In late October Sean Palmerston had the chance to speak to Canadian vocalist Stu Block about his recent decision to join Iced Earth. Stu and Sean had a brief chat about how he came to join the legendary American power metal band band, about writing and recording the new Dystopia album, future touring plans for the band and that cool new mid-range voice that has come alive on this new album.

Days after kicking off a North American anniversary tour, with headlining dates tucked in between dates opening for Opeth, guitarist/songwriter Anders Nyström enthusiastically answers Laura Wiebe’s questions about Katatonia’s latest activities and current travels on this side of the Atlantic.

Now after watching this thing twice I’ll bet anyone who would argue that Matt Barlow is not the one and only true vocalist for this band. His performance on the Metal Camp festival show is flawless. Such emotion and passion in his delivery, it will have you punching your fist in the air. Highlights are “Declaration Day” and “Dracula”. He hits the highs effortlessly and really knows how to command the stage. The band sounds as tight as hell and really proves that they are the premier power metal band in North America bar none.

“We’ve accumulated a very dedicated hardcore fan-base. This kind of liberates you, because we kind of feel nowadays we can pretty much do anything we want, and we don’t have anything to lose because we are in the lucky position that we don’t have any pressure from the label. They never told us what to do from the beginning, and now we’re very established and, well, and we don’t wanna become the next big thing.”

Jay H. Gorania in conversation with Angela Gossow of Arch Enemy

Two very different reviews of the new Arch Enemy album, entitled Khaos Legions, out now on Century Media. Which one do you agree with?

Hellbound.ca’s Jason Wellwood in conversation earlier this April with Jay Postones of UK prog metallers TesseracT

“Now, although we are all collectively really into popular science, cosmology and physics, none of us (except maybe James [Monteith, guitar] who has a MSC in Engineering) are smart enough to really get a grip upon the mathematics behind such things as string theory, holographic and multi-dimensional reality. So, the truth is Acle saw a movie called Cube2: Hypercube – and well TesseracT is a far better name than Hypercube, isn’t it? Fuck I couldn’t live with myself if I was in a band called Hypercube…”

Adrien Begrand interviews Jay Postones and Amos Williams of UK progressive metal band TesseracT

Thematically, Turisas sustain their mostly historical bent with eyes turned toward Byzantium, though any storytelling takes back seat to the triumphant tone and exultant crusade invoked by the music itself.