BLACK SABBATH Drummer TOMMY CLUFETOS: ‘Rock And Roll Is Gonna Explode’ After The Pandemic

During a recent appearance on Ted Nugent‘s “Spirit Campfire” Internet TV show, drummer Tommy Clufetos (BLACK SABBATH, OZZY OSBOURNE, ROB ZOMBIE, TED NUGENT, ALICE COOPER) spoke about what the touring circuit might look like post-pandemic.

He said (see video below): “After all this time off, I’m gonna blow up, man. But during all this chaos, I’m trying to take it as, ‘Okay, this is your breather, man. Take your breather, and just be ready.’ ‘Cause it’s happening for a reason. But rock and roll is gonna explode after this. People are gonna go nuts.

“People are saying, ‘Well, I don’t know if people are gonna go to concerts again.’ And I’m going, ‘Are you crazy?’ People don’t care,” the 40-year-old rocker continued. “They’re gonna go, ‘Virus smirus.’ When they’re allowed, people are gonna come out in droves. They’re gonna let loose like the end of the war, man. They’re gonna go nuts, and we’re gonna be right there rocking for ’em.”

Clufetos worked with such rock icons as Nugent, Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie before joining Ozzy Osbourne in 2010. That led to a spot as the drummer on BLACK SABBATH‘s last two world tours.

In a 2018 interview with The Oakland Press, Clufetos stated about playing with SABBATH: “All four of those original SABBATH guys have a very unique way of playing, four unique individuals creating a sound. You can’t copy them. You’ve just got to get into the heartbeat of the music and do it justice. Hopefully I did it justice. I tried my best.”

As for Osbourne, Tommy said: “He’s a special guy. He has a special talent and a unique charisma unto himself that I’ve never seen before. He’s just entertainment, all the way around. He’s a master at what he does, and he knows how to entertain a crowd and give them what they want. He sets the tone, and you want to go to war with him. It’s a great feeling being behind him.”

ANTHRAX’s SCOTT IAN On Touring Post-Pandemic: ‘In My Mind, I’m Not Going Back To Work, Probably, Until 2022’

ANTHRAX guitarist Scott Ian recently spoke to “Hardcore Humanism With Dr. Mike” about how he is dealing with the coronavirus crisis and what the touring circuit might look like post-pandemic. He said (hear audio below): “We never would have electively, as a band, said, ‘Let’s take two years off.’ It’s not something we would ever have done. Financially, it’s not something we could afford to do even. But even just on every level, that conversation — ‘Let’s take a hiatus’ — that’s not gonna happen. We’ve been forced into that situation. So if there’s one silver lining about this for me, [it’s] I get to be home with my family for longer than I’ve ever been. That’s awesome. So figuring out ways to work with everything going on on the planet and being able to stay creative and stay busy and work and make things work financially, it was kind of like starting over, in a weird way, four months ago.

“All right, what I do is not essential, which that was not hard to come to grips with,” he continued. “I understand. I get to be home with my family. Now I get to do this full time. And then how are we gonna make it work with the band so financially we could keep our heads above water as well? Because who knows how long this is gonna be? We’re gonna be the last ones to go back to work. So, figure it out.

“There’s a part of me now that’s in those same shoes I was in when I was 17 years old, because it’s trying to figure out, how are we going to do this? Luckily for us, this year was kind of an off year from touring anyway, because we’re writing a record, and the plan was to have it out at the end of this year. That’s all changed. We’re hoping next summer. But it’s still a crapshoot. Nobody knows. Everyone’s saying everything’s gonna happen again in ’21 — maybe.

“In my mind, I’m not going back to work, probably, till, I’m thinking, ’22,” Ian said. “Realistically, that’s when things will maybe start to get somewhere back to normal, for my world, as a touring musician. So now it’s become a case of, how do I keep things running for the next two years — with the luxury of being home. Because if it was up to me, I’d just hang around and jam with my son all day long. But now I have to be able to have the balance of I get to just be home and I get to go to the beach and hang out. And it becomes very easy to do nothing. And when I say nothing, I don’t mean nothing in a lazy way. I mean, not have anything to do with my band and literally be on vacation from my work. So it’s almost like a retraining. Even doing interviews, I kind of, at one point, said, ‘I’m not doing anything.’ You know what? I have a chance now to literally take a break. And I did. We kind of did. And then we started doing these ‘Instajam’ collaboration things online and whatnot and slowly but surely getting our feet back in the game, and I’m sure that’ll pick up over the months.

“But I’ll tell you what: I love being home,” he admitted. “I love not traveling. I love not getting on a plane. I was looking at our schedule, ’cause it was all on my calendar. I was supposed to be in Europe for the last two weeks playing festivals. I was, like, ‘Oh my God. I am so glad I am not in the Ukraine right now.’ Imagine there was no pandemic. I’m literally, like, I’m home right now, and I’m sitting in my living room hanging out. Just the idea of that, it’s never happened. We’ve never canceled shows. It was out my hands. And it was nice to have no power. For kind of the first time, it’s all out of my hands. It’s, like, ‘Hey, there’s nothing I can do. [I’m] just gonna hang out here with my family. You tell me when it’s okay to come back to work.'”

The 30th-anniversary Deluxe Edition of ANTHRAX‘s “Persistence Of Time” album was released on August 21 via Megaforce Records. Produced by ANTHRAX and Mark Dodson, it was made available exclusively on disc and vinyl. The CD package includes two CDs and one DVD, the vinyl edition offers four LPs, as well as revised cover art that reflects what had been the album’s original visual concept.

Last week, Ian said that ANTHRAX has “a lot of material” written for its next studio album. The follow-up to 2016’s “For All Kings” will be ANTHRAX‘s third full-length release since the 2010 return of singer Joey Belladonna, who came back into the fold for the “Big Four” shows with METALLICA, SLAYER and MEGADETH, in the process helping inspire a new wave of creativity.

Suicide Silence Virtual Tour Live Stream

Review by Shawn Brandon

What is certain to become the new normal in the music community Suicide Silence has started a virtual tour playing live streams to different cities, countries, and on certain dates multiple locations in the same day.

On the heals on their most recent release “Become the Hunter” which marked the bands return to their Deathcore roots. So, whats a band to do in the middle of a global pandemic to promote their release when you can’t tour? Bring the fucking show to the people right in their living room!

This was my first virtual show and Suicide Silence did not disappoint. I want to say their sound was impeccable and wire tight! The band did a great job of having funny skits in between every few songs to really keep the audience entertained. Some skits that stood out was Garza’s healthy pizza where he put oreos and gummy’s on his pizza to help cut carbs, the Alex Webster dictionary to help you find the right words for your next death metal song.

We will have to wait to sometime in the future for live shows to happen but I will say that this was a great experience and Suicide Silence is doing a fantastic thing by bringing this to the masses. Kudos to SS!!

Go support the guys and enjoy some kickass Deathcore music!

Setlist
Meltdown
Two Steps
You Only Live Once
Unanswered
Fuck Everything
Wake Up
No Pity For Cowards
Disengage
Skin Tight
Hold Me Up, Hold Me Down

LAMB OF GOD Release “Memento Mori” Track and Music Video

“If all you pay attention to is catastrophe, then soon you will begin to see monsters everywhere you look.” – D. Randall Blythe

First New Album in Five Years, “Lamb Of God,” Due Out May 8

LAMB OF GOD has released the music video for “Memento Mori,” the opening track on their forthcoming self-titled album due May 8 via Epic Records. Fans were able to unlock a 10 second teaser of the song through an eerie Instagram Story filter released by the band over the weekend.

Watch “Memento Mori” at www.lamb-of-god.com.

Executed from a narrative treatment written by vocalist D. Randall Blythe, the “Memento Mori” video features the band (guitarists Mark Morton and Willie Adler, bassist John Campbell, drummer Art Cruz, and Blythe) performing the unrelenting album opener from their upcoming self-titled new album (due May 8 worldwide). Lyrically and visually, the message of both the song and video are extremely topical, offering hope at a time of societal and personal upheaval.

