Samson, Xbox and Revolver were backstage May 2 at the 5th annual Revolver Golden Gods Awards to host all the artist interviews, which aired live exclusively on Xbox Smartglass. Now Samson and Revolver are releasing all the interviews for you to watch!
Here’s the first of many clips from the 5th annual awards show. This video features our hosts David Ellefson and Zakk Wylde interviewing Philip Anselmo backstage at Club Nokia in Downtown Los Angeles after he performed with Anthrax and Rex Brown. For more information on Samson, visit samsontech.com. To watch all the performances and awards from this special night, click here or go to www.GoldenGodsAwards.com.
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Co-founded by metal lifer Phil Anselmo and true-crime author Corey Mitchell, the inaugural Housecore Horror Film Festival goes down in Austin, Texas, October 25 – 27. Brazilian horror legend Coffin Joe will be there, Nekromantik director Jörg Buttgereit will be there, The Manson Family director Jim VanBebber, Goblin will be there live-scoring a screening of Susperia while Mayhem vocalist Attila Csihar will provide a live score to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari in his Void ov Voices alter ego. Down, Crowbar, Eyehategod, and Warbeast will play, as will Anselmo’s solo project, Philip H. Anselmo & the Illegals. All in all, it will be a sick, twisted, and terrifying experience for all who attend. In anticipation of the event, various members of the HHFF staff and bands will be providing weekly lists on a variety of ghoulish topics; first up, festival co-founder Mitchell, with his Top Five Favorite “Horror” Films Based on Real-Life Crimes.
1. Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)
Though not a by-the-book retelling of the Henry Lee Lucas and Ottis Toole’s alleged serial-killing spree, this is my favorite film of all time, regardless of genre. This low-budget nightmare is rude, abrasive, funny, and frightening as all get out from the first frame on. The home invasion scene was shocking 27 years ago and still packs a wallop today. Breakthrough role for The Walking Dead’s Michael Rooker.
2. Boys Don’t Cry (1999)
This female-to-male transsexual rape and murder documentation will destroy your senses. The retelling of the murder of Tina Brandon (A.K.A. Brandon Teena) by men insecure in their own sexuality is brutal and will leave an impact on your psyche that will last a lifetime. Hillary Swank won her first Oscar for her performance and was directed by Kimberly Peirce, director of the upcoming (and not anticipated by me) remake of Carrie.
3. Deranged: The Confessions of a Necrophile (1974)
Another gritty, low-budget shocker that is based on the murderous life of Wisconsin farmer Ed Gein. Now, I love The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Psycho, but despite their claims of being inspired by the Gein case, this is the one that actually comes closest to telling the actual story of an old man who only killed two people, but did make dead skin masks and nipple belts from his victims (and some corpses he dug up from their graves). Early special effects by Tom Savini (Dawn of the Dead, Friday the 13th). Written and directed by Alan Ormsby, who also starred in the first horror film I ever saw, Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things.
4. Targets (1968)
Wow, what a weird film directed by Peter Bogdanovich. As a young filmmaker, he was given the opportunity by legendary low-budget filmmaker Roger Corman to take unused stock footage from the terrible film The Terror and also incorporate horror legend Boris Karloff into a film. He decided to set the film at a drive-in theater, replete with Karloff horror film on the drive-in screen, and place a sniper in the midst of the complex. Very loosely based on the Charles Whitman/University of Texas (my alma mater) tower shootings of 1966 that occurred only two years prior.
5. Badlands (1973)
Terrence Malick turned true crime into art with this depiction based on the 1958 murder spree of Charles Starkweather and 15-year-old Caril Ann Fugate. Of course, it certainly helped to have Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek (Carrie) in the starring roles.
Runners-up: The Honeymoon Killers, Ed Gein, In Cold Blood, Wolf Creek, Jack Ketchum’s The Girl Next Door, Zodiac, Cannibal, Men behind the Sun, The Town That Dreaded Sundown
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Philip Anselmo, legendary frontman of Pantera and Down, will release his career-first solo album, Walk Through Exits Only, on July 16 via his own Housecore Records (MRI/Megaforce). Walk Through Exits Only will be available digitally, on CD and on vinyl.
