Nick Raskulinecz – the man behind the production of RUSH‘s latest offering – admits it: he’s an unabashed, over-the-top RUSH fan. But although the Grammy-winning producer, known for his work with the Foo Fighters, Alice In Chains, the Deftones, Stone Sour and Evanescence, among others, considers himself among the Canadian power trio’s most ardent admirers, when it comes time to sit behind the console, he’s all business. Check out an extract from an interview that the producer did with MusicRadar recently, below:

How would you say the recording of Clockwork Angels differed from Snakes & Arrows?

“When I got involved with Snakes & Arrows, I was coming in a little late for school. They had most of the album written already. A few songs were works in progress, but pretty much everything was there. So the lesson plan was in motion, and I helped facilitate what they were doing.

“This one we started from scratch. They didn’t talk about doing a concept album – that came later. But when I sat down with them three years ago, I said, ‘I want to hear unbridled Rush. I don’t want to focus on three-and-a-half minute songs; I don’t want verse, chorus, verse, chorus – none of that. I want you guys to play, no holds barred. Let’s just make music.’ And that’s what we did.”

How were the songs presented to you?

“Geddy and Alex made rough sketches. They’d do demos and send them to Neil and me, and we’d all talk about them. They’d send three or four songs, and then six or seven months would go by and they’d send a few more. They went on tour for a year and a half, and there were no songs. This album has been in the works for some time.”

Did any songs change radically or reveal themselves in new ways during mixing?

“I’d say all of them. I was still producing when we were mixing. While we were recording, there were definitely things I wanted to do in the mix – different effects, vocal sounds… The whole middle section to Clockwork Angels, that bluesy bar band section, that definitely happened in the mix. The ending part of Seven Cities Of Gold, where the drums and the rhythm section fade out and you’re left with those big, beautiful guitar chords, that was in the mix.

“And those guys hear everything and can spot everything. They’ve been rocking and getting pummeled on stage for years, but I’ll tell you, Geddy Lee can hear a mouse fart on the other side of the room! [laughs] I would make the smallest, slightest adjustment to something, and he would catch me every time.”

Point your mouse in this direction to read the full interview on MusicRadar.

And in case you missed Geddy on this morning’s Planet Rock Radio show with Darren Reddick, click here to listen in on how the album was conceived, why the band decided to finally create a concept album, what the band’s touring plans are and much more.

Legendary rock band RUSH have announced details of a UK Arena tour in May 2013. Full dates are as follows

2013
Wed May 22nd Manchester Arena
Fri May 24th London, O2 Arena
Sun May 26th Birmingham, LG Arena
Tues May 28th Sheffield, Motorpoint Arena
Thurs May 30th Glasgow, SECC

Tickets go on sale at 9am GMT Friday 18th May 2012 priced at

STORM CORROSION‘s Mikael Akerfeldt and Steven Wilson have put tofgether a series of clips from a vinyl shop where they spoke about the nuances of the vinyl format, song structure and other stuff. In today’s third and final clip in that series, the guys talk about their influences with regards to this project. Watch as they flick through vinyl and get all geeky about some of their favourite albums and influences. Click here to watch this worldwide exclusive clip on Classic Rock Prog’s website.

Pick up a copy of STORM CORROSION‘s latest album below:

CD: http://smarturl.it/stormcorrosionint
Digital: http://smarturl.it/stormcorrosion

DELAIN‘s frontwoman Charlotte Wessels believes in doing all that she can to maintain her voice inorder to belt out our favourite DELAIN tunes. Well, she decided to let us in on one of her ‘Singer Secrets’ by showing us how to make her legendary Hot Toddy drink for all those aspiring singers out there. Check it out below:

DELAIN will embark on a UK headlining tour in a week and you can find those dates below:

May 12 – Birmingham – HMV Institute The Library
May 13 – Sheffield – Corporation
May 15 – Manchester – AcademY 2
May 16 – London – Koko

Click here to here to pre-order DELAIN’s upcoming album ‘We Are The Others’.

Dutch symphonic metallers DELAIN are releasing their upcoming album on the 4th of June and in anticipation of the release, the band are premiering an album teaser clip over on their Facebook page. All you have to do to access the content is ‘like’ the band’s official page. Click here to head over to Facebook and let us know what you think of the teaser!

Pick up the new single ‘Get The Devil Out Of Me’ from iTunes by clicking here.

Click here to pre-order your copy of ‘We Are The Others’ now!

