Venue magazine, June 2008. Click here for a larger version.

Another nutty nutty month in the life of High Wycombe's sole rock and metal author, with lots of press for The Bloody Reign Of Slayer including the interview on the left in Venue magazine and reviews in all the major magazines (see Books page for details). I'll announce my next book in August when the dust has settled from the Slayer biog.

Cool interviews this month: John Campbell of Lamb Of God (whose new DVD I reviewed in a couple of magazines -- it's excellent), Wes Borland of Black Light Burns and once of Limp Bizkit, Mike Amott of Arch Enemy and Carcass, Kerry King of Slayer (who is pictured holding a copy of my Slayer book here), Bobby Burns of Soulfly, Chris and Ben of Black Stone Cherry, Eddie Jackson of Queensryche and Dave Mackintosh of Dragonforce.

Interview of the month? Ted Nugent. The guy is unstoppable and went off about Barack Obama (and not in a good way) for at least 20 minutes before I got a word in. Although Ted's views on just about everything are way too right-wing for me to stomach, he's incredibly entertaining.

Other writing stuff -- helping out with the resources sections on Metal Hammer's forthcoming Metallica and Doors specials, reviewing stuff for The Quietus (a new music site that you must check out immediately -- it's a breath of virtual fresh air), sleevenoting a 3-CD compilation called This Is Rock, and doing a stack of reviews for Metal Hammer, Record Collector and DVD Review magazines.

I was present at a playback of Metallica's new album, Death Magnetic, in early June. Rather than bore you with a blow-by-blow, riff-by-riff account of what it sounds like, let's just say that it's their best work since 1991 (but that's hardly difficult). It is not, however, anywhere near the return to form that certain reviewers who should know better have been claiming it is.

I also caught gigs by Sabbat (with the almighty Akercocke in support), Glenn Hughes and Morbid Angel -- all on stunning form. The debut London Guitar Show at Excel in east London was impressive, too -- I recommend a visit next year to anyone with a penchant for loud axes.

Kerry King of Slayer with my new book on his band, June 2008

Life gets busier and better, so I'll be brief. Here's what I've been doing, in bullet points, since last month's update...

Interviews:
Trevor Peres of Obituary
Dusty Hill of ZZ Top
Avery Sharpe of McCoy Tyner's band
Keith Groucutt of ELO
Pat O'Brien of Cannibal Corpse
Mikael Akerfeldt of Opeth
Richard Patrick of Filter
Victor Wooten
Joe Satriani
Jack Bruce
Mark Morton and Willie Adler of Lamb Of God
David Vincent of Morbid Angel
Stanley Clarke
Tony Iommi
Esperenza Spalding
Corey Beaulieu and Travis Smith of Trivium

I think that's a record number of interviews in one month for me, even excluding the ones that were scheduled to happen but didn't occur for one reason or another -- Jim Kerr of Simple Minds, M Shadows of Avenged Sevenfold and Shagrath of Dimmu Borgir.

Book stuff
Press for The Bloody Reign Of Slayer
Finishing off the next one, out at Christmas (press release to follow next month)
Signing the deal for the next biggie
Scheduling two more books for 2009
Attempting to complete novel (as all non-fiction writers do...)

Other stuff
Doing long old liner notes for a big old 3-CD thrash metal compilation what I compiled
Hanging out with Mrs M and the kids
Jamming with a couple of bands
Drinking beer
Sleeping

Not a bad month now I look back at it. If this is how my career stays until retirement or death, I won't complain.

FINAL EXCERPT FROM THE BLOODY REIGN OF SLAYER
(PUBLISHED JUNE 9 2008)

Once again, here's a chance to read some of my forthcoming Slayer biography. To order the book from Amazon, click here.

Feel free to sign the guestbook while you're here -- it's on the Contact page.

‘Angel Of Death', was – quite apart from its musical qualities – a shock to the established Slayer fan because it sounded so crisp and immediate. The murky shroud that obscured the finer elements of songs on the earlier records was gone, whisked away as if by a breath of ice-cold air: King's opening guitar riff, although loaded with distortion, stands out clearly at all frequencies. It's interesting to speculate how much of this came directly from Rubin, his skilled engineer Andy Wallace (who went on to be a much in-demand metal producer in his own right) or simply from the superior LA studio and mastering facilities which could be used thanks to the ample Def Jam budget.

After that snaky opening riff, the band punctuate the track with a series of unison stabs and Araya launches the most shattering death-scream ever uttered on record, modulating it into a roar as it dies away in time for the song's verse riff. Musically, the song is pure genius – perhaps Hanneman's finest work. There's a totally unexpected key change in the first verse (at the line “Forced in, like cattle you run”); the slow, extended section in the middle is based on an unforgettable riff that has gone down as one of thrash metal's finest; a duelling lead section, featuring Hanneman and King swapping solos over an ever-intensifying backing riff that leaps a fourth higher at each change; and a few seconds of Lombardo showing off his double kick-drum prowess near the end.

The devastating opening line of “Auschwitz / The meaning of pain…” made it immediately clear that Slayer were no longer confining themselves to lyrics about Satan. The song lists in agonising detail the torture and human experimentation meted out on the inmates of the Auschwitz death-camp in World War II by Nazi scientist Josef Mengele. The listener wouldn't necessarily pick this up from the lyrics without some education on the subject (although a clue to the subject is provided by the lines “Destroying, without mercy / To benefit the Aryan race” and “Sickening ways to achieve the Holocaust”), with Mengele referred to only by his real-life sobriquet of the ‘Angel Of Death'. Araya's syllable-perfect enunciation takes the listener through a gratuitous river of gore in which the “pathetic harmless victims” are sequentially subjected to “surgery, with no anaesthesia”, pumped with fluid, burned, frozen, “sewn together”, “abacinated” (eyes burned out), injected with substances and have their eyes dyed a different colour.

