Soundcloud Promotions: How To Get Noticed On Soundcloud

June 1st, 2013 by Luke

Soundcloud Promotions is a new way for those interested in increasing their presence on online to get ahead of the game. If you’re struggling to gain momentum in your online presence through social media, Soundcloud Promotions might be of interest to you.

What is SoundCloud?

If you’re not already familiar with what SoundCloud is, get over there right now and set yourself up an account. It’s an essential part of any current artists promotional kit. SoundCloud is the world’s leading social sound platform where anyone can create sounds and share them everywhere. Recording and uploading sounds to SoundCloud lets people easily share them privately with their friends or publicly to blogs, sites and social networks. Everybody is using it, and for good reason!

Why increase followers on SoundCloud?

On SoundCloud followers can see any song uploaded by the people they follow and listen to it immediately. They receive real time updates about their favourite artists activity and what they are doing on the site, plus receive lots of extra information about the artist and their music. This is important to help a bands music gain momentum on the site, the more activity people see, the more it will help gather traction among the fanbase and create a discussion about the music.

There is also many advantages to having a large fanbase, such as looking impressive to new potential fans. The bigger a bands fanbase the more likely someone might give them the time of day to hear what they’re about. It’s true, we’ve all fallen victim to that one, whether we like to admit it or not, or even noticed it for that matter.

Building an online musical presence by hand can take a lot of time and effort (I know I’ve done it) The complicated process required for successful online promotion can take up excessive amounts of valuable time, in my case more time per week than a full time job, for little payoff. It’s time that could be invested better. Musicians should be focusing creative energy on making more awesome music, not days, weeks and months endlessly spamming friends, family and random strangers added on Facebook, or other Social media platforms in a futile attempt to get them interested in what we’re already so passionate about. Inevitably this method will lose more friends than it will gain, and the fans that are gained, will likely be there begrudgingly, as soon as they think they can disappear without being noticed, they will.

What Is SoundCloud Promotions?

SoundCloud Promotions as the name suggests is a service to help promote music on SoundCloud. It gives artists a helping hand getting their feet off the ground on the social music platform and help them get noticed. They have a simple sign up process, simply choose the package you want and then they will email you with further details after the transaction has been processed. The site is user friendly and pretty to look at. The prices are very reasonable too. Visit soundcloudpromotions.com for more details.

Buying Fans?

I’ve heard many artists frown upon the idea of purchasing new listeners for their music, and feel it’s some sort of cheating. But all businesses advertise, if any artist wishes to make a career out of music, understanding that music is a business like any other is key to success. It’s the nature of the beast. If an artist doesn’t advertise in this day and age, their music is going to fail to reach out to the public eye. Whether the artist does it, or a record company does it on their behalf, advertising is almost always essential one way or another. Sometimes artists get lucky with a viral YouTube video, or a song that captures public imagination enough to be spread by word of mouth. But these events are rare in the grand scheme of things, and smart artists back up these events with regular forms of advertising to help perpetuate the spread anyway. All you have to remember is that spamming friends and random strangers with unsolicited messages is a much more frowned upon form of advertising than anything paid for and it’s far less effective.

About The Author

Jon Hutchinson is a music journalist from the UK, As a 10 year veteran of the music industry he is currently building several up and coming music media sites, and loves to help others find their way in the music industry.

Margaret Thatcher Dies: Welcome To The Afterlife (Zombie Thatcher)

April 8th, 2013 by Luke

Welcome To The Afterlife Mrs. Thatcher

This morning (8th of April 2013) Margaret Thatcher died after suffering from a stroke, or after a strike according to the epic typo from the BBC news website which can be seen below. I don’t really have much of an opinion on Thatcher’s politics because it’s not very easy to sort fact from fiction. A lot of people hated her, a lot of people worshiped the ground she walked upon. Having not lived through the larger part of her time in power an opinion I may have wouldn’t be very valid. But Soul Sanctuary would like to welcome Margaret Thatcher to the Afterlife, being our catchphrase and all. And wanted to share this awesome Zombie picture of Mrs. Thatcher in all her glory, eating flesh and swallowing souls. We would also like to dedicate our video Afterlife to the Iron Lady in her moment of passing.

Funny typo about Margaret Thatcher on the BBC News website:

“Welcome to the Cemetery, you’ll walk with grace amongst the dead. Living in a world that’s completely dead inside. Welcome to the Afterlife!”

What do you think about the death of Mrs. Thatcher, were you one of her supporters, were you one of her haters? Did she do anything good or bad for you while she was in power? Should we dedicate more blogs to famous people that have died? Let us know in the comments below. 🙂

Ludwig Van Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata (Heavy Metal Version) by Dr. Viossy

April 7th, 2013 by Luke

Ludwig Van Beethoven METAL METAL METAL METAL METAL AND MORE METAL!

Just a very quick update, to show off this great video one of our fans posted to our Facebook wall recently, of Dr. Viossy playing Ludwig Van Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata in good old heavy metal fashion. Seem he thought our guitarist Ed Stevens looks a bit like Dr. Viossy, in fact I can see the resemblance. But anyway, personally I’m a great admirer of Ludwig Van Beethoven’s work, and Moonlight Sonata is certainly one of his great masterpieces. Dr. Viossy certainly does the metal version justice in this 6 minute epic of guitar madness. All hail the metal! 😛 So click play and enjoy the music.

I hope you’ve had a great weekend and I’ll speak to you soon. Do you think Dr. Viossy looks a bit like Ed in this video?

Stay Awesome
Stay Metal \m/

Sempiternal Review: Bring Me The Horizon – Album Review by Luke Jon Gibson

April 3rd, 2013 by Luke

Credits:
Terry Date: Production
David Bendeth: Mixing

Bring Me The Horizon

Bring me the Horizon is a Metalcore/Post Hardcore band from Sheffield UK, currently made up of five members. Oliver Sykes (Vocals), Lee Malia (Lead Guitar), Matt Kean (Bass Guitar), Matt Nicholls (Drums), Jordan Fish (Synth & Keyboard). They have released four studio albums since 2004 when they formed.

Sempiternal: Review

Sempiternal is the New album from Bring Me The Horizon, which was officially released yesterday [2nd of April 2013]. Before now, I’d never paid much attention to BMTH, I heard various bits and pieces from their last three offerings over the years and honestly it just didn’t really grab me. I didn’t think it was bad, but nothing made it stand out for me. With this album that has been flipped on its head. I’ve been listening to this album a lot in the last few days, via their now “self-destructed” preview on www.sempiternal.info. I’m really impressed on many levels. I heard the band starting the move into exploring more melodic ideas in the predecessor of Sempiternal: There Is A Hell, Believe Me I’ve Seen It. There Is A Heaven, Lets Keep It A Secret. But this time I think they took it one step further and to a whole new level. I made the decision to purchase it after only hearing the first few tracks, so I visited Amazon and bought it there and then. Sempiternal is probably the first album I’ve ever bought on its release date. Saying that, I actually feel quite ashamed, being such a big music fanatic and that until now I’ve never purchased an album on the day of its release is pretty bad. Oh well, it now seems that BMTH have taken my virginity on that one. I feel 14 again! 😛

CAN YOU FEEL MY HEART

Sempiternal kicks off with CAN YOU FEEL MY HEART which pulls in with a strange melodic “ah” sound cut into a choppy staccato melody via what sounds like excessive autotune. At first it struck me as odd, and didn’t sit with me well, but it quickly grew on me as an essential hook of the track. The first thing you notice about this track is that although Oli Sykes still screams in a hardcore style vocal, it’s been altered from the flat monotone sound that had never really got my attention, into a more melodic and much more exciting style. Even more of a surprise came when I heard him sing in a completely clean tone, I will admit I’m not familiar enough with the previous album to know if Sykes attempted any sort of melodic vocals there, but for me this album is the first time I had heard him stray from the path of standard hardcore vocalists. The track has an almost dubstep feel to it, which I can only imagine was helped along by the addition of BMTH’s new Keyboard man Jordan Fish. With booming synth under Lee Malia distorted guitars, layered with a thick dashing of autotune and halftime drums. Does a sense of Skrillex’s collaboration with Korn comes to mind? It does for me. This track has definitely been added to my list of favourite tracks from 2013 so far.

