A few notes of interest from the studio this past week: 36 Crazyfists – Brock is in Alaska till the New Year, and the rest of the band is in Portland, and all are beginning to write new material for release #3…and the band has a message to relay – “Hope everyone is enjoying the holidays, gettin fat and drunk, we are…” Chimaira – the band is in Cleveland writing new music, and word has it they just got a PA for their rehearsal studio. Chimaira will start recording sometime in the New Year. DevilDriver – the band is in the studio right now, at Sonic Ranch in Texas with producer Colin Richardson. Word has it things are going great, and they should wrap up by Dec 23. Ill Nino – the band’s DVD – Live From The Eye Of The Storm – is out now. And much like many of the bands written about above, Ill Nino is writing new music. Expect them to start recording after the New Year. Machine Head – Live At Brixton… Machine Head’s show last night at Brixton in London was shot for an upcoming DVD. And boy, was it magnificent. Rock. Soulfly – Max and company started in the studio yesterday, recording out in Arizona. Max will be producing the effort, and the band will be recording till the end of the year. Still Remains – still in Vancouver with producer Garth Richardson, where they started recording their RR debut last month. Things should wrap up come year’s end. The Agony Scene – the recording process of The Darkest Red is moving right along. Drums are complete on all 13 tracks recorded (10 or 11 of which will be on the release), and now all the guitar and bass tracks are being worked on..should be done with vocals before Christmas. Trivium – hot damn, Trivium. The mixing of this release is being finished now, and you gonna like. Wednesday 13 – the release is being mastered next week. Expect to hear some new W13 music for the Holiday Season…

“Chicks Dig Tattoos,” reads the headline of an interview at the online e-zine Fourteen G. The interview we speak of is with Trivium’s Corey Beaulieu (guitar) & Travis Smith (drums), and took place this past August back when the band rolled through Chicago on the Road Rage tour with Machine Head and Chimaira. You can check out said interview HERE. Also new in the world of Trivium to check out is new photos. Example, THIS SHOT of Corey taken during the band’s recent travels with Fear Factory. And if you are looking for more, a whole bunch of live shots from the the said four dates with Fear Factory can now be found on the band’s website HERE.

The Murderdoll’s debut album ‘Beyond the Valley of the Murderdolls’ has officially turned silver, meaning it has shipped over 60,000 copies here in the UK! Everyone here at Roadrunner would like to extend their congratulations to Wednesday 13, Joey, Eric, Acey and Ben and also their thanks to all the ghoul scouts for their support!

If you haven’t got it yet, now is the time…. Pick up the Murderdolls album ‘Beyond The Valley Of The Murderdolls’ for only 퉌£4.99 exclusively from HMV while stocks last! Stay tuned for an exciting Murderdolls announcement later this week!

Following last week’s awesome (albeit too short)Walls of Jericho sets on the EastPak Resistance dates, the band are now back at home, and Mike sends this note… “Well another tour down the drain. All went well on our European Eastpak Resistance tour. Thanks to all the bands and people involved with the tour. It was the first and probably only time we will be on a tour bus. They rule but we are not stars and therefore will remain in a van. We shared our bus with Unearth and a band from Sweden called The Bones. All said we had 18 people in the bus and amazingly enough never once did people get shitty and annoyed with anyone else. It was awesome. Big thanks to all the dude in those 2 bands for being amazing and fun people. And of course, a big thanks to all at MAD for setting up the whole event. Another great job as usual. So I am not going to go on about any particular stories or big thanks or whatever, just know we all had an amazing time and are now safely at home and preparing for the holidays. Some well deserved time off is about the only reward we could hope for and we seem to get our wish on that. Rock on.” Mike

If you are a Slipknot fan, get ready to be glued to Kerrang! TV… There will be 6 repeats of the Slipknot Special ‘Superstars of Noise’ (featuring all the bands videos and ‘Pulse Of The Maggots – Live from the London Astoria’) running over 2 weeks as follows: December 6.00pm – Monday 6th 6.30pm – Wednesday 8th 6.00pm – Friday 10th 6.00pm – Monday 13th 6.30pm – Wednesday 15th 6.00pm – Friday 17th

