrisThe 2010 LA Weekly poster children for LA Metal posing at Sunset Strip Music Festival​ "THE" 10 best LA Metal shows of the year? How dare we? Alright--we're gonna go there. It wasn't easy but after a few hours rummaging through the desk drawer that finds my old drunkenly discard ... More >>

Whatever Happened to Chet Thompson?

Tonight: Slayer, Megadeth, Film School, Los Enanitos Verdes, Wiz Khalifa, Born Ruffians, Frank Fairfield

Slayer​If the current "Clash of Titans" tour featuring Slayer, Medageth and Anthrax has reinforced one notion, it's that anger never goes out of style. The tour, with Slayer and Megadeth co-headlining, has been raging, drawing metal fans young and old to the music of bands that, along with Me ... More >>

MR. CLEAN TALKS!

Live Review: Slayer, Megadeth and Testament Hit Long Beach for American Carnage (and a Couple of Christians Are Not Amused)

Evil AlexWarning thrash metal fans about Hell​ A tall skinny man in all black shouted, "FUCK YOU JESUS FREAK! SATAN SATAN!" as he stood in line to be frisked at the Long Beach Arena Monday evening, for the American Carnage Tour, a thrash metal epiphany type event, featuring Testament, Megade ... More >>

Exclusive Interview: Megadeth's David Ellefson on Thrash Metal, his Favorite Bible Story and the Status of That Elusive American "Big Four" Tour (Yes You, Metallica. We're Waiting.)

Valerie McRobertsDavid Ellefson enjoying a stiff Starbucks before Megadeth's set​Megadeth are undoubtedly one of the biggest thrash metal bands of all time. Fronted by Dave Mustaine, founder, guitarist and vocalist, the band was formed in the early '80s after Mustaine was kicked out of Metalli ... More >>

Sunset Strip Festival: West Hollywood Declares August 26, 'SLASH DAY'

Alex DistefanoLast night, the focus was on Slash (focus not pictured)​On the eve of the third annual Sunset Strip Music Festival, Thursday night, the House of Blues on the Sunset Strip and the city of West Hollywood honored none other than hard rock guitar icon Slash, who rose to fame with Gu ... More >>

Over the Weekend: The Power of the Riff Festival at the Echo and Echoplex

Evil AlexCorrosion of Conformity's Mike Dean​ Nothing beats a free show, especially in today's economy. Which is why both the Echo and the Echoplex were full to capacity on Sunday, for a 12 hour eclectic mix of metal artists such as grindcore innovators Repulsion, Southern California hardcor ... More >>

Live Review: The Murderdolls at the Key Club

Roadrunner RecordsJoey Jordison & Wednesday 13​[See also Full Metal Jackie and Alex Distefano's pre-show interview with Murderdolls' Joey Jordison & Wednesday 13.] Joey Jordison might possibly be the busiest musician in heavy metal today. His decade-plus career as the uber sonic madman behind ... More >>

Where Punk Meets Glam: An Interview with Murderdolls' Joey Jordison and Wednesday 13

[Also see the review by Full Metal Jackie and Alex Distefano of Thursday's Murderdolls show at the Key Club.] Taking a few minutes before a headlining show at the Key Club in Hollywood, Joey Jordison and Wednesday 13 took time to give the LA Weekly insight into the much anticipated second Murderdol ... More >>

City Declares May 30 'Ronnie James Dio Day'

Dio and the devil horns.​The Los Angeles City Council has officially declared May 30 Ronnie James Dio Day. The announcement was made at Sunday's public memorial service for the recently deceased, eternally awesome metal singer. Event MC Eddie Trunk, the host of VH1 Classic's That Metal Show, ... More >>

Heavy Metal Internship Studies Sabbath, Priest, and Napalm Death

Heavy Metal Internship Studies Sabbath, Priest, and Napalm Death

10 Great Heavy Metal Albums of 2009 (Or, Well, Make That 14)

Over the Top Eyes open and ears bleeding, Phil Freeman loads up on the year's best metal. This year was such a good one for heavy music, we wound up having to cheat when putting this list together. We just couldn't settle on ten albums that kicked my ass the hardest in 2009; there were dozens of ca ... More >>

Notes on the Grammy Nominations: Excuse Us While We Puke

​What follows are a few random notes on LA-based nominees for the 2009 Grammys, which were announced yesterday in downtown LA. If you're looking for thoughts on the big-ass pop categories, go elsewhere; we're going to try and wade through the rock and lesser known categories without throwing u ... More >>

