Jason Roche

Recently we spoke with Alice Cooper. That same day British newspaper The Guardian posted an archived article from 40 years ago highlighting efforts of high-ranking government officials to ban his shock-rock stage shows from entering the United Kingdom. Needless to say, it just helped build his legend even more on......

Led Zeppelin lead singer Robert Plant returns to Los Angeles on June 26th at the Shrine Auditorium with his newest backing band, The Sensational Space Shifters. The lineup features members of his early-'00s band The Strange Sensation, and sees Plant revisiting both blues rock and world music influences; this after......

Monday, June 3 Abigail The Joint Japanese outfit Abilgail is one of the more unabashedly sleazy bands in metal. Their blackened thrash attack is a raw celebration of sex and violence. Tracks such as "Satanic Hell Slut" and "Satanik Metal Fucking Hell" are pure rippers that make you want to......

One of the fascinating Angelenos featured in L.A. Weekly's People 2013 issue. Check out our entire People 2013 issue here. For lunch today in Culver City, Justin Smith has ridden his motorcycle up the 405 from Cal State Long Beach, where he teaches U.S. history classes as an adjunct professor......

More than 1,000 fans are expected at this year's Thrasho de Mayo festival, drawn by rising upstart local metal acts and some of the genre's heaviest hitters. But no one expected it to get so big. Particularly not Esther Gutierrez, a housewife who put the first one together at the......

Tuesday, May 7 Cauldron Five Stars Bar Toronto bassist/vocalist Jason Decay was near the forefront of last decade's revival of classic metal sounds, with his previous band Goat Horn. With his current outfit Cauldron, the brand of thrash falls more on the melodic side, taking strong influence from the New......

Paris is considered one of the most romantic cities in the world. But guitarist/vocalist Thomas Bellier and bassist Antoine Morel-Vulliez -- co-founders of psych-rock outfit Blaak Heat Shujaa -- had no problems high-tailing it out of there for Los Angeles in 2010. "Paris is the most fucking boring town for......

Los Angeles black metal demons Lightning Swords of Death have some evil sounds on their new album, Baphometic Chaosium. It almost sounds like the work of an early '90s Scandinavian band. For insight into how L.A. inspires him, then, we reached out to the group's front man Autarch. Ahead of......

Tuesday, Apr 2 Ensiferum, Tyr House of Blues Sunset Strip The annual Paganfest tour has become one of our favorite regular metal tours. Finland's Ensiferum is grounded heavily in orchestral folk metal, but maintains a galloping pace that keeps headbangers moving in the pit. Denmark's Tyr has more in common......