Half and Half…1/2 the members making up 36 Crazyfists are currently in Alaska (vocalist Brock and drummer Thomas), the other half are in Portland writing new material for their second album (guitarist Steve and bassist Mick)…come the end of this week, all will be back in Portland, and all will be writing. However, this time around, there will be something a bit different in the rehearsal room…what could it possibly be? 36 Crazyfists drummer Thomas Noonan stars in ‘The Dream Kit…’ Yes, it’s true. All the rumors you have heard are rumors no more…After months and months in the planning, Thomas is ordering a new drum kit – Orange County, a 4 piece kit. Did You Know? Slipknot drummer Joey Jordison plays Orange County drums. True. Thomas’ new four piece will consist of a bass drum (20″ by 20″), snare (14″ by 4″ 30 ply), and a floor tom (14″ by 12″) and rack tom (12″ by 7″). Okay, so this is perhaps not the grandest of tales, but more a line to all the drummers out there who wonder what others play. And we thought that with Thomas being in the league he is as a drummer, all you players out there might enjoy knowing what he plays. So, as for the rest of Thomas’ set up, he uses DW double bass pedals and Zildjian cymbals (three of which he cracked whilst playing shows in the UK). His cymbal set up is as follows: 13″ A custom hi-hats, 17″ Z custom crash, 18″ Z custom crash, 18″ A custom crash, 18″ K china, 20″ K ride, 6″ A splash, and 8″ K splash. As for Thomas’ dream cymbal set up? Thomas tells, “I already have my dream cymbal set up, minus the 120″ gong that I will set on fire every night!” Final words: “OH YA BABY, I CANT FUCKIN WAIT FOR THAT SHIT!!!” That ‘shit’ of course being the Orange County bass drum and toms. Thomas, thanks for the info…have a safe trip back to Portland, and we can’t wait to start hearing the new music…

“Like freight trains and tank treads,” is how Deathride drummer Junk describes their music. And you know what, you will be able to confirm that statement for yourself sooner than later… As fast and heavy as their music is, the recording of their debut is coming on just as quick. Deathride will be hitting the studio with producer Ross Hogarth starting early February. Where? Not sure just yet, but should be somewhere in The Golden State, that would be California. And speaking of California, we previously wrote that Dez and Deathride were from Orange County in California. Well, we do stand corrected…that should have read Santa Barbara. “It’s 5 hours away with a whole different climate and vibe,” tells Dez. Dez also tells, “Something brutally heavy this way comes!” More detailed information regarding Deathride coming soon…in the meantime, make sure to check out the DIARY section of the Forum up at www.Deathride.cc for regular updates from the band themselves.

