News & Updates — metal

In honor of the birthday of the great psych-funk guitarist Eddie Hazel, he of Funkadelic fame, here's a few assorted renditions of his signature emo-metal tune. It's astounding how many versions there are. While they are all pretty faithful, the range of different types of artists covering it is amazing. As such, I have included everyone from blues icon Buddy Guy to new age piano, famous rock stars to underground psych bands, alt-country to P-Funk related projects. You can decide for yourself which ones are worthy. This one, from the often boring French band AIR, possibly my fave cover of...

Unless you are a Brasileiro or follow modern Brazilian music you probably don't know who Chico Science was but he was a favorite of mine. In fact his band, Nação Zumbi, have continued to tour the world and make fresh albums mixing samba, psychedelia, funk and hard rock, along with regional folk styles of Northeast Brazil. Francisco de Assis França was born in the Northeastern state of Pernambuco, literally coming out of the swamps ("mangue"), and he helped found the manguebeat movement in Recife, a collective identity that nurtured the highly original arts and music scene that was on the...

Happy birthday to the Italian-American sculptor and sound artist Harry Bertoia! He was a jewelry-maker and designer who hit big with some finely crafted chairs. This allowed him to concentrate on creating these unique sound sculptures that lived in his barn that doubled as a mini concert hall. He would strike or "play" these things and the sound would reverberate into my amazed eardrums. I first heard these otherwordly sounds when a cache of self-produced "Sonambient" albums were found and distributed to the public in the mid-1990s. I bought a few of these records and still treasure them to this...

(drawing by Lukas Biel) An icon of heavy metal, Metallica bassist Cliff Burton died all too young at just 24, but not before he made three amazing albums with the band, including the top-rated Master Of Puppets, an album that shows this band of young drunks to possess incredible talent and song-writing chops. The bassists from the bands Black Sabbath, Rush, Thin Lizzy and Motorhead, as well as jazz bassist Stanley Clarke were his biggest influences. Check out his bass work on "Anesthesia (Pulling Teeth)" and "Orion" with Metallica. Here's that classic tune from Master of Puppets, "Orion": And I...

What happens when Chico Mann and the son of Herbie Mann get together to make a Afro-influenced fuzz-metal record? You get Here Lies Man. The drummer in the band is Geoff Mann, son of world music/jazz stylist Herbie Mann and the "Chico Mann" is of course the talented Marcos Garcia guitarist for Antibalas, Ocote Soul Sounds and others. The Los Angeles-based band is described as "Afrobeat meets Black Sabbath". Whoah! Two of our favorite sounds! How could we not have ears open on this one? Hermosa, CA-based stoner/doom rock & metal label RidingEasy Records are gearing up to release the...