During the lead-up to the release of THE AMITY AFFLICTION‘s upcoming album ‘Chasing Ghosts‘ on the 1st of October, the band will be revealing a 30-second snippet of each track from the album every day for the next 10 days. Frontman Joel Birch has also written a brief explanation for each track – enjoy and watch this space for the rest of the teasers!

‘Chasing Ghosts’ explained:

“I wrote Chasing Ghosts as a narrative based wholly around someone that has committed suicide and has passed onto the other side. It’s a story that I hope people will see for what it is; an example in song of why you should turn to someone close and talk instead of taking that last fatal step towards death prematurely. I just want to reiterate to people that once you’re gone, that’s it. There’s no ghosts. There’s no heaven, no hell, just finality and the wreckage left behind in the wake of their decision.”

‘RIP BON’ explained:

Listen to ‘RIP Bon’ in full below:

“This song I wrote to try and give voice to all the people left behind when a close friend takes their life. The thing that people need to realise when they’re contemplating suicide is that there are many, many devastating repercussions to their actions, it’s not just an ‘easy way out’ as some people may see it. I also think that the people left behind need a voice just like the people who have passed on. In this song the words are written from a friend, to a friend that has passed on, expressing their deep sense of guilt at not being able to prevent it, all the way through to their anger that their friend didn’t have the strength to actually lean on them in their time of need. I really feel that’s something that is happening all too often when it comes to depression, and although it’s extremely hard, people need to open up to their friends as much as possible to avoid taking that final, terrible step towards death.”

‘Life Underground’ explained:

“This song is written from the perspective of someone who has killed themselves; it’s spoken from the grave, putting words to the regret they feel for taking their life. I guess I was really trying to put across the fact that there’s no glorification that comes from suicide. It’s a short trip from being alive to being dead, and once you’re gone that’s it. That’s the theme that runs through this whole album in a great deal of the songs, and this one is no different. The lines ‘Is this really what I wished for when I felt my feet drag heavy on the earth? Is this really the answer I sought when I was searching for self worth?’ are directly linked to that sentiment. There’s a moving from the beginning of the song to the end (with my particular parts) that the protagonist almost changes from regret to anger, from wishing he/she hadn’t done it, to just wishing their memory would be erased because of the shame of it all.”

Click the below links to pre-order your copy of THE AMITY AFFLICTION’s upcoming album ‘Chasing Ghosts’:

Play.com Exclusive Slipcase + signed CD: http://smarturl.it/ChasingGhostsPlay
iTunes: http://smarturl.it/ChasingGhostsiTunes

While LAMB OF GOD singer Randy Blythe is back home in America after five weeks in prison in the Czech Republic, his legal problems are far from over. Manslaughter charges are still hanging over Blythe and at some point over the next few months he will have to return to Prague and stand trial. Faced with continuing massive legal bills, LAMB OF GOD has decided to create an eBay auction of equipment and memorabilia to raise money for Randy’s legal bills. All equipment was either used on tour or in the recording studio or in a video. The auction features items provided by all five members of LAMB OF GOD.

In addition, a number of musicians have offered equipment to be used in the auction. Guitars have been donated by Machine Head’s Robb Flynn and Phil Demmel as well as Slash and Five Finger Death Punch. Megadeth’s David Ellefson and Five Finger Death Punch’s Chris Kael have each contributed a bass and the members of Five Finger Death Punch also have contributed a signed skateboard.

Justice Now, the site set up for donations, will remain open for those wishing to donate to Randy’s defense fund. The band appreciates all of the support Randy has received since his arrest on June 28th and is thankful for all of the donations that have been made in these tough economic times. As stated before, without the fans, there is no LAMB OF GOD.

Click here for the link to the LAMB OF GOD Memorabilia site.

Click here for the link to the Justice Now site.

THE AMITY AFFLICTION‘s upcoming album ‘Chasing Ghosts’ is out on the 1st of October and in case you missed the premiere for the official video for the title track, you can check it out below. The band have revealed a ‘making of’ clip about the video this week, which has also been embeded below for your viewing pleasure. Click here to pre-order your copy of THE AMITY AFFLICTION‘s album ‘Chasing Ghosts’ from Play.com and get an exclusive slipcase and signed booklet, BOSH! This offer is only available from Play.com and is limited so be sure to get your order in soon.

