Well, I just heard today via Lambgoat and the PRP that at a show last night (August 7th) in Cambridge, MA they announced that they are in the midst of finishing up a new album entitled White Silence. The record will be around 9 songs, and will be primarily of new material. It should be released by their long-time label Hydra Head. Great news!

Unfortunately, that is the extent to the news. I want to know more! I want to hear a new song and see the album artwork (even though I can’t imagine anyone has even begun to think about making artwork for the record given it’s unfinished.) After a quick search on Youtube I found a clip of one of the new songs. Check out “Centered” here. Sounds pretty awesome. I can’t wait to hear a proper mp3.

M83 “Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts” 3.5/5 A synth heavy spacewalk that soars more often than bores. Mars rover as drum machine #nwms

Om “Pilgrimage” 3/5 Transcendental stoner metal, meditation on unison of the Godhead & the tonic via bass, drum & droning vocal #nwms

Electric Wizard “Dopethrone” 4/5 Fantastic voyage on a magic carpet to the gates of Hell only to discover the Devil is high as a kite #nwms

Harvey Milk “My Love Is Higher Than Your Assessment of What My Love Could Be” 4/5 Pre-emo sad bastard at the bottom of a glass #nwms

Ra Ra Riot “The Orchard” 4/5 Sound of zipping up your jacket & breathing deep the brisk air. Scent of a tended fire. Fine, fall music. #nwms

Neurosis’ “Times of Grace” 4.5/5 Loneliest sea battle of man vs. God ever, an atheistic Jonah in crashing chords #nwms

The Flaming Lips’ “Embryonic” 3.5/5 More noir, noisy & paranoid than Kirby’s Dreamland, but suffers from being too long (18 tracks!) #nwms

Sunn O)))’s “Monoliths & Dimensions 4/5 Druid music enveloped in fog & pre-dawn light. Heavy & bowel shakingly sub-bass low #nwms

Mammoth Grinder “Extinction of Humanity” 4/5 A veritable greatest hits of death metal & early grind. Napalm Death, Autopsy & Discharge #nwms

Clinging To The Trees Of A Forest Fire “Songs of Ill Hope & Desperation” 4/5 When you can’t Liberate Te Ex Inferus #nwms

Kvelertak s/t 4/5 Norweigan black’n'roll that is less Nachtmystium & more Baroness. Who knew such fun could be had in corpse paint? #nwms

Lightning Swords of Death “The Extra Dimensional Wound” 1.5/5 Should have been called The Extra Forgettable Songs instead #nwms

Ion Dissonance “Cursed” 3.5/5 Currently occupying the space between Infinity & Nothing. Plenty to bob the head about. #nwms

Norma Jean “Meridional” 4/5 NJ has moved into the “heavy” territory that Thrice abandoned post-Vheissu #nwms

High On Fire’s “Blessed Black Wings” 4/5 Crazy Train + H&H Sabbath with manic vocals that fully embrace the melodic Dies Irae #nwms

is listening & enjoying an old TX hardcore band Big Boys for (nearly) the last hour #nwms

Big Boys’ “Fat Elvis” 4.5/5 31 song comp of three LPs, Bad Brains – Bob Marley + Funkadelic, new fav. early hardcore band #nwms

thinks he may have heard the first hardcore “breakdown” ever in Black Flag’s “My War” from the 1982 demo #nwms

Black Flag’s “1982 Demo” 4.5/5 All the aggression of the first EPs no BS noodling, perfect line-up, songs & intensity FAV HXC album #nwms

Fight Amp’s “Manners & Praise” 3.5/5 Young Widows if kept Breather Resist moniker – Jesus Lizard + Shellac #howfire: 3 #nwms

Iron Age’s “The Sleeping Eye” 3.5/5 “Dress as your favorite centurion” themed thrash party that degenerates to fantasy drinking games #nwms

Kylesa’s “Static Tensions” 3/5 Nate Newton fronts Baroness playing Old Man Gloom covers. Crusty sludge rock #nwms

Pissed Jeans’ “Hope for Man” 4/5 Disgorging noise punk, dirtiest stripper bar band in PA, vocals akin to David Yow #nwms

Rollins Band’s “End of Silence” 4.5/5 Being punched in the head while staring at Henry’s four black bars bc he has you in a head lock #nwms

Unsane “Visqueen” 3/5 Loud, noisy NYC stoner post-hardcore/grunge with a chip on its shoulder. Heavy, groovy, great angry music #nwms

Nile’s “Those Whom The Gods Detest” 4/5 Wow, epic ancient egyptian fantasy death metal? Yes! Arabic singing? YES! Crazy leads? YES!!! #nwms

Agoraphobic Nosebleed’s “Agorapocalypse” 4/5 Excellent varied grindcore full of devastatingly heavy vocals, riffs, speed & breakdowns #nwms

Flipper’s “American Grafishy” 3.5/5 Rick Rubin produced rock record with teeth, sounds a bit like F* Up listened to this b4 Chemistry #nwms

Gojira’s “From Mars to Sirius” 5/5 Like sibling Mastodon, G’s heavy, melodic, devastatingly beautiful. Diverse vox heard in awhile #nwms

