Riffs Across Generations
Welcome to RIFFS ACROSS GENERATIONS. I am your host, Andrew. I have been metal since the day is long. Tracing back to the 80’s with tape trading, editing a fanzine (TIN BEAN FANZINE) and years as the growler for a Western Massachusetts death metal band (CLOT) I have seen the trends and sounds come and go. Joining me is our co-host Eli. I am an aspiring guitar wizard who loves to mess with all types of gear I am a metal head to the core. i was Born after the glory days of metal, but am forging ahead and creating the next generation of head banging to be louder and more brutal than ever. We cover the music from old to new, from Nuclear Assault to Cattle Decapitation and everything in between. Come on the journey with us and submerge yourself in the METAL JOURNEY ACROSS GENERATIONS!
Riffs Across Generations
Episode One- Why Are We Doing This? (It is for the METAL!)
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
In this, the maiden voyage of RIFFS ACROSS GENERATIONS, Eli and Andrew discuss metal shows, new releases, metal news and some tours that are up and coming. This episode also discusses what is to come, what each episode will look like and what topics we will be discussing. LONG LIVE METAL \m/
Metal Music Podcast Inaugural Episode
Speaker 1Hey everyone , welcome to the initial first UNO episode of Riffs Across Generations . If you didn't hear the previously launched trailer that we sent out , let me give you a little bit of insight on who we are and what we are doing here . My name is Andrew . I'm an old dude , been into metal for a very long time and , if you were listening , remember tape trading . I did a fanzine called the Tin Bean Fanzine . I was a death metal lead singer for a band called Klot out of western Massachusetts . So I've seen a lot . I've seen trends come and go and I am joined by my co-host , eli . Tell me what's up , eli .
Speaker 2I'm an aspiring guitarist who loves to mess around with all types of gear . I'm metalhead to the core . I was born after the glory days of metal , but I'm forging ahead in creating the next generation of head banging to be louder and more brutal than ever .
Speaker 1Yeah , so , eli , you've missed a lot of the earlier metal bands , but you've seen some of them , right ? Yeah , so you've seen Sacred Rite .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1You've seen .
Speaker 2Cannibal Corpse . Immolation . Morbid Angel Obituary .
Speaker 1Yeah , so you've seen a DRI , yeah , dri . So you've seen a lot of the old ones and then you've also met a lot of new ones . I think we're at a really good crossroad in music right now , with the old bands coming back and putting stuff out , and then the new bands are coming out with some really intense stuff , right .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1Yeah , so last couple months we've been a little bit busy going to shows and we've actually seen Zack Wilde twice , right .
Speaker 2Yeah , pantera and Zack Sabbath , which the Zack Sabbath show was crazy , like you couldn't even get out of the gates at the end of it .
Speaker 1Yeah , so we usually go to smaller clubs to see shows . Right , we see bands that maybe aren't ready for or never got to that point where they play in big stages and selling out arenas and stuff like DRI shows or obituary shows or things like that that were obituary's headlining . So we saw Zack at With Zack Sabbath and with Pantera , and one was a pretty big outdoor venue , right Standing Room , only 2,500 people and then the Pantera show . Of course was that Omelie Arena , which was a huge indoor show .
Speaker 2Yeah , pyrotechnics .
Speaker 1So some problems taking you to those outdoor venues , right ? So what happened during the Zack Sabbath show ?
Speaker 2With Zack Sabbath . There was a guy in front of us kept moving back , and then there's another drunk guy , who's unbelievably drunk out of his mind , who was pushing guys . He was not paying attention , he was just crazy . The whole thing was crazy .
Speaker 1Yeah , it seemed like that man in front of you kept moving in front of you . He had shoulders like three times as wide as that . He had skinny dudes with .
Speaker 2Really wide shoulders right . Yeah , he had big padded coat shoulders .
Speaker 1Yeah , he was crazy . And then we went to Omelie to see Pantera and Lama God , who were just pretty incredible , right .
Speaker 2Yeah , the sound was pretty good there , but that .
Speaker 1Yeah , kind of echoey right .