“There is a vast amount of indisputably real and depressingly negative occurrences happening across the globe,” Blythe explains. “Currently, at the forefront of everyone’s mind is the global COVID-19 pandemic. This is a very real concern, and proper precautions need to be taken by EVERYONE in order to protect those most at risk – the elderly, infirm, and immunocompromised. It is indeed a scary time, but in this hyper-connected age with its 24/7 never-ending news cycle of atrocity, outrage and lurid click-bait headlines (not to mention ill-informed lunatics running amok and spreading misinformation and panic on social media), it is all too easy to lose sight of the fact that life is still carrying on, and good things do in fact still happen.”

“Months before the COVID-19 outbreak occurred, I wrote ‘Memento Mori’ as a reminder to myself to not be consumed by the omnipresent electronic harbingers of doom that surround us – cellphones, computers, and television screens. While these devices can be useful tools, and it is important to stay informed, it is equally important to remain engaged with the real, physical world we live in, not just digitally filtered representations of reality. I wrote the narrative music video treatment a few months ago to illustrate how warped and myopic our mental states can become when we fail to remain engaged with that reality – if all you pay attention to is catastrophe, then soon you will begin to see monsters everywhere you look. The actual monsters we used in the video are Sinisteria, a local Richmond, Virginia haunted house/dark performance troupe I met on the street at our annual Krampus Nacht parade. Richmond has a strong tradition of loud music and weird costumed monsters working hand in hand to make salient points (we are the birthplace of GWAR, after all), and I couldn’t be more pleased with the results. Music has always been there for me, raising my spirits during hard times, and it is my hope that this song’s positive message will do the same for fans of our music right now and beyond. The release date for the tune was set a good while ago, but the timing seems eerily prescient to me now. So enjoy the song and video, and then remember to step away from the screens for a bit – real life is waiting for you. We only get one shot, so don’t waste this day. Everyone be well, keep a cool head, take care of yourselves, and take care of EACH OTHER.”

Regarding the music, guitarist Mark Morton adds, “I had been sitting with the music for the intro and the post chorus for quite a while. I was trying to develop those two parts as separate songs altogether and was a little bit stumped, particularly with the intro piece. Me, Willie and Josh Wilbur (producer) were doing demos in the studio and the idea came up to try to mash those parts into the same tune and everything just took off. It was one of those times where once I knew what we were trying to do, the riffs just kind of fell out of me like they were writing themselves. It’s always a crazy feeling when that happens. Vocally, Randy heard the intro and said he instantly got a throwback Sisters Of Mercy type vibe from it and he took off from there.”

The music video for “Memento Mori” follows fast on the heels of “Checkmate,” the first new music from LAMB OF GOD in roughly five years. Both songs are set to appear on the band’s eighth studio album, which was produced by longtime collaborator Josh Wilbur (Gojira, Korn, Megadeth, Trivium). Lamb of God will be the band’s first record with Cruz, who sat behind the kit with LAMB OF GOD in 2018 and became an official member the following year.

LAMB OF GOD propelled heavy metal into the new millennium two decades ago with their genre-defining New American Gospel. They followed with 2003’s As the Palaces Burn, which made the Rolling Stone list of the Top 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time. Ashes of the Wake (2004) was the first LAMB OF GOD album to be certified gold by the RIAA, followed by Sacrament (2006), which debuted in Billboard’s Top 10. Wrath (2009) earned the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Hard Rock, Rock, and Tastemaker charts and was No. 2 on the Billboard 200. Those No. 1 positions were repeated with Resolution (2012). VII: Sturm und Drang (2015) debuted at No. 3 in North America and in the Top 5 in several countries.

The new album features guest appearances from Jamey Jasta (Hatebreed) and Chuck Billy (Testament). Blythe sounds more driven and insightful than ever on Lamb Of God, offering up the angriest and most comprehensive diatribes, addressing modern life in the current landscape, of his storied career thus far.

The band is scheduled to make their live return at Welcome to Rockville in Daytona Beach, Florida, followed by a massive co-headlining tour with Megadeth, featuring support from Trivium and In Flames.

Lamb Of God pre-orders are available at http://lambofgod.lnk.to/LOG.