A storm of protest blew up when Reign hit the stores. The problem for many observers (in particular those representing society's moral code) was not the grisly imagery, it was the fact that Hanneman did not condemn or negatively judge Mengele's actions. He simply reported them, which was deemed by some to be at best in poor taste and at worst a gesture of approval. Over the next two decades the band were called to task over ‘Angel Of Death' hundreds, perhaps thousands, of times, and on each occasion they denied that they were Nazis, neo-Nazis, fascists, racists, anti-Semites, white supremacists or in any way particularly right-wing or intolerant.

Hanneman was asked time after time if he sympathised with the acts of Mengele: a typical answer was one he gave to the NME in March 1987: “I feel you should be able to write about whatever you want. ‘Angel Of Death' is like a history lesson, but as soon as we released it everybody was calling us Nazis. Our singer's a dark-skinned Chilean, there's no way we're fascists. I'd read a lot about the Third Reich and was absolutely fascinated by the extremity of it all, the way Hitler had been able to hypnotise a nation and do whatever he wanted, a situation where Mengele could evolve from being a doctor to being a butcher.”

Those who have worked with Hanneman are quick to point that he's far from being a Nazi sympathiser. Photographer Ross Halfin says: “People don't get it – it's all right for the Stones or Lemmy to dress up as Nazis, but as soon as he does it, it's all, ‘Oh, he can't do that'. The thing is, Slayer don't mean it. They're not some far-right band at all.”

Jeff himself explained: “Right before I wrote ‘Angel Of Death', I read a bunch of books about Mengele because he was pretty sick. That was how ‘Angel Of Death' came about… I know why people misinterpret it – it's because they get this knee-jerk reaction to it. When they read the lyrics, there's nothing I put in the lyrics that says necessarily he was a bad man, because to me – well, isn't that obvious? I shouldn't have to tell you that.”

This stance of refusing to pass judgment and allowing the listener to draw his or her own conclusions has been typical of Slayer over the years. Araya was once informed by an interviewer that the Slayer website forum was attended by a number of racists and asked if he had a message for those people – to which he responded: “I'm not white, so I don't think I need to send out a message. I've noticed it and met people that are into that. I have no problems with people's beliefs and how they want to live their lives, but just don't fuck with me.”

While the memorable opening track would seem hard to follow, ‘Piece By Piece' was just as fast, heavy and as lyrically uncompromising as ‘Angel Of Death'. One of the first songs which might be classified as ‘gore-metal' before bands such as Autopsy took that approach to its logical, queasy limit, ‘Piece…' originally began with a bass intro, replicating the opening whole-band riff. This was removed, however, and the song begins with a fat, lumbering riff that accelerates after 23 seconds to one of the fastest tempos Slayer had yet attempted.

“Modulistic terror!” barks Araya mysteriously, before embarking on a tale of death and dismemberment, the like of which hadn't been seen too often on the metal scene, only adding more fuel to the fire of controversy. King was the songwriter this time, coming up with lines like “Bones and blood lie on the ground / Rotten limbs lie dead / Decapitated bodies found / On my wall your head”. More importantly, Kerry amped up a device used on previous songs such as ‘Fight Till Death' where the band execute a fast chord change at an odd place in the bar – in this case under the last word of the line, ‘As soon as life has left your corpse…”

This unexpected device, which goes against all previous riff-writing rules, lends the song an air of unpredictablity and instability, as if the band might implode at any second. It's this air of impending destruction which gives Reign In Blood its sense of engorged energy.

On first listen it appeared hilarious that the very fast ‘Angel Of Death' was followed by the even faster ‘Piece By Piece' – but it was stupefying when track three was faster still. The unearthly ‘Necrophobic' – like ‘Chemical Warfare' two years before – was the fastest song ever written at the time, by Slayer or anyone else. How the band conceived, wrote and recorded at such phenomenal speed was hard to understand back then, although the fact that it's a Hanneman/King co-write is obvious, with both men's lust for fast metal now renowned. Asked how he played at such ferocious speed night after night, King reasoned: “To me, it's like if you're working out and you go from lifting 20 pounds to 50 pounds. You don't lift 20 pounds and then say, ‘Hey, I'm going for 50.'

“When I warm up before a show I start out by playing ‘Propaganda' by Sepultura, because it's got some pedalling, but it's not fast pedalling. I don't warm up with, say, ‘Angel Of Death', because if you cramp up it blows your gig. I'll warm up with something slow and then build up to where I need to be in an hour. My goal before a gig is to play the fastest riffs in the set, so I'll make a point of getting ‘Angel Of Death' down…. If I had to play [it] today, I probably couldn't, because I've had five weeks off – but my hands are trained to bounce back…”

‘Necrophobic' – which was often confused with the Hell Awaits track ‘Necrophiliac' - describes someone who is “scared to die” and is basically a shouted list of ways to expire, from “Strangulation, mutilation, cancer of the brain” to “Skin contortion, bone erosion” less than two minutes later. In that frantic 100 seconds or so, the band whip through no fewer than nine verses (there's no chorus as such), a solo section – featuring the most gripping leads yet, aided by a delay loop at the end – and a final, catastrophic crash to an end. Araya has clearly honed his act, spitting out the words with perfect clarity despite the ridiculous speed, and Lombardo is a powerhouse, delivering his most intense performance yet.

Here's the new issue of Bass Guitar Magazine with my Peter Hook cover feature. He was great. A bit spiky, but a decent geezer, and he let me become the first journo ever to hear his new band, Freebass, in which he plays alongside Mani and Andy Rourke.

Just in the middle of press for The Bloody Reign Of Slayer, recording interviews for American radio and doing Q&As for various magazines. Elsewhere I've recently interviewed Mikael Akerfeldt, Fredrik Akesson and Martin Mendez of Opeth (whose new album may be the metal release of the year unless Metallica come up with something pretty spectacular in the autumn), Mille Petrozza of the mighty Kreator, Jason How at Rotosound, Charlotte Cooper of The Subways, Grog of Die So Fluid, Matt and Rob from Chimaira, Doug PInnick of King's X, Tim from Bloodsimple, Michael Schenker, Frank Allen of The Searchers, Guy Ritchie (yes, you read that right -- Madonna's husband), the bassists from Gogol Bordello and Flogging Molly, Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, John 5, Stuart Zender and Wednesday 13. All this hot air eventually finds its way into Rolling Stone, Metal Hammer, Total Guitar and Bass Guitar magazines. I did a big Foo Fighters resources round-up for Hammer too.