THE HOUSE OF WOLVES

The second track on Sempiternal is THE HOUSE OF WOLVES which is a much more energized track, with a punchy hardcore punk vibe to the opening riff. Complimentary fast paced drumming from Matt Nicholls soon kicks in and Oli Sykes comes crashing in screaming the words “Show me a sign, show me a reason to give a solitary fuck about your goddamn beliefs. I’m going blind, but one thing’s clear. Death is the only salvation you’ll feel” although I think “Goddamn” is slightly cheesy and might have been better off being worded slightly differently, it fits and shows the angry intention of the track and its anti-theistic theme. It lets you know Oli has got something to be seriously pissed about. The melodic style chorus really adds a great dimension to what could have been a pretty a straight forward hardcore musing. When the song hits the breakdown/middle eight with the awesomely catchy hook “And when you die, the only kingdom you’ll see, is two-foot wide and six foot deep!” You really can’t help, but want to sing/scream along. The track continues to rage until the end blasts out in a blaze of glory.

EMPIRE (LET THEM SING)

Track three is up next, titled EMPIRE (LET THEM SING) which introduces Mr. Sykes screaming almost completely solo with only a small amount of soundscaping to add subtle atmospherics to his tone. As the intro progresses, a distorted guitar is introduced slowly into the left speaker as it fades up to the climax “Let them sing, let them SING!” unleashing some almighty mosh pit inducing riffage layered with dark symphonic overtones that is sure to create chaos and cause injury to a notable percentage of their young and boisterous fan base. Littered with beautiful soundscaping and amazing production values this tune really gets the blood pumping and the heart beating, with a healthy dose of head banging for good measure.

SLEEPWALKING

The opening of SLEEPWALKING wouldn’t raise an eyebrow placed on a Linkin Park album with it’s reverb soaked pad sounds and futuristic vibe that is intertwined throughout most of LP’s music. In fact the whole song feels very Linkin Park even the vocal melody and lyrics hints at influences that make me recall fond memories of Hybrid Theory and Meteorafrom my teens. That certainly doesn’t take away from the sense of euphoria that it induces upon impact, oscillating the membranes of my eardrums. The sound is sweet and full of succulent flavour, I will easily say this is one of the best/catchiest tracks on the album. The hook “It’s like I’m sleepwalking” gets caught in your brain like a genetically engineered bio weapon, designed to be as infectious as the common cold and as deadly as a strain of Ebola. A strain of Ebola that’s having a really fucking bad day. In a word this track is simply “Killer!” if this was released in the age where we still didn’t have the option of buying separate tracks unless released as single, (i.e. the Internet) this track would be worth the purchase of the whole album alone.

GO TO HELL, FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE

In my opinion Bring Me The Horizon have always had a clever sense of humour with their song titles and present many wonderful distortions of cultural references, although not strictly humourous, it certainly has a little tongue in cheek twist to the title GO TO HELL, FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE. This is another great offering from the Sheffield based 5 piece. Another track with an intro that probably wouldn’t sound out-of-place on a Linkin Park album. Sykes voice comes in with his more usual hardcore style over some very satisfyingly punchy toms and bass pedal work. Then comes a heavy pre-chorus before dropping out for a short moment of silence, where only a gentle bass synth rumbles in the background while a soft spoken vocal leads with the very bizarre lyric “When did the diamonds leave your bones?” which I either don’t know the particular reference or is meant to be purposely cryptic and lends itself to a sort of Deftones-esque void of logic. A beautifully gritty chorus with a melodic scream “I’m burning down every bridge we make, I’ll watch you choke on the hearts you break, I’m bleeding out every word you said, Go to hell for heaven’s sake” is superbly catchy and infection. My only gripe in this song is the use of the word “make” instead of “made” not only would it have sounded better, but it doesn’t quite make sense with the first part of the line sounding like it belongs in a past tense. How can Mr. Sykes be burning down bridges he hasn’t MADE yet? Or am I missing the point, and it’s actually a very clever micro black hole in logical thinking again? Only the boys from BMTH could answer that I guess. Other than my meaningless insignificant gripe, it’s a great track with lots of energy.