Wed 24th Nov – Tempe, Marquee Theatre I turned up late from the hotel on purpose knowing there was nothing around, but no way as late as James who’d been missing since the day before having his first tattoo, done by Evil Dave (Incision tattoos). He ended up missing sound check. We played here last year and I was excited to be in a good venue again, even though the shower was bust. Had fun watching all the other bands rip the crowd to pieces and when we hit stage all hell broke loose. We had technical problems form the start which became a major distraction for the show and so we came off a little deflated. The crowd was good though and still loved it, thankfully sparing us. Was a bit of a downer to also find that Himsa and BT had left early and so didn’t hang out much. And guess what… no bras! Thu 25th Nov – Los Angeles, House Of Blues We were woken at 8am by our tour manager Big Martin to the news that our bus had broken down 40 miles outside Pheonix and a new bus was arriving shortly. So, we swapped buses in the middle of the desert after only 3 hours sleep and carried on towards LA as soon as possible. Obviously, the crew arrived before us and so we had a late sound check. Bam and Brandon from Jackass suddenly appeared totally out of the blue and the other good news was tonight had sold out. I hung around and saw great sets by all the bands before us and I was nervous we were not gonna be able to keep up after last nights onstage shit. But… I was totally wrong. This could have been the show of the tour (I can’t say right now ‘cos its not over yet) and we came offstage on a total high. We had a laugh for once afterwards and some great people were there to witness it. I stayed over in LA with friends. Fri 26th Nov – Anaheim, House Of Blues Tonight was sold out over 3 weeks ago. Bleeding Through’s “Home town” gig. Arrived on time for sound check and a chance to chill before tonight’s show started. The venue’s security seemed a little confused with our passes which meant us and our guests kept being hassled the whole time. Some of our friends didn’t even make it in. Missed some of Himsa tonight as I fell asleep on the bus before. Shit. I was kinda feeling a little lazy before we hit stage but once we got on all was good. Managed yet another blinding gig with Dani being on top form, mid set pulling some of my missing underwear out of his pocket to get a cheap laugh from the crowd. Bastard. I invited some fans backstage who had made this their third straight show at the front and were even making tomorrows! Now that’s dedication. Hung with the Himsa guys and Sarah until we pulled out at the usual 3am leave. I’m still ill 🙁 Sat 27th Nov – San Diego, Soma Never been here before. The venue was a huge old cinema with below par facilities. Another day with no shower. Didn’t eat all day either. Bummed out zombie state was strong today. Did do a little toy shopping though at a flea market near by. The positive was, the ticket sales was approaching 2,000 and all the bands took advantage of the enthusiastic Saturday night crowd. Great show for all. We had a little party afterwards which finished with us getting kicked out of the venue. It then moved onto Bleeding Through’s bus, ending with Martin and Thomas (B.T. Merch guy) having a belt whipping session. I was shocked. I mean, what’s wrong with a kiss? I guess I’m just old fashioned. Set off without Sarah so she had to run after us down the street. We left early as we had to change bus again the next day. Wow, must have been good tonight, seven bras onstage!!! Sun 28th Nov – San Francisco, Fillmore Thought we’d been here before but I was wrong. Met the guys from AFI before the show, which was a pleasure. Also got to hook up with my old friend Ghost of G.G.F.H. Watching from the balcony I noticed a pretty violent pit tonight for Bleeding Through. Big guys just running into each other and punching anyone who came near them. Even girls are in there. I don’t see the sense but hey, I’m onstage. It looks dangerous. We got news today of someone who was seriously hurt in Denver I remember at the end of our set as we walked off stage, lots of security guards went into the pit and I instructed our tour manager to check it out, as I was concerned something had gone seriously wrong. I saw a couple of fans jumping into the pit from above before the end of the song and thought it was way out of line. I want people to know we, as a band, do not condone anything like crowd violence. We spend a lot of time and effort trying to entertain our fans in other ways. It’s a shame when something like this happens and we hope the person injured is ok. Anyway, back to tonight show. We did our fourth straight good gig to another sold out audience. Pretty hot without a shower, yet again. Thankfully, a day room tomorrow half way to Seattle to try get back to being human again.

Former SPINESHANK singer Jonny Santos is currently seeking musicians for a new band. “He is looking for a drummer and a guitarist in the L.A. area,” Scott Stokes of Sinister Management writes in an online posting. “Mind you, this project is going to be straight-up METAL!! That’s right, hardcore shit, boys and girls! He is still working on something else, but it is only twice or three times a month that they rehearse. He needs to play more!!!” Interested parties should send demos and photos to: Sinister Management 101 N. Victory Blvd. # G-99 Burbank, CA 91502 Jonny will review the packages personally and will arrange auditions beginning shortly after Christmas. For more information, click here.

