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Once again, Simon and Lee from ABREACT stormed onto my heavy metal radio show and took control. The Boys from bendigo are making big moves, and their debut album is out.
They played some tracks from their new album, they played some tracks from some other local artists, some of their favourites from international acts as well.
Remnants - ABREACT
Wolves At My Door - Converge
Transition - S E R I E S
Words And Phrases - Raised Fist
Shura - House Of Thumbs
Weight Of Disturbance - ABREACT
Asphyxiate - Artilah Underwater Bimbos From Outer Space - Every Time I Die
Cull - ABREACT
Deathstar - Sevendust
Hollow - Alice In Chains
The Grit That Grinds - ABREACT
Scar The Surface - Disolved
For Those...(Dead On The Way) - ABREACT
Now there's a cool way to spend a Wednesday evening.
Another year gone, and the 3rd Annual 'Sleeping in the Fire' Halloween Special has been and gone, with some inescapable tracks, and some fresh additions. Enjoy my playlist which aired on Halloween itself, nicely timed.
Intro / A Cautionary Tale - Sabbat
It had to be done (again). It's the perfect intro for a Halloween Special.
Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath
Another must play song. Classic!
Night Crawler - Judas Priest
Great Intro. It didn't make it in the list for the last couple of years, it had to be done this year.
Don't Fear the Reaper - Blue Oyster Cult
I played 'The Siege and Investiture of Baron Von Frankenstein's Castle at Wesseria' last year from the under-the-radar classic BOC album 'Imaginos'. This year, I returned to the old reliable.
Bewitched - Candlemass
A cheesy, chunky song made for spooky holidays
Halloween - King Diamond
Another must-play track. Oh, KD, you loveable, satanic goofball, you...
Come To The Sabbath - Mercyful Fate
A KD double feature? Hell(oween) yeah!
Halloween - Helloween
I'd have my Heavy Metal Weilding Licence revoked if I didn't play this one. Unavoidable.
Trick Or Treat - Fastway
Getting all the classics out of the way...
Ghostbusters - Vomitron
Ah Ha! A recently-discovered track that fits in perfectly with the Heavy Metal Holiday.
The Big Bad Wolf - Macabre
Such Big Eyes! Macabre are a great choice again.
Zombie Attack - Tankard
For the intro alone. And it's a great song as well. Also goes well with the Easter Zombie Special.
Vlad The Impaler - GWAR
All the classic scary characters get a song. And performed by a bunch of guys who are arguably even scarier.
Jack The Ripper - Hobbs Angel Of Death
Melbourne's own with their ode to the original slasher.
Horrorshow - Hallow's Eve
The name says it all.
It's not a Halloween without a Cannibal Corpse song, preferrably about zombies. No shortage to choose from...
The Exorcist - Possessed
Another atmospheric addition to the list.
Lost Reflection - Crimson Glory
Not exactly in line thematically, but a major atmospheric addition, this haunting (no pun intended) (well, maybe a little) track deserves a spot nonetheless.
Hatework - Morbid Angel
Pure evil in a song. No-one does evil music quite like Morbid Angel, fast or slow.
Under Bergets Rot - Finntroll
Infectious song from Finntroll, with just the right mix of carnival, spooky and trolls.
Draculea - Necrodeath
Another great intro, and another star of Halloween
A Day Of Night - Battle Of Mice
I love this track all the way through. It's a great finisher for a show, and the outro is just a little too real for a Halloween Special, but keep 'em on the edge of their seats, I reckon.
Eclipse travelling can be frustrating. I have heard somewhere, that if you stay in the one location, a total solar eclipse will happen once every 400 years. So, if you really want to see one, you will most probably have to travel to see one. You, and lots of other people. So organising a trip to a location lucky enough to have a solar eclipse has a little more aggravation than a regular trip will entail. Hotels will raise their prices for the occasion, everything else becomes more expensive, as locations cash in, and at the end of the day, the entire event can be utterly ruined by the weather.
This happened for my first Solar Eclipse trip to Tanegashima, Japan on the 22nd of July 2009. This was the 'Eclipse of the Century' with 6 minutes of totality. I was living in Japan at the time, in Tokyo, and the effort involved in organising a trip there, and back (which had to be organised separately), was arduous enough to earn me a brief interview on Bloomberg News at the time. And, for all that, on the day, it was completely overcast and raining.
On the morning of the 14th of November, on 4 mile beach, Port Douglas, for the morning of the eclipse, it was cloudy all along the horizon. There were breaks in the clouds, but it looked as if a large band of cloud was going to obscure the eclipse, and I was resigned to having travelled only to miss another eclipse.
And then, there was a miracle break in the clouds for exactly 2 minutes, for the 2 minutes of totality. It was a beautiful sight to behold, an impossible object hanging in the sky with weird light. Words fail, and pictures, honestly, do no justice. But I tried.