Behemoth’s “Evangelion” 4.5/5 Musical Lord of the Rings epic with Sauron winning. Heaviest blackened death metal cd til judgement day #nwms

Hatebreed’s “Perseverence” 2.5/5 Middle of the road mosh, sounds like most NY hardcore #nwms

Lamb of God’s “New American Gospel” 2.5/5 LoG paved modern metalcore highway but not down with vox. Brutal as Rambo #nwms

In Flames’ “Clayman” 4/5 Swedish melodic death metal, beginning of “gothenburg” sound #nwms

Lamb of God + In Flames = Killswitch Engage (& the rest of the melodic metalcore 2001 scene) #nwms

Nachtmystium’s “Assassins…” 4.5/5 Incredibly diverse black/death/prog metal with riffs! & choruses! & guitar solos! wee!!! #nwms

Big Business’ “Here Comes the Waterworks” 3/5 Buzz Osbourne’s (Melvins) & Troy Sanders’ (Mastodon) lovechild play Sabbath covers #nwms

Marduk’s “Wormwood” 1.5/5 Couldn’t finish. It’s too kvlt maybe. Trvly boring. Gruesome vox though. #nwms

Church of Misery’s “Houses of the Unholy” 3.5/5 Rockin’ 7 min blues-based hardcore. makes me wanna bleach my tips #nwms

Jucifer’s “L’Autrichienne” 4/5 The soundtrack to Terminator starring Clint Eastwood directed by Alejandro Jodorowsky. In a word: Trippy #nwms

Daath’s “The Concealers” 3/5 Entombed/Repulsion-esque death metal, slick production, endlessly heavy if not a tad repetitive #nwms

Propagandhi’s “Supporting Caste” 4/5 All over the map, fast “emo” rock with hints of Bad Religion & Thrice. Really good #nwms

Polar Bear Club’s “Chasing Hamburg” 2/5 Poppy emo-rock, just cause you play Am Tele’s thru Oranges don’t make your songs good #nwms

Goatwhore’s “Carving Out…” 2/5 Black/death metal with crust & doom influence. Exciting start, asleep by end #nwms

Thursday’s “Common Existence” They get better with every record, melodic hardcore that pops, Rickley’s vox are spot on too #nwms

At the Gates “Slaughter of the Soul” 4/5 Beginning of melodic death metal, tasteful use of keyboards, riffs on fire, classic #nwms

Blut Aus Nord’s “Memoria Vetusta II” 4/5 Chilling & epically prog black metal. Solos smooth as ice on frozen duck’s back, if this is hipster metal give me more #nwms

So far Caitlin’s had one 2 hour session and she still has to go back for color. The same tattoo artist who did my more recent arm piece did Caitlin’s too. Her name is Lauren and she’s pretty great. I’m planning on having her do another for me but I’m currently design-less and am not sure what I’d like to get next. Check out a few photos of Caitlin’s tattoo at my Flickr page.

ABC just launched a fun, kind of terrifying, mystical, psychological murder mystery called Happytown. Great show so far. I’ve seen two episodes that you can also see at Hulu. It reminds me of one of my all time favorite TV dramas, and one you should all see if you haven’t, David Lynch’s Twin Peaks (which can also been seen over at CBS.) I’ve always enjoyed mystical shows (X-Files comes to mind) as well as crime dramas (I’ve been watching Castle lately too) so Happytown was right up my channel (or alley, or whatever.) Love the first two episodes (I mean, come on, it has Sam Neill playing a Dr. Weir-type character!) then today I was saddened to see ABC has decided to cancel the show.

THEY CANCELED A BRAND NEW SHOW AFTER TWO EPISODES! TWO!

Why? WHY ABC? Why do you cancel shows before they have a chance? What if you canceled LOST after two episodes because it was slow-going catching on? I’m just baffled.

Well, it may be hard selling you on the show now knowing it has already been canceled, but if you’d like to check it out, there’s a link towards the top of this post. And if it turns out that you like it, as do I, please consider sending ABC a quick “WTF are you canceling a show after two episodes?” message at their site. The link is this picture right below.

I got the guitar for Christmas my freshman year of high schoolcollege (before that I played an Ibanez RG570) and kept it until the spring before my junior year ended. I sold it on eBay and bought a different guitar because of another guitar player I grew to admire. It’s a few albums before we get to him though so you’ll just have to wait to see…

Daath’s “The Concealers” 3.5/5 Entombed/Repulsion-esque death metal, slick production, endlessly heavy #howfire: 7 #nwms

The Flaming Lips’ “Embryonic” 3.5/5 More noir, noisy & paranoid than Kirby’s Dreamland, suffers from being too long (18 tracks!) #nwms

Propagandhi’s “Supporting Caste” 4/5 All over the map, fast “emo” rock with hints of Bad Religion & Thrice. Really good. #howfire: 2 #nwms

Polar Bear Club’s “Chasing Hamburg” 2/5 Poppy emo-rock, formulaic songs played with good equipment #howfire: -3 #nwms