Speaker 2A little echoey , but also like the sound , for the first song of Lama God , which was Walk With Me In Hell , was so bad you couldn't hear any of the guitars . It was like , oh , what's next ? And then the drums . At the beginning they didn't get the drums right and it was like it blew everyone's ears out because drum the kick drum the hit it it was like you could hear the whole , like Omelie arena shake .
Speaker 1Yeah , you could feel it in your guts too , right . Yeah , stomach like all wiggly .
Speaker 2That was a good one .
Speaker 1And then there's the security lady at Omelie Arena .
Speaker 2No .
Speaker 1No .
Speaker 2So we were .
Speaker 1Yeah , we were on the floor behind the pit not in the pit , because the pit was kind of crazy for the show , but there was a security lady standing right in front of the pit which was like three rows in front of us , and she was a little .
Speaker 2A little too good at her job . If you put your feet too far out in the aisle because that's how I saw she would be like hey , you got to put your feet back in the aisle and she'll run across it with like a light , like she'll have a light and she'll just go around the aisle . Same with that old guy . And then some guy jumped over the wall to get into the pit because you had to pay extra to get into the pit area , like you had to go through the security thing . He just jumped it and the lady was like trying to grab his shoe and he just like ticked her in the face and it was like . Then she ran and went to go get the other older guy who was over there and like I don't understand why she went to go get him . What was he going to do ? Go into the pit and find him ? Like that's not .
Speaker 1Yeah , he kind of got lost in the pit . So , if you haven't guessed , eli is my son and we go to a lot of shows , and we decided to take everything that I know and everything that he's learning and everything he's experiencing and turn it into this podcast . What we'll do each episode we're going to bring you some music reviews like this one right here , and , thank you , I will win John , and that's announced
Metal Music Reviews and Tour Updates
Speaker 1. The apocalypse released their latest album experience machine . Yeah album was released what a month ago .
Speaker 1Yeah yeah , and it's a roller coaster ride of progressive metal with aggressive thrash and aggressive Death tones . The band's second album and it showcases musical talents of the complete band , so I really like that . You can hear the bass and the drums . Yeah it's really well , as you can hear each instrument pretty clear on it . It's because it's probably because he went to more sound studio , right ?
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1Yeah , so the they did the final mix . It more sound and you can hear , I Guess , the the spirit of Chuck Schaldinger and some of his things you can hear that . Yeah , that , that that old school death metal coming through and a really new school kind of way . Progressive thrash death metal album . This is how the band describes the album here . A .
Speaker 2Concept album set in polarized , dystopian world , seen through the eyes of stories . Protagonist a man lost in depression and heartache . All seems lost until a chance encounter with a mysterious doctor lets him Doctor sets him on a new path to find peace in mind and escape from the chaos of his life . What will be the final outcome for the protractedist ? Are you ready to enter the experience machine ?
Speaker 1Yeah , so that's pretty cool . So we know this is a concept album and and we were talking a little bit earlier concept albums and of course , the the Most known concept album is won by Queens Reich operation mind crime , which isn't too far from this Concept . So we have a , you know , a throwback to when progressive Bands used to do concept albums like this and in each song . Now that we understand the concept , we won't give too much away on this , but you can hear the feel of what's going on . It's like a movie and this is like the movie soundtrack to each part .
Speaker 2Yeah , it's like it goes through the . I think everything in the albums it's all the songs are in order , so it all makes sense and stuff like that .
Speaker 1Yeah , and when , when he's , when he's feeling really good about parts in there , it's a little bit upbeat . I'm not too upbeat , so I'm not talking about , like you know , like a glam metal or anything like that but then one is really depressing parts . You can really feel it in the music . Yeah , and it's been live . They're true to music , live . So it sounds really complicated to play on In when you're listening to it , but live they pull it off really well .
Speaker 1Yeah that's another one We've been listening to a lot that just came out . This is the new vitriol album called suffer and become . So we saw them about a year ago on the morbid angel tour , I think it was , and we were joking . Before the Before the set , before we saw vitriol , were listening to the first album and it just makes our brain scrambled eggs . Right yeah .
Speaker 1Yeah , we're wondering how they're gonna pull that crap off live . But they did and they were insane and we kind of fell in love with the band both at that point . And then they come out with this album , which is more insane than the first one .