The following shots are of the same eclipse, but I played with the colour balance of each for effect, with the exception of the first shot, which is an unaltered crop.
Port Douglas is gateway to the Daintree Forest, one of the oldest rainforest in the world. It would have been rude not to visit...
World Heritage Mossman Gorge is nestled in the Daintree Forest
Cape Tribulation is about as far north as you can travel along the coast without a 4WD
Along the Captain Cook Highway, coming into Cairns...
And a day out on Agincourt Reef, on the edge of the Great Barrier Reef was also on the cards. Agincourt Reef is on the edge of the Continental Shelf, where you can see the reef drop off into the depths of the Pacific Ocean.
Heavy metal bands just love to drink. And sing about drinking. And drink while singing about drinking. Tankard and Korpiklaani come immediately to mind when someone mentions Beer Metal. And Alestorm throw in pirates into the drunken mix. Yarr!!
But there is a growing market for heavy metal bands to bring out their own brand of alcohol. Natural progression? Sellout? Shut up and drink!
Motorhead have their own drinks shop, where they sell Bastards Lager, a Motorhead Vodka, a Rose Shiraz and a regular Aussie Shiraz, with a warning from Lemmy himself.
This page is being constantly updated. Keep checking in, I'm finding more and more Heavy Metal Signature Alcohol all the time. It's a booming market, and far more difficult to download, though many of the beverages are limited by number and/or location. Good Luck!
AC/DC have a range of wine choices from a Back in Black Shiraz, a Highway to Hell Cabernet Sauvignon and
not forgetting their You Shook Me All Night Long Moscato.
And what better way to celebrate the greatest thrash album of all time, than to drink along with the wine? Slayer's 'Reign in Blood' wine. I'm serious here.
Now all I need is a distributor, and a backer for my hard rock/metal bar idea, and away I go. Are there any more heavy metal beverages out there? I'll keep looking... and drinking...
Update 10/03/13. I just found this cheeky picture of Chris Bowes holding Alestorm Mead! Go Sick Now! Yarr!
Update 09/04/13.
Not sure how this one slipped under the radar, but Iron Maiden have a cheeky Merlot (Chilean, I believe) available online through their online shop.
There is also an array of Iron Maiden glasses, leather tankards, tumblers. shot glasses, etc, if you feel like having an entire Iron Maiden-themed bar. Me, I'm just in it for the booze...
There are a couple more wines that I should add to this list. One is thanx to the comment below about Tool's James Maynard Keenan, who owns Merkin Wineyards and their associated winery, Caduceus Cellars. The wines doesn't scream 'TOOL' the way the above alcohol cashes in on a Heavy Metal Band brand name, but the question remains, how well known would this wine have been, had it not been associated with a famous Heavy Metal Dude?
And secondly, Geoff Tate, former frontman for Queensryche, and current frontman for another Queensryche (yeah, legal battles, gotta love the music industry right?) and noted wine enthusiast has launched his own brand of wine with wife Susan. The wine is called 'Insania', and features a red "full-bodied Bordeaux blend" and a white that "is noteworthy for its viscosity and vibrant acidity". Enough of the ad, start drinking!
Let's not forget another couple of beers to throw in. Clutch have a dark sour ale on the market...
And Mastodon have added a couple of beers to the mix...
...and a stylish stein to hold all that loveliness
I'd love to review any of these products, but the only one I've seen in the local is the AC/DC wines. Feel free to send me samples!
26/04/13
The more I dig...the more I find...
Sepultura have a beer brand out which, by one account possesses “turbidity caused by natural yeast in suspension” and the “aroma and
flavors of banana and clove from a special strain of yeast that produces
the chemicals that lead to these perceptions.”
It comes in a package resembling a Marshall Amp.
And Finnish Black Metal dudes Impaled Nazarene have released (wait for it) Goat Brew Beer!
However it's only available in Finland. Bureaucracy and legal issues are blamed. I assume no goats were harmed in the making of this beer.
Municipal Waste have a signature oatmeal stout called Toxic Revolution that has been described as a “black liquid wall of death in your mouth.”
Pig Destroyer have jumped on the ale-wagon
Eyehategod have a beer named after their debut album 'In The Name Of Suffering.'
Burnt Hickory Brewery are working on the official Corrosion Of Conformity Imperial Porter. It's a Rum Barrel Aged Raisin Porte. Yummo!
And not to be left out, Marilyn Manson has his own 'Mansinthe'. Of course he does.
Lordy Lordy...
Update 11/05/13
Blind Guardian have released "a perfect Syrah from the famous growing area Languedoc in Southern France." The perfect drink for any of their power metal albums, or even their first two speed metal albums.
Nightwish have released 'Imaginaerum', a Spanish wine from the Ribera del Duero region, characterized as "Rich at the palate, with blackberries, noble woods and a persistent aftertaste." Obviously to co-incide with the album and movie release.