Onward and Upward. However, before leaving 2002 fully (and even latter 2001 for that matter – this year’s Grammy eligibility period was October 1, 2001 thru September 30, 2002), you must look back at the best from the year…the best according to the Recording Academy’s voting members. You ask, “what the hell do they know?” Fair enough…but apparently the answer is a whole hell of a lot. For this – the 45th Grammy Awards, to be held February 23rd in NYC – we proudly announce the following Roadrunner nominees: Category 1 – Record Of The Year (Award to the Artist and to the Producer(s), Recording Engineer(s) and/or Mixer(s), if other than the artist.) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ How You Remind Me Nickelback Nickelback & Rick Parashar, producers – Joey Moi & Randy Staub, engineers/mixers Track from: Silver Side Up Other competition in this field is: í¢ä‰åŒ¢ A Thousand Miles Vanessa Carlton í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Without Me Eminem í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Don’t Know Why Norah Jones í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Dilemma Nelly Featuring Kelly Rowland Field 4 – Rock Category 16 – Best Rock Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal (For duo, group or collaborative performances, with vocals. Singles or Tracks only.) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Hero Chad Kroeger Featuring Josey Scott Track from: Spider-Man – Music From And Inspired By (Various Artists) Other competition in this field is: í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Girls Of Summer Aerosmith í¢ä‰åŒ¢ In My Place Coldplay í¢ä‰åŒ¢ My Sacrifice Creed í¢ä‰åŒ¢ When I’m Gone 3 Doors Down í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Take Me As I Am Tonic í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Walk On U2 Field 4 – Rock Category 18 – Best Metal Performance (For solo, duo, group or collaborative performances, with vocals. Singles or Tracks only.) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ My Plague Slipknot Track from: Resident Evil – Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture (Various Artists) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Get Inside Stone Sour Track from: Stone Sour Other competition in this field is: í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Here To Stay Korn Track from: Untouchables í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Portrait P.O.D. Track from: Satellite í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Never Gonna Stop (The Red, Red Kroovy) Rob Zombie Track from: The Sinister Urge Field 4 – Rock Category 20 – Best Rock Song (A Songwriter(s) Award. Includes Rock, Hard Rock & Metal songs. For Song Eligibility Guidelines see Category #3. (Artist names appear in parenthesis.) Singles or Tracks only.) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Hero Chad Kroeger, songwriter (Chad Kroeger Featuring Josey Scott) Track from: Spider-Man – Music From And Inspired By (Various Artists) Other competition in this field is: í¢ä‰åŒ¢ All My Life Foo Fighters, songwriters (Foo Fighters) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ I Stand Alone Sully Erna, songwriter (Godsmack) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ The Rising Bruce Springsteen, songwriter (Bruce Springsteen) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ When I’m Gone Brad Arnold, Todd Harrell, Chris Henderson & Matt Roberts, songwriters (3 Doors Down) Field 21 – Film/TV/Visual Media Category 79 – Best Song Written For A Motion Picture, Television Or Other Visual Media (A Songwriter(s) award. For a song (melody & lyrics) written specifically for a motion picture, television or other visual media, and released for the first time during the Eligibility Year. (Artist names appear in parenthesis.) Singles or Tracks only.) í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Hero Chad Kroeger, songwriter (Chad Kroeger Featuring Josey Scott) Track from: Spider-Man Other competition in this field is: í¢ä‰åŒ¢ If I Didn’t Have You Randy Newman, songwriter (Randy Newman) Track from: Monsters, Inc. í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Love Of My Life – An Ode To Hip Hop Erykah Badu, Madukwu Chinwah, Rashid Lonnie Lynn, Robert Ozuna, James Poyser, Raphael Saadiq & Glen Standridge, songwriters (Erykah Badu Featuring Common) Track from: Brown Sugar í¢ä‰åŒ¢ May It Be Enya & Roma Ryan, songwriters (Enya) Track from: The Lord Of The Rings – The Fellowship Of The Ring í¢ä‰åŒ¢ Vanilla Sky Paul McCartney, songwriter (Paul McCartney) Track from: Vanilla Sky Congratulations go out to all artists above, but of course in particular to the ones on Roadrunner -). Best of luck. For a full listing of all the 45th Grammy Awards Nominees, check out www.Grammy.com.

As we are just getting acquainted with the new year, Type O Negative’s Josh Silver acquaints us with a bit more on the progress of Type O Negative’s upcoming release. His update is as follows: “Peter (vocalist) sleeps on the couch in Systems Two Brooklyn, mainly holding his penis. When asked why he sleeps holding his penis – “I’m afraid someone will take it.” With that said…Johnny and Kenny are finished with their parts. Peter is the process of the overdubs needed to flesh out this beast – including a boat scene. Hopefully, late April will be the perceived release date – we will include tax forms in the packaging to increase your suffering during that month. “We lost some time making the studio airtight to hold poisonous methane gas during the mix-down. The studio has asked us to purchase new furniture when finished so as not to offend future clients. One of working titles and I stress working title, “The Dream Is Dead” is from the end of the Valentine’s Day…not from demo version, but the final recorded song. Other album titles are being kicked around as well…”Flabby Road” is one. I am a bit depressed that my suggestion of a homage to the Beatles’ “Let It Be” – “Shouldn’t Be” was rejected quickly by all involved. “Creation is pain, hardship is involved.” This has been the word of Josh… Now, time for a random Roadrunner fact. Did You Know? The demo tape that Spineshank made before The Height Of Callousness was in fact The Height Of Callousness, was initially called Flabby Road. True. The Beatles. It’s a love affair.