Slayer’s Bloody Template

More tales of serial murder and psychosis, state oppression, snuff films and endless war over oil

This Just In: Fans of Cartoon Metal Band Dethklok Line Up for Hours @ The Palladium

We've seen the future of rock'n'roll, and it is a fictional metal band. This picture below is the line at 3:35pm in front of the Hollywood Palladium for the double bill of Mastodon (a real metal band) and Dethklok (a fictional metal band from the Adult Swim Metalocalypse cartoon). When the fans we ... More >>

Red Line Fever: It’s Casual

Coming to an off-ramp near you

Slayer Signs Guitars, Kids, Shark-Eaten Feet at Hot Topic

Slayer Signs Guitars, Kids and Shark-Eaten Feet at Hot Topic

Slayer to Appear at ... Hot Topic at Hollywood & Highland? Really? Yes.

It has come to our attention that next Tuesday Slayer will be meeting its fans not in Hell, Hades, or even some burning lake of fire. Nope, Rather, they will appear at HOT TOPIC at Hollywood and Highland. Details, and reactions, after the jump.

Ten Great Motorhead Moments for the Unenlightened

We could go twenty, actually, but will stick to ten. Motorhead plays tonight at Club Nokia. Any other information seems superfluous. But: If you've never seen Motorhead and you call yourself a Buddhist, well, you need to look a little deeper within, because nothing clears the mind of extraneous thou ... More >>

Megadeth vs. Metallica: Both Have "Gone Down the Shitter"

Gotta love the Internets. "Rust in Peace was one of the hardest-ass fucking metal albums I've ever heard in my life. I even like the bass solo on 'Dawn Patrol.' That's a great fucking bass solo. I don't give a shit what anybody says." "I noticed that about the same time that Metallica started su ... More >>

Sunn O))) Melts Eardrums at the Eagle Rock Center for the Arts

Light from surrounding streetlamps and neighborhood porch lights filtered in through the Mission-style high ceilinged windows lining the perimeter of the Eagle Rock Center for the Arts. They illuminated rotating specks of dust as they filtered toward the chandeliers hung from the center of the room. ... More >>

Required Listening Before Sunn O)))

Required Listening Before Sunn O)))

Judas Priest's Performance of British Steel at Gibson Amphitheatre: Sonically Beefier, Possibly Record-Breaking

By Skylaire Alfvegren Judas Priest at Gibson Amphitheatre, August 2 Last year, Birmingham, UK stalwarts Judas Priest released an ambitious double album conceptualizing the life of French seer, Nostradamus, and mounted an epic summer escapade with Motorhead and Heaven & Hell. Under the stars abo ... More >>

Who the Hell Is Holy Grail?

An L.A. metal band with songs about “chicks, Vikings, ex-chicks, being tough, macho/machismo, FEMA, Fabio, Conan, rad dinosaurs, UFOs and Bilderberg Group,” that’s who

LA People 2009: The Throat — Lemmy

Touring is too fun to stop for Motorhead's lead singer, who's taken his vocal cords to hell and back for nearly 35 years, but he'll always come home to his barstool at the Rainbow

Anvil! The Story of Anvil: A Canadian Metal Band's Great Feature-Length Doc

Duo will make you laugh, cry and cheer with songs like "Hair Pie" and "Show Me Your Tits"

Screw Metallica: Southern Lord Showcase Kills at SXSW

Randall RobertsPelican rips it at the Southern Lord Records showcase I'm sure Metallica was great. They were good when I saw them at the LA Forum a few months back, where the dudes in the pit were in their typical testostero-frenzied state. And the indulgent 45-minute soundcheck that preceded their ... More >>

SxSW Scene: Metallica Sets Up Shop at Four Seasons

View live photos in the "Metallica Thrashes Stubb's" slideshow. On Friday afternoon, the four members of arguably the world's most famous heavy metal band flew into Austin, Texas, from San Francisco to promote a new music video game called "Guitar Hero Metallica." For the press conference, they set ... More >>

Top 10 Metal Albums of 2008

By Phil Freeman In a year worthy of your rage, metal delivered in spades. What with the economy circling the drain and Sarah Palin coming down from the tundra and then refusing to go back, 2008's been the kind of year that really makes you want to smash your head into walls or punch random stran ... More >>

Penetration

Today’s Iron Maiden sticks it to ya

Not Fade Away