By the divine power of Thor, we’ve got something nice for you today. First off is a written review/preview of OP from Rocksound.TV – giving a moderate preview of what to expect and comparisons of previous Dillinger material. Check it out here -> Rocksound.TV
Next is something we ALL want to hear. ACTUAL audio from each new song. Check it out here.
Enjoy guys 
This JUST popped up on Greg’s twitter. Probably the best laugh I’ve had all day due to my insane headache caused by new job.
MTV News writer guy accuses me and others of steroid use here: http://bit.ly/4tbHMs , gets scorched here: http://bit.ly/6eC0mh .
James Montgomery casually addresses Mark McGwire which has nothing to do with MTV. In fact, last time I checked, MTV provided what they call “music television” to people back in the eighties and early nineties before deciding on providing America and much of the world with sub-par reality shows and more garbage than anywhere else. When out of every imaginable idea, they ask hard hitting questions that no one cares about. One important one is who in music might be shooting the juice and Hulkin’ out.
Courtesy of what we call “MTV”
Greg Puciato
The diminutive wailer for New Jersey spazzers Dillinger Escape Plan is ripped enough for a man five-times his size, and though he’s denied using steroids (he chalks his physique up to “eat[ing] a lot of protein and work[ing] out a lot”), we’re still not entirely convinced. Then again, positively destroying the stage on a nightly basis has to have some benefits, right?
Check out the links at the top and read Greg’s response here. Thank you, Greg. Thank you.
According to now updated wikipedia entry for the album AND this wonderful Blabbermouth.net post, we’ve got ourselves a track list for Option Paralysis!
“Farewell, Mona Lisa” was premiered this past Christmas exclusively on Sirius XM’s Liquid Metal. A low-quality recording of the song can now be heard in the YouTube clip below.
“Farewell, Mona Lisa” will be made available as a digital single on January 19.
According to guitarist Ben Weinman, “I Wouldn’t if You Didn’t” was one of the last songs written for the album, “taking DILLINGER to places [we] have never gone before.” Meanwhile, “A Room Full of Eyes”, which Ben dubs as a favorite on the album, is “one of the most intense songs we have ever written.”
U.K.’s Metal Hammer magazine recently reported that “Option Paralysis” will feature a guest appearance by 70-year-old Mike Garson, who has previously contributed to DAVID BOWIE’s “Aladdin Sane” and NINE INCH NAILS‘ “The Fragile” albums.
Vocalist Greg Puciato previously stated about the band’s new songs, “Wait ’til you hear what we’ve got for you now. The vibe when we recorded ‘Ire Works’ was defined by a feeling of struggle and hope and just staying alive in the face of almost falling apart, feeling triumphant in making it through the previous couple of years, and now the vibe is OK, now we’re just gonna fuck everyone up.’”
The track list for Option Paralysis is..
Greg has kindly update the MySpace blog with some words of wisdom as well as a gift to all you drummers..
Category: MusicJeez….has it really been three months since the last blog? Time goes by fast when you’re busy SCORCHING POSEURS. Hopefully you guys all know what I’m talkin’ about and the time’s gone by fast for you too, and if you don’t and it hasn’t, SHAPE THE FUCK UP AND GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER cause that’s what you should be doing at all times! Setting the proverbial flamethrower to eleven and taking aim. In fact, let that be your New Years resolution. Repeat after me: “I, (insert name), do solemnly swear, no matter how old and tired and worn down by idiots I may become, to make it my life’s duty, to SCORCH POSEURS in whichever field I choose to operate in, no matter what it is that I’m doing…FOREVER.” There. You just made a fucking COVENANT. Like the Jews of old, except this time the burning smell shouldn’t be coming from a talking bush in the desert, it should be the stench rising up from the trail of seared dorks you leave in your wake like a just blown out match. Got it?
