REGENTS MAY NOT BE METAL, BUT THEY LIKE METAL

Regents features current and ex-members of Sleepytime Trio, Maximillian Colby, Frodus, the Exploder, Battery, Combatwoundedveteran, Thursday, United Nations and Decahedron playing the sort of screwy and spazzy post-punk punk rock you’d expect a band featuring current and ex-members of Sleepytime Trio, Maximillian Colby, Frodus, the Exploder, Battery, Combatwoundedveteran, Thursday, United Nations and Decahedron to be playing. As well, the legendary J. Robbins is involved on the band’s latest album, Antietam After Party, acting as both engineer and playing bass. The album’s title is in commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Antietam which cursory glances at history sources tells me was one of the turning points in the American Civil War. Take a brief listen to what the band sounds like here:
http://rgnts.com/music/

Here’s a taste of what they look like when they’re sounding like that:

Here’s what they look like when they’re standing still:

In order to up the relevance of dropping mention of Regents here, we felt we needed to up the metal content. Thus, we asked a few of the members to let us know what their favourite metal albums are. This is what they came up with:

Jason Hamacher (drums)
So, I was running through the woods when it hit me: I’m 36-year-old child-raising, home-owning, wife-having, metal-loving, harDCore-playing, stage-diving adult. The sound track to this epiphany was my Metal Mix 1 playlist. It starts with Slayer followed by Metallica, Megadeth, & Entombed. Basically, I was exercising to my 8th grade music collection and wasn’t sure how that made me feel. There is music that affects us no matter how old we are. Here are three of my favorites:

Slayer- Seasons in the Abyss. I had a seriously rough asthma attack the night MTV debuted Slayer’s “War Ensemble” on Headbanger’s Ball. I was sleeping over at my friend Brian’s house and forgot to bring my inhaler. My breathing became more difficult as we quietly thrashed to Wrathchild, Vio-lence, Megadeth, Nuclear Assult, & Metallica videos while Brian’s parents slept in the room next door. Headbanger’s Ball was literally taking my breath away. The only medicine Brian had was Alka-Seltzer. As we dropped the tablets into water as “War Ensemble” came on TV. We were amazed how fast it was was and how awesome the drum fills were. Enthralled by Slayer, I sat struggling to breath hoping Alka-Seltzer Cold and Cough would cure an asthma attack. Near the end of the song I drank the Alka-Seltzer, blacked out, and hit Brian’s kitchen floor. I was slightly hurt, still couldn’t breath, and arose a Slayer fan for life.

Metallica – Ride the Lighting. “For Whom The Bell Tolls” was the first song I played with a guitarist, the legendary Brian Biegert of Satellite Beach, Fl. We were 12 and had I convinced my 8th grade science teacher to let our band play in the school cafeteria as a science experiment. The experiment had something to do with sound waves and I couldn’t tell you what we were measuring. We brought all our gear to school and set up during class. I used my parents comforter as a (failed) drum rug, and we put the Peavy combo amps on a lunch table. We blasted our classmates in the face with our Metallica experiment and ended up getting a B.

Sepultura – Beneath The Remains. The cover of this album is a skull with flowers!!!! Beneath the Remains was one of the first metal records I heard that started with an acoustic intro and busted into a thrash attack. I thought that was the best. I used to play it in the car to scare my parents. Brian and I used to blast this and mosh in our bed room. Florida Tank-tops in the pit!!!!!

Dave NeSmith (guitar/vocals)
Quiet Riot – Metal Health. Well I know this is quite the mainstream choice having been one of the first metal albums to make it to the top of the charts. But I love this record for how rounded it made my future likes in music. My Mom took me for my first record buying outing and with my allowance I was able to get three tapes. My choices were this record, Lionel Richie’s Can’t Slow Down and Berlin Love Life. I listened and loved all of them. It makes me laugh now at how different each one was. But Metal Health was the only one that got “TURN IT DOWN!” yells from my parents. Too late. The rebellion was already started.

Sliang Laos – Never Released. To my knowledge, the Richmond, VA greats Sliang Laos never got their LP out the door. Which is SUCH a shame. At first I just had a tape of this incredible band and now I have the mp3s. Are they metal? Definitely influenced by it, considered “mathy” and dark. nd heavy… oh my dark lord they are heavy! At one show the singer banged and scraped on a huge metal pipe while the rest of the band devastated the crowd.

Lukas Previn (bass)
Sleep – Holy Mountain.
It’s like smoking with gandalf and him showing you riffs.

Entombed – Wolverine Blues
A true showing of style beating out the desire to fist a thousand notes into every bar.

Varg Vilkernes
This isnt a band, but this one dude has had more of an impact on Black metal than most bands ever could. Do a Wiki on him and hold on.

The Dillinger Escape Plan – Under the Running Board
One time their old drummer hit me square between my eyes with a hurled drum stick at the end of their set at the Space in Worcester, Mass.

Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin 1
Hey wanna record the most influential shit in about a week then finger-fuck a girl with a fish?

Shit, even Mike from Darkest Hour digs ’em

[photos 1 and 2: chuck powell; #3 nathaniel shannon]