Ahhhh, it’s getting to be that time of year…the time of year to “Celebrate Canadian Music,” the Juno Awards season (Canada’s equivalent of the US Grammy’s)…it’s coming… If you remember, last year Nickelback took home three awards including Best Rock Album and Best Group. This year, whilst Nickelback is up for two more awards (Fan Choice Award and Songwriter Of The Year), another band in the Roadrunner ranks joins the bill, Theory Of A Deadman. Theory is up for New Group Of The Year. This year’s Juno Awards will be held on April 6th starting 8pm sharp (you figure out the time zone). Shania Twain will be hosting the evening. Nickelback, Theory Of A Deadman, congratulations on the nominations…and all the best…

Type O Negative are currently hard at work mixing their forthcoming album ‘The Dream Is Dead’… we interrupted to grab a few words with Josh Silver. What’s behind that title? Josh elaborates, “Peter chose it. I think it’s pretty appropriate seeing as it’s our last album for Roadrunner under this contract. I don’t think people realise sometimes how much real work and effort goes into making music, it’s not just one non-stop party. I guess it’s also about perhaps not getting to the level we’d hoped for – being financially secure etc. In 5 years time we’ll probably have all gone back to normal jobs… stacking shelves, whatever.” How long will the mixing take? “A day or a month,” he grins “depends how serious we get! If Monte [Conner, TON’s A&R man at Roadrunner] grows hair we’ll mix even faster! You should put that up, he loves to be immortalised… hell, I’ll tell myself.” So no rest for the wicked then? “I’m too tired to be wicked, I’m just moderately sublime right now!” he laughs. Can you give us the lowdown on some of the new tracks? “Sure,” he says obligingly, “let’s see… A Dish Better Served Cold “This used to be called Truth Decay. Ya know, a play on tooth decay. Did you get that though? We changed it, the joke was based too much on language, people wouldn’t get it. I actually prefer Truth Decay though.” Nettie “This is about Peter’s mother. He has deep feelings about watching her suffer. He’d like to remove all her pain like we’d like to prevent our parents hurting in any way. At least if you’re somewhat sane.” Valentines Day “This is pretty self-explanatory really. It’s a typical Type O kinda theme. Love stinks.” I Like Girls “Hah! This is a spoof about Peter having a gay man try to pick him up. It’s very tongue in cheek. That’s what I miss from some of the other stuff we’ve done. Type O was a mix of tradegy and comedy, a lot of humour. Some of the lyrics from this will definitely piss people off. Actually, this is one of my favourite tracks.” He pauses to say, “I think this album is a more ecletic bunch of material than the last couple of albums. Some of it’s punky, some of it’s slow, some of it’s in the middle. It’s a good mix. It wasn’t planned, it’s just what has come together. We have an identity, a sound, and I like that. It’s better than being generic. The ones who really did the rap + metal thing well were Rage Against The Machine. The only thing new about nu-metal is the haircut.” Angry Inch (cover from Hedwig and the Angry Inch) “You wanna know what this song is all about? Just wait until the next Playboy spread comes out… ha ha ha. Seriously, we just really liked this, we tried a couple of others but they didn’t work as well. It has the comedy and tradegy going on.” “Some other song titles include Anesthesia, I Don’t Want To Be Me, Electrocute, Above All Things, Life Is Killing Me… ah, I’m sorry,” he apologises tiredly, “I was up at 2 with my kid, and she’s learning to say ‘No’ all the time, just like a musician.” I commiserate. They (whoever they are) say being a parent’s rewarding, but they never tell you about the lack of sleep involved. Josh deadpans, “Ah that’s ok, I’ve been working with infants since I was in this band, so at least this one’s cute!” More to come.

While you’re surfing the great wide web, be sure to stop by the Australian Big Day Out website for a video interview with the Murderdolls! To view it, just go HERE, and then click the link for ‘Sydney’… you can choose between windows media or real player.

The second installment of Chimaira’s mixing mayhem in England… “What’s up everyone?!! Mark here. Well, the mixing process is going great right now. We have just finished the first song we started to mix. It’s a heavy creepy song called Pictures In The Gold Room. Man, working with Colin was the best choice we made. This shit sounds brutal. Our guitars are super thick, and the drums sound like we are in an arena! That means big and LOUD!!! We are going to start a song called Power Trip later today, and the best way to describe this song is by using our old phrase “Full Blown Ass Ripping Metal” then multiply that times 10, and you have Power Trip. It is Slayer fast, and Morbid Angel heavy in the bridge. Can’t wait for you guys to hear this shit. So the nightlife has picked up a bit, Jim and Rob went with Colin to Nottingham to see the band Funeral For A Friend, they said it was a real good time and the band were cool to hang out with as well. They came back saying how much we need to tour the U.K. because the fans seem a lot more into the concerts then back in the States. Well, all I can say about that is we are going to make sure 100% that we will tour the entire U.K. as well as the rest of Eruope, I promise you that. Now onto food, a lot of the band warned us we were not going to like the food here, and that we would loose 20lbs, well they are full of shit we are getting fatter by the minute because the food is great! That’s all for now, will give you a shout in a few days. Cheers!” Thanks for the lines Mark… glad it’s going well.