SHADOW MOSES

SHADOW MOSES was the first track I heard from Sempiternal, I had no idea that BMTH was about to release a new album, but while scrolling through the limited choices on Xbox live’s music channel, I decided to give it a try. I was instantly taken back by the new melodic style that Bring Me The Horizon had brought to the table. A sound that I hadn’t heard from them before, and when the killer heavy riff kicked in I was totally hooked. I probably raped the replay button at least 6 times before my other half decided she was getting pissed off at me for being a hog with the Xbox controller. So I went downstairs to find the video on YouTube and listen some more. I must admit I did laugh at all the comments on the video’s YouTube page about Oli Sykes sounding like he’s screaming “This is Sandpit Turtle” instead of “This is Sempiternal” during the middle eight of the song. But if I’m honest even if that’s what he was singing it wouldn’t affect the quality of the track. Although nothing to really do with the album in terms of how it sounds, the strange effect used in the music video for this song did become quite nauseating after a while. Overall though it was a wise choice to represent the album before it’s release, simply because it kicks a lot of ass!

AND THE SNAKES START TO SING

This track took a little longer to grow on me than the others before it, not because it’s any less of an awesome tune, but after 6 seriously pounding tracks, it felt like the low to the high I was only came a little too quickly. But after a few runs through the album, it’s certainly found it’s place, and it’s exactly where it belongs. Bring Me The Horizons new reverb drenched ballad is by far the most mellow track on the album and is very rich with Deftones influences from the album White Pony. Surprisingly it’s mostly what sounds like Sykes impersonating the Deftones frontman Chino Moreno with his overly breathy melodic whispers. It all works very nicely, the only real bad point of this track is the some of the snare rolls sound very unnatural against the background. Probably not Matt Nicholls (Drummer) or the bands fault, most likely whoever did the drum replacements, was being lazy with recreating any of the subtle dynamics that Nicholls probably intended. That’s just my opinion though, as a producer myself I felt it made the drums sound programmed and very over-produced. Still I wouldn’t say it takes away from the song in any major way.

SEEN IT ALL BEFORE

Up next we have SEEN IT ALL BEFORE, Sempiternal’s eighth track. The band push off with a very mellow lead in, which lends itself nicely to the previous track, but quickly changes direction into a fast paced riff that has an almost 80’s pop rock vibe to it. Although I can’t quite put my finger on what. On this track Oli brings back some more of his Deftones overtones in his vocals. This song has a nice use of dynamics throughout the duration of its short and sharp 4 minute lifespan. The chorus has a sweet catchy screamed melody that compliments all aspects of the sound spectrum flowing through the listeners speakers. At the end of the song it drifts out on a soft passage which slips into the night and disappears into a faint echo, before flatlining completely.

ANTIVIST

By the very high standards of Sempiternal as an album, thus far. In terms of lyrical merit I don’t feel ANTIVIST delivers its message as thoughtfully as the rest of the album. Although it isn’t a bad thing to come down from your pedestal to say what you mean without remorse, or beating around the bush. The style of the lyrics sounds like they were only used for their apparent shock value. Obviously not shocking to anyone who is intelligent enough to understand words are only as offensive as you let them be. But to me it sounded somewhat forced, it felt like the sole intention of this track was designed to make the overprotective parents of teenage girls want to write angry letters, and post them to worthless newspaper columns. It lets the track down a bit, but that being said the somewhat cheesy, but still insanely catchy hook “Middle fingers up, if you don’t give a fuck! Think you’re changing anything? Question everything!” is a lot of fun to sing to. It still contains some great hooks, and the the carnage of djent style guitars after screaming the word’s “I think you’re a CUNT!” does have a certain appeal to my own inner rebellious child that likes to come out when I’ve had too much to drink. TMI?

