Upcoming Shows: What To Do In Pittsburgh This Weekend (19-22 April 2012)

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: Wykked Wytch Joining Soulfly on Tour

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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Just Released: Invader – Self-Titled

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InvaderInvader (6 March 2012, Innervenus Music)

Hey!  What are you doing tonight?  If you are anywhere within driving distance of the Southside of Pittsburgh today, cancel those plans now.  You are going to need to get yourself down to The Smiling Moose bar, where they are throwing  a CD release party you will absolutely not want to miss.  More details on that later; first let’s talk about this relatively new (founded in 2009) local band Invader and why you’ll definitely want to check out their self-titled album that has just been released by Innervenus.

Invader first came to my attention when their song “Plow City U.S.A.” was included on the Pittsburgh-area metal compilation Iron Atrocity v.1 (I can’t imagine any reason why you wouldn’t have a copy of it yet, since it’s awesome, and also free to download, but JUST IN CASE, you can grab it from here).  Then, I saw word around town that the band was putting a new record out this week; the official press release had two main points that really caught my eye: first, it listed similar artists “Nicki Minaj, Lady GaGa and The Grateful Dead,” and went on to say the five members of the band’s “goal is to play music that they themselves wanted to hear.”  Now, clearly that first part was a joke, but I did really appreciate the second quotation, because too often people just try to latch onto whatever current trend is out there, instead of playing what is genuine, and I think it really manifests in the sound a band produces.

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