Metal News for January 21, 2004
Last updated on October 4, 2025 at 3:07 AM ET
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Hot Topics
- Trivium Parts Company With Drummer
- Kreator To Release New Album In January
- Enthroned To Release New Album In December
- Potato Premiere New Single & Music Video "YUGE PP"
- Omnium Gatherum Drops "Walking Ghost Phase" Video
- Messa Shares New Music Video "Reveal"
- Spite Premiere New Single & Music Video
- Carcosa (AngelMaker) Premiere New Single & Video
- Stellar Circuits Premiere New Single & Music Video
- Agnostic Front Premiere New Single & Lyric Video
13 news articles posted on this day.
Headline News
Century Media Now Majority Owner of Now Or Never
The following is the press release on the Century Media Records website:
"The Century Family is proud to announce it’s joining forces with New Jersey-based label Now Or Never Records. This exciting collaboration will result in the Century Family, and its affiliated imprints, handling the manufacturing, marketing, and retail distribution of current and upcoming Now Or Never releases. This includes highly anticipated releases from DIECAST, DEVILINSIDE and THE POSTMAN SYNDROME.
Now Or Never has made a name for itself as more than just a typical hardcore label, but as a diverse operation showcasing a wide spectrum of aggressive styles, featuring acts like DIECAST, THE DILLENGER ESCAPE PLAN, BRAND NEW SIN, DEVILINSIDE, WORTHLESS UNITED, ALL ELSE FAILED and THE POSTMAN SYNDROME. Its artists have landed impressive tours that include SLAYER, MOTORHEAD, HATEBREED and BLACK LABEL SOCIETY, among others, while being backed by a team of dedicated, energetic music lovers with quality distribution to aid in their already imminent impact on the music world. Now Or Never and the Century Family’s emphasis continues to focus on building up their artists in a “classic” artist development sense, a valued ethic that has been lacking throughout much of the music industry. It’s this ideal that has garnered much success with both labels’ diverse rosters and lasting relationships with their bands."
Too Pure To Die Enter Studio
Minneapolis group Too Pure To Die recently entered Logic Studios (Martyr AD) to record their debut full-length for State Of The Art Recordings. Look for the effort to hit streets in March.
Poison The Well, The Bled, etc. Tour Dates
Dates for the upcoming Poison The Well, The Bled, Murder By Death, and The Kinison tour have been firmed up. Here's the latest: More...
Drowning Pool To Announce New Singer On HBB
DROWNING POOL are advising their fans to tune in to "Headbanger's Ball" this Saturday, January 24 at 10:00 p.m. for a "special announcement that you don't want to miss!"
The Texan band are expected to reveal that they have recruited ex-BUILT XL frontman Jason "Gong" Jones to fill the singer slot left vacant by the death of Dave Williams.
The 30-year-old Williams was found dead on the DROWNING POOL tour bus on August 14, 2002 while the band were touring as part of the U.S. Ozzfest. An inquest into the singer's death in September 2002 concluded that the vocalist died from cardiomyopathy, a heart muscle disease for which he was never diagnosed. No traces of drugs were found in Williams' system, finally dispelling widespread speculation about the cause of his death.
Machine Head Drummer Discusses US Label Situation
MACHINE HEAD drummer Dave McClain recently spoke to the U.K.'s Live 4 Metal about the circumstances that led to the group's split with the U.S. branch of Roadrunner Records after releasing five full-length albums through the label (including the live CD, "Hellalive").
"It's weird," McClain explained. "All the different territories of Roadrunner are kind of like their own little label. For the rest of the world, they all wanted us back. They were pretty much all on the same page, but Roadrunner U.S. is kind of a different place. They started trying to break all these bands. When NICKELBACK broke, I think they started getting a lot of bands that were kind of like NICKELBACK or whatever. I think they kind of changed their priorities from where they were before NICKELBACK broke. They wanted to be a different kind of label. At the time, they didn't really feel like our record was what they were into, but once they saw how good it was doing when it came out, of course, they stepped up and said we'd really love to have this record and blah, blah, blah. It was kind of a weird thing. It would have been great 10 months ago [laughs]." Asked if the band have secured a U.S. deal for their new album, McClain said, "Hopefully, we'll be announcing the American deal soon. We'll see what happens. The people that we're talking with right now, at least the main companies, we feel are almost where Roadrunner was a while back, like when we were first with them, like right around the time of 'The More Things Change'. They have the whole marketing thing down to market a record like we've got now, so we should be all right."