STORM CORROSION‘s debut self titled album was released in the UK on Monday and the US the following day and so far the response has been great! Click here to check out some reviews of the album that have surfaced this week and watch this space for further updates. The guys are continuing with their fan Q&A clips and in today’s clip they sum up STORM CORROSION in one word….or two. Or maybe three!? Check out the clip below:

Pick up a copy of ‘Storm Corrosion‘ from the below retailers:

Play.com
Amazon
iTunes

As we reported yesterday, OPETH‘s frontman Mikael Akerfeldt took a tumble on MASTODON‘s tour bus and ended up with a rather nasty looking gash on his head. Mikael has since released a statement about what happened, as well as reassuring fans that he has not had a car accident or brokwn any bones. See what he had to say below:

Hi guys! I’m writing from beyond the grave. Seriously, I was not in a car crash and I haven’t broken my arm. All that happened is I hit my head in mastodons tour bus as I was getting a new pair of (red) underwear out from my suitcase. Wish the story was more rock and roll, believe me.

Anyways I split my head open down to the skullbone and had to be taken to the emergency. They gave me a bunch of shots in the wound, cleaned me up and stapled my head shut with 8 metal staples. Head is sore and if I smile it feels like the wound is gonna burst open again, but I’ll be on stage by tomorrow again.

I feel extremely disappointed that we couldn’t play at the myth in Minneapolis, but paramedics told me I couldn’t. We will reschedule the show for our next trip to the USA. So all rumors of me being in a car crash are false. I did crash my head into a car though, well…a bus really. Sorry for disappointing our fans in Minneapolis but I hope you understand.

See you next time. Best. Mikael

Check out his rather fetching looking head staples below:

LAMB OF GOD frontman Randy Blythe has been expressing his views via Twitter again and in his most recent ‘rant’ he discusses how labels support bands / promote their releases vs releasing independently, as well as touching upon why ‘the record industry is dying’. Check out some tweets from the opinionated frontman below:

“So Marilyn Manson‘s new record debuted at #10 [with] just over [38,000] sold, including iTunes. He released it independently on his own record. This is a guy with 3 platinum records, 3 gold, 5 top 10 debuts including two NUMBER ONE RECORDS in the U.S. He also has a HUGE CULT FOLLOWING.”

“A #10 record? 38,000 sold first week for arguably one of the biggest ‘underground’-type acts? IT’S FUCKING PATHETIC. The industry is DYING.”

“All the people who argue about not feeding the record labels, the corporate machine, etc., about how artists should just release their albums THEMSELVES and THE FANS, THE REAL UNDERGROUND FANS will back them to support the artists? There is your fucking answer.”

“I don’t listen to [Marilyn Manson], but dude has cred for making his own artistic choices. He hasn’t released a record in 3 years and his fans, his HUGE-ASS FAN BASE, could only chart 38,000 records? That’s fucked up. MARILYN MANSON is a MUCH LARGER BAND than LAMB OF GOD, and we outsold him by over 10,000 first week. Not because we have gotten bigger, but because we had a label, a promotional machine behind us. So much for the ‘release it yourself and we will support the artist and not the greedy corporate label pigs’ theory. Amazing.”

“Don’t cry for me, Argentina – I can tour ’till the cows come home and pay my bills. But I feel sorry for the young bands.”

Check out Randy’s Twitter feed by clicking here.

Point your mouse in this direction to pick up a copy of LAMB OF GOD’s latest album ‘Resolution’.

Issue 171 of Classic Rock magazine features a FREE CD compiled by SLASH, cunningly titled ‘This Is Radio Slash‘ – the CD features rare SLASH tracks and collaborations (SLASH with Ronnie Wood, BB King, Edgar Winter, Beth Hart) as well as some of his heroes (Buddy Guy, Michael Monroe, Joey Ramone) and up and coming bands.

The CD was compiled from a longer list compiled by Mr Hudson so here, courtesy of online radio-on-demand site Mixcloud, are some of the songs that SLASH also wanted but didn’t make it on to that collection, including guest spots with Iggy, Paul Rodgers, Alice Cooper, Cheap Trick and tracks from Wolfmother, Motorhead and more. Check it out below:

Click here to find out more about the SLASH Classic Rock fanpack.

Troy Sanders of MASTODON teamed up with Fuse TV recently to teach fans all about Mastodons…being an expert and all!? Troy explained how the great mammoths improved primitive man’s sex life and why they had trouble playing guitar. Check it out below: