By Jillian Locke, Music Editor

Once again, that magical time of the year came to Worcester and destroyed all in its path: The 11^th annual New England Metal and Hardcore Festival. On April 17^th-18^th, the Palladium said hello to old friends and warmly and brutally greeted new ones; veterans like Thy Will Be Done came around for their third year, while bands like Century and Aggressive Dogs got to experience for the first time the pure joy and mayhem of being a part of one of the biggest and most badass metal and hardcore fests around.

THY WILL BE DONE

There is something I think is very important to point out, maybe more for this year than any other. This was a topic of discussion between Jay Costa, vocalist of RI’s metal dominators, Thy Will Be Done, and me while I was interviewing him at the fest. There’s no dispute that we’ve all fallen on tough times, and everyone is struggling just to keep their heads above water with the state of our economy and, well, our world in general. However, and people may disagree with me on this one, but one thing that has NOT suffered is the extreme music industry. NEHMF did NOT suffer this year; in fact, for the first time that I’ve been aware of, Saturday’s afternoon show sold out. I’ve NEVER heard of Metal Fest selling out. Maybe it was due to the fact that it was downsized from three days of music to two; maybe more hardcore kids came out for the killer hardcore line-up. Who knows. But that fact remains that the turn out showed no signs of the recession.

What it did show was our undying and passion-fueled need to go out and rock our f*cking faces off. It showed our need to connect with one another through the power that reigns high and true for all of us ~ the power of music. The power of metal truly compelled us all that weekend, and for this reason, rock and extreme music will never die.

“If it takes doing this to open people’s minds, that’s why metal and hardcore will always be around. Extreme music will never go away. It’s not a phase. It’s a life style,” Costa attested. I told Costa I feel that fans of metal and hardcore are the most passionate fans out there, to which he replied, “Metal and hardcore fans ~ they want it. That’s the right word: passionate. There’s so much passion in this genre. Too many people are in it. It’s not goin’ anywhere. I hope it doesn’t,” Costa laughed, “‘cause I’ll be out of a job!”

TWBD has a new album coming out later this year entitled In Ancient of Days. Let me just point something out ~ the album that they are currently touring for is entitled Was And Is To Come. Clearly, Costa has little to no regard for grammatical law. When I threw that thought out there, he merely laughed and replied, “Ahhhh, but wait. In Ancient of Days…WHAT in ancient of days? You’ll just have to find out!”

Costa is a spiritualist and philosopher, and soft spoken at that. He is a true artist. I got to watch TWBD on the main stage after the interview, and the pure fury and power that Costa summons on stage backs all his musings and casts a light on the age old adage that you really can’t judge a book by its cover, which I also think is completely befitting of the entire extreme music movement. Thank Gawd for small miracles.

CENTURY

Moving along to our first NEMHF virgin: Century. This Lancaster, PA-based metalcore outfit is the brainchild of vocalist Carson Slovak. Slovak started Century to further his expertise in his two main areas of creative interest: audio engineering and graphic design. Slovak is the designer and web developer for Aurora Films & Music, and is also the Art Director for Prosthetic Records, the label that as breathed life into his musical endeavor. And that’s exactly what Century is ~ a musical endeavor.

Black Ocean, Century’s first Prosthetic offering, is an epic concept album concerning a secret, universal cult and the sacrificial game they play. “Black Ocean is a cult that many people are members of, but no one talks about it. The god is the equestrian figure on the cover of the album, and he’s hidden ciphers in nature. The goal of this cult is to solve them, but nobody knows what happens when they’re solved,” Slovak explains. “The cult uses a sacrificial lottery ~ that’s actually the basis for the first video for the title track.”

The video features a man receiving a package containing a book. He takes the book and ventures to a wide-open field, where he proceeds to read passages while being stalked by a prowling lioness. “The lioness represents death,” says Slovak. “The lioness eats you, and you’re thrown into a forest of perpetual night, and that’s your afterlife. In this afterlife, you can feel pain and you never die. So, if you get mutilated in the afterlife, you don’t die and you feel that agonizing pain for eternity.” Slovak goes on to explain the role reversal of animal and man, and how man has become the hunted, and animal the hunter. “Human beings begin to devolve to a savage state, eventually resorting to cannibalism.”

The next album will continue on with this theme, and the videos will all come together to form a full-length feature film, which will explain the entire story. I don’t think the word epic really does this concept justice….

“We’re a serious joke band,” mused guitarist Todd Mogle. “The only thing we take seriously is writing and performing. This is a fun, creative outlet…we’re more of a project than a band. We’re a group of friends with the same artistic vision.” Comprising the rest of this core is guitarist Jason Baker, bassist Ricky Armellino and drummer Grant McFarland; the latter two also comprise two-thirds of another Lancaster, PA metal band, This Or The Apocalypse.

Not only is this Century’s first NEMHF appearance, it’s also only one of a handful of times they’ve played in the past year. “We play when we can play, but the core is always there,” says Slovak. They played at 12:30pm on Saturday, so needless to say, the place wasn’t packed, but there was definitely at least one dude in the place that feverishly celebrated the song “Drug Mule,” much to Century’s delight.

With the new material, there’s more collaboration, seeing as Carson write “Black Ocean” by himself. “I’m excited for the writing process. There’s total collaboration now and I can see things from an objective perspective.” The new material also includes one of the most badass covers I’ve ever heard ~ Seal’s “Kiss From A Rose.” “The process for ‘Kiss From A Rose’ is representative of how I want it to be ~ total collaboration.” I for one am eagerly anticipating the final product that is the result of this creative collaboration, and perhaps the possibility of Century touring more!