Speaker 2No , somehow . Yeah , the first song in that album is sedouzi , and all the albums , all the songs are all with . You see , actually , I don't know how they pull it off live , but they did crazy .
Speaker 1Yeah , like each , each person , and that album has to be the pinnacle at what they do and what they play . I mean , I don't . I don't know how they keep up . Shaman is after birth was the first single that they released out there , and the guitar solo with the sweet picking towards the end Was just , you know , insane . And , as a guitarist , what do you think about that , eli ?
Speaker 2Just like the in , it's like throughout that it's not just in the solo , it's throughout the whole song . He's like sweeping parts and same with the bassist . The bassist was doing like taping live , like he was crazy . Yeah , it's just all crazy .
Speaker 1Yeah , this is one of those bands that you know are crazy sounding but put together the songs very well . It's well organized . I know it took the band a long time to put these songs together , but my assumption is you know , being a vocalist , I really don't have these feelings . But a lot of musicians who listen to stuff like this must feel really bad about themselves and the way they play when they compare themselves . So the guys in vitriol yeah , yeah , it's just Sure .
Speaker 2They've been playing for most of their life and that's about all they've done . All I mean the band isn't that . How old is the band ? They're like 2012 , I think .
Speaker 1Yeah , the band hasn't hasn't been around for a while , but I think , yeah , the musicians have been musicians for , as you said , Most of their life and this is .
Speaker 1This is what they do and what they talk about , and they've been with some other bands so they've had experience and they really bring that experience like all together and set it up on this altar of craziness that Vitriol . So give them a listen . Other things we'll do on this podcast is we'll talk about some metal news . So , along with the metal news , we'll talk about some tours that are coming around the country . So if you're listening from Europe right now , we haven't got that far yet . We might put some European stuff in there , depending where the ship comes from . If I mentioned band vitriol , they're hitting the road again , so we get a chance to see them again . Eli .
Speaker 2Yeah , with the chaos and carnage tour .
Speaker 1Yeah , I think that's got a lot of dates right . That's , that's coming up . Yeah they can spring . It's a very fitting title for the bands that go in . And it's a very long , it's a very like packed , it's almost like like like a festival .
Speaker 1Yeah , it's almost like a festival . I , we know it's . It's , yeah , it's the show here . Is that a Decent-sized club and they have some out the room , but it's not huge or anything . But the show starts at four in the afternoon on a Monday and we'll go definitely late into the evening . So the opening band on the tour is a band called face yourself . It's a nasty sounding deathcore band from New York . They have a vicious Leeds singer who happens to be female and they have three guitars . So they're just bananas and all over the place . The next band to hit the stage will be Zenith passage .
Speaker 2They're like bands , like infinite annihilator and Just like crazy over the top . They're like vitriol but somehow more crazy . I just like they combine all elements of keyboards , guitars , vocals , just everything crazy all at once . They're kind of like yeah , just a crazy band .
Speaker 1Yeah , they definitely have those neck break , time changes and our 2d2 type Mutant sounds that you don't know what that is that come from the guitar . The bass Is it a keyboard ? Is it the singer singing , all crazy . Yeah , so it's like math metal to the extreme .
Speaker 1And then a band called humanities last breath is on the tour . This band hails from Sweden and it delivers . You know just that big Swedish Wall of sound , apocalyptic death barrage . It's sad , it's full of despair , it's powerful , it's beautiful . It's just that , in the vein of unleashed , I came out of the area and then hit in the stage . After them will be vitriol , which we are super stoked . We are super stoked . So next on is rivers of Niho , and they're an American band from Reading , pennsylvania . They're again super technical . They're on metal blade records . They're at least two EPs and four studio albums . So they're super veterans in the in the circuit and the metal circuit , if you will . So it's gonna be fun to see them . And then after them we have getting to the stage of band called carnifix . You heard carnifix yet , eli .
Speaker 2I think a little bit of them . Yeah , they're an American deathcore band from San Diego , california , formed in 2005 . They're currently signed in nuclear blast records After have been signed for to vis victory records .