Since the last checkpoint, we finished recording our new album “Option Paralysis”, played a bunch of killer shows with Thursday, Fake Problems, and Endless Hallway, and then capped off the decade with two exceptional shows with our buddies Gogol Bordello, Glassjaw, Thursday, and United Nations. 2010 is gonna be a really big one for us. There’s no better way for us to start a decade then by releasing a new album in the first quarter(March 23) of the first year, and then by touring and playing everywhere that this big spinning rock will have us. Hopefully we’ll manage to avoid self destructing by 2011, cause as I’m sure you guys can tell we always have our finger hovering around the red button no matter how long we’re around. It’s the only way we know how to roll. Full speed or die. This shit ain’t fun when it’s safe, folks. Safety and comfort is boring, and leads to even more boring art. What I’m trying to tell you guys is to SABOTAGE YOUR LIFE NOW WHILE YOU CAN BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!!! What I’m really trying to say is that things in The Dillinger Escape Plan are unbelievably great right now. We’re about to unleash what we and a lot of close longtime critical eared friends around us all feel is our best album to date, and we’re all healthy and playing furious shows lately, so lets embrace it all while it’s here ’cause given our track record who the hell knows how fast and how long we can keep the train runnin’ this time. Lets all kick ass and make 2010 the best it can be and try to start strong, and finish even stronger than we began it. We’re ready to do our part.
On another note, our drummer Billy has been a man of few public words so far, since he pretty much keeps himself in a dungeon playing drums nonstop. He has, however, recently expressed a desire to share his freakish gift with others and wants to expand his super select pool of students. I don’t know what the hell he and his tiny club of drum disciples do when they get together, ’cause it gets weird like a freemason society or something and they speak in code that only other drum wizards seem to understand, but if you play the drums and are already better than most and want in, he’s ready to unleash the Secrets of the Skins(if any of you turn that into an X-rated film name or a documentary about Native Americans, I want royalties.) The man of few words and many paradiddles had this to say:
“Greetings and happy New Year to all. As we have some time off for the month of January, and some more time here and there coming up, I am currently offering private lessons to skilled drummers in the Long Island/NYC area, where I reside. If this interests you, contact me at bill.rymer@gmail.com.
-Billy”
I mean imagine him emerging out of his drum cave and saying that in a wizard’s voice in a hooded cloak while waving his hand in the air. Things like “Greetings….to all,” and “where I reside.” He even speaks like someone who plays drums 23 of the 24 hours out of the day, and by that I mean WIZARD-LIKE. Like a wise drum wizard who plays weird shit at freakish speed. Seriously though, he sees drumming the way Neo saw the Matrix when he got all Jesus-ish, he’s insane even by our high standards of mental insanity, so if you wanna take your skills to another place hit him up.
What else? Hmm. Our tourdates on the front page are about to get…oh…I dunno, around a hundred dates longer, so keep an eye out for that, cause chances are unless you live in Yemen or on a mountaintop in Tibet we’ll be heading your way this year. Only two months and some change left until our new album comes out, and we can’t wait. Presales will start soon, with all kinds of options(enough to paralyze you…we’re punbelievable OH!!!!) including a completely one of a kind box set that makes the Hellraiser box look like a happy meal box(I hear they’re bagged now? what a crime), and ruined the lives and crushed the souls of everyone we had working on it to try to make it a reality. Happy New Year everyone, I hope you all have a good one. Become a better version of you. Talk to you sooner than later…
-Greg
twitter.com/dillingerescpln
twitter.com/gregpuciato
twitter.com/liamwilson
facebook.com/dillingerescapeplan
Also, if you’ve been following the Warped Tour 2010 Facebook/Twitter/Myspace/Website, you’d have noticed that Dillinger are doing the entire Warped Tour for 2010. If you’re not knowledgeable of the Warped Tour- it WAS a very sold tour back in the day. It had a number of my favorite bands playing for years straight at a time and it’s a fantastic way to get some major fan-base started as it’s a huge draw for teenagers and college students. Of course, times and music tastes have changed and a majority of the bands over the last couple years have been of the “pop-punk variety”. This year is a bit different , they have confirmed a few decent bands that will be hitting the stage with TDEP. Check out their website to find out more.
Two new song titles got confirmed via Optionparalysis.net as well – Those being “Endless Endings” and “Widower”.
Stay tuned for more info to come out as the release date draws closer! Option Paralysis drops March 23rd, 2010.
