I really, really miss playing in a metal band. I'm scouring my area for members, but it's slim pickins 'round here. My fulltime band is doing well, however. We're getting more/bigger shows and starting to get an actual fanbase. We just need to find a studio to record in and we're all set. High school girls LOVE US! Shit, that means my band's terrible.

Sadly. it does. reap all the benefits that gathers you. Back when I was touring and playing in a screamo band we were loved by highschool and wannabe punk girls.. I guess pop punk girls.. Just go with it and milk it for all the sweet nectar you can.

This is useful advice. Generally, people all around really seem to dig us, so I'm glad about that. But I gotta tell you guys...I miss playing over 200bpm.

that's what side projects are for. I enjoyed playing in that old band, but at the same time I played bass in a sludgy southern metalcore band and drums in a death/thrash band.

I love side projects. I probably have more side projects than "main" music. My main music evolved from detuned thrash into melodic death, and I've already released a traditional death metal album (side project) and I have plans in the future (and lots of music written for) additional side albums of old school death/thrash, black metal, stoner metal, and the list goes on.

Yup, side/solo projects are great as long as you're still getting shit done with your main band. I play in a synth pop/indie/new wave band but I'm working on a DSBM album in my free time, which isn't much between work, practice, gigs and life.

Tonight spent I bumming around the studio with my band. I recorded synths for a few new tracks, one of which we are gonna release a new single and video for next month. It went quite well, we've got an arsenal of different synthesizers both analog and digital so I've got a lot to work with. It went so well we thought we might a bit more but a wire somewhere between the mixer, computer, monitors or PA started crackling and we couldn't figure out exactly which one it was, so we fucked off and went for a drink. All in all a fun and productive night.

Incredible that a string can unwind from both ends almost simultaneously. This happened to my low C string during a drunken jam yesterday. First, the tuning went to Z as the string started unwinding from the bridge end. I released the knife edge and pushed the end of the string further down, and after maybe a minute of attempting to tune it, the string unravelled in the tuning knob.

My band might be looking to perform overseas with overseas musicians. Meaning, pick location X, find good musician in location X, have him learn songs, then fly to location X to perform. Main reason being lineup problems and flaky replacements. What do y'all think of such an idea? Who knows, one of you guys might end up being the musician in location X

If you come to Chile, count with me being for bass or guitar

I recorded a demo song of something completely unrelated to any of my bands. This, I guess, will be completed by some guys from the Vintersorg forum, just for fun.

http://soundcloud.com/kveldulf-bjalfaso ... rg-projekt

This morning I ended up writing I short black metal song that I might end up using for a solo project.

This afternoon my friend is hopefully coming over to my house so we can record our song for the songwriting challenge. Edit: This actually isn't happening this afternoon, he's busy (and I have a lot of work too anyways), but I'm disappointed that school stuff has been getting the way of recording so much.

I'm packing my stuff up and getting ready to move. I can't fucking wait - 8 days and I fly back to America! Hopefully my new bass guitar comes in the mail before then. If not, it's going to be stuck in the mail for a couple months. Damnit. Once I get back, I'll be enjoying the west coast for 2 weeks, then driving across the country with my wife and 3 cats in a minivan (fun). I'm going to stop by a lot of places that I've never been and play tourist. I'll have my laptop with me and two guitars, so hopefully I'll be able to write some music along the way.

Once I get to Maryland, I'll be finalizing a full-length album. It's going to be melodic death metal - not too melodic, though. I want to rerecord the vocals on all the songs, redo a couple solos, and it'll be done. I'm strongly considering buying an amp, as well, probably a lower-watt Engl. I really like the simplicity of using VSTs, but I miss having a nice amp.

After watching this, I think I'll get the Engl Gigmaster 15. More than enough power for me, and being stuck in an apartment, the lower watts will come in handy (although 15 tube watts is still kinda loud).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVFogN2w6NA

I've been doing some electronic based stuff recently (I'm completely ignorant of subgenres when it comes to electronica). Here's some tracks:
Machine
http://soundcloud.com/dystopia4/machine

Dirge
http://soundcloud.com/dystopia4/dirge

Space Trip (Demo)
http://soundcloud.com/dystopia4/space-trip-demo

I wrote something that eventually might fit on Forestfather and decided to record the first minute of it:

http://soundcloud.com/kveldulf-bjalfaso ... ather-demo

Sounds good man, how's the scene and crowd for metal over there? This is an option we're almost definitely going to go with once we're done with our second full-length. It's just too hard to find competent and non-problematic musicians in our own scene. That said, we believe strongly enough in our material to want to get it out there, and if this is the only way to do it, why not? I doubt many of you guys would break too much of a sweat playing our stuff, from some of the material I've heard on this board.

Yeah, that amp is fucking solid. Played it once in a store and couldn't get enough. Mille Petrozza himself uses that to practice and write songs on.

Depending the style and the bands that play of course, I would say that Chile it's just second in latinamerica in terms of 'metalness' (just after Brazil). If your band plays extreme metal and it's underground, you might work with very good producers. About the metalheads: Chileans are some of the most ferocious metalheads you can find and many, many bands have stated this, so it's always fun to play here. The attendance is great, depending the venue.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm excited to see what the next challenge is. I finally was able to participate in one, and now I'm hooked.

That sounds pretty cool. And yeap, the band in my sig does play extreme underground metal. Perhaps in future we might head down there after all if we can get a good organiser!

I saw the link on your sig, I'll check it out!

Much appreciated. it'd be absolutely cool if my plan comes to fruition and some of you guys get to session in live!

Man, I hate coming up with names for projects and song titles.

