Today’s I LOVE Pedals giveaway is from Runway Audio. Enter for your chance to win a Custom Patch Cable Kit! Ends March 2, 2022.Instrument Cable and Patch Cable BundleRunway Audio builds extremely low-capacitance, custom cables to ensure the least amount of tone loss for your stage setup, studio gear, or bedroom rig. We use the same cabling across all of our products so your signal chain from pickups to pedals, to amp retains as much tone as possible. Our cables are handmade in Nashville, Tennessee, and spreading rapidly across the music industry.Color: Red, Aqua, Gray, Black-Out, White-OutOrientation of the plugs: Straight to Straight, Straight to Right-Angle, Right-Angle to Right-AngleFor our patch cable bundle, the options are only the end orientations which is any combination of 2 of the 3 options for each of the 5 patch cables:Right-Angle, Square Plug (a very low profile, thin right-angle plug), and Half-Profile (a straight plug that is about half the length of normal straight plugs)I Love Pedals Day #29: Runway Audio

The popular guitar YouTuber explains how his musical journey began with a few single notes on bass.

Former VENOM and current VENOM INC. guitarist Jeff “Mantas” Dunn says that he would love to reunite the classic VENOM lineup to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the band’s “Black Metal” album.

Released in 1982, “Black Metal” is considered a major influence on thrash metal and extreme metal in general. VENOM’s second album proved influential enough that its title was used as the name of the extreme metal subgenre of black metal. The band classic lineup trio of Dunn, vocalist/bassist Conrad “Cronos” Lant and drummer Anthony “Abaddon” Bray recorded two further studio LPs, “At War With Satan” (1984) and “Possessed” (1985), and live album, “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” (1986). Often cited by bands such as METALLICA, BEHEMOTH, CELTIC FROST and MAYHEM as major influences, they are one of the most revered bands of their generation. VENOM is still fronted by Cronos and headlines festivals all over the globe and continues to release new music while Dunn and former VENOM bassist/vocalist Tony “Demolition Man” Dolan have joined forces in the similarly named VENOM INC.

Dunn touched upon the possibility of a classic VENOM reunion during a Facebook Live chat on Monday (February 28). He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): “I’ll never retract anything I’ve said, because I’m sorry but it’s true. Regardless of what him or him thinks, it’s true; it’s just as simple as that. I’m not gonna go out there and blatantly talk a lot of bollocks like one of us did. What I’ve said is absolutely true, and I’ve put it in print — into the book as well. It’s there. It’s absolutely true. But we’re at that age now — I’m 60; Bray’s, like, 61; Conrad’s what — 58, 59? We’ve just been through a massive fucking pandemic where nobody’s done anything. We’ve got fucking a war in Europe at the minute. [All the issues we’ve had with each other], it fucking pales into insignificance; it’s fucking bollocks.

“Like I say, I’ll never fucking say ‘sorry’; I’ll never fucking turn around and go, ‘Yeah, well, I didn’t fucking mean that,'” he continued. “What I said was fucking true. But we missed the 25th anniversary. We didn’t celebrate the 30th anniversary. And it’s, like, for a band who had such a fucking impact… And, again, my friends, I still find it difficult to take in myself, people saying…

“When I did the interviews for the 40th anniversary of ‘Welcome To Hell’ — there’s another anniversary we fucking missed; nothing done about it; it just passed, Dunn added. “But the thing was, I got these interviews in, and people were saying to me, ‘You just don’t realize the importance of what you did.’ I don’t, because I suppose we were so close to it. I’ve said it a million times — I was just a fucking kid writing tunes in my fucking bedroom living with my mom, and I was lucky; people fucking dig them.

“But it’s, like, could we not just fucking celebrate this for once? I mean, fucking hell — I’ve already died once. And fucking you haven’t got long, and you haven’t got long, because I know what you’ve fucking done to yourselves.”

Addressing the fact that VENOM INC. will commemorate “Black Metal”‘s 40th anniversary by performing it in its entirety on October 2 at the Keep It True festival at Posthalle in Würzburg, Germany, Dunn said: “When the Keep It True thing came along, I thought, ‘Yes! Yes! I’m gonna fucking do it.’ Because no one fucking else is. Nobody else is gonna go out there and celebrate this fucking album — monumental fucking album. It should be fucking celebrated.”

Dunn, Bray and Dolan released three albums as VENOM between 1989 and 1992 — “Prime Evil” (1989), “Temples Of Ice” (1991) and “The Waste Lands” (1992).

VENOM INC. is not to be confused with the aforementioned Cronos-fronted version of VENOM, which is continuing to tour and make albums under the VENOM moniker. Joining Cronos in that group are Rage (a.k.a. Stuart Dixon) on guitar and Danté (a.k.a. Danny Needham) on drums.

Posted by Jeff Mantas Dunn on Monday, February 28, 2022

San Francisco Bay Area metallers TESTAMENT have announced the return of drummer Dave Lombardo to the group’s ranks.

Lombardo was the guest drummer on TESTAMENT’s 1999 studio album “The Gathering”, which also marked the first time the band worked with then-up-and-coming British producer/engineer Andy Sneap. “The Gathering” is widely considered to be an improvement over 1997’s “Demonic”, an album that saw singer Chuck Billy employ a more guttural style of vocals and was released at a time when thrash acts as TESTAMENT had fallen out of favor.

Billy comments: “I’ll state the obvious, We are more than overwhelmed to welcome back Dave Lombardo to play drums with TESTAMENT. We are so excited to share the stage again with Lombardo. Dave added immense power when he joined the band for ‘The Gathering’ [album], and we are ecstatic to see what new flavor he will bring back to TESTAMENT.”

Lombardo states: “This is a long-awaited reunion that was bound to happen. Once upon a time, we created a thrash masterpiece. I have no doubt that our musical chemistry will pick up exactly where we left off. I love the TESTAMENT family and am very excited to be joining them once again. Pure brutality awaits.”

Peterson expresses: “Having Dave Lombardo join us again feels like we are picking up where unfinished business had left off. There is a silver lining to every cloud and working again with Dave calls for us to celebrate with our horns held high.”

In January, TESTAMENT parted ways with its longtime drummer Gene Hoglan. Hoglan originally played drums on “Demonic”, but didn’t stick around long enough to do any touring with the band. He officially joined TESTAMENT in 2011 and played on the group’s last three albums: 2012’s “Dark Roots Of Earth”, 2016’s “Brotherhood Of The Snake” and 2020’s “Titans Of Creation”.

TESTAMENT, EXODUS and DEATH ANGEL played the sole 2021 date of “The Bay Strikes Back Tour” last November at the Fox Theater in Oakland, California. The gig took place less than two months after the three bands shared the stage at the Aftershock festival in Sacramento.

“The Bay Strikes Back Tour” was originally scheduled to kick off on October 6 at the Fremont Theater in San Luis Obispo, California and make stops in Austin, New York, and Detroit before concluding in Oakland. The tour has since been rescheduled to take place in April and May 2022.

Photo credit: Stephanie Cabral