Deathride, the new band featuring Coal Chamber vocalist Dez Fafara, is ringing in the New Year with rehearsals, new music, recording a new record, and getting on the great tour road. Dez speaks as follows: “Rehearsals started again on [January] 3rd with about a 4 to 5 hours session. We’re all having a great time playing this music and we’re tight as hell. “Then on the 4th, we wrote a new song called “Meet the Wretched.” We rehearsed for about 4 hours and now on Sunday [Jan. 5], we’re just taking a break. “As we await for [producer] Ross Hogarth to return from the east coast, we spend our time tightening up everything and when the inspiration hits, we write new stuff. “Album titles have been shifting around and nothing is set in stone, but right now, the band is holding on tight to the number Thirteen for a title. “So basically pre-preproduction is starting. We’re getting ready to fly people in for video taping and were waiting for our producer. So everything’s moving along nicely. “Last night, the band and I were talking about touring and we cannot wait. We all want to go overseas and we smell festival seasons coming as well as the summer in the United States will be a DEATHRIDE summer. As we constantly crisscross the United States playing 6 shows a week, I personally can’t wait to get to Texas and New York City to play this music, see people and party.”

The fantastic Roadrage DVD featuring new video’s from the likes of Murderdolls, Stone Sour, Killswitch Engage, Nickelback, Soulfly, Ill Nino and classic video’s from Life Of Agony, Machine Head and Type O Negative, gets it’s general release on Feb 17th. The DVD , originally released only through Virgin Megastores will be available to buy everywhere for just 7.99.

Best Day of My Life í¢ä‰åäóì Part 2 Pretty much a month has passed now since I won the bidding for the VIP Tickets and Backstage passses to the private Nickelback gig in New York. Probably one of the main things that I’ve been doing is trying to pay for the damn things! Handy hint for anyone who buys anything on eBay that amounts to a considerable amount of dosh í¢ä‰åäóì don’t try using their PayPal online payment system! I literally wasted two and a half weeks trying to pay using my credit card on the PayPal system. Never again! Utter nightmare! Basically, even if you OK everything with your credit card company, if the amount you’re trying to pay is considered ‘considerable’, then the PayPal system itself can refuse the transaction due to ‘unreasonable risk’. It’s all part of their automated anti fraud system apparently, and its something that cannot be manually overridden (I know this because I called PayPal in California!) Anyway, because of all this delay, I started to panic and I was convinced that the tickets would be re-auctioned as it was getting dangerously close to the 14 day payment deadline. In the end, after numerous emails between myself and Treana Peake (thanks Treana for assuring me that the tickets were most definitely mine and that it didn’t matter if payment was a bit late), we decided that a new line of attack was called for. Off I went to the bank and set up an international money transfer. So hopefully, all is now sorted. I booked our flights to New York just before Christmas and me and my boyfriend fly out on the 18th January. We thought that we’d take full advantage of being in New York and do the full tourist thing. We’ve got our Rough Guide to New York City, comfy shoes, warm coats and woolly hats. Not very rock n roll I know, but apparently the temperate in New York is í¢ä‰åäóì3 degrees on average during January so warm apparel is definitely required. Still got to book accommodation, but I’m waiting to find out exactly where the venue is in New York, so I can book something fairly close by. Finally got round to telling my parents about it all. They weren’t as shocked as I was expecting! I think they already knew that I’d entered my ‘mad, do crazy things, I’m approaching 30’ phase. Mum was just worried that I was going to run off with Nickelback (Chad specifically) and be a groupie. I told her to breathe deeply, relax, not to worry and that I thought I’d read somewhere that Chad preferred blondes rather than brunettes, so him running off with me was a bit of a long shot 🙂 What else? Oh yeah, having a major girlie panic about what to wear for the gig. I have problems even when it’s a normal night out, let alone a night when I’m actually going to meet Nickelback. No doubt between now and then I’ll change my mind about a thousand times and will then go back to the first outfit I picked out. Needless to say, the colour black will probably play a major role and big, high heeled boots as well í¢ä‰åäóì can’t be a complete short arse when I stand next to Chad 🙂 WOW, standing next to Chadí¢ä‰åŒ_oooohhhhhí¢ä‰åŒ_.sorry, it all went a little bit funny then. It all still keeps hitting me like a tidal wave. I have alternating waves of excitement and panic. I keep watching the Live at Home DVD and just end up drifting into a Chad induced trance! Blimey, its all a bit silly really. I’m 29 years old and behaving like a complete girlie. I keep wondering what its going to be like í¢ä‰åäóì best day of my life or worst? What if it’s a complete disappointment? What if Chad and the guys turn out to be real arses? Sorry, that’s the ‘worse case scenario’ side of me talking. I think in my heart I know it will be a great night and after reading Verity’s account of meeting Ryan and Chad after the Sheffield gig, it sounds as if my heart is right. I still have very little idea of what I’m going to say to them or what I’m going to ask them. I think even if I did prepare a load of questions, I’d just forget them all as soon as I was there. I’m just hoping that it’ll all happen naturally on the night. If all else fails, I can just get them all completely shit faced (especially Chad) and then it won’t matter if I talk complete and utter bollocks í¢ä‰åäóì no one will notice! :-)Wonder how many beers it takes to get Chad drunk? Watch this space for Best Day of My Life Part 3: A Night with the Greatest Rock Band in the World.

On a night described by member Chris Spicuzza as being “cold as fuck,” Chimaira played their 3rd Annual Christmas Show at The Odeon in Cleveland. The band ripped through sixteen songs, including three new tracks – “Stigmurder,” “Power Trip,” and “Pure Hatred.” In fact, word has it the crowd was singing along to “Pure Hatred” by the second chorus…a new song which the band never before played live. A couple other surprises from the night? Chimaira tattoos. For those of you sporting one at the show, the band did take note. What else…people traveled to Ohio from places as far away as Oregon, Iowa, Detroit, Chicago, (the streets of) Philly, Indiana, and NYC. What else…ahh yes, guitarist Rob gave an early Christmas gift to the crowd, throwing out one of his ESP guitars at the end of the show…it was a mob scene, we tell ya… Onward and Upward…on the Chimaira recording front, all recording is complete for the upcoming The Impossibility Of Reason release ceptin’ for vocals and samples, which we hear are about 50% complete as of now. Fourteen songs have been/will be recorded in total… And now, before we leave you with this update, the full set list from Chimaira’s 3rd Annual Christmas Show: This Present Darkness Let Go Lumps Force Life Painting The White To Grey Stigmurder Silence Sphere Divination Jade Sp lit Severed Lend a Hand Pure Hatred Power Trip Dead Inside

2002 has now come to an end, and what a year it was in music. We asked a handful of Roadrunner’s artists and employees what they thought were the greatest releases of 2002. Overall, here’s what Roadrunner artists thought of 2002… 1 Queens of Stone Age – Songs for the Deaf 2 Hatebreed – Perserverence 3 TIE Soilwork – Natural Born Chaos 3 TIE Audioslave – Audioslave 4 In Flames – Reroute To Remain 5 Down II – A Bustle In Your Hedgerow 6 Mudvayne – The End Of All Things To Come 7 Killswitch Engage – Alive or Just Breathing 8 Taproot – Welcome 9 System of a Down – steal this album 10 Beck – Sea Change …and here’s what Roadrunner employees thought… 1 Killswitch Engage – Alive or Just Breathing 2 Queens of the Stone Age – Songs for the Deaf 3 Sinch – Sinch 4 Stone Sour – Stone Sour 5 Sepultura – Under a Pale Grey Sky 6 Opeth – Deliverance 7 Audioslave – Audioslave 8 System of a Down – Steal This Album 9 Eminem – Eminem Show 10 Foo Fighters – One By One 2002 was a great year but 2003 is looking to be even better, already we are looking at releases for Machine Head, Type O Negative, Chimaira, Spineshank, Double Drive, Goneblind, Dirty Americans and Rumblefish plus loads more. So a HAPPY NEW YEAR to you all and here’s to a great 2003.

All here at Roadrunner UK would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year… You can check out our Murderdolls festive greeting by clicking HERE… thanks to Mik McDade for the design!