Ian Chainey

This month, Metallica scored an unlikely hit when their 36-year-old “Master Of Puppets” charted in Top 40 in both the US and the UK. What pulled the strings? Stranger Things. The ’80s-set Netflix show paired a fun visual with one of metal’s most indelible epics in a way that landed with modern audiences.  » Read More

So, In Flames are good again?  » Read More

When does it click for you that a metal artist gets it? Is it the music? The presentation? The live show? Or is it something else, something subtler, something that’s like an up-up-down-down cheat code? Something that cuts through perfunctory metal artifice by presenting a heightened version of the self. Something informed by a shared understanding of what makes metal metal.  » Read More