Category: metal

Throwback: Happy 75th Birthday, Mick Mars!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Motley Crüe co-founder Mick Mars’ 75th birthday.

New Video: Die Spitz Shares Seething “American Porn”

Rising Austin-based outfit Die Spitz — Ava Schrobilgen, Chloe De St. Aubin, Ellie Livingston and Kate Halter — can trace some of their origins back to when Schrobilgen and Livingston met in preschool. They befriended Halter in middle school. And they brought De St. Aubin into their friend group when they started the band back in 2022. 

Initially, the quartet was looking to find reasons to hang out more often, and decided they should start a band after a late-night viewing of the Mötley Crüe biopic The Dirt. They settled on the name Die Spitz over a “brown bag of Fireball,” opting for the feminine German definite article in place of the English. “It reminds me of the Grim Reaper spitting,” Livingstone jokes.

Their first live shows saw them pairing originals with covers from some of their early inspirations including Black SabbathPixiesMudhoney, PJ Harvey and Nirvana. Unsurprisingly, they express their ideas and themselves through a mischievously shameless blend of classic punk, hardcore metal, alt rock and more. They’ve also become known for riotous live show, where dueling cartwheels, members climbing rafters and solos while crowdsurfing could happen at just about any moment. 

The Texan quartet’s highly-anticipated full-length debut, the Will Yipproduced Something to Consume was released last September through Third Man Records. The album sees the band combining their passion, friendship, identity and artistry to fight against the inescapable decay and chaos that surrounds modern life, “There’s a political side to it, but addiction and love can also be all-consuming,” the band’s Ellie Livingston says. 

Something to Consume‘s 11 tracks contains multitudes and yet feels singular. It’s an expansive and expressive collection of songs, unified in its sense of deeply held camaraderie and freedom. “We depend on our freedom — freedom to do what we want, present the ideas we want, make the music we want,” Livingston says. “Whether it’s based in metal or something soft, no matter which of us wrote the song, we all contribute and work together. As a person, I don’t have a strong ego or voice, but within this band each one of us is capable of so much more.”

Something to Consume is an album experience for everyone. Whether you’re craving a smack of lively metal or a melancholy wave of grungey violin, there’s a piece of all of us injected. Something to Consume is a call to the multitudes of ways we as humans allow consumption to enrapture our culture as well as ourselves.”

Though they’ve only been playing together for a few years, the album shows a maturity and technical prowess wielded and wed to the service of their deep and abiding friendship — and a hope to inspire change. “Some people aren’t interested in being political activists via music, but it weighs on me heavily and I feel misaligned with my calling if I don’t,” Chloe De St. Aubin says. “The four of us are free spirits with multiple interests, and there’s no limit or power dynamic that can derail us.”

The album features the previously released “Throw Yourself to the Sword,” a bruising mosh pit friendly synthesis of thrash metal, stoner rock and punk featuring some of the hardest and grimiest guitar riffs I’ve heard in some time. The album’s latest single “American Porn” comes as the quartet announces a lengthy list of summer and fall tour dates. The tour includes three New York City dates: November 13, 2026 and November 14, 2026 at Warsaw. Both of those shows are sold out. But don’t worry, they’ve got a February 19, 2027 stop at Brooklyn Steel. As always, all tour dates are below.

“American Porn” sees the rising Texans channeling a seething synthesis of grunge and riot grrl punk that calls out sexist record industry insiders and perverted older dudes, who come to their shows to leer and objectify them. “It’s a very angry song,” says the band’s Eleanor Livingston.” “And I want the people that come to our shows just because we’re pretty women or they want to sexualize or objectify us to listen to that song and tell us if they’re still a fan.”

Continuing an ongoing collaboration with director Emily Sanchez, the accompanying video for “American Porn” is a surreal fever dream of a visual that wouldn’t be out of place on 120 Minutes. The video calls out gender-roles, stereotypes and beauty standards with seething anger and a sense of mischief.

New Audio: Bronco Forte Shares Bruising “Obvious Alias”

Los Angeles-based stoner rock outfit Bronco Forte — Chris Klepac (vocals, guitar), All Hail the Yeti‘s Sako Inajaian (guitar), White Forest‘s Jen Glomboski (bass), and Batillus‘ and A Storm of Light‘s Geoff Summers (drums) — will be releasing their full-length debut, Lightning Scars on April 3, 2026.

After years of creative toil and preparation, the Los Angeles-based stoner rock quartet’s full-length debut sees the band stepping into the spotlight as a fully-formed heavy rock phenomenon with roots in the classic heavy music of the 1970s — but with a modern sensibility and sonic approach. Lightning Scars was tracked and mixed by engineer Kevin McCombs at The Steakhouse, the studio where Queens of The Stone Age recorded Era Vulgaris. The album was mastered by Nick Townsend, who cut the album to lacquer on his own personal lathe.

Thematically, Lightning Scars chronicle the uncertain lives of ordinary people of California and elsewhere, with the characters each song depicts desperately striving to maintain their integrity and sanity in the face of a rapidly-changing, increasingly dystopian hellscape.

And as a result, the album’s lyrics balance literary style and kitchen-sink realism. The album’s material is anchored around deep, dirty riffs, hard swinging grooves and song structures that are clever without being cluttered or overly complicated. And this is paired by a pop leaning sense of harmony.

Lightning Scars‘ second and latest single “Obvious Alias,” is anchored around the sort of bruising riffage that seemingly channels Queens of the Stone Age, Dirt-era Alice in Chains and Badmotorfinger-era Soundgarden while showcasing a band with an uncanny knack for pairing catchy, melodic-driven hooks, rousingly anthemic hooks and lived-in lyrics.