5) It’s not a specific moment. All of us who later turned into bands like In Flames, Dark Tranquillity, At the Gates, Ceremonial Oath, and Tiamat. We were just hanging out, listening to heavy metal, starting our little pre-bands. It was just 20-30 people hanging out, going to beaches, drinking beer, starting bonfires, listening to old thrash and death metal albums. (more…)

We here at Decibel were going to plan an elaborate Deciblog Holiday post. Something in the order of Bergdorf Goodman. But the elves were redistributed from our Holiday Department to Graphics. The layouts for Decibel issues #52 and #53 must be on deadline. And we’re always professionally behind.

From Decibel to you: Merry Shitmas, fuckers!

Audio excerpt courtesy of defunct Swedish thrashers Gehennah. Song title “Merry Shitmas.”

By Christos Antoniou (guitars) of Septicflesh:

Christmas is another case of human stupidity, an excuse for extended consumerism and a programmed state of “happiness” and joy brought to you by “G.O.D. LTD”. It is a time for drunkards dressed in red and white funny clothing, to mask themselves as the heroes of a new generation of stupid children that are living a lie just for the sake of tradition. (more…)

So it takes two Australians, an associate professor and a research assistant, from the British Medical Journal to come to the conclusion that headbanging isn’t good for neck and head health. Pretty much any concert-going dude into metal could tell you that. He might not be able to tell you scientifically why headbanging causes neck pain and headache, but he’ll tell you nonetheless.

The funniest thing about this research is one of the suggested courses of action is to take a course before you go to heavy metal concerts. Also, watching news anchor Elizabeth Cohen demonstrate the headbang is awesome.

Click here to read the article. WARNING: science content.

OK, lots of out of print CDs sell for big bucks (~$400 range) on eBay these days, but check out these (here and here) listings, by seller thergothon72, for Sororicide’s The Entity.

We’re in elephant bucks land here, folks. $2,800.00 for the first listing and $3,574.50 for the second (private for you CEO types) is astronomically high for an admittedly rare, if average, CD. The dude has $3,300.00 and $4,289.40 for Buy It Now! But he’s offering free shipping. What a deal!

Uh, for those prices you could fly to Iceland, hire the band for a private gig, a local model to hang on you, stock up on Brennivin, barf up some Hákarl, and have a grand old fucking time in/out of the geothermal springs. The Icelandic Kronur is at an all-time low against the dollar ($1 U.S. = 122.080 ISK).

So, uh, anyway here’s Sororicide’s MySpace.

We here at Team Decibel can’t get enough of Guitar Hero: World Tour. When we heard RedOctane and Activision were bringing a Metallica version of the game we got pretty fuckin’ excited. We’ve paddled our plastic guitar-controller to death trying to perfect “Trapped Under Ice” in GT: World Tour, but our collective head explodes when we contemplate paddling/faux-drumming through songs like “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “Master of Puppets,” and “Hit the Lights.”

Initial reports are 28 Metallica songs will be playable. (more…)

Guitar hero Scott ‘Wino’ Weinrich talks to Decibel about his upcoming solo album for Southern Lord and the Shrinebuilder project for Neurot Recordings. 2009’s gonna be heavy.

Decibel: Tell me about Shrinebuilder.
Scott ‘Wino’ Weinrich: Shrinebuilder involves Dale Crover from the Melvins, Scott Kelly from Neurosis, Al from Om, and me. We’re going to get together and record a record. It’s definitely an art project, ’cause we’ve not had the luxury of having long, drawn-out rehearsals. As a matter of fact, we’ve only got together a handful of times. (more…)

It’s only a matter of time before the universe explodes.