Merry Christmas from Everyone at SLW and DEP. Ben was on Sirius earlier for this:
Enjoy. Sorry for delay on massive OP write up. Christmas has been a huge sidetrack on it.
Much love, Mike.
This got confirmed this morning during a discussion in the forums about Greg’s work with Max Cavalera:
In related Dillinger news, the band confirmed that the tracks “I Wouldn’t if You Didn’t” and “A Room Full Of Eyes”will join “Good Neighbor,” “Farewell, Mona Lisa,” “Crystal Morning,” and “Gold Teeth On A Bum’’ on Dillinger’s new album Option Paralysis, due for release on March 22nd.
So that’s six of the possible ten songs named. During an interview for BareBonesMusic, Ben and Greg mentioned a couple more facts about OP:
During a independent interview a girl did after a show with Jeff and Liam, they mentioned Dimitri will be doing the artwork and packaging for OP. Even though Dimitri had left the band as their vocalist after Calculating, he still has worked continually with the band. He did the artwork for Miss Machine, backing vocals on Ire Works for “Fix Your Face” and now artwork for OP.
In the next day or so, I’ll be writing up a large post about what we know as fans, what we don’t know, and what’s to come. More so for people who may just be finding all of this out and want to have a complete post about all the information. The feed of this site is imported on the Dillinger Escape Plan Facebook page, and that’s where we see lots of feedback. Anyone with some serious questions about the album, the band, and things concerning OP should post a question. Make it legit, guys. I’ll pick some of the stand out questions, answer them the best I can, and provide solid information for you all.
Stay tuned as I’m 50% done this massive write up.
ALSO:
Merry Christmas from the band. Release date is now 3/22/10.
Anyone within the Dillinger community knows about Greg’s collaboration within Spylacopa. Yesterday he broke some news on twitter of the somber side. Troy Young, drummer for the band’s EP was found shot to death in his apartment.
Drummer Troy Young, played on the Spylacopa EP, was shot to death in his apartment. Sad day. Talented drummer and nice person, 29yrs old. [twitter post]
Via NYPost.com
A 29-year-old musician on the cusp of the big time was found shot dead early yesterday in his Brooklyn home.
Drummer Troy Young, hit with a bullet that pierced his heart, was found on the floor of his basement apartment on Fourth Street in Carroll Gardens when police arrived shortly after midnight.
The door to the apartment was unlocked and nothing appeared to have been stolen, police said.
Cops went to the apartment after a friend reported Young hadn’t been seen in several days. Acquaintances said they last saw him alive Tuesday.
“Troy was very hard working, he went to New York to ‘go where the big time is,’ ” said his grieving father Ed.
Young sometimes played with The Spines, a Long Island band, and may have met his recent girlfriend at one of his gigs last month, his father said.
Young’s sister, Allison Marotta, said her brother had a girlfriend who also had another relationship.
“This guy has been in Troy’s face a couple of times,” she said.
No arrests were made or suspects named.
If you’re looking for a huge pick-me-up in your mood now, check this sick quality video of “Good Neighbor” from Sauget, Illinois’ show. Click here.
Looks like our good buddy PandorasSecret from the forums got a bit more information on the download cards that are available on the tour for $10USD/$15CDN.
“well I just got back from the show in Covington. Ben and Greg said if you bought that card then the 3 extra songs are up for download right now.
Im going to do it in the morning. Just wanted to let people know.
oh and also from gregs twitter:
GregPuciato: Covington, Kentucky goes OFF! Who knew?! Best of tour so far. Be back asap.” [Post here]
Then our even greater buddy m4tthew from the forums and previous heartwarming post said he download the three songs.
“Bonus tracks are remixes of Sunshine, Black Bubblegum, and Unretrofied. The Sunshine one melts faces!!” [Post here]
So there you go guys, go to the shows, download the tracks and enjoy. No word on if Ben is responsible for the remixes or other artists but I am waiting to find out more.
Stay up to date with the tour by following twitter feeds, MySpace, Facebook, and of course Spreadinglikewings.com/news
It’s not often in communities around bands where we see the glimmer of humanity shine through. Despite what many people think about rock bands and the inner circle surrounding the band itself, there are some moments that need to be mentioned. This is one of them.
