Dave MacIntosh of DRAGONFORCE fame has taken some time out whilst on the road in the US of A to update the ModernDrummer.com Mayhem tour blog…

It was an awesome first show, and I couldn’t have wished for a better performance from all of us. With the show done and dusted, we all head for the after-show, where there was much consumption of beverages and buffoonery. I didn’t see my tech Stuart there; for some reason apparently someone took him out the night before and forced booze on him all night, transforming him from his usual calm self into the full-on karaoke queen that he really is!

Check out the full blog HERE

DragonForce release new album ULTRA BEATDOWN on August 25th. Look out for news soon on an EXCLUSIVE MySpace album playback! You can pre-order the album HERE

Oh and dont forget that upcoming UK tour! Tickets on sale now!!! Dates as follows:

Fri 26th Sep – Manchester Academy
Sat 27th Sep – Birmingham Academy
Sun 28th Sep – Southampton Guildhall
Tue 30th Sep – Cardiff University
Wed 1st Oct – Nottingham Rock City
Fri 3rd Oct – London Astoria
Sun 5th Oct – Norwich UEA
Tue 7th Oct – Leeds University
Wed 8th Oct – Newcastle Academy
Fri 10th Oct – Glasgow Academy
Sat 11th Oct – Belfast Mandela Hall
Sun 12th Oct – Dublin Ambassador Theatre
Mon 13th Oct – Cork Savoy

If you head over to MetalHammer.co.uk right now, you will be able to see

Exactly what it says on the tin! If you pre-order your copy of the upcoming SLIPKNOT album ALL HOPE IS GONE at HMV.com, you will recieve an exclusive slipknot patch. But hurry- offer open only whilst stocks last!!!

HEAD HERE TO PLACE YOUR ORDER!

ALL HOPE IS GONE hits stores on the 25th AUGUST.

MADINA LAKE finish their stint on the US Warped tour today so that they can head off back to Chicago and continue work on their follow up to last years ‘From Them, Through Us, To You’. It would seem that they did find some time to have a bit of a party when they were on the road, as the folks at Fuse found out when they crashed the bands RV party! Check it out:

CLICK FOR HOT BOYS AND SCANTILY CLAD GALS

You can check out the latest video from the guys, PANDORA, below and their album can be bought online at THIS LOCATION.

Kerrang.com have loaded a couple of podcasts that they grabbed with some of the Roadrunner posse on the US Mayhem tour. Check out the links below for podcasts with SLIPKNOT and MACHINE HEAD.

STAIND will release digital single BELIEVE on the 25th of August. This will be the first single taken from upcoming album THE ILLUSION OF PROGRESS which is due to hit stores on the 8th SEPTEMBER.

The band have just hit the rd in the US with 3 Doors Down and Hinder and are keeping their fans up to date via their web blog. Here they also chat about recording the video for the track:

“it’s about a guy who plays guitar and wants to move to the west coast. the filming started in springfield, ma and they took a week and drove across the country filming their experience’s along the way. it’s kind of like a reality video and it came out really cool!!”
(read the full blog here).

More news on when and where you can check out the video soon…

STAIND frontman Aaron Lewis has chatted to LIVE DAILY about the bands upcoming release THE ILLUSION OF PROGRESS which is due for a release in the UK on SEPTEMBER 8TH.

“We took a lot of time trying to come up with the perfect tone, taking all the different guitars I have and comparing every guitar to every amp,” Lewis said. “Sometimes we’d spend eight to 10 hours in a day trying to find the right sound. I think that’s probably what was different than other things on the last album,” “Chapter Five.”

You can check out the full interview HERE

The band, who are currently on tour in the US will hit the UK in September is support of labelmates NICKELBACK. Full dates are as follows:

Fri 12th Sep – Belfast Odyssey
Sat 13th Sep – Dublin RDS Simmonscourt
Mon 15th Sep – Manchester MEN
Tue 16th Sep – Sheffield Arena
Thu 18th Sep – Birmingham NEC
Fri 19th Sep – London O2 Arena
Sun 21st Sep – Wembley Arena

You can pre-order your copy of THE ILLUSION OF PROGRESS HERE.

Roadrunner’s Orange County bruisers, ATREYU, are set to headline this year’s Taste Of Chaos tour in the UK.

ROCKSTAR energy drink will continue to be the title sponsor and will be giving away drinks, as well as coming up with some great surprises. Ernie Ball will be a sponsor on the tour as well. They will provide musical instruments for fans to test out and will pick the opening act through their massively successful Ernie Ball Battle of the Bands.

Vocalist Alex Varkatzas from Atreyu states,

“We had the best tour of our lives on Rockstar Taste of Chaos USA so it’s a huge honour to be invited to play Rockstar Taste of Chaos International. We also have the pleasure to share the stage with Story of the Year, As I Lay Dying, MUCC, and Horse the Band on this tour. We’ve toured the US with all of them in the past. It was a blast then and it will be a blast to tour with them again in Europe.“

Tickets are on sale now at GIGSANDTOURS.COM. Full dates line up as follows:

Wed 15th Oct – London Astoria
Thu 16th Oct – Lincoln Engine Shed
Fri 17th Oct – Norwich UEA
Sun 19th Oct – Cardiff University
Mon 20th Oct – Nottingham Rock City
Tue 21st Oct – Birmingham Academy
Wed 22nd Oct – Leeds Metropolitan University
Fri 24th Oct – Hull University
Sat 25th Oct – Edinburgh Picturehouse
Sun 26th Oct – Dundee Fat Sam’s
Mon 27th Oct – Glasgow ABC
Wed 29th Oct – Preston 53 Degrees
Thu 30th Oct – Manchester Academy
Fri 31st Oct – Oxford Academy

LEAD SAILS PAPER ANCHOR is in stores NOW. You can pick up a copy online at THIS LOCATION.

SOULFLY have confirmed 4 additional UK shows following on from their Bloodstock and Kerrang! Week of Rock appearances. The full list of dates are now as follows:

AUGUST
15th Bloodstock, Derby
16th ULU, London
17th JB’s, Dudley
18th Leadmill, Sheffield
19th Junction, Cambridge
20th Concorde 2, Brighton

Tickets are on sale now from the usual outlets.

The new issue of METAL HAMMER magazine not only has a splendid feature on our fave Brazilian Max Cavalera and his new record CONQUER with SOULFLY but there is also an 8/10 album review. Check out what the ‘Hammer folks made of their new offering…

“There was a time when Max Cavalera could have gotten away with pretty much anything. As he approaches the end of his time with Sepultura, the Brazilian was as widely loved and lauded as anyone in metal, and even when he took the band into the Amazonian jungle for the might Roots, even the most tedious purists were happy to give him the benefit of the doubt. All that changed when Max fled the nest and formed Soulfly. As the 90’s trundled on and nu metal tightened its grip on heavy music, Max’s eagerness to lock horns with as many seemingly inappropriate collaborators as possible may have endeared him to younger fans, but for those weaned on Troops Of Doom and Inner Self, the sound of this trash legend making merry with Fred Durst, Sean Lennon and that berk with the dreadlocks from Ill Nino was something of a disheartening nadir. As a result, even when Soulfly started making great albums – both 2004’s Prophecy and 2006’s Dark Ages ere fantastic – there was so much cynicism and calumny to wade through that the big guy seemed to be in a lose-lose situation, regardless of what he did musically.

It’s amazing what difference a year can make. After reuniting with his brother lggor and making the excellent and well-received Cavalera Conspiracy album, Max is suddenly back in favour and, if Conquer is any indication, in devastating form. It starts insanely well with Blood Fire War Hate, a brutal and epic scene – setter co-written by Morbid Angel’s Dave Vincent, with all the death metal menace and bug-eyed urgency that such a collaboration deserves. It’s followed by Unleash, which fans may have already heard on MySpace – another furious slice of breakneck violence that pauses briefly for a cleverly mellow interlude before erupting anew, all hammering aggression topped with Max’s insistent bark. Both Paranoia and Warmageddon reaffirm their creator’s thrash credentials, the former with high-velocity riffing and frantic, 80s-tinged solos, the latter strongly reminiscent of Sepultura’s Arise, again with some scorching lead work. In fact, it’s the surfeit of blazing solos that makes Conquer such an invigorating return to top form. It’s almost as if Max has suddenly rediscovered his true roots and found them to be just as exciting as the esoteric experiments of the last decade. Significantly, Fall Of The Sycophants sounds like a cross between Dead Embryonic Cells and Eye For An Eye (the opening track on the first Soulfly album) before exploding into the kind of multi-tempo savagery that Machine Head harnessed on The Blackening. Of course, it wouldn’t be a Soulfly album without a few bits of genre-flipping chaos, but the butt-shaking samba vibes of For Those About To Rot are surrounded by so much that reeks of thrash, death and good old heavy fucking metal that any reservations old school Max Cavalera fans might have about embracing his current endeavours deserves to be swept swiftly under the nearest rug.

Conquer is a great heavy metal record, pure and simple.”

CONQUER is out NOW digitally on all the usual platforms and will be released 28/07