AGGRESSIVE DOGS

Japan’s answer to Madball, Aggressive Dogs, also had their NEMHF cherry popped this year. They’ve toured with hardcore legends Agnostic Front, Murphy’s Law, and Madball, and in 2007, they celebrated their 25^th anniversary. To commemorate it, ADs have compiled three albums celebrating their quarter of a century mark. One of the albums, a tribute to the band released by Japan’s Defstar Records, features such hardcore compatriots as Jamey Jasta of Hatebreed and Kingdom of Sorrow, Agnostic Front, Stigma, Sick of It All, Loyal to the Grave, and many more. Their latest album, “Aoki Garou,” was mixed at Planet Z recordings by none other than the infamous recording legend Zeuss.

UZI-ONE, vocalist and only remaining member of Aggressive Dogs, has been with the band since 1983, and had this to say about still playing hardcore and playing NEMHF for the first time: “Many things have happened since then, but I’m still playing! We’re very lucky be able to come out here and play!”

This summer, they’ll be touring Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore; in July they’ll be playing a festival in South Korea ~ “the biggest festival” ~ according to UZI-ONE, and then Hong Kong and Taiwan. UZI-ONE is also organizing an event to promote the three albums next year and he’ll be inviting some kick-ass US bands to play. AD is currently touring for the first of the three commemorative albums, and have already started planning the second tour. It’s stamina like that that keeps bands around for 25 years, no doubt.

Even though the fans weren’t familiar with Aggressive Dogs, they still gave the Japanese wrecking ball the warm welcome they deserved, thrashing just as hard for them as for more well-known, American hardcore bands that played that day. And one thing I definitely noticed about AD is their level of gratitude. When the performance was done, vocalist UZI-ONE said a lot of appreciative-sounding things in Japanese, and the bassist, putting his hands in the universal prayer position, continued to thank the crowd over and over again. Beaming with appreciation and gratitude, Aggressive Dogs made a solid and lasting impression on the show goers.

Show Highlights:

Cattle Decapitation was unlike anything I’ve ever seen: vocalist Travis Ryan is literally a pig personified. He squeals, he spits, he rubs it on his face. He makes demonic, possessed expressions. The man does his job well. Check back next month for my interview with the human swine as we talk vegetarianism, anti-humanism, and the point at which his unnerving squeal was developed.

Grind legends Napalm Death unleashed their controlled chaos onto the ravenous crowd, playing what vocalist Mark “Barney” Greenway described as “more f*cking music in a half hour set than any other band on the roster!”

Hometown heroes The Acacia Strain dominated the crowd, per usual, as they unleashed a solid set of old and new brutality, which lead to the most successful and brutal wall of death I’ve ever seen at The Palladium!

Between The Buried And Me proved the epic nature of their band, and talent beyond their years. This band blew me away more than any other band this weekend; their musicianship, their passion, and their enormous stage presence really catapults them to legendary status in my book. Switching from monstrous brutality to swooning serenades and gut-wrenching breakdowns, this outfit of metal finesse contorts, destroys, and brings it all back full circle. I literally can’t come up with the words to efficiently and succinctly describe the full, epic nature of this band, so I’ll just stop here.

On day two, Suicide Silence replaced Animals As Leaders at the last minute, and completely pummeled the main stage. The vocalist seemed to emulate a human bat, flapping his long, gangly arms throughout the set. That band is a force to be reckoned with ~ I highly recommend checking them out. They’re so choice.

Municipal Waste was the comic relief for the night, as they had purchased some tie-dyed shirts from the hippies attending the Grateful Dead reunion at the DCU Center next door, and just kept the skits rolling through the performance. Vocalist Tony Foresta instructed the audience to hug the person next to them and uttered typical hippie sentiments as they ripped into such Waste classics as “Sadistic Magician,” “Beer Pressure,” and “Municipal Waste is Gonna F*ck You Up!” It was truly hilarious, and I’m actually really surprised none of the other bands thought of doing the same thing, but if it was gonna be done, then clearly it was going to be Municipal Waste.

Along with Municipal Waste, God Forbid is on the Rockstar Energy Mayhem tour with As I Lay Dying and Lamb of God. The NJ metal masters returned from their two year tour hiatus and ignited the crowd with tracks from their 2009 release, “Earthsblood.” Any worry that God Forbid fans had lost interest or wouldn’t be receptive to the new material were vanquished as the crowd busted a proverbial nut over their estranged metal masters.

The result of As I Lay Dying and Lamb of God closing the last night of Metal Fest was nothing short of total annihilation. These bands alone are juggernauts of modern day metal, and their playing back to back woke the tired and weary right the f*ck up as they dished out rugged, raw metal served up on a silver platter of what it means to be a metal band today. These two closing acts were (yup, I’m gonna use this word again) an EPIC culmination to the 11^th annual Mecca of Metal. They provided the therapy and relief that only metal can, and no matter how broke and destitute and down-and-out we are, we will ALWAYS find a way to get to Metal Fest. Always.

Thanks to ALL the amazing bands that played this year, and to ALL the metal-hungry fans that came out and made such an import and essential event possible. Thanks to Scott Lee, Leah Urbano, and the folks over at Mazur PR for once again doing a stellar job getting the most brutal acts together for our general consumption. It’s all about the gratitude people. ROCK!