CROOKED YOUNG

CROOKED YOUNG is another track based on an anti-theistic theme. This time it’s probably more obvious, with the line “Fuck your faith!” being a much more direct way of sticking a middle finger up at organised religion and the god fearing folk of planet Earth. The track comes belting in with a mix of Matt’s fast paced drumming and low mixed guitar work from Lee Malia and Matt Kean’s bass, which gives way to a classical sounding piece of string music complementing the instrumentation in a very satisfying way. After the intro section, the sound drops into a more classical sounding Bring Me The Horizon sound that many fans with be familiar with. The song slows its pace with sections of more reverb soaked symphonic compositions that add a lot of atmospherics to the songs. The lyrical content of this track, although still containing some elements of the shock value from the previous song, feel much more polished and well thought out. Eventually the song builds to a climax and then burns out like a candle on crack!

HOSPITAL FOR SOULS

The eleventh hour is upon us and also the eleventh and final track of the album. HOSPITAL FOR SOULS begins with a soft ambience that rings out under Oli Speaking about how hard it is to change, and learning valuable life lessons. The musical style of this number goes back round full circle with a dubstep style intro of slow thumping drums and bass overloaded synth that could kill a small rodent at fifty feet. Sykes showcases a fairly long scream (for him) of the lyrics “Watch me BURN!” repeated several times throughout. Although not more than about 5 seconds long, from the live performances I have seen of Oli, I’m interested to see if he’s able to pull it off. His screams sound great on record but live his technique rags his throat very quickly. The vocal has obviously been majorly tampered with in places, but it’s hard to tell if it’s just an artistic choice or not, the effect is littered on many accented screams throughout the entire album, so it’s more than likely it’s simply for artistic reasons. The track then goes on to settle down into a prolonged mellow buildup before the album chimes in with the final hook laced with gritty guitars and more orchestral overtones playing in the background, which add a lot of character to the soundscaping. Soon after, the track wraps up the curtain drops, the band takes its bow and as quickly as it had started, it was all over again. At least for now!

Final Thoughts on Sempiternal

I would personally put this album on par with albums like Hybrid Theory and White Pony, the latter of which is probably helped by the fact Sempiternal was produced by Terry Date who did many of Deftones albums. Although it’s hard to see Sempiternal as being the same kind of game changer as Hybrid Theory in terms of impact on the music industry. I do believe the quality of the songs is of the same calibre and mass appeal without pandering. If you don’t like LP that probably sounds like an insult, I could imagine many BMTH fans disliking the comparison, but Hybrid Theory was and still is a great album which brings back many fond memories, as I’m sure Sempiternal will for many, in successive generations. I think this album will stand the test of time far better than their previous works, but ironically only time will tell if I’m right. So we’ll have to wait and see. Overall I would give this album a solid 9/10.

What’s your favourite track on the album? Are you already a Bring Me The Horizon Fan? Or are you like me and feel this latest album is enough to make you change your mind about them? Have you bought their album? If so how do you feel about it? Let us know in the comments below.

Thanks for reading guys, I know it was long, but I had a lot to say about the album.

Stay Awesome
Stay Metal \m/

You can purchase Sempiternal here
. Also go check out the official video for Shadow Moses below.

Fear Factory’s Former Bassist Auditions For Machine Head Tour, You Can Too

April 2nd, 2013 by Luke

Fear Factory‘s Former bassist Christian Olde Wolbers recently posted a video clip on Facebook of him “auditioning” for the currently empty bassist position in the band Machine Head. Which can be checked out below.