Hmm. When it's written down like that it really looks like a lot of work. And it is. Not to mention actually writing about these people once the interview is done, planning the next few books and mowing the lawn. But no complaints from me! There's always time for this, this and this...

There's so much to do that I fear I may fall asleep in my muesli. Here's what I've been doing: writing a feature for the new Classic Rock (left) called 50 Bootlegs You Must Hear, interviewing Amebix, Bloodbath and Kreator for Metal Hammer, interviewing Michael Romeo of Symphony X, Thomas Fischer of Celtic Frost and Black Tide for Total Guitar, interviewing Larry Hartke, Stuart Zender and John Moyer of Disturbed for Bass Guitar, interviewing Jaska Forgottenhissurname of Children Of Bodom for Rhythm, interviewing a ton of metallers for the next book after The Bloody Reign Of Slayer (for which I've been on the receiving end of a load of interviews) and reviewing the usual pile of films and albums for Record Collector and DVD Review. I also went to the playback of Ihsahn's amazing new album, and I added a gallery of my UK and overseas book covers to Facebook here. That's about it, in between lots of vodka.

And here's the best book ever written.

EXCERPTS FROM THE BLOODY REIGN OF SLAYER
(PUBLISHED JUNE 2008)

You lucky people. Two to three months ahead of publication, here's a chance to read some of my forthcoming Slayer biography. To order the book from Amazon, click here.

Excerpt 1: Chapter 2 – Metallica vs. Slayer, 1983

Show No Mercy was, to a certain extent, Metallica's fault.

As has been detailed at great length elsewhere, Metallica were probably the world's second ever extreme metal band, after the British band Venom had founded the idea of thrash metal (heavy metal played fast) and black metal (heavy metal played fast with Satanic lyrics). The band, also formed in LA mere months before Slayer, had relocated to San Francisco in 1982 for two reasons. Firstly, the LA scene was largely populated by hair metal acts – make-up-wearing pretty-boy glam-rock bands – and secondly because their new bass player Cliff Burton didn't want to move from San Francisco, his home town.

In 1982 Brian Slagel performed for Metallica the same service that he later did for Slayer – he used one of their songs on his first Metal Massacre compilation album. The following year Metallica were invited to visit New York by the East Coast-based Jon Zazula, who became their first manager and record company boss, having founded a label called Megaforce specifically for them.

Slayer were aware of Metallica's activities in California long before the latter made the move to New York in spring 1983, because they had been regarded as a breath of fresh air on the tepid metal scene of the day. After a series of demo recordings, the quartet (at that time singer/guitarist James Hetfield, guitarist Dave Mustaine, bassist Ron McGovney and drummer Lars Ulrich) released their best and most influential cassette, the seven-track No Life 'Til Leather . This tape soon became the stuff of legend among metalheads worldwide, duplicated endlessly and distributed through the tape-trading underground in many countries. Its popularity stemmed from the relentless speed of the riffs and the precision with which Hetfield executed them; his machine-like picking skills soon set the standard to which all thrash metal guitarists would aim in order for their songs not to sound muddy. One song, ‘Phantom Lord', was a token nod to black metal devilry, but by and large Metallica's lyrics dealt with life on the road, warfare and the same subjects which bands such as Motörhead had been dealing in for many years.

Metallica's debut album, Kill 'Em All , contained all the songs on No Life 'Til Leather , although Hetfield evolved his vocals from a melodic wail to a rough-edged bark for added malevolence, and the band as a whole played faster (and better) on the record. Released in August 1983 – four months before Slayer entered Track Record Studios to record their own album – Kill 'Em All was easily the fastest, heaviest, most uncompromising album released at that point, although it would be superseded dozens of times by the end of the decade, not least by Metallica themselves.

That Metallica were the pioneers of American thrash metal is not in doubt, although one or two observers point to the earliest work of New York act Overkill as contemporaneous while others, more misguided, even attribute the start of thrash metal to traditional HM acts such as Judas Priest. The template that Metallica established for a double-speed snare pattern beneath one- or- two-string riffs, picked with extreme precision and palm muting, was the major element of all subsequent thrash metal songwriting – an element that was to underpin most of Slayer's songs.

Brian Slagel: “When Metallica started, nobody knew what they were doing. People thought they were a punk band, but when they played in San Francisco, people loved it and understood exactly what they were doing – and of course the last straw for them was when Cliff said, ‘I'll join your band if you move to San Francisco'.”

If that's so, then why didn't Slayer – mere months behind Metallica in the thrash metal stakes – also up sticks and move to Northern California? One answer lies in the cataclysmic impact that Metallica's arrival in San Francisco made on the overall Californian scene: as Slayer's first tour manager Doug Goodman told the author, every other band on the SF scene was relegated to the status of also-rans when Hetfield, Ulrich et al made their move north. Metalheads began hearing of this crazy new band that played so fast – and the ripples spread back to Los Angeles, where the struggling thrash metal scene was trying to find its feet. Thus, Metallica's success in San Francisco meant success for Slayer in LA.

Secondly, Slayer had crossover appeal. The speed of their early songs, inspired by the hardcore punk that Hanneman had introduced to Lombardo, naturally attracted a punk audience – making Slayer the only band in 1983 who could pull punks and longhairs in to the same show. This kind of universal appeal remained at the heart of Slayer's dark, addictive appeal.

Slagel points out the relationship between Slayer and Metallica when both bands released their debut albums within months of each other in 1983. “I'm sure Metallica were an influence on Slayer in the early days, but I'm not sure that Slayer would admit that! Metallica were probably a year ahead of Slayer, but Slayer saw them and thought, ‘We can play faster and heavier than them'. I know that was definitely at the back of their minds when they started to write their own material.”

The fact that Slayer were trying to outdo their contemporaries was confirmed by Araya in 1999 when he told the author, “When we wrote ‘Aggressive Perfector', that wasn't the kind of music we played at the time. That became a Slayer template. The only reason we wrote it was because we'd heard what had been on the first two Metal Massacre records, and we thought, ‘Fuck, we're heavier than that!' So we wrote that song for the third album.”