MACHINE HEAD's fifth studio album, "Through The Ashes Of Empires", has been available in Europe since October.
Read the full article at Live 4 Metal.
Ayreon Sign With Inside Out Records
AYREON, the brainchild of Dutch guitarist Arjen Lucassen (ex-BODINE, VENGEANCE), have inked a new deal with Inside Out Records. Lucassen's first release for Inside Out under the AYREON banner will be the band's much-anticipated new CD, "The Human Equation", tentatively due in May.
In other news, URIAH HEEP's Ken Hensley and IQ keyboardist Martin Orford have both been recruited to appear on the upcoming album. "Ken was asked if he could give a killer Hammond performance, and he delivered in true URIAH HEEP form," reads a posting on Lucassen's web site.
As previously reported, "The Human Equation" will feature guest appearances by a number of world-class singers, including James LaBrie (DREAM THEATER), Mikael Åkerfeldt (OPETH), Devin Townsend (STRAPPING YOUNG LAD), Devon Graves (a.k.a. Buddy Lackey, DEAD SOUL TRIBE, ex-PSYCHOTIC WALTZ), Magnus Ekwall (THE QUILL), Heather Findlay (MOSTLY AUTUMN), Eric Clayton (SAVIOUR MACHINE) and Mike Baker (SHADOW GALLERY).
A short preview "The Human Equation" is currently available online in Windows Media format at this location.
RIAA Resumes Lawsuits
The recording industry today reignited its legal campaign against online music piracy, filing lawsuits against 532 people it accused of illegally swapping copyrighted music on the Internet.
The Recording Industry Association of America's legal salvo is the first since a federal appeals court ruling last month restricted the group's ability to track down the identities of suspected file sharers.
Read the full article at Washingtonpost.com.
Rob Zombie Enlists Borland And Lohner
ROB ZOMBIE has enlisted some diverse personnel to accompany him in the studio for the recording of his new CD. Danny Lohner of NINE INCH NAILS and Wes Borland who once was in LIMP BIZKIT have the honor of joining Zombie after he finishes up filming for the sequel to 'House of 1000 Corpses'.
The Judas Cradle Release MP3 From New Album
Check out the latest song from THE JUDAS CRADLE entitled "What to do in Oregon when your van breaks down", the song is off their upcoming album "Too bad they're all dead", available for pre-order through Eulogy Records. You can download the MP3 of "What to do in Oregon when your van breaks down" right here.
Lacuna Coil And In Flames Extend Contracts
LACUNA COIL and IN FLAMES have both extended their respective contracts with Century Media and Nuclear Blast. In light of that, both bands will be releasing new albums this year on those labels, as previously reported.
Kthulu Productions Update
Two new releases by the CA based Khtulu Productions:
Finally after 6 long years, the "Under the Serpentine Spell" rehearsals by CRIMSON MOON will be officially released as a limited cassette tape to 500 with very special packaging!!! This will be released during 2004 on Kthulu Productions and Silcharde Records.
NIBIRU will be arriving in 2004. Cold, dark, Atmospheric Black metal by Nocturnal Overlord of Crimson Moon. Originally started as an ambient keyboard project, then progressed to a very dark and epic journey like no other... 2 CD releases are being worked on now.
Destruction Prepare DVD
Schmier, the singer of Germany’s legendary Thrash Metal trio, DESTRUCTION, recently talked about the band’s new live DVD “Live Discharge - 20 Years Of Total Destruction":
“This DVD features DESTRUCTION material from all eras including myself on vocals. We did try to catch that energy of a thrash show rather than just recording the most perfect, clean and flawless concert.”
Beside a large live section with concerts filmed at Wacken Open Air, With Full Force and the Metal Days at the Swiss club Z7 the DVD also contains a lot of bonus material in the form of backstage and extra footage, interviews, two video clips ( ‘Desecrators Of The New Age’ and ‘The Ravenous Beast’) and a detailed band history among other things. Together with the backstage and 'on the road' footage you will get a nice extra look behind the curtain of a DESTRUCTION show.
Release: February 2004
Mnemic Win A Danish Metal Award
The Industrial Detah metallers from Denmark MNEMIC, who were nominated for the Danish Metal Award 2003 with their debut album “Mechanical Spin Phenomena”, won the award for “Album of the Year”! Furthermore MNEMIC’s bass player Tomas “Obeast” Koefoed got the decoration “Best Bass Player”.
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