Olde Wolbers was Fear Factory’s bassist up until the year 2002, but after Fear Factory had a falling out with then guitarist Dino AKA “Fat Bastard” he was prompted to take up the guitar for the band until 2008.

Interesting Fact:

Contrary to the fact that he had been the bass player in Fear Factory for near on 10 years, Olde Wolbers spent the first part of his career in the music business as a guitar player, where he held several positions in bands located in Christian’s home country of Belgium, before joining Fear Factory in 1993.

In August 1999 during an interview, Olde Wolbers told RoughEdge.com the story of how his decision to join the band Fear Factory came about, and how it pivoted on the suggestion of his friend Evan Seinfeld (the front man of Biohazard). A suggestion which influenced him to make the original switch to the bass guitar.

“Evan Seinfeld [Biohazard frontman] had seen me playing upright bass in a rockabilly band on the street in Belgium back in ’90 or ’91,” He said. “He always thought I was a bass player. I had always played guitar in metal bands and hardcore bands. And [during a night hanging out together] he said, ‘Oh, you’re a bass player, I have a band for you!’ I kept telling him ‘I’m not a bass player, I’m a guitar player now.’ But he said, ‘Fear Factory needs a bass player — you’re a bass player and you’d be perfect.’ ”

Olde Wolbers continued “And I’d actually heard of Fear Factory because someone told me about them while I was still in Europe. However, I really wasn’t into the death metal scene too much, but I knew they were different. When I went to the audition and I was blown away when I saw Raymond [Herrera, Fear Factory Drummer] playing — I said, ‘Alright, I’ll play bass.’ So I borrowed a bass from Evan and auditioned for a couple of days right before a tour with Sepultura and then I knew I was going to do the tour. After the sepultura tour, the rest of the guys said, ‘Do you want to be in the band?’ I said, ‘Hell yeah!’ ”

So do you think you can out play Christian Olde Wolbers on the bass? If so, you might just be interested to hear that Machine Head’s auditions for the bass player slot are open to the public. Machine Head who are based in San Francisco Bay Area, are on the hunt for a bassist who can fill the shoes of temporary bass player able to perform at this year’s Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival tour.

In an attempt to find the right man for the job of playing the duration of the Mayhem festival, Machine Head posted to the Facebook page of nearly 800,000 fans, asking for anyone interested in filling the bass player position. They asked for fans to post video clips of themselves singing and playing bass along to three tracks: “This Is The End”, “Halo” and “Beautiful Mourning”.

After Machine Head narrows down potential candidates, they will be holding live auditions in person at a currently undisclosed location.

If you wish to take part in the Machine Head auditions click here to find out how to get involved.

You can support bands like Machine Head, by clicking here and buying some of their music! DO IT NOW!

Christian Olde Wolbers audition video:

Metallica’s Kirk Hammett shows Anthrax what’s up – Video

March 30th, 2013 by Luke

Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett is probably one of the most well known heavy metal guitarists of all time. Anthrax is a band that are recognised as one of the great pioneers of the genre. So when these two monstrous forces collided on Thursday (28th of March 2013) at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco, it was certainly a spectacle to behold. And better yet we have footage of Kirk Hammett strutting his stuff alongside his fellow rock legends from Anthrax. This is the second awesome guest appearance we’ve talked about this week on our blog. Also both at the same venue. Very unfair. I’ll go make sad faces in a corner and cry because I don’t live nearby. Anyway I digress, Kirk’s appearance delivered a thunderous cover performance of AC/DC’s classic rock anthem “TNT” which is Anthrax’s newly released “Anthems” EP. You can watch the fan-filmed video footage of Kirk and Anthrax below.

Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante Spoke to Music Radar recently, where he talked about the band’s recent cover version of AC/DC’s classic track “TNT” “This was Joey’s [Belladonna, vocals] track.” He said “We already had ‘Whole Lotta Rosie’ recorded, but he wanted ‘TNT’. I can see why: his voice totally lends itself to this track.” He said smiling.

