Awwwwww! Slayer cares. Check out little Gypsy, who was placed in a happy home in Indianapolis thanks to the thrash metal band. The band’s publicist explained how Gypsy found a new home: “[Slayer guitarist] Kerry [King] and some of the crew went to dinner at Kerry’s favorite steak house in Indy, St. Elmo’s Steak House. Afterwards, the assistant tour manager, Jess [Cortese] saw a homeless man on the street who offered up this little kitten for a dollar. The kitten apparently was freezing so Jess took it, slept with her in her bunk on the bus and went to the venue with her today, hanging out. One of the runners knew someone who wanted a kitten, so the little cutie now has a new home where he or she currently is.”
The new owner took to Facebook to give an update: “Here she is! I named her Gypsy! I gave her a bath last night then she slept for 5 hours on the heating pad. She’s at the vet this morning being treated for fleas and worms. Thank you SLAYER for your act of kindness…..”
Nope. Definitely not dead. Guns N’ Roses frontman Axl Rose found himself at the center of a death hoax last week when a fake news page circulated with the headline, “Sources: Guns N’ Roses Frontman Axl Rose Found Dead in West Hollywood Home at Age 52.” Axl took to Twitter soon after to mock his alleged passing.
“Much like the legendary glam-metal band whose grindingly arduous rise to fame it lovingly chronicles, shock-rock-doc We Are Twisted F*cking Sister! is superficially “controversial” (profanity in the title!), essentially conventional, but very, very, very entertaining,” says a new Hollywood Reporter review for German filmmaker Andrew Horn’s film that chronicling Twisted Sister’s infamous club days. Continues the review, “Automatic catnip for fans and rewarding for those previously indifferent to or even hostile towards the veteran Long Island combo, this persuasive paean to sheer bloody-minded persistence flies by over the course of 136 engrossing, often hilarious minutes.”
The film recently premiered at the world’s biggest documentary festival, International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. We’ll keep you posted when it makes its way stateside. Check out the official trailer.
Swedish headbangers Europe are readying their 10th studio album, War of Kings, for an early March 2015 release. Here’s your first look at the cover art.
AC/DC guitarist Angus Young continued his frank discussions in the press about his brother and former bandmate Malcolm Young in a new interview with VH1. About the things he’ll miss most playing in the band with Malcolm, Angus said, “It is kind of hard, you know, being brothers… just being brothers, we always had a kind of psychic thing going on. I don’t
know how to explain it, but we just seemed to know what each one of us was going to play next. It was bizarre sometimes. He could go to play something and I’m following him and then he would change something and I had anticipated him. So there was that kind of thing. And I don’t know what it is. It’s a strange thing. I guess maybe it’s just a brothers thing, because when the two of us used to play together in the beginning, Malcolm would always, even if we were playing in a bar or something, and somebody said they wanted to hear some song, Malcolm would just go into it and I wouldn’t know what to do about it and I would just have to follow him. Usually by the time we finished, that would be when I’d actually learned the song. But you just get into this thing of you, the two of us would be in sync with each other.”
Elsewhere in AC/DC world…The Canberra Times reported that drummer Phil Rudd’s recent legal troubles stem from him allegedly threatening to kill a contractor and the man’s 10-year-old daughter during a phone conversation. Rudd was arrested last month and released; he’ll return to face charges in February of next year.
Rudd found himself back in the back of a police car again this week after an incident outside a coffee shop (in New Zealand). He got in a brief skirmish with a man, and when Rudd’s alleged bodyguard stepped in to separate the two, a witness said Rudd started punching his own man.
Aerosmith axe man Joe Perry has just released a new EP, Joe Perry’s Merry Christmas. The four-song EP includes holiday classics “White Christmas”, “Silent Night”, “Santa Claus Is Back In Town” and “Run Run Rudolph”…with actor/musician Johnny Depp on rhythm guitar. Says Joe, “I have wanted to do a Christmas CD with Aerosmith for years, but it seems we never have the time to record one. When my Rocks [autobiography] book tour ended, the timing was right — we were in L.A. with access to a studio with some really talented friends and it all fell together. I was finally able to record some Christmas classics for the fans.”
And if you’re into way-outta-left-field metal, don’t miss actor Sir Christopher Lee’s new take on the classic “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” called “Darkest Carols, Faithful Sing”. “It’s light-hearted, joyful and fun,” says Lee. “It’s a band singing on how metal should be played, the effect it has on the band and its listeners.”
Lee released another holiday effort called “A Heavy Metal Christmas” back in 2012; in 2013, his song “Jingle Hell” made it to #18 on the Billboard charts, making the 91 year old (at the time) the oldest performer in history to make the charts.