Category Archives: Pittsburgh

Upcoming Shows: Dresden 2012 U.S. Tour Kicks Off This Week

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Crust Warriors Dresden Announce May/June Tour Dates

…and they include Pittsburgh! Even better, although the show is on a Sunday, it’s the night before Memorial Day, so you don’t even have to worry about going to work in the morning.

 
Here is the official press release, and the list of dates will follow below.

Crust punk crew Dresden will be hitting the road later this month, burning their way through their native Midwest and out towards the coast. The band’s M.O. is a powerful mixture of D-beat hardcore and powerful punk imbued with a vicious intensity that comes from their depth of experience playing in bands like Wartorn, Despite, In Defence, False, and Remission. Along the way, Dresden will be joining forces with Profane Existence cohorts and legends in their own right Deviated Instinct, Antisect, Wartorn, Appalachian Terror Unit, and Tragedy. Don’t miss out on these gigs – blood will be shed, cities will be leveled, justice will be served.

 
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Upcoming Shows: What To Do In Pittsburgh This Weekend (12 May 2012)

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Hi there.  It’s been a few weeks since I’ve done one of these “What To Do In Pittsburgh” features, but there are a couple interesting events coming up this Saturday (12 May) that I’d like to bring to your attention.  For the record, if you work for a local promotion company, a venue, or a band, I can only write about the shows that I know about!  So get in touch with me if you’ve got something you want to share.

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Upcoming Shows: Sabaton Swedish Empire Tour

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Sabaton Swedish Empire Tour

Hey readers! If you’re looking for something to keep you busy on a boring Monday evening, head on down to Altar Bar in the Strip, because I’ve just learned that Swedish power metal giants Sabaton are swinging through town tonight as part of their Swedish Empire Tour through North America! I would’ve posted this earlier but I just found the above poster this morning, which local thrashers Sick Twisted Debauchery had linked to on their Facebook page last night. (People need to tell me about these things sooner so I have time to pass the word along to you!)

Anyway, details for this particular show are reprinted at the bottom of this post, after a list of all the confirmed dates remaining on the tour…
 
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Upcoming Shows: Akron Deathfest 2012

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Akron Deathfest 2012

Saturday, 28 April 2012

Annabell’s Lounge in Akron

 

$6 cover charge ($10 if under 21)

Doors open at noon

784 West Market Street, Akron OH

 
See the Facebook event page for complete details.
 
The schedule of bands — which includes a couple from Pittsburgh, as well as all across Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and Illinois — is listed below.
Click on a band name to visit their Facebook page.
 
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Upcoming Shows: What To Do In Pittsburgh This Weekend (19-22 April 2012)

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Hello again, readers.  To paraphrase a certain local musician’s recent post on Facebook, there are like 8,000 killer shows taking place right here in Pittsburgh this month!   It seemed like about half of those were taking place last weekend (see here for a summary of those), but there are tons more going on this week too!  Some big names, and some not-so-big but who have been talked about frequently on this very blog… details below.
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Upcoming Shows: What To Do In Pittsburgh This Weekend (12-15 April 2012)

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Hello, readers! How are you? I think I’ve officially recovered from the holiday weekend and am ready to get back into the swing of posting updates. Did you have a nice Easter? I’ve been spending a lot of time listening to Ghost, since I finally got around to picking up Opus Eponymous on CD almost two weeks ago. I like it a lot, but I’ve kind of got a funny feeling about it. I haven’t tried slowing it down or playing it backwards or anything, but I get the impression that there might be some kind of hidden evil messages or something. Oh well. Hey, speaking of which, they’ll be coming to town in just a few more days! In fact, they’re just one of a whole slew of awesome bands playing in Pittsburgh over the coming weekend. Just keep on reading for all the details on this show and tons more.

 
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Upcoming Shows: Across Tundras Heading Across the U.S.A.

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Hey, just a quick heads-up so you can start getting excited about this: Nashville, Tennessee’s Across Tundras are heading out on tour in just a couple of days, and will be making their way back and forth across the country, almost non-stop for two months. A full list of dates can be found at the end of this post, including a few yet to be confirmed or still needing booked.