My passport didn’t come back in time to do the Canada dates so I have to skip them. If you or anyone you know can get me from Syracuse, NY to Kalamazoo, MI you get your pick of merch, you and your homies get into whatever show you want, and you can hang out with us on our day off in Kalamazoo on the 8th. You can ask me all the annoying questions you want which I’m sure will last the entire 600 hour drive. – Doug
This is for real. Reply to this thread if you are also for real. I leave Syracuse tomorrow morning at like 11am and need to be in Kalamazoo on the 8th.
Basically Doug, the official merch guy for the band got stranded. He needed someone to give him a ride to the rest of the band. m4tthew on the forum heeded his call.
Some of the back and forth:
Holy shit I live in Kalamazoo!! My car is in the shop but will be done tomorrow..I’m half tempted to take her to NY and back…Let me find out what time it’s going to be done and let me know if you still do need a ride in the first place. – Matthew
Matthew Wasick for the motherfucking win. Thanks a million brah.
Don’t not show up.. Because like I said.. Greg is short and fast. And can jump freakishly high for dude who has to hop up on a bar stool. And Ben is fast and Jewish. What all that means.. I’m not sure.. Some lost episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm.. But anyway, I need a ride so please don’t leave me in this frozen tundra. – Doug
Read the rest of the thread here.
So Matthew made the journey and he did with absolute dignity. He posted a new thread on the forum [click here.] and well, the replies came in from everyone with huge envy for what he divulged.
If you recall the thread from a few days ago where Dillinger Merch (Doug) said he needed a ride, I’m the guy that responded and then embarked on a three day rock ‘n roll-DEP style adventure for the ages. Below are some of the details.
After a night of celebrating my roommate’s birthday and sleeping awkwardly on a couch for a few hours, I came back to my place and logged onto the forums here to see if anyone had posted footage of the new songs. Instead, I found Doug’s post which I basically interpreted as saying: “your #1 favorite band is going to be hanging out in the shitty city you live in in a couple days, and they need your help. In exchange, you will be able to:
-hang with the guitar tech and hear DEP stories
-get free merch
-get paid gas/toll money
-hang with the band on their day off
-hear new OP songs
-experience random DEP hilarity as it happens”I only had to read that offer once for it to be an obvious snap decision so I then did everything I could to make it happen as fast as possible. First, I pulled some strings with my dad since my p.o.s. car was getting fixed, and he loaned me his. I then began driving what would be 20+ hours and 1200 miles in that day, only stopping to eat and get gas for the car. Got to Doug in Syracuse, NY at about midnight and then realized that the mission for the day was only half over. After grabbing some food and watching the newly posted “Farewell, Mona Lisa” footage on YouTube, I was ready to ‘do it drive!’ and get the hell back to Michigan. Doug and I were both relieved that our hastily arranged internet to real life meeting didn’t turn out to be the next Chris Hansen Dateline special, and he was relieved that I didn’t look like Zakk Wylde. For the next 11½ hours we watched 600 miles of roadway go by while listening to mostly shitty metal on the radio (wtf Sirius??) while talking about a wide range of interesting topics, along with awesome DEP stories thrown in. A blizzard, sleep deprivation, and any other obstacles we encountered couldn’t stop us and we made it back to K’zoo at about 11:30am the next day. We spent the rest of the day sleeping/eating pizza and soon it would be the following afternoon and we would be on our way to the tour bus…
I discovered Dillinger just before Ire Works came out and they soon became my favorite band. Since then I haven’t stopped listening to their cds and I always enjoy watching a random interview with one of the members on YouTube or reading articles about them whenever I can. So you can imagine it was pretty fucking surreal to find myself all of a sudden walking up to their bus to hang with them. We went in and said hi to everyone and started hanging out as Greg finished up an interview on the phone. The guys couldn’t have been more awesome/hilarious and I probably seemed lost for words at the beginning since my brain wasn’t prepared for experiencing something like this. Later on a few of the guys wanted to go to the mall so we fit Jeff, Ben, Greg, Billy, Doug, Zach, and myself into my car and headed there. Normally I drive to this mall while listening to the Dillinger Escape Plan, but on this day I was driving the Dillinger Escape Plan to my local mall….definitely a mind fuck of an experience hahaha. We spent some time there and then drove back to the bus. (Let me emphasize that the whole time hilarious/cool shit is happening)