Produced by Philip Anselmo and Michael Thompson, and recorded over the past couple of years at his New Orleans studio, Nodferatu’s Lair, with his band The Illegals–guitarist Marzi Montazeri and drummer Jose Manuel “Blue” Gonzales–Walk Through Exits Only features eight songs, including “Battalion of Zero” to “Usurper’s Bastard Rant” to the album’s title track.
“It wasn’t about doing a paint-by-numbers thrash or heavy-metal record,” Anselmo explained about the project. “It’s an angry album that only I could do. I don’t see anybody else out there screaming about the same shit I’m screaming about. On this album, there isn’t any wordplay, there isn’t any hidden message, it’s all right there in front of you.”
Anselmo and the Illegals will support the new album with a major North American tour planned for this summer. Anselmo, who is up for Best Vocalist at this year’s Revolver Golden Gods awards, will make a special appearance at that event.
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In what can only be described as a match made in hell, the worlds of heavy metal and horror collide this fall as the first-ever Housecore Horror Film Festival (HHFF) erupts in Austin, Texas. World-famous heavy metal musician Philip H. Anselmo (Pantera, Down, Superjoint Ritual) and internationally renowned, best-selling true crime author Corey Mitchell (Hollywood Death Scenes, Dead and Buried) have teamed up to create the ultimate underground, three-day horror and heavy metal fan event that will combine live concerts from some of the biggest bands in metal and hard rock with more than 70 screenings of horror, true crime, and heavy metal films, music videos, and more—and special guest appearances from three of the world’s most revered underground directors of horror.
The Housecore Horror Film Festival will take over the entire Emo’s complex in the newly revitalized area of East Austin for three days of shock and roll. HHFF will feature seven screens, which will display more than 70 horror, true crime, and heavy metal film screenings, including feature-length films, short films, documentaries, classic horror films, world premieres, music videos, vintage and faux movie trailers, and more. As darkness descends each night, a dozen heavy metal and hard rock acts, handpicked by Anselmo himself, will hit the stage.
The nefarious brainchild of Anselmo and Mitchell, the Housecore Horror Film Festival spawned from a mutual love for all things horror that was discovered while the two were collaborating on Anselmo’s upcoming autobiography (Simon & Schuster, 2014). Wanting to bring their passion for—and knowledge of—extreme music and horror films to legions of fans, HHFF was born, with the goal of showcasing the best in a wide range of horror films—from the obscure to the extreme, from quality mainstream to the most unrepentant gore—and the heavy music that goes hand-in-hand with it.
Two confirmed special guest film directors include the notoriously controversial Jörg Buttgereit (Nekromantik, Nekromantik 2, Schramm) and revered do-it-yourself guerilla filmmaker Jim VanBebber (The Manson Family, Deadbeat at Dawn). Additional guest film directors will be announced as the festival nears.
Several top-tier metal and hard rock bands have signed on to perform at the inaugural event, and HHFF today announces the first round of confirmed artists: Anselmo’s own Southern metal supergroup Down, New Orleans masters of metallic doom Crowbar, and the Texas premiere of Philip H. Anselmo & the Illegals, Anselmo’s greatly anticipated extreme-metal solo project.
With films screening inside Emo’s East, and smaller screening rooms throughout the Emo’s complex, and nightly concerts inside the 2,000-capacity Emo’s East, organizers are planning for an immersive, three-day, horror and heavy metal fan mecca. HHFF will also host several “Side Show” attractions—from “gore-lesque” routines to suspension exhibitions to rare horror memorabilia displays. In addition, there will be dozens of horror- and metal-centric vendors dispersed throughout the complex plying their scare wares for the public to check out.
Filmmakers, screenwriters, producers, and actors in attendance will introduce their works and hold question-and-answer sessions after their screenings and will be available to the public at an outdoor celebrity signing and chat booth. Several notable authors of horror, mystery, true crime, and heavy metal will be also be signing books throughout the weekend.
And since no horror fest would be complete without creating some terror of its own, festival-goers can take a walk through the Haunted Corridor and allow festival-goers the opportunity to be scared all weekend long. The Haunted Corridor will be constructed by a Texas haunted house team with creative design help from Anselmo, who is one of the original co-founders of the internationally beloved House of Shock haunted house experience from New Orleans, Louisiana.