“AC/DC is probably one of the greatest bands ever.” Claimed Benante enthusiastically “They came in with a certain sound, and they’ll end with that same exact sound. They never altered it; they just stayed true to what they were. To me, that’s an honest-to-goodness rock ‘n’ roll band.”

Benante continued “It would have been obvious to pick something off of ‘Highway To Hell’ or ‘Back In Black’, and so we didn’t. [laughs]” Benante then went on to talk about his dedication to keeping the track as faithful to the original as possible “I studied every Phil Rudd lick, and I did not go overboard with anything. I played exactly what he played on ‘TNT’. You can’t do a fast drum fill on the song — it’ll stand out as being out of place. I laid it down, pulled it back, and that was that.”

Anthrax’s long-awaited, eight-track EP “Anthems”, pays tribute to some of the band’s favorite acts from the 1970s. The EP sold relatively well at around 8,500 copies in the United States, during its first week which went on to debut at 52nd on The Billboard 200 chart.

Anthrax’s latest full-length offering, entitled “Worship Music”, sold a massive (by today’s standards) 28,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to land at No. 12. Which out performed their last record by by almost 3 times the amount of units sold and charted over 100 places higher. A big positive move for the band.

MACHINE HEAD: Guitarist steps in on Steel Panther for two songs live

March 28th, 2013 by Luke

Machine Head are a long time favourite of Soul Sanctuary, but a recent appearance from the guitarist of the big MH at a Steel Panther concert was very surprising to say the least. But a pleasant surprise nonetheless. According to a report from Blabbermouth.

Machine Head guitarist Phil Demmel, recently shared the stage and spotlight with Steel Panther, the LA based 80’s hairstyle glam-rock parody band. He stepped up to the plate at San Francisco, California’s Regency Ballroom on the 23rd of March to help perform two of Steel Panther’s prankster anthems (songs): “Turn Out The Lights” and “Asian Hooker”. Luckily for us this rare spectacle was witnessed by someone with the good sense to whip out his camera and get filming, The Fan-filmed video footage of Phil Demmel’s appearance on stage with Steel Panther can be seen below.

On the 13th of April Steel Panther kicks of their interestingly named S.T.D. (Spreading The Disease) Tour, The tour is set over 20 dates starting in Orlando, Florida at WJRR’s Earthday Birthday.

Lexxi Foxx was quoted as saying “What better way to kick off the S.T.D. tour than with a concert to celebrate the Earth’s birthday”.

We here at Soul Sanctuary love random guest appearances like this, and really they should happen more often. It’s always the unusual events at live shows that you will remember the most. If a band plays exactly like a CD you might as well have stayed at home and listened to the CD, the whole point of a live show is for the experience, so we take our hats off to Machine Head Guitarist, Phil Demmel and the rest of the Steel Panther crew because this shit is what rock n roll is all about.

Stay Awesome!

FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH: New studio footage 2013

March 26th, 2013 by Luke

Five Finger Death Punch (5FDP) have released new studio footage for their time in Las Vegas’ The Hideout Recording Studio where they are currently working on their fourth full length studio album due to be released in the summer of this year. Overseeing the recording sessions once is Kevin Churko, a Canadian musician, record producer, songwriter, sound engineer and The Hideout’s owner. Kevin Churko is known for his work with artist such as Ozzy Osbourne and In This Moment amongst many others.

This very short video clip of Ivan Moody from Five Finger Death Punch highlighted in a dim red light doing a screaming vocal take, can be see below:

As an added bonus we have included a YouTube clip containing a small sample of the new 5FDP track “Here To Die”, which has been taken from the band’s forthcoming fourth album. Get your teeth into it with the YouTube clip below:

Five Finger Death Punch have been making waves across the world of popular metal having sold more than half a million copies of each of their first three studio releases, can they do a forth? Or better still can they up the ante and sell over a million? It certainly seems to be a rare feat in today’s world of Metal Music. In fact Music in General. I say more power to them. If you’re not already a Five Finger Death Punch fan, why the fuck not? Because they write some killer tracks! Go check them out.