Goatwhore’s “Carving Out…” 2/5 Black/death metal with crust & doom influence. Starts strong, ends boring #howfire: 7 #nwms

Thursday’s “Common Existence” They get better with every record, melodic hardcore that pops, Rickley’s vox are spot on too #howfire: 1 #nwms

At the Gates “Slaughter of the Soul” 4/5 Beginning of melodic metal, tasteful use of keyboards, riffs on fire #howfire: 6 #nwms

Blut Aus Nord’s “Memoria Vetusta II” 4/5 Chilling & epically prog black metal. Solos smooth as ice on frozen duck’s back. #howfire: 4 #nwms

im going to also start ascribing a #howfire level to these #nwms records on a scale of Jane Doe (10) to #crabcore (-10) #nwms

Behemoth’s #howfire score is a 6 #nwms

Hatebreed’s “Perseverence” 2.5/5 Middle of the road moshcore, sounds like most NY hardcore #howfire: 3 #nwms

Lamb of God’s “New American Gospel” 2.5/5 LoG paved modern metalcore highway but not down with vox. Brutal as Rambo #howfire: 7 #nwms

In Flames’ “Clayman” 4/5 Swedish melodic death metal, beginning of “gothenburg” sound #howfire: 4 #nwms

Lamb of God + In Flames = Killswitch Engage (& the rest of the melodic metalcore 2001 scene) #nwms

Sunn O)))’s “Monoliths & Dimensions 4/5 Druid music enveloped in fog & pre-dawn light. Heavy & bowel shakingly sub-bass low #howfire: 6 #nwms

Nachtmystium’s “Assassins…” 4.5/5 Incredibly diverse black/death/prog metal with riffs! & choruses! & guitar solos! wee! #howfire: 5 #nwms

Big Business’ “Here Comes the Waterworks” 3/5 Jim Ward (Sparta) & Troy Sanders’ (Mastodon) lovechild play Sabbath covers #howfire: 1 #nwms

Marduk’s “Wormwood” 1.5/5 Couldn’t finish. It’s too kvlt maybe. Trvly boring. Gruesome vox though. #howfire: 4 #nwms

Church of Misery’s “Houses of the Unholy” 3.5/5 Rockin’ 7 min. blues-based hardcore. makes me wanna bleach my tips #howfire: 3 #nwms

first up: Unsane’s 2007 “Visqueen” #nwms
about 17 hours ago from Twitterrific

Unsane “Visqueen” 3/5 Loud, noisy NYC stoner post-hardcore/grunge with a chip on its shoulder. Heavy, groovy, great angry music #nwms
about 16 hours ago from Twitterrific

Nile’s “Those Whom The Gods Detest” 4/5 Wow, epic ancient egyptian fantasy death metal? Yes! Arabic singing? YES! Crazy leads? YES!!! #nwms
about 15 hours ago from Twitterrific

Agoraphobic Nosebleed’s “Agorapocalypse” 4/5 Excellent varied grindcore full of devastatingly heavy vocals, riffs, speed & breakdowns #nwms
about 14 hours ago from Twitterrific

Flipper’s “American Grafishy” 3.5/5 Rick Rubin produced rock record with teeth, sounds a bit like F* Up listened to this b4 Chemistry #nwms
about 12 hours ago from Twitterrific

Gojira’s “From Mars to Sirius” 5/5 Like sibling Mastodon, G’s heavy, melodic, devastatingly beautiful. Diverse vox heard in awhile #nwms
about 11 hours ago from Twitterrific

I’m also going to be recording some instrumental guitar music by my friend/brother John Brit. John is a killer player, riff auteur and song writer & I’m completely stoked to be tracking his tasty music. I think I will also be starting that this weekend. We’ll see.

Life at Hartford Coffee (@hartfordcc on twitter) has not done anything to make my life less budy. We’re doing quite a bit of business lately, especially on weekends, and I’m roasting much more coffee than I was when I started in June. The best selling coffee too is our Italian Roast which is a blend recipe & roast I created. It’s been great, don’t get me wrong, just extra busy. On top of cafe hours & roasting hours I’ve been tasting all our coffees & writing “flavor & pairing descriptions.” Let just say, after tasting your 6th different coffee in 3 hours it all begins to taste the same. Oh, and you begin to feel all fidgity like your insides are about explode. It’s awesome!

I’ve bought several records lately that I’ll write about briefly later. F* Up’s “The Chemistry of Common Life,” Doomriders “Darkness Come Alive,” Converge’s “Axe to Fall,” Mastodon’s “Crack the Skye,” Coalesce “OX,” Baroness’ discography & Brand New’s “Daisy.” Each & every one of those records are awesome & are challenging & motivating me to write the best songs & riffs I possibly can. The motivation has been extremely helpful as I’ve already written two songs with two more in the works.

Last thing for this post is tomorrow is Converge at the Pageant with High On Fire, Mastodon & Deathlok (the last of which is the joke band from the Adult Swim program Metalocalypse.) I’m more than stoked. I’m expecting Converge to rip my face off It’s going to be awesome to see Converge’s vocalist Jacob Bannon run around the Pageants super large stage like the madman performer he is. It’s going to be a great show.

Until next time…