Whether it’s a classic horror film, a big budget blockbuster, an underground gore-fest, an experimental flick, or a quiet chiller, it will be screening at HHFF. Filmmaker submissions open today, with an early submission deadline of March 20. Feature-length or short films, big budget or shot on a cell phone—if it’s well made, compelling, and chilling, Anselmo and Mitchell are ready to select it. HHFF is an IMDb-qualifying festival, which means that all films in consideration will receive an invitation to create a title page on the Internet Movie Database web site.
Films can be submitted here.
The official website launches today, where interested filmmakers can find more information on how to submit their work. The web site will also contain continuous updates, including new band and special guest announcements, film screening schedules, vendor and sponsorship opportunities, contact information for HHFF staff, and occasional musings from Anselmo and Mitchell.
]]>Check out “Family, ‘Friends,’ and Associates” off War of the Gargantuas below:
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At Revolver, we are bringing this year to a close and making lists like we’re starring in a metal version of High Fidelity. Our January issue of Revolver (on newsstands now) features our Top 20 Albums of the Year. Online, we have posts and polls (like Best Music Videos), as well as a tribute to some musical heroes we lost this year.
In the meantime, we’re asking you to choose 2012′s Song of the Year. We’ve put together a list of the biggest and baddest songs in hard rock and heavy metal below; all you have to do is pick the best. And feel free to vote as many times as you want–until the poll ends on January 1.
UPDATE: The poll is closed. For the results, click right here.
]]>We just posted our list of the Best Music Videos of 2012. Now we’re asking you, what is your favorite among our picks? Vote below, as many times as you want, to tell us.
UPDATE: The poll is closed. You can see the result right here.
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Sure, music videos aren’t what they used to be since MTV all but dropped the “M.” But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t still bands who give a serious shit about the clips they produce to accompany their songs. 2012 had its share of badass music videos–here are our picks for the 10 best. And if you don’t like our ranking, tell us which video is your favorite in our poll right here.
12. Machine Head, “Darkness Within”
Blood, worms, tight claustrophobic spaces, and perhaps most frightening of all, considering Lamb of God frontman Randy Blythe’s legal problems there, the city of Prague, Czech Republic, all feature largely in this dark, disturbing clip for the standout centerpiece song off Machine Head’s Unto the Locust.
11. Asking Alexandria, “Through Sin and Self-Destruction”
No one music video could capture the nonstop sin and insanity that is a day in the life of Asking Alexandria. So the band released three videos this year, making for the epic “Through Sin and Self-Destruction” trilogy, a cinematic roller-coaster ride full of sex, drugs, violence, rock and roll, and more drugs.
10. Lamb of God, “Ghost Walking”
Saying that Lamb of God had quite the year (in both good and bad terms) would be an understatement–from the release their great album Resolution to the arrest of vocalist Randy Blythe in the Czech Republic. A highlight from LOG’s 2012, the band’s video for the single “Ghost Walking” uses first-class animation as it follows a shady-looking character as he seeks to protect top-secret information.
9. Slash, “Bad Rain”
This single from Slash’s second solo album Apocalyptic Love, features the rock god’s top hat and all in an animated video of a strip-tease show gone horribly wrong.
8. In This Moment, “Blood”
The title track of In This Moment’s record features a video that ties together all the spooky and fairy tale-esque imagery of the album’s art. Vocalist Maria Brink isn’t shy about her own sexuality and she just doesn’t care what you think anymore.
7. Black Veil Brides, “Coffin”
Though this song comes of the band’s 2011 EP, Rebels, this candlelit video was released this year. The Black Veil Brides’ glam-metal-tinged hard rock goes grim as they play with fire and snakes.
6. Down, “Witchtripper”
It’s been a while since we heard from Down and even though the Down IV Part I- The Purple EP isn’t a full-length, it packs more high-quality sludge then most bands do in their careers. The video for “Witchtripper” features one of the more bizarre storylines of the Top 10 chosen videos–but what else would we expect from vocalist Phil Anselmo anyway? After some eyeball stew and satanic ceremonies, Down teaches us that metal actually is the devil’s music.
5. Pig Destroyer, “The Diplomat”
This is the first of two videos on this list directed by Phil Mucci (see also No. 1), whose work seems to have distinct editing choices and layers of vibrant colors. After a five-year break between albums, Pig Destroyer dropped this new video that delivers a surefire message: When a jittery diplomat gives AK-47s to monkeys on an alternate planet, it can only lead to a smattering of green guts.