Excerpt 2: Chapter 5 – Slayer's first European tour, 1985

The situation was almost farcical in retrospect: a bunch of Californian longhairs being flown to a foreign continent with very little finance, no foreign language skills, barely any support personnel and no experience of the world outside America. With 18 shows over six weeks in May and June 1985 to get through, the learning curve would be impossibly steep.

The tour didn't start well. Accompanied by KJ Doughton and Doug Goodman, Slayer landed at London's Heathrow Airport on May 26. A small hire bus came to pick them up from the arrivals hall, as Goodman recalls, “We were driven to the place where our rental gear was, and we're talking to the driver, thinking that he was our driver for the tour. We were a little bummed out by the size of this thing, because there was no place to sleep and the seats didn't pull down all the way… [Then] we realised that we would have to drive through Europe in this bus ourselves!”

The band got a further shock when they went to locate their hired amplifiers and other equipment. The large drum kit, two guitar amps, a bass amp and at least six guitars and basses plus numerous cases of cables, strings, effects pedals and stage clothes – as well as the personal luggage the six men had brought – appeared impossible to fit into the hired bus (which Doughton describes as “a hollowed-out bread van”).

At this point, King lost his cool. As Goodman remembers, “Kerry wasn't happy – he was like, ‘Fuck this, let's go home!' But this was the first time to my memory that the band put their foot down. Before that, pretty much everything Kerry said was what Slayer did. Kerry ran that ship. They did things as a group, but if there was a disagreement, ultimately they did what Kerry wanted to do. It wasn't because he was an overbearing taskmaster kind of guy – it was because he was the kind of guy who cared enough about it to argue until everybody gave up and said ‘OK, shut up, we'll do it your way!'”

The other members calmed King down and figured out a way of fitting the gear into the bus, largely by discarding the bulky flight cases housing the Marshall cabinets. The no doubt bemused rental store worker then provided the band with directions to their first show, the Poperinge Heavy Sound Festival in Belgium. The band were supposed to catch the ferry from Kent, although it wasn't made easy for them, as Goodman says: “The guy gives us a photocopy of a map that included London and included Belgium and suggested that we buy an atlas!”

KJ Doughton: “It was a tight, no-budget affair. We all took turns driving. In the UK, I can remember Dave Lombardo learning how to drive on the opposite side of the road from what he was accustomed to in America. I also have a vague recollection of arriving at a customs post without having our merchandise approved beforehand. We were afraid that they wouldn't let us take our T-shirts across the border. The band was hungry and lean at the time, reliant on merchandise sales to pay the bills, so it was imperative that we didn't get them confiscated. 

“We hid the shirts in the amplification bins, where they were never found during inspection. It was a good strategy, aside from the overlooked fact that amplifiers are laced with fibreglass. The band would wear the shirts later, and scratch violently. We thought the whole crew had scabies. Then, I'd notice people purchasing shirts at gigs, and scratching themselves. That's what happens when fibreglass shards work themselves into your torso. I'm sure all the sweaty headbanging only made it worse.”

Fortunately, the shows themselves were a triumph. Slayer, on peak form and hungry for the prize like never before, completely devastated the festival crowds where they appeared that summer in Belgium, Holland, Germany and the UK. The last show was a single date at London's legendary Marquee club on June 24, one of the most important gigs Slayer had yet played. To this day, the amount of punters who claim to have been at the gig easily exceeds the now defunct venue's limited capacity.

Back home, gigs extended from August all the way through until the end of the year, with the band travelling from Canada back to California, up through Oregon and Washington, back to the Sunshine State before playing more dates in New York and New Jersey.

Slayer were now a full-time proposition and thanks to the album they were about to record, they would redefine the metal landscape permanently.

Thanks for reading. There's another 100,000 words of this stuff, including 60 interviews I carried out over a period of about five years with everybody who is anybody on the metal scene. Foreign rights for the book are being picked up already and I have to say, with your help world domination could be a step closer.

In other news this month, I've been interviewing the usual mixed bag of musos, including Andy McCluskey of OMD, Stone Gods (the Darkness minus Justin Hawkins), Jeff Berlin, the miraculous Dillinger Escape Plan, Eric Peterson of Testament, Rudy Sarzo, Billy Duffy and Chris Wyse of the Cult, Rob Miller of Amebix, Slash and Duff from Velvet Revolver... tons of others.

Just bought one of these. Perfect for the car bonnet.

Well, NAMM was insane. For four days I walked around the massive Anaheim Convention Center, interviewing musicians and playing basses. Nice work if you can get it, I thought as I fell exhausted into bed every night, having failed to explore LA in any meaningful way. Still it was cool to see David Ellefson, Paolo Grigoletto, Jeff Berlin, Stuart Hamm, Larry Hartke, Yves Carbonne, Frank Bello, Charlie Benante, Jason Bonham, Victor Wooten, Steve Morse, Kerry King, TM Stevens, Dave Mustaine, Michael Angelo Batio, Rita Haney, King Ov Hell, Yngwie Malmsteen, Carmine and Vinny Appice, Andy Galeon and tons of other musicians, most of whom I interviewed. Pics here.

Other interviewees done recently: Peter Hook (no longer of New Order), Gallows, Tony Iommi, Max and Iggor Cavalera, Thomas Fischer of Celtic Frost, Stone Gods... more added every day, it seems. Film reviews in DVD Review, albums in Metal Hammer, Rhythm and Record Collector and various stuff that I've forgotten about too.

I signed a very, very cool book deal this month but will wait until the press for my forthcoming Slayer biography is all done in April/June before announcing it. Three more book deals to sign shortly, which will keep me busy until the middle of 2009 at least.

Can't wait to see Mayhem in London on 21 Feb... their recent album, Ordo Ad Chao, was my album of the year in Metal Hammer's end-of-year roundup. It's terrifying.