But first, here’s a small sampling of what’s in store for you if the band is coming near where you live (spoiler alert: they are coming to Pittsburgh!) If the name wasn’t already in use for a similar genre, I’d be tempted to call this desert rock, because in my opinion that expression suits this music perfectly: it’s very mellow and introspective, sometimes sparse, and it’s extremely heavy without being especially loud. I don’t know if that makes sense, when you read it, but have a listen and see what I mean…

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Upcoming Shows: Wykked Wytch Joining Soulfly on Tour

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Hey, you remember Wykked Wytch, don’t you? Blackened death metal with vocals by a lady who is clearly possessed by demons? If not, you can check out the review I wrote for their latest album The Ultimate Deception, which was released by Goomba Music on the 14th of February, and you can also listen to it on Soundcloud:

 
 

Anyway, it’s just been announced that the band is heading out on the road with Soulfly, on what’s being called the “Maximum Cavalera” 15th Anniversary North American Tour…

I haven’t seen anything that clearly explains the meaning of the name — my first thought was that Max might be accompanied by his brother (and ex-Sepultura and Cavalera Conspiracy bandmate) Igor, but as far as I can tell, this is not the case. Rather, it appears to be a reference to one or more of Max’s sons; from what I understand, there were guest appearances by three offspring on one of the songs from Soulfly’s latest album Enslaved, and one of them reportedly was playing drums with the band on a recent South American tour. Furthermore, it looks like there are a few junior Cavaleras involved with the opening act, which would add up to a hell of a lot of Cavalera (if not literally the maximum as advertised).

Also joining Soulfly and Wykked Wytch on this month-long, 24 27-city trek are Incite and Lody Kong. See below for a full list of dates. UPDATE 11 April: three new dates have been confirmed and added to this list – Wilmington NC, Dallas TX, and Lubbock TX – see below.

 

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Upcoming Shows: Iron Atrocity Benefit, Vulture CD Release, Ernie and the Berts

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This post goes out to anyone who will be in or around the Pittsburgh area this weekend and can’t find anything to do: GET YOUR ASS OUT TO SOME SHOWS, because there are some awesome ones happening all three nights!! Check out the details below, and get excited!

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Iron Atrocity Vol.2 Benefit Show

at The Smiling Moose bar on the South Side
1306 East Carson Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15203
Friday, 30 March 2012 – doors open at 9:00, show runs until 1:30am
21+ only, $5 per person (suggested minimum donation)

For more details, see the Facebook event page.

You’ve seen me talking about Iron Atrocity, the free compilation of the Pittsburgh metal scene many times before, and for good reason. There’s lots of great stuff on the first volume (don’t belive me? Download it here!), and there promises to be just as much awesomeness when the second one rolls around.

Innervenus, the local record label and music collective responsible for assembling this compilation, held a Kickstarter fundraising campaign recently to help finance the production of the CD. That was mostly successful — at least, enough pledges were made to cover about two-thirds of their target, while the Innervenus staff ended up supplementing the remainder out of their own pockets.

Well, some nice folks decided to throw together another benefit show to help offset some of those costs, and that show is happening this Friday night.

The Smiling Moose Facebook

Iron Atrocity Facebook
Innervenus Facebook, Website

 
 

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If that isn’t already too much excitement for you to handle, there’s plenty more on the way…

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Out Today: Vulture – Oblivious to Ruin

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Vulture – Oblivious to Ruin (27 March 2012, Innervenus Music Collective)

 

I’d to apologize to you in advance for the following review, because what I am about to bring to your attention is going to seriously fuck up the rest of your day.

Today marks the official release of Oblivious to Ruin, the debut LP from “Steel City Sludge” purveyors Vulture. These Pittsburgh natives have been around for a few years now — they had previously recorded a self-titled EP at the end of 2008 with a different singer (this was recorded in Virginia with the assistance of Gwar‘s late guitarist Cory Smoot). The following year, though, they swapped for new frontman Justin Erb, and soon started working on new material.

The first material anyone heard out of this revised line-up was the track they recorded in early 2011, exclusively for the Iron Atrocity Vol. 1 compilation: “Prick of Misery” . That song was definitely one of the highlights from that collection, so of course I was excited not long after that when I learned Vulture had teamed up with Innervenus to put together a full-length album.

The band returned to the same studio in Akron, Ohio, where “Prick” had been recorded, and once again they worked with Complete Failure‘s James Curl. After hammering away at it through August and October 2011, Oblivious to Ruin is now ready to be unleashed upon a thoroughly unsuspecting public.

 

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