More notes from the tour by Dave Pybus, COF’s bassist… Wed 17th Nov – Kansas City, Beumont Music Hall On the road again… last time we played Kansas was an off-date for Ozzfest 2003, the night before Martin’s birthday. He nearly ended up dead that night. Not this time though, as it’s Paul’s birthday today. He got away lightly compared. Me and James got up at 4am to visit our first Wal-mart since we arrived and bought him a huge chocolate cake (… and me a football, yay) etc. Was kinda surreal, us being the only two people in the whole place at that god awful time. Dawn of the dead creepy. So… later, we gave him the cake that Sarah kindly decorated (and got the numbers mixed up, reading 43), onstage and we played a tight set to a great crowd. I came down with a cold today and had Sharlee from Arch Enemy feed me whiskey ’til the early hours. Made me feel a little better but still didn’t sleep much. Himsa and the Bleeding Through guys tried to hijack me and Martin on to their bus for the night drive to Dallas. I managed to escape with my cold at the last minute. Martin wasn’t that lucky. Thu 18th Nov – Dallas, Gypsy Ballroom Never played here before. Didn’t do much today as we had a late sound check. Was nice to have a hot shower. All the usual hurry up and wait, get ready to do nothing fast bullshit. Didn’t really have the energy to fight it either. Just floated along. Watched Himsa from out front for the first time. Loud crowd tonight with a smallish stage. Had a few problems but nothing like last night, when my bass cabinet just went off for the last song. Ploughed through it in the heat. Got quite a few bras as the girls here in Dallas don’t seem to mind not wearing them. Chilled after the show with Brandon (Bleeding Through) and Johnny (Himsa) while watching some homeless guy moonwalk for Scott’s birthday. Gotta say, these two guys are like the most pleasurable frontmen I have encountered in my whole time in the music biz… Ever! We talked about the hardships of life on the road and how, over the years, things slowly change. Starting out in vans, near death experiences, playing small shitty venues to just a handful of people, just enough money for fuel to get to the next show… FOR YEARS! I remember the week before I started session for COF, back in May 2001. I was sleeping on the van floor for ten days straight on tour with Orange Goblin. This was quite common for me back then. These days we command two buses and a great crew. It’s easy now to forget those times. But in a way, it doesn’t get easier. It just means you can stay on the road for longer periods of time and put more energy into the show. It’s usually the downtime that bores you to death now. Fri 19th Nov – New Orleans, House Of Blues The venue where we first played with Killswitch Engage, Shadows Fall and Sworn Enemy at the start of the Ozzfest tour. Our good friend Sammy Duet (Ex-Acid Bath/Goatwhore) came down early and took me and Sarah out for dinner and to show us around some cool stores in the New Orleans french quarter. Had to let him leave us early due to a hangover. Kinda funny, when we arrived there was a swingers convention going on next door to the venue and groups of middle aged drunk women with large cleavages kept trying to get on the bus. This show was a bit of a debacle. Heads down for most of it. Quite a few bra’s on stage though. After show was better. Met up with our friends again and went out. Bourbon Street was nuts! Our super hero Damien Storm showed up when we returned to the bus at 3 am. The drive to Austin was broken up by our bus being sideswiped by a truck and (only) losing it’s wing mirror. Close. Are we destined to die out here? Sat 20th Nov – Austin, Back Room Last time we were here it was over 100 degrees inside the club. Worse news was, it was like 110 OUTSIDE, so there was absolutely no escape. Today was a little better. Same club heat, probably the hottest show so far on this tour, but cooler outside, thankfully. Bit tired from the last three shows but it’s a packed house tonight and we managed to get it together for a great show. It’s way too small for any kind of production so it’s down to us performing good. Not really any technical problems tonight which helps us immensely and we collect a tour high seven bra’s in the process. It was Derek, the drummer from Bleeding Through’s birthday and a girl I met earlier turned out to be a lap dancer so he got a nice present. My good friend Lally showed up too. Tomorrow is a much needed day off. The show days are pretty physical and intense. You don’t seem to notice how run down you get until you actually stop and get a day room to shower and have a proper hot meal. Even the days off fly by. Mon 22nd Nov – Denver, Ogden Theatre Halfway point of the tour already. Played here before, although last time in Denver was with Type O Negative at the Fillmore down the street, a venue I seem to have no recollection of. Signing session at the store next door to the theatre after sound check. The queue didn’t seem to ever get any shorter but I only missed Himsa’s first song. Me and Martin went in the crowd at the front and we later joined by Marta. No one bothered us, except singer Johnny. He seemed happy to see us. Quickly went out for Chinese food and caught some of Bleeding Through and A.E. on our return. Tonight was pretty packed and when we hit the stage the crowd seemed a little laid back. Maybe tired? The sound onstage is always weird here, like quiet, so it makes us feel a little isolated and the audience at a distance. If they don’t make a lot of noise we feel lonely. On top of that, not a single bra hit stage! But it wasn’t bad… far from it. We had a little drink afterwards with Chris from A.E. as it’s his birthday tomorrow and we won’t see them until the day after as we will drive straight to Tempe.

DevilDriver is currently in El Paso, Texas recording the follow-up release to their self-titled debut. To Tony at Sonic Ranch studios, if you are reading this, you have the band’s gratitude for everything you have done for them thus far during the recording sessions. That being said, DevilDriver frontman Dez Fafara checks in with the following: “First of all, DevilDriver would like to thank you all for a great year – anyone who supported us, bought the record, came to a show, our appreciation goes out to you. We’d also like to thank the following bands who believed in us and have taken us on tour over the past year: Superjoint Ritual, Morbid Angel. Opeth, In Flames, Caliban, and Ozzy, Sharon, and the whole Ozzfest camp. “Sorry no update in a while, but things have been extremely busy. Here’s what is going on: We are currently in the studio with Colin Richardson, and having a great time. We started recording about 12 days ago, and are done with drums and well into the guitars. We’ve got 14 tracks, each one brutal as hell. All the musicians in this band, myself included, have stepped up. We’re gonna wrap up 2 days before Christmas…and we’re looking forward to a healthy dose of touring starting February 1st, the schedule is being worked out as we speak. “HAPPY HOLIDAYS FROM DEVILDRIVER, LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING YOU NEXT YEAR.”