The winners of Metal Hammer magazine’s 2009 Web of Death Online Awards were announced today and Ray Van Horn, Jr. was given honors in the category of “Best Personal Blog” for his website The Metal Minute.
The esteemed UK-based rock journal, in publication since 1984, recently hosted their internet excellence awards in response to Revolver magazine’s forthcoming Golden Gods Awards. Metal Hammer’s focus was designed to spotlight journalists and online heavy metal publications with their Web of Death Online Awards.
The Metal Minute fell into the company of other award-winners such as Blabbermouth.net, Metal Underground.com, Metal Sucks.net, Metalrage.com, Metal-Rules.com, Punktastic.com and SMN News.com.
On winning a Web of Death Online Award, Van Horn notes, “I remember how difficult it was in the States during the eighties to hunt down Metal Hammer outside of deep-flung underground music stores, but it’s nothing short of surreal to be given this nod of recognition from a journal I read frequently in my teens along with Rip, Hit Parader, Circus, Kerrang, Fangoria and Gore Zone. To be acknowledged from the traceable birth region of heavy metal means more than a measurable amount to me. I can honestly say there have been times when personal and professional changes within the past year made The Metal Minute’s continuation rather suspect. My readers, my label providers, my publicist friends, my colleagues and especially the nomination from Metal Hammer made me dig deeper inside myself to make The Metal Minute a worthy source of journalism in support of a scene that refuses to let me go and vice-versa.
“I’ve seen some sad moments this year already with the passing of industry friends and the folding of respected magazines I’ve been on staff with for a considerable amount of time. Trying to find new homes to roost has presented considerable challenge while on the flipside, I have now been presented with a beautiful child I am about to adopt. In the same timeframe of hard adversity, I’ve had Rob Halford, Alice Cooper, Lemmy Kilmeister, Jon Schaffer, Trevor Phipps, Aaron Turner, Wayne Static, Mike Daly, Chris Poland, Ross the Boss, Grutle Kjellson, Damon Fox, Max Cavalera, Matthias Jabs and others on my phone. I have a featured gig in a local venue coming up next week, I recently lurched around as a zombie in an indie horror film and I have two new books to finish. Best of all, I am about to become a daddy and Metal Hammer has given my pet project blogsite a very humbling award. Life is good. Thank you to Rob Gill and the Metal Hammer staff for this generous bestowment.”
Since going online, The Metal Minute has now gained close to 300,000 hits from an international base of readers. Featuring numerous album and DVD reviews, special-themed write-ups and video streaming in addition to the reader-praised “Take 5” interview series, The Metal Minute looks forward to continued service of the heavy metal, punk and horror scenes.
http://www.metalminute.com/
To view the Metal Hammer Web of Death Online Awards winners, click here:
http://www.metalhammer.co.uk/news/web-of-death-awards-the-winners/
Read more of Ray Van Horn, Jr’s reviews right here on the HOH Website!