No Solos For Metallica

Blabbermouth had this tidbit about why Metallica opted to go without solos on their new album: 

METALLICA's Kirk Hammett recently explained to Holland's  Rockezine.net why there are no guitar solos on the band's new album, "St. Anger". "The reason for that is because again we wanted to move together all four of us in the same musical direction," he said. "We also wanted to preserve the sound of the album. When we tried to put overdubs on the album and put guitar solos on the album it kind of�it sounded like an afterthought, you know? Like something was put on after we created it. It stood out. We wanted to preserve the sound of  all four of us in a room just jamming. Spontaneously together. To put production stuff on top of that just didn't sound right. We tried to put guitar solos on, but we kept on running into this problem. It really sounded like an afterthought." Asked if he's satisfied with how the record came out, Hammett said, "Oh yeah, absolutely. I'm so proud of this album. It freaks me out. I haven't been this proud of an album  since 'The Black Album', I must say. I mean, the 'Load' and 'Reload' era for us was such a reaction to our first five albums. We didn't want to do what we had been doing: play fast, over the top and aggressive. If anything, the 'Load' and 'Reload' era was a big experiment in hard rock. We needed to do these two albums for us to make 'St. Anger'. If we would have made 'St. Anger' in the mid-nineties, it wouldn't have been fresh and as exciting for us as it was now. It would have felt like doing the same old thing. We needed to balance it out. When we finally got around playing fast and aggressive again, it sounded fresh. You need to get to point A to be able to make point B sound better, you know?"

In the same interview, Hammett predicted that METALLICA's new album would influence other metal bands to play harder and faster once again and implied that another well-known arena act has already pulled the plug on their new release after getting an advance earful of "St. Anger". 

"I have a suspicion that once this album drops and people hear it  everywhere, I just have this suspicion that bands are gonna get heavier  and start playing faster again," Kirk said. "I just have a suspicion that they are. 

"I'll tell you one thing," he continued. "Lars played Fred Durst four songs of our new album and the next week Fred Durst postponed the  release of the new LIMP BIZKIT album and started rewriting it. Lars and I were talking about it, 'Did he postpone it because he wasn't satisfied with it or did he postpone it because he heard our direction and wanted to be contemporary with it?' It's interesting. We'll see."

Ozzy and Zakk Record with Kelly

Blabbermouth also reports this tidbit.

Ozzy Osbourne and Zakk Wylde were reportedly in the studio recently working on a new project for Ozzy's daughter, Kelly Osbourne. No further information is available at this time.
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Avril Subject of ABC Family Special

Launch reports the following:

Avril Lavigne is the subject of the new television special, Avril Lavigne: Anything But Ordinary, airing Sunday (June 8) on the ABC-Family cable network at 9 p.m. ET. The show chronicles Lavinge's childhood growing up in Canada, her family life, and her music.

The "I'm With You" singer told the program she's living the life she's always dreamed. "I have this awesome opportunity to fulfill my dream,"  she said. "I am all over the place, flying here and there, going through different stuff every day."

During the show, the 18-year-old singer confides that she used to fantasize about being a rock star when she was a child. She said, "I remember when I was really young, standing on my bed like I was on stage, singing at the top of my lungs and visualizing thousands of people surrounding me."

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