Happy New Year and thanks for visiting. Global domination is a step closer with the addition to the 20,000 things I already do of the features editor's post at Bass Guitar Magazine, the UK's only bass mag (left). They're sending me to NAMM in LA later this month to meet the four- (and five, six, eight, twelve, etc) stringers of the world and rub shoulders with rock celebrity. I'll be meeting Glenn Hughes and Gene Hoglan there, as well as my esteemed journalistic colleagues Steven Rosen and Bob Nalbandian and members of Morbid Angel, Possessed, Lupara and the usual cast of metal nutters. If you want to meet up, email me.

Cool magazine stuff coming your way: Alexi Laiho of Children Of Bodom in Total Guitar, M Shadows of Avenged Sevenfold, John K of Biomechanical and one of the crazed Finns out of Apocalyptica in Metal Hammer. The current Bass Guitar is a rock and metal special and includes my interviews with Rex Brown, Jon Lawhon of Black Stone Cherry and Dickie Peterson of Blue Cheer. I also wrote a tribute to the late Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy. Buy it here.

Here's a cool story for you: during my interview with Rex Brown, he told me that one thing he'd always wanted to do was interview Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath for a bass mag. As it happened, I knew that Geezer was interviewing (I'd spoken to him for Bass Player, the American magazine) and thanks to some cunning logistical tweakery by Roadrunner and Noble PR we made it happen for Rex. His interview with Geezer is also in the current issue.

The current Metal Hammer (with Dimebag on the cover) also tells the full story of the interview with Phil Anselmo which it ran shortly before Dimebag's death. Some of the comments Phil made about his erstwhile bandmate were rather unpleasant: he initially denied ever doing the interview, a slightly tricky position to adopt as the tapes were sent to Dimebag's brother Vinnie Paul, who later confirmed their content. Anselmo then changed his mind, claiming that he'd been misquoted. Again, not true, as Vinnie Paul stated. Anselmo then fell silent about the whole issue.

Anyway, I was the writer of that feature. I'd made a strict point of quoting from the interview absolutely verbatim and so the fuss died down fairly quickly. I've never commented on the issue, even when offered a chunk of cash by a certain music-TV station to do so: the new issue of the magazine sets the record straight at last. Hurrah!

Onto more cheerful matters. I've just been asked to co-write the autobiography of a certain rocker, as well as a major guitar book that I reckon will be the first of its kind. Both books subject to contract, but it looks like 2008 will be another busy busy year. My Metallica book is out in Bulgarian shortly and the Slayer biog I've just finished is attracting some overseas attention already. (By the way, thanks to whoever keeps reading this and updating my Wikipedia entry -- you're very diligent.)

Read this, it makes a lot of sense!

The Bloody Reign Of Slayer is just about done and will be out in May or thereabouts. Thanks to all the people who emailed me for more information about it: when I have an exact publication date I'll post it here. The image on the left is a cover which may or may not be the final design. Cool though, isn't it?

Musicians who I've had the pleasure of interviewing this month: Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath (again), Kerry King of Slayer (yet again), Dennis Pepa of the mighty Death Angel -- and that's about it, as I've been thinking about the Slayer book and pretty much nothing else (except sustenance and sleep) the whole month.

Some very interesting book possibilities coming up... let's get Christmas out of the way first though, eh? Have a good one, wherever you are.

A slightly quieter month, thank God, although you can catch my writing in Bass Guitar Magazine (left, featuring my guest editorial), Metal Hammer, Total Guitar, Rhythm and Record Collector. Over the last couple of weeks I've also interviewed Geezer Butler, Billy Sheehan, Pepper Keenan, Kirk Windstein, Al Di Meola (spot the odd one out, eh?) and Michael Angelo Batio. Coming up: Death Angel, possibly Richie Blackmore.

Finishing The Bloody Reign Of Slayer (pre-order here if you're in the UK or here if you're in the US of A) this month. A rather dedicated bunch of thrashers are doing the foreword, I'm honoured!

Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is out in Finnish, which is very cool -- the Metallica book I wrote in 2004 was a bestseller in Finland. I wonder what house prices are like in Helsinki...

Cool interviews recently: Matt Pike of High On Fire, Ihsahn of Emperor, Dave Mustaine of Megadeth, Mika Karppinen of HIM, the Reverend Tholomew Plague (crazy name, crazy guy, eh?) of Avenged Sevenfold, Chris Pennie of Coheed And Cambria, Mikael Akerfeldt of Opeth. I also appeared on Total Rock's recent Teach Yourself Black Metal show and forthcoming DVDs on AC/DC and Metallica. What a metal month it's been, anybody would think I never wrote about anything else.

I'm doing a 10k run for Cancer Research UK on 28 October. If you'd like to donate, go to http://www.10ksponsorme.org/joelmciver. Thanks!

I've just found out that combined sales of my 2004 book Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica have exceeded 30,000 units -- not quite JK Rowling standards, I know, but still something of an achievement in the oversaturated music-biog field. Thanks a lot if you bought one, and if you didn't, why, it's still available in English, French, German, Italian, Polish, Croatian and Finnish and shortly in Bulgarian! There's even a German-language audiobook on CD, narrated by the actor out of Das Boot, if you're so inclined.

Got this email from Poland: "I think your book Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica is really great. I read it a lot of times and I think, that you are topping fellow, you do not make shit, your work is work of art." Pure genius.

Some highly interesting interviewees around at the moment. This month it's been Daniel Erlandsson of Arch Enemy, Tom DeLonge of Angels And Airwaves (you know, the guy who used to be in Blink 182) and his axe-wielding mate David Kennedy, all-sibling (but not creepy) rockers Eisley, Sindre Solem of amazing death metallers Obliteration, old geezers Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt of Status Quo (the former launched into a completely unexpected diatribe about the evils of Catholicism and the importance of understanding the laws of relativity) and Dave Witte of Municipal Waste.

Next week I'm talking to Michael Bradley of the Undertones and David Vincent of Morbid Angel, neither of whom usually do much press. Also Rex Brown of Down, whose new album is rather good. All this hot air is for the usual magazines -- Metal Hammer, Total Guitar, Record Collector, Rhythm, plus the others on the About page.

Bookswise I'm still writing the big old Slayer hardback for Omnibus Press which I started ages ago. After that there are three official autobiographies on the back burner, just waiting for the right deal to fall into my inbox...