LAMB OF GOD tour dates:

5/9 – Daytona Beach, FL @ Welcome to Rockville (US Festival)

Co-headlining w/Megadeth and special guests Trivium and In Flames:

Summer 2020

6/12 – Bristow, VA @ Jiffy Lube Live

6/13 – Charlotte, NC @ PNC Music Pavilion

6/14 – Raleigh, NC @ Red Hat Amphitheater

6/16 – Virginia Beach, VA @ Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater

6/17 – Wantagh, NY @ Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater

6/18 – Camden, NJ @ BB&T Pavilion

6/20 – Holmdel, NJ @ PNC Bank Arts Center

6/21 – Boston, MA @ Rockland Trust Bank Pavilion

6/23 – Syracuse, NY @ St. Joseph’s Health Amphitheater at Lakeview

6/24 – Providence, RI @ Bold Point Lake Amphitheater

6/26 – Darien Center, NY @ Darien Lake Amphitheater

6/28 – Burgettstown, PA @ S&T Bank Music Park

6/29 – Toronto, ON @ Budweiser Stage

7/1 – Detroit, MI @ DTE Energy Music Theater

7/2 – Mount Pleasant, MI @ Soaring Eagle Casino Amphitheatre

7/3 – Indianapolis, IN @ Ruoff Music Center

7/5 – Atlanta, GA @ Ameris Music Center

7/7 – Cincinnati, OH @ PNC Pavilion

7/8 – Cleveland, OH @ Jacobs Pavilion at Nautica

7/10 – Chicago, IL @ Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre – Chicago, IL

7/11 – St. Louis, MO @ Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre – St. Louis, MO

7/12 – Nashville, TN @ Nashville Municipal Auditorium

7/14 – Rogers, AR @ Walmart AMP

7/16 – Austin, TX @ Germania Insurance Amphitheater

7/17 – Houston, TX @ The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion

7/18 – Irving, TX @ The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory

7/20 – Albuquerque, NM @ Isleta Amphitheater

7/21 – Phoenix, AZ @ Arizona Federal Theatre

7/23 – Irvine, CA @ FivePoint Amphitheatre

7/25 – Auburn, WA @ White River Amphitheatre

7/26 – Portland, OR @ Moda Center

7/29 – Salt Lake City, UT @ USANA Amphitheatre

7/30 – Pocatello, ID @ Portneuf Health Trust Amphitheatre

8/1 – Concord, CA @ Concord Pavilion

Fall 2020

10/2 – West Palm Beach, FL @ iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre

10/6 – Birmingham, AL @ Oak Mountain Amphitheatre

10/7 – New Orleans, LA @ UNO Lakefront Arena

10/9 – Corpus Christi, TX @ American Bank Center Arena

10/11 – El Paso, TX @ Don Haskins Center

10/14 – Springfield, MO @ JQH Arena

10/16 – Kansas City, MO @ Sprint Center

10/21 – Columbus, OH @ Schottenstein Center

10/23 – Huntington, WV @ Mountain Heath Arena

10/24 – Bethlehem, PA @ The Wind Creek Event Center

10/27 – Quebec City, QC @ Centre Videotron

10/28 – Laval, QC @ Place Bell

10/30 – St. Paul, MN @ Armory

10/31 – Green Bay, WI @ Resch Center

11/2 – Omaha, NE @ Baxter Arena

11/3 – Sioux Falls, SD @ Denny Sanford PREMIER Center

11/5 – Denver, CO @ Pepsi Center

11/7 – Las Vegas, NV @ Mandalay Bay Events Center

11/10 – Spokane, WA @ Spokane Arena

11/11 – Nampa, ID @ Ford Idaho Center Arena

11/13 – Reno, NV @ Reno Events Center

LAMB OF GOD is:

D. Randall Blythe – Vocals

Mark Morton – Guitar

Willie Adler – Guitar

John Campbell – Bass

Art Cruz – Drums

LAMB OF GOD online:

www.lamb-of-god.com

www.facebook.com/lambofgod

https://twitter.com/lambofgod

http://instagram.com/lambofgod