So we get back and a few of us are chilling in the living room portion of the bus when Greg has Liam throw Option Paralysis onto a cd. I’m sitting there watching in awe as Liam hands Greg the newly burned cd like it’s that top-secret deadly virus thing from the movie Beavis and Butthead Do America…I’m just thinking to myself, “holy shit, there it is!” Greg gets up and puts it into the cd player for the bus living room and then makes sure to ask if I have any kind of recording device on me or if my phone is recording. I assure him that I’m not wearing a wire and I simply took my phone apart and set the cover, battery, and phone on the table in front of him. I felt like I was in a secret government lab and they were about to show me evidence of aliens or something. Turns out what I was about to listen to was way more badass than that would have been. I sat and listened as my face melted away and I was simply blown away by the entire cd. I don’t even know where to begin describing what it was like…all I can say is imagine the footage of the new songs you’ve seen on YouTube so far, multiply how badass that sounds by ten thousand, leave plenty of room for shit you don’t expect and/or see coming, and you might come somewhat close to imagining how great it is. It is THAT. FUCKING. GOOD. As if that wasn’t enough, Greg then turns to me and says something along the lines of “you are the first person outside of people involved directly with the band to hear this record.” I’m still having a hard time realizing just how badass that is and how awesome the past few days have been. I think I described it best to Greg when I was leaving at the end of the night when I just told him to imagine back in the day when he was really into Metallica doing the same thing I did but with them. I have more appreciation and look up more to Dillinger than any other band/celebrity and so in my own world, meeting and hanging out with these guys and having them play their new masterpiece of a record for me is way more cool to me than hanging out with any other bullshit celebrity or whatever in the world would be, by far.
Hope that wasn’t too long winded and didn’t sound like too much of a brag, although it was pretty much the coolest thing some random Joe Fan could hope to have happen to them…
And a nice little follow up after questions came.
As far as the questions in regards to more specific details about the record, the best I can answer is this:
-I definitely feel like the record had an awesome flow to it. There wasn’t any ‘two awesome songs-one ok song-2 more awesome songs-a 50 second buildup track-3 more awesome songs’ type of deal going on. Personally I don’t think any DEP cd is like that and I listen to them all from beginning to end, but I think everyone will agree that OP is an unstoppable freight train of great songs. It’s one you can put in the cd player and not worry about skipping any tracks until it’s over. And then you will want to just play it again.
-As for electronica/heavy/lighter/in between: there is no way you can define the entire album as being one specific adjective like that or throw a blanket over it, let alone one song in particular. The best analogy I can give is the song Farewell, Mona Lisa itself. That song has so many different parts to it that when it’s over you are like ‘what the fuck did I just hear?’ And that’s kind of how I felt the whole album was.-As for production, what I listened to wasn’t the final-ready to go to the stores version, but we are talking about Dillinger here, guys. When I spoke to Billy after listening to the cd, he said something like, “we would leave the studio after working all day and be excited/happy about getting 14 seconds done on a track.” They didn’t cut any corners and took their time on this and that will be very apparent on March 23.
Another thing I want to say is it’s not a record where you hear a song and think “there’s 43% pt.2″ or “Mouth of Ghosts jr.” OP is a whole new batch of songs and I can promise you guys will be the opposite of disappointed with it.
This is definitely a once in a lifetime experience. It’s not that often you see a fan do this for a band. Kudos to the entire band and Matthew. He deserves it.
[Let's hope the band doesn't give me flak for writing about it.]
Pre-orders are now available for purchase
Adrian mentioned the other day that over at Seasons of Mist that you could check out the physical pre-orders. Well, as of this morning I presume everything is available for purchase.
Click here. Also, as you already should know there are only 2000 boxsets being made. So be one of the first 2000 to get one.