Keeping it brief this month. Cool interviews recently: most of Municipal Waste, Brett Gurewitz of Bad Religion, Nikki Sixx of Motley Crue, Robb Flynn of Machine Head, Jim Davies of Victory Pill, Waldemar Sorychta of Enemy Of The Sun, David Gray and Jason Mendonca of Akercocke, Jeff Becerra of Possessed. Coming up: Greg Lake of ELP, Sharlee D'Angelo of Arch Enemy. I've done the usual stack of album and film reviews in Metal Hammer, Record Collector, Music Mart, DVD Review and elsewhere. I also compiled albums by Gary Moore, Colosseum (both I and II) and Deep Purple. And I edited the resources section in Classic Rock's forthcoming metal special. That's enough for one month.

Here's an interview I did with Metallica before their frankly awe-inspiring show at Wembley Stadium the other day.

And here's me being interviewed by a metal fanzine, The Legion.

There's so much to do I fear I may pass out before I finish typing this, but what a great position for a self-employed geezer to be in, eh? This is what I've been doing and/or am about to do: interviewing Dino Cazares, Buckcherry and Sum 41 for Total Guitar (I took a pic of Deryck Whibley, it's on the About page), interviewing folkmaster Davy Graham for Record Collector, interviewing Akercocke, Municipal Waste and Darkthrone for my Slayer book, trying to get Warners to reissue Airhead's classic Boing!! album (sign the petition for a reissue here and I'll be eternally grateful), interviewing Robert Trujillo of Metallica for Bass Guitar magazine at Wembley Stadium this weekend, compiling and sleevenoting a humongous hard rock box set for Union Square, reviewing the amazingly tasty Emperor reissues, the new Obituary album and Mick Wall's new Waxl Rose book for Record Collector, reviewing albums by Still Remains and Decadence Within for Music Mart and still trying to lead a social life of moderate debauchery and be a responsible family man.

In the new Metal Hammer (pictured above left) there are features by me on Hatesphere and Bad Brains, as well as some album reviews. So pick it up.

Occasionally I check the web stats for this site and it seems most people come here looking for Slipknot. It's six years since I wrote a book about them -- how interesting that they're still so sought-after. I'm writing a short piece for Record Collector on their long-lost demo album Mate. Feed. Kill. Repeat., which will set you back at least £100 if you can find an original copy. Which you probably won't: Mick Thompson told me "There are no fuckin' original copies!" when I asked him about it. And he should know...

Here comes the summer, and with it the new issue of Music Mart with my Queens Of The Stone Age (left), Machine Head and Linkin Park features in it. Total Guitar is currently running my Nine Inch Nails interview as well as, um, another Linkin Park feature. There's a load of reviews in DVD Review, Metal Hammer and Record Collector, too, as well as the usual stuff that I write about here every month.

Forthcoming features: funkmaster bassist TM Stevens, the even funkier Ozomatli, rock sluts Buckcherry... supposedly even Geddy Lee, who I've been waiting to speak to for ages.

Bookwise it's all about the mighty Slayer, whose first ever English-language biography I will be finishing soon. It'll be a big fat hardback, published globally by Omnibus, and I've been interviewing a load of Slayer-related personnel. It's fascinating stuff, although I say so myself. There's a press release at this Blabbermouth page.

I now have a Myspace page here, swing by and say hello.

Here's a classic clip of death metal geezers Deicide from 1988, when they were still known as Amon. Classic stuff.

Life is rather fine at the moment -- lots of interesting work to do, but not so much that I don't have time to lie around and do nothing when I like. And believe me, I do. While I'm doing that, keep an eye out for the new Music Mart with my Biffy Clyro feature on the cover, Bruce Foxton of The Jam adorning Bass Guitar mag (left), Metal Hammer with a Nox interview in it and all the other stuff I mentioned last month. And a piece about collecting Black Sabbath vinyl in Classic Rock.

Interview-wise it's been busy busy busy. I'm looking forward to a long chat with Josh Homme of Queens Of The Stone Age as well as an interview with Darryl Jennifer of Bad Brains this week. John Myung of Dream Theater, the legendary John Martyn and Geddy Lee of Rush are on the schedule soonish, too. Danish thrashers Hatesphere gave good soundbite the other day, as did Ryan Richards of Funeral For A Friend, two of Linkin Park and also the great Marc Almond, who is still recovering from a motorbike crash that almost killed him in 2004.

I learned the other day that Ville Valo of HIM has a copy of my Black Sabbath book. Bless him, I would have sent the old goth a freebie on request.

Here's a truly excellent website that you must visit immediately.

And I highly recommend this book!

And -- for the truly keen only-- I'm looking for someone to do work experience. Admin, filing and a bit of writing. Mail me if you're up for it.

As spring arrives at last, my Trivium feature is on the cover of the current Total Guitar, an interview with Ritchie Havens is in Acoustic magazine and there are Machine Head features in Music Mart and Bass Guitar. A feature on the mighty Celtic Frost is also underway, and watch out for my Poison The Well and Annihilator interviews in the next issues of Metal Hammer and Total Guitar.

Radio-wise, you can hear me uttering pearls of wisdom at Gideon Coe's page (on the 29 March show at about 11.30am) and at 11.30pm on Total Rock on Tuesday 10 April.

I recently sleevenoted a Gary Numan Peel Sessions compilation as well as compiling and annotating Uriah Heep, The Nice, UFO, Status Quo (that's right!) and Asia collections.

Imminent interviews: Marc Almond, Nine Inch Nails, Devildriver, hopefully Geddy Lee of Rush. I'm also reviewing the new Queens Of The Stone Age album and others for various rock publications, as well as the usual bunch of films for DVD Review. It's all go round here.

My occasional (and not very serious) band The Corky Nips is playing a show at the venerable 100 Club on London's Oxford Street on 17 May. Tickets £5 from the singer.

Read this!

Too much work, too little time, but it's better than selling double glazing for a living. I've just had a weekend in California interviewing Trivium for the cover of Total Guitar magazine, in between writing about Lacuna Coil, Mudhoney and Opeth for Bass Guitar mag, Rotting Christ in Metal Hammer and the usual reviews in Record Collector, DVD Review and Music Mart.