Speaker 1Yeah , so they're . They're a super heavy crunchy , crazy band from San Diego and then the headliner of this , if you can believe , there's another band on it . So the one , two , three , four , five , six , seventh band we're gonna see in this crazy death thrash festival is cattle reputation .
Speaker 2Saw them once before . They were great , sound crazy . There's something like there's a big boom that they have . They must have like a something backstage that they have set to . They're just crazy . Live they're .
Speaker 1How old they're , they're old they've been around a long time , yeah , so they have a lot of albums out , and each album just gets progressively crazier and faster . The thing that struck me when we heard the new album was this the drummer's feet in this album . It's crazy , so fast .
Speaker 2Yeah , and his drum set live is big , very big .
Speaker 1It is very big and the singer comes out and he's got his little platform . We were wondering what ?
Speaker 2oh yeah , platform and they put a fan under it that blows all his hair up , and he was like . Spray and water like he was he . They were crazy .
Speaker 1Yes , that's gonna be a crazy long story . I hope we survive that one . That could be the one that kills us , I think .
Speaker 2There'll be some bands I don't know I mean , cuz all of them sound like a band I would want to see and I don't wanna miss any of it .
Speaker 1but like so long , yeah , when do you go to the bathroom and when do you get ? Water and when do you like , take a break and sit down . I don't know for I don't know if we're gonna be able to .
Speaker 2Where is it ? Where they playing ?
Speaker 1at the orpheum and Tampa they are okay .
Speaker 2Well , at least we know them , like know where the places you're here to figure out .
Speaker 1We also looking forward to a tour with frog mallet there touring with trash panda , which is pretty crazy .
Speaker 2Yeah , they're crazy slam band there . Yeah , they're like saying to go back there . Both of them were originally on a tour with sing , with suga bog actually , but then they must have Got off that tour and they're still touring . Coming back to the , they're going to be orpheum , is it ?
Speaker 1know the plan , the mug , the other price mug yeah , I mean , they have some some crazy song titles , right , yeah , what are some of them they have that they have this saying gwisigabog frog , yeah , sing with suga frog .
Speaker 2They have bullfrog beat down . They have , I'm a frog . They have chased their cave by a shooting frog yeah , that's my favorite right yeah , there's another one called the righteous amphibious mallet yeah , the righteous amphibious .
Speaker 1So so that's gonna be fine . And , of course , trash panda is On with them , and they're crazy . Do me slam band as well , that are yeah . Other tours worth mentioning Vader is coming , polish death metal band , against one of those bands that I saw when I was young but I never thought you would have the opportunity to see . They're coming here with origin and in humane condition and then , when we got tickets for that , are playing a subsizable , a sizable venue , smaller than amily , but still big yeah .
Speaker 2It's a monomarth with cannibal corpse of the cherry , frozen soul , all great bands , just all that old death metal . A monomarth , more like they have some power metal mixed into it . They're like power death metal kind of thing , yeah , but as they've stated multiple times , they don't like being called like metal . But that's kind of what they are . They're like , kind of like a stormy , I guess .
Speaker 2I guess you could say something like that Cannibal corpse , obviously old death metal obituary , same with that and frozen soul . They're kind of their death metal . Yeah , they're along the lines of that .
Speaker 1Yeah , that Swedish type metal there . Yeah , it's very , very old school sounding frozen .
Speaker 2Yeah , there's no kind of like black medley .
Speaker 1Yeah , a little bit . Yeah , there's , there's no , yeah , not many surprises , but it's just really well played
Upcoming Concerts and New Releases
Speaker 1and well . Orchestra music how do you think cannibal corpse obituary gonna condense their sets there ? Used to both like headlining , so now they're opening for a monomarth , so definitely gonna consider less stage time .
Speaker 2I think cannibal corpse is gonna play like their Older stuff . But they're gonna play like the classics at the end . But they're gonna start it off with like stuff off of like the bleeding and stuff like albums like that . And then they're gonna go into the older albums like to mutilated and A couple of the other ones . They'll play a couple of those obituary . They'll definitely play A lot of their songs . What did they start off with last time ? They started off with the .
Speaker 1Redneck Stomp .
Speaker 2Did they start off with ?
Speaker 1Yeah , I don't remember what they said about that .
Speaker 2I think they started off with Redneck Stomp . Yeah , they played the brass mug when we saw them and that show was crazy . There were people passing out actually in there .
Speaker 1Yeah it was so , everyone , this is . We live in Florida , we live in Tampa , in case you didn't know , and this was in a club without air conditioning , packed like shoulder to shoulder person to person in the middle of summer it was like for a bit where he went off to Europe for the tour . So they're kicking it off with a lot of local bands opening up . That was a hot ass show .
Speaker 2Like , if you didn't bring water to that show or get water at that show , you would have , like you would probably die .
Speaker 1You'd probably die . Yeah , we saw some people getting carried out and stuff , right .
Speaker 2Yeah , there was that one guy . Yeah , the pit was so crazy insane because it was like it wasn't a big pit , because there wasn't enough space for a big pit but it was like everybody , there's one circle , that it was everybody just going around in circles , and then if you got up close , it was also crazy . It was all . Of it was crazy .
Speaker 1Yeah , was that the biggest pit you've seen at a show ? The craziest pit .
Speaker 2No St Gwisuga Bog was over the top . Like that may be the most violent thing . What is it called ? Like Butterball or whatever it's called ? Murderball , it's murderball yeah , some guy had his head physically beat in , he was getting stomped on and stuff and when he got up he was bleeding . He was just bleeding and they said you come up to our . It was like if you hold on to the ball long enough in the pit you could , you would get something off their merch table for free .
Speaker 1Yeah , yeah , yeah .
Speaker 2And it was like I'm like , oh , that'd be cool . But then when I saw what was happening , I'm like , oh , that's not good .
Speaker 1They tossed that football into the crowd and it changed hands a few times and some people tried stopping the show , but I think the ball like it , like that . It's a really violent pit .
Speaker 2Violent , yes , most slender , yeah , like peeling flesh yeah .
Speaker 1Who are very cool . They're also touring . We're going to see them soon . I'm excited . They're from Oklahoma . So they are a special spot in my heart , yeah .
Speaker 2And St Gwisuga Bog's from Cleveland Ohio , I believe .
Speaker 1Maybe Akron , cleveland , somewhere up there , yeah , so moving along in the episode , we're also going to talk about some long awaited new releases from bands and one I didn't see come in that actually we just found out a couple days ago was High on Fire .
Speaker 2Yeah , mid-April they had already set their first album out .
Speaker 1It's Comet the Storm .
Speaker 2Yeah , that's the name of the album , but their first song is A Burning Down . Yeah , Burning Down . Okay , alright , I can let it down .
Speaker 3Like I did . No one will listen here too late after we've tried it . The cryptid walls and hide where we live to regret it . Our castles pouring down on the soul of the forsaken . They'll watch the eyes to make us white the time was going down on the sky .
Speaker 2The time was going down on the soul of the forsaken . The time was going down on the soul of the forsaken . Minutes like just not chords there , just crazy .
Speaker 1Yeah , and he's got this time around . He's the only member from the last album that's sticking around on this . He's got a new bassist called Jeff Matz and he has a new drummer from the band Big Business and the Murder City Devils named Cody Willis .
Speaker 2Yeah , but they've been most of the . At least Matt Pike has been doing this for many years .
Speaker 1Yeah , I mean , this band's High on Fire has been around since what ? In 2018 ?
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1Let me see who they're on here . They're from Oakland . Oh , actually , he actually formed the band in 1998 . Yeah , and he was also with Sleep . Like you said , they won a Grammy , or we're up for a Grammy , a Grammy Award for the best metal performance with their song Electric Messiah .
Speaker 2So that's pretty interesting . Yeah , that's yeah . After Sleep he just went to . Sometimes he still interchanges with Sleep and does stuff like that . But yeah , they've been going for a while , played the small shows , played the big shows . They're kind of a little bit like Motorhead , but they're definitely have more doom Like . They're more like a doom band than Motorhead , but some of their songs are definitely . You can definitely tell that they're Motorhead .
Speaker 1Yeah , and he's a super talented guitarist , right ? So ?
Speaker 2a lot of his .