Britney Spears Toxic Music Video. A Cover by Trollfest

March 25th, 2013 by Luke

Trollfest “True Norwegian Balkan metallers” have decided to go all out pop mad with this strangely infectious cover of Britney Spears’ Toxic. The video stars the band on a black curtain background with stumpy legs being puppeteered from behind them. It is certainly a strange sight to behold, but it certainly fits the mood of the cover songs silliness. Watching the drummers legs go double pedal mad is a big highlight for me. I literally LOL’d. The track is a promotional video for Trollfest’s upcoming 12-inch picture vinyl “A Decade Of Drekkadence”, which the band is releasing in celebration of its 10th anniversary.

“A Decade Of Drekkadence” features 16 tracks which include a completely new song, three acoustic versions of Trollfest’s signature tracks recorded during a live Trollfest performance at Metalcamp in 2012. Three covers, two B-sides and Trollfest’s never previously released demo from 2004, a piece that will no doubt please many hardcore Trollfest fans. Each Picture disc includes information on how to go about obtaining an MP3 format version of the “A Decade Of Drekkadence” album. Obviously for those who only wish to own the records as a collectors item, and would rather listen to the music on modern technology. Admittedly you wouldn’t want to have to leave the house with a vinyl record player strapped to your backside. If you could even figure out how to build a portable battery pack for it.

Swedish cartoonist Jonas Darnell and designer Terje Johnsen, have gone all out for the designs of Trollfest’s new picture disc, which includes illustrations of various characters created by Darnell from the Trollfest’s album releases over the last 10 years. Making appearences are the iconic metal duck from the “Villanden” album and the hellhound from the track “Helvetes Hunden Garm” a big fan favourite at Trollfest’s live shows.

“A Decade Of Drekkadence” will appear in time for the band’s first North American tour in March, when they will hit the road with Enisferum, TYR, Heidvolk and Helsott for the Paganfest Mexican, American and Canadian tour.

“A Decade Of Drekkadence” track listing:

Side A

01. På Beruselsens Vinger (new song)
02. Gods Away On Business (TOM WAITS cover)
03. Toxic (BRITNEY SPEARS cover)
04. Drekkadag (DREKKAMERATENE cover)
05. Selvforherligende Vås (B-side from “En Kvest For Den Hellige Gral”recording)
06. Drekkaekspedisjon (B-side from “Brumlebassen”recording)

Side B

01. TrollfesT (På Veg Til Vorspiel) (Demo 2004)
02. Drekka Konkurransen! (Demo 2004)
03. Drekka Mer!!! (Demo 2004)
04. …Skogsfest… (Demo 2004)
05. Nachspiel In Ein Baum (Demo 2004)
06. Heimferd (Demo 2004)
07. Brakebein (acoustic re-recording)
08. Rundt Bålet (acoustic re-recording)
09. Karve (acoustic re-recording)
10. Gitarharding Bromleskandinav (song from the Brumlebassen teaser)

Chuck Norris has chucked his beard. All hope is lost! Beardless Chuck jokes incoming?

March 21st, 2013 by Luke

Chuck Norris shaves his beard, no third fist found

Behold a photo you thought you would never see in your life time. Chuck Norris has lopped off his ginger face pubes, revealing the wrinkly old man beneath and it isn’t a pretty sight (Also there is no third fist to be found as once claimed by many a Chuck Norris fan). Oh please Chuck grow it back, grow it back now! This recent shot of Chuck was published by Den of Geek. He looks so odd, Certainly not the sort of bad ass dude that we all know as the legend of Chuck Norris. I can only imagine now there is bound to be a relentless stream of beardless Chuck Norris jokes on the horizon. Do you have an beardless Chuck Norris jokes? Let us know in the comments below.