It's currently available only in Sweden (of course). According to Hisingen Brew, it is "made from special Cascade-hops that makes it taste even better lukewarm for your festival nights." For those of us who like cold brews, that sounds like a cop-out, but I do rather like the chicken with tentacles on the can.
GWAR have announced their own beer coming out for August 3rd. It's the GWAR B-Q Beer, and was created for the upcoming GWAR B-Q on August 17 in Richmond VA. The beer should go well with the Brutal Burgers topped with GWAR-B-Q Sauce.
Another couple of drinkables that have slipped under my radar.
Whitesnake had a Russian River Valley 2008 Zinfandel on the market awhile ago, and according to this website is sold out.
Was it love? Love of money perhaps. Their Cabernet Sauvignon is still apparently available, but, alas, EU and US deliveries only.
And Swiss Industrial/Black/Symphonic/whatever they are playing today band Samael (a band I quite like, despite my description) have entered the Signature Alcohol market with a wine described as "a fine assemblage made from grapes of Gamay, Diolinoir and Sangiovese. It
should surprise the connoisseurs by its mixtures of dark and deep
aromas." Mmmm Mmmm.
It's called 'Alliance', it's a 2009 vintage, and is a limited edition, and probably sold out as I type.
Italian Symphonic Death Metal merchants Fleshgod Apocalypse have released a brutal couple of wines to celebrate their latest (and recommended) album 'Labyrinth'. The wines are named after characters from the Labyrinth of Knossos, reflecting the band's Italian and Mediterranean heritage. 'Minotaur' is the red, presumably (there is very little information on the actual wine or grape itself), and 'Ariadne' is the white.
The wines are currently available only in Europe, but their website promises world wide availability 'coming soon'. I'm open to reviews on this, please sent bottles to me now!
Norwegian band Kvelertak have jumped on the bandwagon with a very very limited edition of Kvelerbräu. And by limited, I mean there are only 30 bottles available. WHAT?!? And because I completely missed the boat on this one, this 6.66% alcohol content (\m/) was available only at a show they did in Vienna in December of 2011. I can't track down whether they've released any more, so I assume it tasted like sweaty arse, but, for the sake of a completionist article, I present to you Kvelerbräu, the beer 'made out of honey and hate'.
Stoner Metal band High On Fire are in the process of bringing out a signature bong...er beer called Razorhoof, after the song of the same name. Well, to be technical, a Saison Ale.
Details are sketchy, but it will be released from Three Floyds Beer, and is possible slated for a Feb 2014 release. Maybe one of the delays is frontman Matt Pike being released from rehab last year.
Matt Pike, Chin Chin!
Slayer Guitarist Kerry King, evidently not content with the 'Reign In Blood' wine mentioned earlier, has ventured into brewing (or distilling rather) with his Coldcock Whiskey Company.
I'm not sure exactly what a Herbal Whiskey actually is, but it claims to not give you a hangover. Rather, judging by the name, it will just knock you out instantly. Oh yay. While Slayer or Kerry King's name aren't plastered all over the label, it's clearly another cash grab, and will sit comfortably next to such double entendre-inviting whiskeys as Knob Creek, Fighting Cock and Redbreast. Currently available only in select US states, they have plans to expand the power of Coldcock, and punch the world into swift submission. Look Out!
Update 1/12/13
The Beer Must Flow
Norwegian Stoner band Thulsa Doom have jumped out of AA and onto the beerwagon with a Signature Release Barbarian Beer! Get in touch with your Inner Barbarian and guzzle this latest addition to the burgeoning collection of Signature Alcohol! Conan-Approved!
Inspired by the legendary drinking prowess of Robert E. Howard, the beer's soundtrack should be their epic 'Barbarian Beer Attack!'
Again, it's a seriously limited run, available only through the band's Facebook page. And it's probably all sold out by now. But, hey; Signature Beer, right?
Swedish band Wolf have teamed up with Swedish distiller Sankta Annas Bränneri to produce a Green Absinthe. With an alcohol content of 66.6%, it is suitably evil, and according to one reviewer..."After you get past the initial blast of flavor there are plenty of
subtle notes working on the front end and the back end of the tast (sic)".
Dave Mustaine Sells Out! (of his limited edition "Symphony Interrupted" Cabernet Sauvignon 2012)
Here's another one for the not-quite-signature-series. It's not a Megadeth Wine. It's not a I Hated Metallica Before It Was Cool wine. But it is Dave Mustaine's Winery. And his debut Cab Sav 2012 was made in limited quantities to commemorate Dave Mustaine’s sold-out
performance with the San Diego Symphony at Copley Symphony Hall on April
12, 2014.
And Baltimore-based The Brewer’s Art have been issued a 'Cease and Desist' by Ozzy Osbourne to stop producing their Belgian strong pale ale, called “Ozzy.”
Spot the headless bat
So, it's not an official Heavy Metal Beer, and may be pulled soon so get it while it's hot.
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