4. Motionless In White, “Devil’s Night”
Fight scenes are pretty much always memorable, and terror scenes are even harder to forget. Motionless In White deliver both here, constantly increasing the numbers of their gang with the use of a straight razor in this twisted West Side Story-like video directed by Cody Blue Snider, son of Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider.
3. Dethklok, “I Ejaculate Fire”
As with most things Dethklok-related, the band’s mere presence brings about a disaster. Is that a Spinx ejaculating fire? Yes. Is this video NSFW? Yes. Is it absurd yet totally funny? Absolutely.
2. Revocation, “The Grip Tightens”
The tech-thrash band comes out of “retirement” to play for the senior-citizen crowd in this hilarious video. Forget about age, they still partake in rock-and-roll debauchery–grandma panties and all.
1. High on Fire, “Fertile Green”
The plot of this visually stunning video may be about as complicated to understand as the concept behind High on Fire’s most recent album, De Vermis Mysteriis. But we’re guessing that if you watch the clip after puffing on a bong a few times, it makes perfect sense. We’re guessing.
Vote for your favorite video on this list in our poll right here.
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With Phil Anselmo’s debut solo album tentatively due sometime in 2013, fans can get an early taste of the former Pantera singer’s solo material via a newly announced split EP with Texas thrashers Warbeast.
Titled War of the Gargantuas, the EP will feature two tracks from each artist, and will be released on January 8 via Anselmo’s Housecore Records, just in time for the kickoff of the Down/Warbeast West Coast tour on January 11.
“This split is a glimpse into the future of both my solo project and ultimate thrash metallers Warbeast,” said Anselmo in an official press release. “The title of the split is War of The Gargantuas and it is fitting on many levels because of our combined love for the ’60s Japanese film of the same name, the power of our combined musical output(s) and our humorous affection that plays out within each of our “Gargantuan” personalities.”
He continued, “Both Warbeast and myself have full length LP’s that will be released shortly after this is released, but this split is unique musically. It is a time capsule; a loud pause ‘til we both release our full length products. Enjoy the destruction of music!”
Down and Warbeast 2013 Tour Dates
1/5 – Fort Worth, TX @ The Rail Club (WARBEAST ONLY, War of the Gargantuas Release Show)
1/11 – Houston, TX @ Warehouse Live – Ballroom
1/12 – San Antonio, TX @ Backstage Live
1/14 – Tempe, AZ @ The Marquee
1/15 – Las Vegas, NV @ Fremont Country Club
1/16 – West Hollywood, CA @ Key Club
1/18 – Anaheim, CA @ City National Grove of Anaheim
1/19 – Sacramento, CA @ Ace of Spades
1/20 – San Francisco, CA @ Regency Ballroom
1/22 – Seattle, WA @ Showbox at the Market
1/23 – Portland, OR @ Roseland Theater
1/24 – Boise, ID @ Knitting Factory Concert House
1/26 – Denver, CO @ The Summit Music Hall
1/28 – Minneapolis, MN @ First Avenue
1/29 – Milwaukee, WI @ The Rave
1/30 – Cincinnati, OH @ Bogart’s
2/1 – Chattanooga, TN @ Track 29
Kill Devil Hill–the metal supergroup featuring former Pantera and Down bassist Rex Brown and ex-Black Sabbath drummer Vinny Appice–released their self-titled debut earlier this year. Today, they’re premiering the lyric video for standout track, “Voodoo Doll,” as well as sharing behind-the-scenes footage in which band members discuss the song. The group is also announcing new tour dates for this fall, including shows with Alice Cooper. Check them out under the video.
Kill Devil Hill Headline Dates:
11/15: Oklahoma City, OK @ The Chameleon Room*
11/16: Dallas, TX @ Boiler Room*
11/17: Houston, TX @ Concert Pub North*
11/24: Salt Lake City, UT @ Bar Deluxe*
11/28: Bakersfield, CA @ Elements Venue*
12/01: Fresno, CA @ Babylon*
With Alice Cooper:
11/23: Denver, CO @ The Paramount Theater
11/25: Reno, NV @ The Grand Sierra Theater
11/27: San Francisco, CA @ The Warfield Theater
11/29: Los Angeles, CA @ The Orpheum Theater
11/30: Las Vegas, NV @ The Pearl Theater