In other news, we're just finishing up some video editing for my bands new single. Been a busy year, this will be our sixth video release and I think one of our best yet.

I find naming my work most satisfying. Esp when I feel I came up with something really special and unused. Kinda takes the cake I made and icings it up real gorgeous like... I wish I thought of something other than comparing creating metal and making cakes to each other... you get what I'm saying.

I like band names that use nonce words or something really whimsical because all I associate with the word(s) is the band. Uzumaki is a really cool name and seems otherwise unused to me, but I imagine is Japanese for something? Personally I try to go for something that if I typed it into Google I would get 0 search results but that isn't always feasible.

I finally got my new bass guitar in the mail. 5 piece neck through body, active electronics, plays great and sounds great. Hand made, even. $200, from china. I would prefer to make it myself or support an American company/luthier, but I couldn't pass it up at the price. And of course, the day after I got it, the movers came and packed up all my stuff. I don't mind too much though, because that means I'm almost out of here. I fly back to America in 2 days, and I can't wait.

I have 5 old school death/thrash songs done now. Once I get about 10 or so, I want to release an album. As for my standard melodic death metal, I'm just redoing the vocals and a solo or two and I'll be ready to release an album. Like my previous one, it will be for charity, and probably 5 bucks. When I release it, I'll probably drop the price of my previous album, Premeditated, to a dollar or so, to try to get some more sales.

I also have begun taking notes for a future album. I want to do an album lyrically based on scientific theories and principles; i.e., a song about the big bang, a song about evolution, a song about general relativity. I would also try to make them musically follow the topic, when possible. Like a song about the big bang would start off very explosively, a la Nile, slow a bit, and gradually speed up, so it would match our current observations of the universe (which is that the universe is expanding and accelerating). In keeping with my death metal for charity ideals, I would probably donate the money from that to some charity involved in education.

Yea I think I only came across a single electropop band that wasn't signed or anything on myspace or something for the name. Other than that it's completely unused by any other band aside from me. It is Japanese and it means Spirals. There is a horror comic book that i highly recommend. The utter stange occurances that happen in it were an influence on the music along with just the plain meaning of the word, cause I wanted the music in Uzumaki to sound like a whirlwind that's forever devouring and collapsing in on itself. Basically total chaos, just chaos I control. It's basically the most enjoyable creations I do cause though I have a pretty solid idea of what i'm trying to capture and what I'm writing to get to that point... It is still a good surprise to me to come back after I finish everything and after I mix everything and relisten with renewed ears to truely see if I captured what I wanted. Eso since after I write and record everything... I start to forget what and how i played it. Since i only have to remember it long enough to record it... it's like a brand new release to me.

Playing in Chile was always fun. Even the most shitty, underground venues had hundreds of people in attendance...no matter what.

Man, that sounds totally awesome. I'll definitely look into that as a place to go once we are done with the album. We've all but given up playing shitty local shows to crowds of 20 people who have no clue what actual death metal is.

When one thing is going well, others have to fuck it up for you. Got a letter today that our contract for our rehearsal place has been cancelled. It was supposed to happen much later due to the owner of the building (and small island) is building apartments all over the place, so the guys who ran the rehearsal rooms were dropped much earlier...

It might not be so bad, since they are thinking ahead so we might move in February to their new facilities that they are planning to build.

At least I got to hang out with Rotting Christ after their gig on Tuesday... I was planning to take them on a day trip but that didn't happen due to a tight schedule.

I have a townhouse picked out and waiting for me when I get to Maryland. It's an end unit, and the bedroom furthest from the side with a neighbor is going to be turned into a studio. Finally, I'll have a decent area to record in, instead of shitty old run-down Army barracks. I'll also be in the market for an amp, and I want to make sure I do it right.

That being said, any recommendations? I'm really a huge fan of the Engl sound - especially the Savage! I was also considering their Fireball 60, or Gigmeister 15, or possibly even the E530 preamp. Either way, I'll be running it through a Randall 1X12 isolation cab. Other amps I'm considering are the Peavey 6505 and the Bugera trirec. Once I get near a high-quality guitar shop, hopefully I'll be able to test some of them out. If not though, then I'm basically limited to youtube videos, and in that aspect, the Engl Savage so far is my #1 pick. I'm glad that I'm financially in a place where I can afford a truly nice amp, but the quality and sound of these amps is such that the decision is quite difficult. One thing I've decided is that I do not want a Mesa, I'm too tired of their sound.

When were you here? which band was? hell, I might have been there!

Sounds like I need to play a show in Chile.

As I've told you before, that's incorrect. Check out this page, for instance. According to that bio, there's at least two bands named Uzumaki besides yours, one obscure Dutch band and the Japanese rapcore/whatever band whose pictures are featured on the page, and who clearly has the most listeners on last.fm of all the Uzumakis.

Unless, you were referring to that rapcore band by "electropo band" - the Dutch band is quite insignificant.

I might have. I didn't listen to it. I just knew it was not metal. The Dutch band apparently isn't even metal either. If you don't have a release... it's tough shit.

I don't think there's any question as to whether any of these Uzumakis are metal (they're not), but they're still bands.

Oh that doesn't bother me at all. hell my other doom band I'm restarting is called the Nautilus. There are a few rock, accoustic and other along those lines but none are metal and otherwise unimportant in any scale of anything.

If we can ever make it, it would be completely awesome to have a Forestfather live performance!

Hahaha, I was in Chile from 2009 to 2010...and I mostly just did guest spots with local bands from Maipú.

I lived there. The world is so small!

Back to topic: I wrote a new song for Forestfather, which I'll be demoing this week.

Guess you and I need to do an online project, friend!

EO SHILENOPO, CONSHITUMARI!