MASTODON played a stonking set at both Leeds and Reading Festival this weekend and for those of you who weren’t there, the BBC have posted a live video of ‘Curl Of The Burl’ from the band’s Reading set on YouTube. Check it out below:

STONE SOUR revealled two tracks recently from their upcoming album ‘House Of Gold And Bones‘ – Part 1’ titled ‘Gone Sovereign’ and ‘Absolute Zero’. The tracks are the first two songs from the first part of this two-part album and you can now buy them on iTunes by clicking htis link.

You can hear both tracks over on the STONE SOUR’s House Of Gold and Bones website here.

The mighty MACHINE HEAD headlined Bloodstock a few weekends ago and we spotted a few reviews and photos that we thought we’d highlight. Check out some extracts from the reviews below:

Machine Head once again rise to the occasion and show everyone that has ever tried to hold them down that they are not only still standing, but they are still very much capable of kicking anyone’s ass on any given day. This is just another step up the ladder for the boys , and hopefully this is the step they needed to take to finally cement their place in history as a band that managed to conquer the metal world on their own terms and in their own time. – ThisIsNotAScene (the photo in the picture to the left was taken by Sabrina from TINAS)

Machine Head draw a huge crowd and don’t mess about, ploughing into a flame-powered set with an opening triarch of I Am Hell, Aesthetics Of Hate and a storming Imperium before going on to further remind everyone just why it makes perfect sense for this most loved of bands to be headlining this most metal of festivals. Robb Flynn’s speech highlighting the significance of this gig representing 20 years since their first ever live show is poignant and rabidly received, and despite some tedious sound issue, this is an overwhelming triumph. Outstanding. – Metal Hammer…

Live shots on Thrash Hits…

‘Halo’ from album ‘The Blackening’ is dedicated to roadie Mike ‘Scum’ Rivera because “Who knows what would have happened if [they’d] never played his keger?” and anthem ‘Davidian’ closes an absolutely amazing set. This is the kind of show that makes you want to have a fight, break some rules, scream into the night, that sort of thing. Machine Head are inspiring to the point of heating the blood in your veins. Who doesn’t want to let freedom ring with a shotgun blast after a night like this? – Virtual Festivals…

They played songs from most sections of their career, but the biggest cheers of the night belonged to material from the debut album, 1995’s “Burn My Eyes”. Flynn raised numerous toasts with his favourite, hilariously-named “Browneye” tipple, and shared it with comically dressed audience members, namely “Wolverine, Bananaman, Chicken Head Man and….Dildo Man!!!” There is a party vibe throughout, and the set closes with a sound that introduced Machine Head to many. The crushing riffs and drums of “Davidian” still sound great after all this time. All hail Lord Browneye! – Metal Gigs…

Check out a video interview with Metal Hammer and Phil Demmel below:

Yell! Magazine sat down with TRIVIUM frontman Matt Heafy at Heavy MTL 2012 to get his take on the Randy Blythe situation, as well as listing his top 5 horror films and his unique zombie survival tips. Check out the video interview with Matt below:

ROYAL REPUBLIC are set to release their new album ‘Save The Nation’ on the 24th of September here in the UK and Play.com are selling a limited edition exclusive version, which includes an awesome ‘Save The Nation’ wristband! Check out a picture of the wristband and the tracklist for this version of the album below:

Save The Nation
You Ain’t Nobody (‘Til Somebody Hates You)
Be My Baby
Everybody Wants To Be An Astronaut
Make Love Not War (If You Have To Make War – Make Sure To Make Time To Make Love In Between)
Strangers Friends Lovers Strangers
Addictive
Molotov
Punch Drunk Love
Sailing Man
Let Your Hair Down
Revolution
Vicious
I Don’t Wanna Go Out

Click here to pre-order your copy of ‘Save The Nation’ from Play.com!

As we reported a month ago, Metal Hammer launched a competition for readers to win the chance to create a custom design for MACHINE HEAD‘s Robb Flynn’s Epiphone Love / Death Baritone Flying-V. The competition was fierce but Robb himself has chosen a winner and some runners up, which you can see in the video below. The winning design will be made into an actual custom guitar for Robb to use on stage!

