Tracey Hays « Hollywood Metal

April 11, 2010

Hollywood Metal Episode 91

Alas, the US release date for KALMAH’s new album had arrived so it was time to add “Sacramentum” to the playlist as co-host Tracey Hays and I both marked that as a must-play. All in all, I think its a very strong release from these veterans but I think the album of the year title is still very much up in the air. (Jari, are you listening?) A pair of Austrian bands were next. HEATHEN FORAY and BIFROST are two quality viking/pagan metal bands. I had a hard time choosing which songs from each but settled upon “Winterking” from HEATHEN FORAY and “Ragnarok” from BIFROST. Both have memorable riffs and epic subject matter. Tracey introduced me to IMMANIFEST today. These guys are a symphonic black metal band from Florida who just released their first EP called Qliphotic. I had no idea what that meant during the show but doing some research afterwards reveals that Qliphotic is a derivative of Qliphoth which refers to “the representation of evil forces in the mystical teachings of Judaism (such as in the Kabbalah)” according to wikipedia. In other words, evil and demonic stuff…. awesome. “Thaumiel” is the song we picked from the EP and it too is dark and epic all around: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thamiel. WINTER RAGE is an upstart band from Croatia that released an EP in ‘08 called The First Raging Snow. “Northern Legacy” is off that EP and I am now definitely on board for a full length from these winter warriors. Congratulations goes out to our friends in STATIUS, who won battle of the bands last weekend for a spot on California Metalfest this summer. Drummer Wyatt Bentley brought WODENSTHRONE to my attention during the bonfire after-party. “Leodum On Lande” is pretty much an atmospheric black metal clinic.

Filed under: Showlog — Tags: BIFROST, Brendan Biryla, HEATHEN FORAY, Hollywood Metal, IMMANIFEST, KALMAH, Tracey Hays, WINTER RAGE, WODENSTHRONE — Brendan Biryla @ 8:37 pm

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March 28, 2010

Hollywood Metal 90

Hollywood Metal Episode 90 (audio)

Tracey Hays joined me on the program for episode 90. He also picked a couple of the tracks as he has been insisting that we play these awesome bands. WAVES OF AMPHITRITE from Illinios is an interesting new band with an EP out. Elements of power and symphonic black metal are combined to create their epic sound. I have been on a big MANOWAR kick lately so at least two songs from the kings of metal were necessary. “Sleipnir” and “Thor (The Powerhead)” were choosen. I’m sure I will be playing more of them in the next few weeks as I have rediscovered my love for the defenders of true metal. Tracey selected “Belus’ Doed” from the new BURZUM album. The new album is great because it doesn’t deviate too much from the melodic black trance-inducing metal that we have come to appreciate from Varg. Tracey’s next pick for the show was from VHALDEMAR, a spanish power metal band with some excellent neoclassical shredders. “Breaking All The Rules” is just a solid song. We ended with “Repulsion Salvation” from SKELETONWITCH, one of Tracey’s favorite bands and one I saw recently in Hollywood.

Filed under: Showlog — Tags: Brendan Biryla, BURZUM, Hollywood Metal, MANOWAR, SKELETONWITCH, Tracey Hays, VHALDEMAR, WAVES OF AMPHITRITE — Brendan Biryla @ 7:04 pm

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February 22, 2010

Hollywood Metal Episode 86 (Jan-30-2010)

Hollywood Metal Episode 86 (audio)

Saturday Jan 30th 2010: After a few weeks off Hollywood Metal Radio is back in the saddle charging forth towards honor and glory! I was at the KORPIKLAANI – TYR – STATIUS – REIGN OF AVARICE show this past Tuesday and there is plenty of footage on the youtube channel Youtube.com/HollywoodMetalRadio. Tracy Hays was back on the show today after taking a leave to start a new job so it was good to have my old pal back rocking on the show. Tracy picked AMORPHIS “Silver Bride” to lead off the show. While they do sound quite a bit different from the early days, I still like their heavy sound and polished production work. AMORPHIS will always be legendary in my book. Next I played a clip of the Howard Stern show that featured an audio byte from me during the Conan O’Brien rally at Universal Studios last week. I’ve been a huge fan of Conan since I was 12 so I’ve been very involved with the whole late night shakeup that’s going on. Upon return to the metal I played a band called TUMULUS which I was recently introduced to via a friend on twitter. This band is everything I’m looking for in a power/folk band and definitely one of the best Russian bands I’ve ever heard. The guitars are so perfect in the songs and the lead singer has a great voice. The synthesizers create a really cool folk melody using an interesting sound, very much like AMORPHIS did on “Black Winter Day” years ago. Very glad to hear that sound again. CRYPTIC WINTERMOON was next with what I would call a black metal ballad. The song features some great piano parts that setup a powerful story of war and hardships sung in a black metal voice. Unique, to say the least. I decided to play two songs in a from from VIGRID next because the one I like the most, “Crown of Thorns” doesn’t feature vocals and was only 3 minutes in length but “Howl for the Absent Moon” does and both are fantastic pagan black viking metal songs. SKELETONWITCH is coming to town in 2 weeks to put on a free show at the Roxy on Sunset Blvd. There is a website where you can RSVP for the show which is hyperlinked off www.moshking.com February 11th. That’s going to kick ass so I played “Released from the Catacombs” from their new cd called 2009 Breathing the Fire. Lastly, I closed the show with a song from a friend of mine named Kevin Curtain who has a band called DAYS OF LAMENT which was featured about a year ago. This song is called “Absent” and it’s a virtuoso melodic groove metal piece that I dig.

Filed under: Showlog — Tags: AMORPHIS, Brendan Biryla, CRYPTIC WINTERMOON, DAYS OF LAMENT, Hollywood Metal, SKELETONWITCH, Tracey Hays, TUMULUS, VIGRID — Brendan Biryla @ 6:08 pm

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