Category: Articles

Hellbound knows its metal, so get comfortable, grab a beer and prepare to get schooled!

  • Hatebreed: Interview With Jamey Jasta

    He was the host of Headbangers Ball, he owns a few businesses, and he’s in two successful touring bands. On face value, one might think Jamey Jasta would have little to complain about, and even less angst to vent through hardcore music. But such criticism loses grounding when taking into consideration that he’s “turning negatives…

  • Photo gallery: Down @ Koolhaus, Toronto ON, Sept 18, 2009

    All photos by Adam Wills. All photos are the property of Adam Wills and Hellbound.ca – do not copy without written consent.

  • Forest Stream’s Somn on Songwriting and Storytelling

    I asked Forest Stream if they consider their music to be driven more by emotion, storytelling, visual imagery, social interactions, or something else altogether. Somn replied:

  • Forest Stream: Nature and Society, Misery and Hope

    “Russia is a very good country in many ways, but that is also the country I, personally, hate many things about. The main issue causing this glaringly negative feeling is human indifference. Sometimes it reaches the top level of some sort of cold desperation, and it starts being felt like absolutely nobody cares about anything.…

  • Megadeth: From Vic’s Garage To Endgame With Shawn Drover

    The words “Megadeth” and “Dave Mustaine” are pretty much synonymous. In fact, we’d be willing to wager substantial sums of money that we don’t actually have that “Megadeth” and “Dave Mustaine” are far and away more synonymous with each other than “megadeath” and “Herman Kahn,” the gentleman who just happens to be the RAND military…

  • The Gathering: The Next Chapter

    When Anneke van Giersbergen announced her departure from The Gathering it was a shock – for many fans but for her bandmates as well. But shock doesn’t have to lead to death or paralysis, and in a sense The Gathering had been down this road before. Reinvention is a familiar enterprise for the Dutch alt…

  • Killswitch Engage: Turning Liquid Sugar Into Gold

    Whether it’s because they have definite hardcore roots, forming as they did from the ashes of Overcast, Aftershock and, later, Blood Has Been Shed, or because they have choruses that sound more like globules of liquid sugar instead of caustic battery acid, Massachusetts’ Killswitch Engage has always had troubles being accepted by metalheads across the…

  • Interview with Phil Freeman, Author of Sound Levels: Profiles In American Music, 2002-2009

    “Metal is hard,” says Freeman. “It’s difficult, rigorous music but it’s not treated as such. These are guys who are on the level as symphony players on their respective instruments. These are guys who went into their bedrooms at age 10 and didn’t come out until age 20, but because they have long hair and…

  • Birushanah: Taking Japanese Culture To New Extremes

    One band that has embraced traditional Japanese culture and used it to make something that is both new and exciting is the Osaka based quartet Birushanah. A band that has ties to the always-amazing Corrupted (bassist Sougyo spent some time in that band), Birushanah melds traditional Japanese percussion (done on metal instrumentation) with sludge metal…

  • Slayer: Preparing for a World Painted Blood

    “I can imagine myself at 75 looking like Charlie Watts playing speed metal,” says Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo. “I’m OK with that. I don’t know about the other guys. I’ll keep playing, though, and as long as Slayer needs me, I’ll be here. Whatever they wanna do.” Keith Carman speaks to Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo…