By the time you read this, tickets for the Deep Purple gig at Massey Hall next year will have just gone on sale. The band will be spending the entire month of February in our country on a 17-date Canadian tour that includes not one, but two gigs in Newfoundland, five concerts in Ontario, and at least one show in every other province except PEI and Quebec. I could be wrong, but I don’t think that a major non-Canadian recording artist has embarked on a cross-country tour of this magnitude in decades. Too bad they couldn’t turn back the clock on those ticket prices…

I gotta say, I’ve always been more of a Maiden man. Put it this way: I heard “2 Minutes to Midnight” before “Living After Midnight.” Well, maybe not, but the former made more of an impression on me. However, when Judas Priest announced their Epitaph farewell tour in the summertime, I didn’t think twice about getting a ticket–even though Kyuss Lives! went on sale the same day. Finally, after several months of waiting, the time has come for their final Toronto gig: Tuesday, November 22nd. I’ll be there with bells on.

7th Street is another impeccable notch in the Hammers’ collective belt, and while it may be their most sophisticated and accessible album to date, it is without a doubt sonically and thematically classic Hammers of Misfortune. One of the must-have albums for 2011.

“Starting the show off with a seamless segue from set opener “Are You Ready” straight into “Waiting For An Alibi”, it became clear right away that this wasn’t some thrown together slapdash attempt at cashing in on the band’s previous glories. This six piece band is tight as hell and know the material inside out.”

Sean Palmerston reviews the March 30th concert by Thin Lizzy at Toronto’s Sound Academy. Photos by Albert Mansour.

“Hellbent for Cooking is a compilation of culinary classics of every culture from metal bands and artists around the world… I have decided to record my thoughts and experiences while cooking my way through Hellbent for Cooking, also providing my view on the bands that graciously donated their recipes.”

Ola Mazzuca serves up some delicious meals straight from the Hellbent for Cooking in part 2 of “Blasphemous Meals”.

Part two of Adrien Begrand’s comprehensive wrap up of Sanctuary’s deluxe Motörhead reissues, from 1983′s diamond in the rough Another Perfect Day to 1987′s not-so-great Rock N Roll.

Literally, a “dark horse” is an unexpected or unknown victor, a competitor that defies the odds, mocks the prognosticators, and pulls off a win that nobody saw coming. While its short game may have fizzled and its medium game may have been relegated to disowned curiosity, Another Perfect Day’s long game has proven durable and significant to an extent that nobody could have anticipated.

Minor quibbles aside, this is a great collection that features enough rarities and previously unreleased material (including a great four song Peel session from 1980 and BBC sessions from ’80 and ’86) that on musical merits alone this would be worth purchasing.