Click here to pick up a copy of MACHINE HEAD’s latest album ‘Unto The Locust’.

DREAM THEATER performed two special shows in Luna Park in Buenos Aires and the set list for each night included four songs performed with a string quartet: The Silent Man, Beneath The Surface, Wait For Sleep and Far From Heaven. Roadrunner US emailed guitarist John Petrucci and keyboardist Jordan Rudess to get their thoughts on these special shows – check out what they had to say below:

You played four songs with a string quartet over the two nights—who did the arrangements?

Jordan Rudess: All the string parts were written by Eren Ba탁Ÿbu틁Ÿ, the young and talented Turkish musician that I discovered online through his beautiful orchestrations ofDream Theater’s music and then his great work orchestrating and conducting the premiere of my own composition, Explorations for Keyboard and Orchestra! For two of the songs we did live with the quartet (“Beneath the Surface” and “Far from Heaven”) I had originally arranged and recorded quartet-like string parts from my keyboard, and that is what you hear on A Dramatic Turn of Events. Eren was able to take those two songs and really make sure what I wrote worked for real players, as well as add some nice touches! For the other two songs, “The Silent Man” and “Wait for Sleep,” he created original quartet arrangements!

How much rehearsal time did you have with the quartet?

John Petrucci: We played through each song with them a couple of times at soundcheck. We probably spent about an hour in total making sure they were comfortable and that they knew certain cues, etc.

JR: We had one rehearsal before the first show. I had sent all the music to coordinatorLuis Gorelik (who is a well known conductor in South America) and he helped organize the players!

How did their presence alter the way you guys in the band played those songs? Obviously they weren’t just sawing away in the background; they were integral to the music, so…in what ways?

JP: Honestly, we played the songs just as we have been and they followed us. On “Beneath the Surface” and “Far from Heaven,” they basically played the arrangements that are on the album. Original arrangements were created for “The Silent Man” and “Wait for Sleep.”

JR: In our rehearsal I was literally conducting them and we all worked quickly to get things into shape and make sure the players really understood the music and what was going to happen in the chain of events on stage. The good thing was that these four songs all really are totally suitable for real strings, so it was an easy conceptual/musical addition to our presentation.

Other than the new album (which was played almost in its entirety each night), the albums you played the most material from were Images and Words,Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence and Awake—why those albums, from your perspective?

JP: We try to create a show that has a certain curve to it. The way that it begins, unfolds and concludes are all carefully thought about. We have so much material at this point that it’s difficult to fit in songs from each album. Based on what we played on past tours as well as the flow and arc of the show, we thought these were the strongest choices.

JR: There are so many factors that are in play to create a setlist. Generally we all felt that we offered a night of music that was a well-balanced, mixture of our material that not only spanned a lot of our albums but also flowed really well for the course of the evening.

On the second night, you guys played “Pull Me Under” as the encore, which you’ve been playing a lot more on tour this year than in the past few years…but only outside the US. Is that a song foreign audiences want to hear more than fans at home?

JP: “Pull Me Under” always goes over, no matter what country we are in. It just has that kind of power and familiarity, I guess. We really thought that it sounded great with Mike Mangini playing it and wanted to share that with our listeners.

JR: I don’t know—but I will tell you that they literally were trying to rush the stage in Buenos Aires when we played it. It was nuts!

The band has made several live DVDs over the years—have you ever found the presence of cameras a distraction to the point that it impacted your playing?

JP: Yes. Absolutely. As much as you try not to think about it or let it, the presence of cameras and the notion that you are filming for a DVD inevitably works its way into your mental chatter during the show. Having said that, all the cameramen on this shoot were incredibly respectful of the performance environment and made us feel as comfortable as possible.

JR: Yes. It’s fun in a way for sure but when you start seeing things out of the corner of your eye that you are not used to and don’t expect, it can be distracting. The other part of it is that there is added pressure that in one way can make you focus more intensely but from the other angle adds stress. It’s a great life learning experience to do these amazing, important events because it offers us a chance to really grow and keep learning how to have control, to be the best musicians possible under any circumstance!

Click here to pick up a copy of DREAM THEATER’s latest album ‘A Dramatic Turn Of Events’.