Forthcoming interviews: Scottish alt-rockers Biffy Clyro, Dutch devil-worshippers Nox. I also have to write up interviews with Adam Duce and Dave McClain of Machine Head, nice guys both. MH frontman Robb Flynn made me drink a Brown Eye cocktail last week, it was alright until I asked what was in it (don't ask).

Films For Men is done and should be out in May or thereabouts, followed by a sequel in the series soon after.

Also slaving away on my big old biog of a big old thrash metal band, I still can't reveal who it is but their name doesn't begin with M...

Here's 'Kids In America' by Kim Wilde -- a song I loved as a kid and rediscovered the other day. This file is super low quality but who cares -- anyway you can buy it on CD here.

Next up from me is a movie guide called Films For Men, to be published by Beyond Black in the summer. The journalist Robert Crampton at The Times wrote about his contribution to the book in his weekly column on 3 February -- click the image on the left to read it.

Elsewhere you can read an interview I did with Paul Stanley of Kiss in Music Mart, another interview with Deicide in Modern Drummer, a chat with Viking metallers Unleashed in Metal Hammer, my summit on 1970s metal with Mikael Akerfeldt of Opeth in Total Guitar and the usual reviews in Record Collector, DVD Review and the other mags listed on the About page.

I've just compiled and sleevenoted this Motorhead compilation.

Some recommended reading for you: the endlessly entertaining weblogs of Ross Halfin, Dave Ling, Joe Matera and Mick Wall.

Happy New Year and let's hope for a slightly saner year all round in 2007. This year there will be at least two new books from me, one a film guide with a difference and the other a biography of the world's greatest thrash metal band (any guesses?). Details here as soon as contracts are signed.

Click here for a review of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath in the Sun and here for another in the Daily Telegraph -- really.

A few people have recently asked me what I do and how I manage to pay my bills as a humble hack. The answer to both questions is that I write books (there are now 23 available in various languages and editions -- see Books page or just Google me), contribute to a ton of magazines, edit music books, appear on BBC 6 Music radio and the occasional TV show and DVD, and various other stuff. Most of which takes place at my home in leafy Buckinghamshire from my office overlooking a field with geese in it.

Here's an insanely fast and aggressive song by a Boston band called Watchmaker (2Mb approx). If you like it, buy their album. Cheers!

Click image for more reviews of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath...

This month it's been all about reviews of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. So far Q, Kerrang, Metal Hammer, Music Mart, Guitarist and the Classic Rock Newswire have all run glowing reviews (click image at left to see them). Lots more reviews to come from worldwide press and also, I'm told, from our own soaraway Sun!

Visit the excellent Hard Radio site for their regular podcasts: the next one (number 6) has an interview with me in it.

Five book deals coming up, one on film, two on extreme metal bands and two on classic rock artists. Three of these are the official story, which should be exciting. Details posted here as the contracts are signed...

The nights draw in but the McIver workload remains simultaneously heavy and enjoyable. All the stuff you read about below is being published as we speak. New interviews on their way: The Haunted and Mastodon for Bass Guitar, The Berzerker for Rhythm (drummer David Gray, also of arch Satanists Akercocke, is a gentleman and a scholar), reviews of Japanese action movies in DVD Review, a funny interview with Eurovision-winning monsters Lordi in Total Guitar, reviews of the new Sisters Of Mercy and Cradle Of Filth albums in Record Collector... and loads of other stuff that I've forgotten about. I've also just written a cover endorsement for an excellent American book called Metallica & Philosophy (Blackwell).

Three more book deals in the offing, details posted here as soon as possible. World domination is surely but a step away.

The nice people at Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, Music Mart, Record Collector, Acoustic, Bass Guitar, Rhythm, Drummer, The Crack, Big Cheese, Guitar Techniques, Total Guitar, Powerplay and (maybe) Kerrang are going to run reviews of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. Reviews posted here when I see them. Then again, they might all think it's rubbish...

I'm now accessible via webcam, Skype user name joel.mciver (UK office hours).

Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is out! Get it here. Alternatively, the first person to email me the answer to this question gets a free signed copy: What's Ozzy's wife's name?

Elsewhere, I'm a talking head on this Metallica DVD along with a bunch of other journos and musicians; the next Metal Hammer includes a feature I wrote on Converge, and the one after that will have an interview with the mighty Anaal Nathrakh (possibly the heaviest band in the world).

Film and TV-wise, the new DVD Review mag has a ton of reviews in it -- Japanese horror, vintage Brit TV and the usual eclectic stuff.

Here's another chat with Steve Asheim of Deicide, this time for Rhythm.

McIver-penned stuff this month: Stewart Copeland and the brothers Carmine and Vinny Appice in Rhythm; the new Metal Hammer includes big ol' features on Emperor, To-Mera and Thine Eyes Bleed; Record Collector's review of the new Slayer album (3 stars out of 5, if you're interested); DVD Review mag is about to run an interview with The Matrix and Kill Bill fight choreographer Yuen Wo-Ping (conducted via the most useless translator ever); the aforementioned chat with Jean-Jacques Burnel is in Bass Player.

I've just interviewed Billy Gould (ex-Faith No More -- the best band there ever was) for Bass Guitar and Barney Greenway of Napalm Death for Hammer as well. Music Mart have commissioned a Trivium piece too. I'm also speaking to Steve Asheim of Deicide next week for a piece in Modern Drummer, should be a lot of fun.

Stepping away from all the grind and blastbeats, Metal Hammer's third Satanic special contains a piece by me on Elvis Presley and the evils of 1950s America. Thangyouverymuch, ma'am.

I recently compiled and sleevenoted this 3-CD collection by progressive rock legends Yes.

There's an interview with me in the new issue of the Mike Oldfield fanzine Dark Star, because I compiled EMI's recent 2-CD Oldfield best-of (buy it here) and interviewed the man himself for it.

There will be excerpts from my Metallica and Black Sabbath books in a cover-mounted book on a forthcoming issue of Classic Rock soon.