Speaker 1YouTube stuff is based around him playing guitar , I think .
Speaker 2Yeah , he's partnered with the guy . I can't remember his name , but he's been partnering with one guitar brand .
Speaker 1Yeah , and they're on Relapse Records .
Speaker 2Oh , they are Okay .
Speaker 1Yeah , so that's really cool . That's something I'm looking forward to . I missed the boat on them . That was not when I was young and it was kind of like , and that time frame I wasn't listening to cool new music . So it's really good to get introduced to them now .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1And then we'll also talk about some throwback bands like the when Are you Now type bands that are you know we talked earlier about bands that are from my youth that are coming back and you know 50 , 60 year old dudes like recording in the studio and touring again . One of those bands are the Arizona Thrasher's Atrophy .
Speaker 3The picture of the switch is the left and the right . The scream is dying so loud . The middle is left . The facts are themselves the power lost in the crowd . If you stand your ground , it's the crumbles away , the crumbles beneath your feet . If you play your fingers , the past has to fade and we all will suffer the fate . So come on , champion next to mine , we got plenty of time to spare . In a world time madness , a danger has to be just for the one-hole man . Punish me . Punish me for all .
Speaker 1The chasing and punching is all . They were actually the first band I've seen live Thrasher's Atrophy bands . They opened for Sacred Rite at a club show I saw and the vocalist , brian Zimmerman he's actually the only remaining member and he's a member of this band , I don't know from the late 80s , early 90s . They were playing Thrasher Metal . He decided to part ways with band members after European tour ended during COVID , so COVID shut them down when they were trying their first time , trying to get back together .
Speaker 2COVID shuts everything down .
Speaker 1Yeah , it does . So he's got Nathan Montalzo , mark Coglin , josh Gibbs and Jonas Schott on drums . I don't know any of those guys really , but I'm really looking forward to this . I heard one of their songs . It seems like it would be the progression from their second album , so this is their third album . They've been together 34 years . Their album's called Asylum and it's the epitome of how Thrasher Metal should play . So it's really solid Thrasher Metal band that's coming back and return to the roots and throw out some Thrasher Metal bands , kind of like Metal Riser's trying to do .
Speaker 2Yeah , metal Riser . We saw them with DRI the first time we saw DRI . They were good .
Speaker 1Yeah , and they're younger guys , but they were playing .
Speaker 2Thrasher Metal .
Speaker 1I think they even threw a cover of a sepultura song in there . They're really cool guys who are bringing back that old Thrasher sound that people in your generation have missed If you weren't around when that started to get big . And finally , with the podcast , we will have interviews .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1And this will be the initial episode , so we didn't have anybody set up here , we just wanted to introduce everybody to what we're doing and what we're thinking and who we were . But tell me what's coming . Next episode Eli .
Speaker 2We have announced the Apocalypse right .
Speaker 1Announced the Apocalypse yeah .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1They'll be on . So we'll make these podcasts between 30 minutes and 45 minutes , depending how long the Interview , how much news we have and what's going on and how long the interview goes . We're going to try to hold the interview piece to between 20 and 30 minutes . I know it's going to be like go by really fast , but we're not going to . I'm hoping we don't stretch it out , but sometimes it'll stretch out to however long it takes for the band to get their point across , I guess .
Speaker 2Yeah , all right .
Speaker 1Anything else to say ? Eli , no , so we were here . At the end we made it .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1So thanks everyone .
Promoting Podcast on Multiple Platforms
Speaker 1We're hoping that you liked our little podcast here and that you share . We're on all platforms and all pod catchers . We haven't dropped on iTunes Apple yet . They usually take a long time but we put our trailer out there to set up all the other platforms . So we're hoping by the time this gets put up we are on Apple and iTunes . But if you go on Spotify , amazon Music , I heart radio , all those platforms were on so you can catch us and listen to us . We're going to try to do every other week but sometimes it'll be every week . We're interviewing , announced apocalypse on Saturday so it'll drop next Monday . So back to back podcast week to week , but with school and work and guitar practice and everything else we have to do that takes up time .
Speaker 2Yeah .
Speaker 1So I want to say goodbye to everybody , yeah .
Speaker 2Bye .