Did you know that today, February 12th, is Mike Gitter’s birthday? Tiz true. Blasting out demos in our New York office, Mike’s the A&R man who brought the sounds of Ill Nino, Killswitch Engage, Glassjaw, Red Tape, Earth Crisis, & The Misfits to Roadrunner, not to mention working with numerous others as well! Happy Birthday… have a great day dude.

We’re happy to report that the mighty Killswitch Engage are confirmed to return to the UK for a slew of dates in April, supported by the awesome Poison The Well. You can catch the bands on the following dates: April 4 – Leeds Cockpit (0113 245 5570) 5 – Glasgow Garage (0870 220 1116) 6 – Manchester Academy 2 (0161 832 1111) 7 – Birmingham Academy 2 (0870 771 2000) 8 – Bristol Fire Station (0117 929 9008) 9 – London Mean Fiddler (0207 344 0044) 10 – Brighton Concorde 2 (01273 772 770) 11 – Camber Sands Kerrang! Weekender (0870 746 0123)

“The Making Of Rock” is the title of this story, and tis not a drug manufacturing reference. Actually, it refers to what the Dirty Americans are up to right now – in the studio recording their debut, an album that is sweet, pure rock. Since late January, the band has been holed up down in Memphis, Tennessee. What’s the word after the first couple weeks? Vocalist Myron gives up the following: “Everything is going so well, Paul (Ebersold, producer) couldn’t be more right and in tune with us. A lot of stuff is in pieces, we’re completing 4 songs a week. It took us 2 days (about 15hrs) to decide on the 16 songs we’re going to record. There were approximately 50 ideas and we had to eliminate some really good songs. We’ve been doing vocals the past two days and it’s so relaxed with Paul. Everyone seems to be hitting right on the head, the vibe and performance is so good. We’ve been going to a small pub down the street after recording that has drums/amps set up for freestyle blues jams. We sat in with different old musicians and also played as a group (we did “Ziggy Stardust” by Bowie, “4 Dead in Ohio” by Neil Young, and “Chico” from our new album). Stay cool, and we’ll keep you updated.” – Myron

Put Your Questions To Corey Taylor And Jim Root! Metal Hammer will be talking to Slipknot/Stone Sour men Corey Taylor and Jim Root next week and they wanna know what you’d like to ask ’em. Gotta question? You can send it in to Hammer HERE.

Machine Head live album ‘Hellalive’ is out March 10th… but you can hear it right now a whole month early! Together with Metal Hammer, we’re letting you hear the entire album online for free! All you have to do is click HERE. Enjoy… While you’re listening to that, why doncha enter our stonking Machine Head competition to win yourself a load of cool, rare, and signed stuff, including a very limited Ten Ton Hammer t-shirt from the Ten Ton Hammer show last year here in London. Yes? Check out the FREE SHIT page.

Now that Chimaira are holed up in deepest, darkest Lincolnshire, we’ve refused to give em directions back to London unless they write regular updates from the studio while they mix the new album with Colin Richardson. Obviously keen to not stay in Lincolnshire forever, we have the first of those reports (complete with photos!) already… report below, photos HERE. Cheers everyone! Rob here, checking in from Lincolnshire, England. To give you guys an idea of what Lincolnshire is like, I’ll start off by saying that I’m one of about 15-20 people actually living here in Lincolnshire. It’s pretty cool though- calm, quiet, and comfortable. The weather is gloomy and cool, and a bit like Cleveland. Yesterday (Sunday), marked the actual start of the mixing process. Colin basically gave each song a thorough listen to give himself a better feel for what he’d be dealing with. I caught him banging his head and playing air drums, so that was cool. Today he’s trying to bring the basic tones from the recording to the table, and then we’ll go from there. As for tonight, I’m sure we’ll end up at the local pub again, which seems to be the height of our “night life”. Keep an eye out for some pictures I recently took of beautiful metropolitan downtown Lincolnshire, and possibly a video clip or two. See you all soon. As for the band’s first night in the UK, out on the town in London… we can tell you that after a leisurely dinner and a few sly beverages, the guys hit local spots Garlic n’ Shots & the Cro Bar until the early hours with a couple RR UK people in tow. The guys even slammin’ one of the most evil shots of all, the Blood Shot (from Garlic n’ Shots) and surviving. “Fuckin’ bloody fun, as you’d say!” mused Mark in the aftermath!