RIP Jesse Pintado of Terrorizer, who I interviewed on 27 July, exactly a month before his untimely death. Another good man down, dammit.

Tons of stuff in Metal Hammer -- the magazine and the specials on Satanism -- plus reviews in DVD Review and Record Collector. Just about to do a major feature on Stewart Copeland of The Police for Rhythm. If you're in the US keep an eye out for an interview in Bass Player with Jean-Jacques Burnel of the Stranglers -- there's a feature I did for them on Guy Pratt of Pink Floyd here.

Found this cool PIL site: www.fodderstompf.com.

Still haven't completed the HTML on the Links page but will get round to it soon, honest...

A quiet month (the McIver family has expanded, with corresponding lack of sleep) but look out for features in Metal Hammer on Carpathian Forest and Moonspell as well as the aforementioned Carmine and Vinny Appice summit in Rhythm. There's also the usual crop of reviews in DVD Review and an interview with Ice-T in Record Collector.

Here's an interview I did with Kerry King of Slayer.

Zzzzz...

Sex Pistols: The Making Of The Great Rock'N'Roll Swindle is out shortly and can be ordered here.

Keep an eye out for a Zyklon interview in the new Metal Hammer, reviews in the current Record Collector and DVD Review magazines, and interviews with Kenney Jones (Small Faces), Carmine Appice (Vanilla Fudge) and Vinny Appice (Black Sabbath) in Rhythm.

Metal Hammer are doing a series of one-shot specials on Satanism in rock, titled The Devil's Music. There's a bunch of features by Joel in there including a think-piece on the nature of evil and a rundown of the Nietzsche-related thinking that inspires a lot of black metal musicians.

There's a fair bit of writing around by Joel at the moment. Keep an eye out for an Ice-T feature in DVD Review magazine and a Cannibal Corpse interview in Metal Hammer. The next Hammer has a Satyricon interview in it, too.

Got a nice email from Therapy? bassist Michael McKeegan, who said of the Metallica biography: "Brilliant all round mate, as a Met fan from day one (first read about em in a K! Sylvie Simmons LA round-up!) it was glorious to re-live the early days and be re-reminded of their 'forgotten' history pre-Black album. In fact i even went and dug out Kill and Ride, listening to them in a completely new light... Put simply, your book refined and crystallised the thoughts of many old-school fans and presented them in an entertaining, comprehensive and mucho enjoyable way. Bestseller? Bloody right!" What a nice chap.

The Making Of The Sex Pistols' Great Rock'N'Roll Swindle is available for order at HMV.com here -- make my day, punks! If you can't wait that long, visit www.sex-pistols.net for the ultimate online resource.

The BBC 6 Music radio show Mint (on which Joel appears every Sunday night at 10.45) is crazy at the moment -- loads of (good-humoured) insults flying around. Go here to sample the madness...

RIP Jack Kane, Joel's predecessor on Mint, who died on 19 May last year. He has been a tough act to follow.

Record Collector's new issue says of Joel's Justice For All: The Truth About Metallica paperback that it is "an impressively comprehensive biography of not only Metallica, but the thrash metal movement as a whole". They also liked Joel's new Red Hot Chili Peppers book. What nice people.

Zero magazine also liked the Metallica biography, concluding that it is "a very well measured, objective look at one of the biggest metal bands in the world with eye-witness accounts of how they got to be so successful." Buy the book here.

The cover feature in the new issue of Bass Guitar is Joel's recent interview with Bill Wyman, in which he waxes lyrical about fretless basses, not getting credited for writing 'Jumping Jack Flash' and other cool stuff.

Joel's Sex Pistols movie book is published soon (details when it's out) and there are a ton of articles about to descend on the public -- Satyricon and Cannibal Corpse interviews for Metal Hammer, Guy Pratt for Bass Player, a funk-metal special and a Les Claypool feature (both for Classic Rock) among them.

Joel contributes this month to:
Record Collector: Suzi Quatro interview
Metal Hammer: Decapitated interview
DVD Review: a bunch of cool reviews
Acoustic: interviews with veteran folkie Andy Roberts

Joel's next book, The Making Of The Great Rock'N'Roll Swindle (MQ Publications) is on its way, featuring unpublished interviews with Jayne County, TV Smith, Dave Parsons of Sham 69 and a load of punk types.

Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Omnibus Press) is nearing completion and will be out in September. With four hundred pages and a ton of photos, as well as interviews with dozens of Sabbath-related personnel, it's causing something of a stir in pre-orders over at Amazon.

There's a feature in the Finnish metal mag Miasma on Joel and his new Metallica paperback. But you'll need to be able to read Finnish to understand it...

You can read features by Joel this month in:
Total Guitar: Extreme metal roundup with Akercocke, Deicide, Darkthrone, Kult Ov Azazel, Biomechanical and others; short feature on Metallica's 'Black Album'
Record Collector: Venom interview
Metal Hammer: Gorgoroth interview
DVD Review: Japanese anime vs. British animation
Bass Guitar: Interviews with Stereophonics, Suzi Quatro, Glenn Hughes, Roger Glover
Bass Player: Interview with The Darkness.

Joel recently received a letter from Varg Vikernes of Burzum, who is currently serving time in prison for murder in Norway, declining an interview for Metal Hammer. See a scan of the letter here.

Joel McIver's bestselling Metallica biography is now available in paperback, updated from the original 2004 hardback with new interviews with Dave Mustaine, Lars Ulrich, Joe Berlinger and others. The new book takes the band's story up to the release of Some Kind Of Monster and beyond.
Metal Hammer says of the new version: "It's all here, everything from each member's embryonic beginning, to that of the band and beyond... McIver has interviewed everyone from fired-lawyers to the neighbours' dogs, and clocking in at nearly 400 pages, the book is exhaustive... it's as much as you're ever likely to find out about the band."
Classic Rock writes: "McIver offers a deeper look into the biggest metal band in the world... exhaustive in its explanation of Metallica's much maligned Napster case, the making of the documentary film, Some Kind Of Monster, and the band's ever-shifting line-up... it certainly goes further to explain things no one has bothered to before."
Order the book here.