Skillet slays Mt. Pleasant, Michigan with Pop Evil

On Saturday November 29th, I attended the Pop Evil and Skillet concert in Mount Pleasant, Michigan and — as always with Skillet — it was absolutely insane. It also happened to be the day of the Ohio State vs. Michigan football game… a detail I’ll come back to later. As someone who has always enjoyed […]

Fit For A King & friends get St. Louis feral-level rowdy

It was another talent-filled night at The Pageant in St. Louis, beginning with metalcore act 156/Silence. The Pittsburgh band took over the stage with their gritty, industrial tracks like “Target Acquired” and their recent single “Our Parting Ways”. Vocalist Jack Murray set the energybar high right off the bat, getting the first mosh pits moving. […]

Catching up with Babe Haven in Nashville alongside Die Spitz

They say ‘third time’s a charm’, but in the case of Babe Haven’s third 2025 performance at Nashville’s Blue Room, it’s been nothing but charm — each time. If you can believe it, this was supposed to be their fourth time in Nashville this year, if it hadn’t been for a cancelled Jhorts Fest appearance. […]

grandson & H09909 give San Diego INERTIA whiplash

It was a rainy. It was cold. It was a Tuesday night nearing the holidays. The odds were against grandson when his INERTIA Tour hit San Diego’s Observatory Theater in North Park, with H09909 in tow. Despite everything, there was still quite an adequate turnout for the metal-meets-rap-meets-EDM enigmatic singer-songwriter. But up first was another […]

Aurorawave avalanches with sophomore album, ‘Monument’

When Aurorawave dropped their debut album last year, visionary frontman Nathan Aurora set out to create a space where sun-soaked reggae rhythms could successfully throw down in a pit with the gritty heaviness of rock and the flexing muscle of metal. In the band’s second effort, titled Monument and released August 15th through Ineffable Records, […]

Pantera unleashes fire & ferocity on St. Louis, with all-star backing

The night of Pantera in St. Louis started off with Aussie grindcore sensations King Parrot. Named after the similarly Australian bird, King Parrot were a colorful bunch. They opened the night with an aggressive, screaming, hair-flipping set that left the already sweaty crowd drenched by the end of it. Lead vocalist Matt Young — shirtless […]

Bruce Dickinson annihilates Iron Maiden fans in Anaheim

Scream for me, Anaheim! Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson brought his Mandrake Project Tour to the United States — with Anaheim, California being the first tour date. In 2024, Bruce and his House Band from Hell played two warm-up shows — one at the famous Whisky A Go Go in Los Angeles, and the other […]

Thrashing through five days at Welcome to Rockville 2025

Every metalhead’s / rocker’s / punker’s dream is to be where they feel like they belong. We are a special breed — a tribe, if you will. Not everyone likes us, but there sure as hell a whole lot of us. Danny Wimmer, with his majestic vision in its’ 13th year, brought back Welcome to […]

Aftershock is off the richter scale for 2025 in Sacramento

The west coast’s premier rock festival presented by Danny Wimmer, Aftershock, is set to return to Discovery Park in Sacramento from October 2nd through the 5th, 2025 — and it’s shaping up to be the festival’s biggest year to date. Last year’s record-breaking attendance was over 160,000 fans. Building on the momentum, Aftershock 2025 promises […]

Babe Haven blows the doors off Nashville’s Blue Room

Born out of the vibrant Boone, North Carolina music scene, Babe Haven has quickly established themselves as one of the most compelling new forces in modern metal. Yet, at their core, the band’s inception was refreshingly simple — there was a desire to “just play”. Guitarist Naomi Poesel recalled during our sit-down conversation that she […]