Download Festival 2013 is just around the corner, so for this week’s podcast, Raz and Hugh got together to talk about the bands they’re looking forward to, the worst clashes on the bill, the bits of the festival we’re dreading, and about what Thrash Hits is going to be doing this year at Donington Park: HINT: It’s going to be awesome.
Black Stone Cherry

Black Stone Cherry are a southern rock band formed on June 4, 2001 in Edmonton, Kentucky, USA. They are signed to Roadrunner Records. The band is composed of Chris Robertson (lead vocals, guitar), Ben Wells (guitar, background vocals), John Lawhon (bass guitar, background vocals), and John Fred Young (drums, background vocals), son of The Kentucky Headhunters' rhythm guitarist Richard Young. Black Stone Cherry has released six studio albums and four EPs, and has charted fifteen singles on the U.S. Mainstream Rock Tracks charts. Read more on Last.fm
Black Stone Cherry on Thrash Hits
The Thrash Hits Podcast 022: We’ve Gone Transatlantic
April 1st, 2013
We’re at the mercy of modern technology for this episode of the Thrash Hits Podcast – Raz has decamped to the USA for a few weeks for SXSW and some California sunshine, leaving the rest of us here in miserable old England. With possibly the dodgiest Skype connection imaginable, Hugh and Raz discuss how SXSW has changed over the years, as well as speculating on how two very different kinds of hype affect bands – that currently being felt by Ghost (or Ghost BC, if you’re an American) and the kind that surrounds Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats.
17 more bands added to Download Festival 2013
March 25th, 2013
Download Festival have announced another load of names for their 2013 line-up. You can check the full list of additions to the bill after the jump.
Kvelertak, Crowbar, and Electric Wizard among the 11 new names announced by Sonisphere Festival for Knebworth
March 6th, 2012
Sonisphere Festival have confirmed 11 new bands for their Knebworth bill this July. Heading up this new announcement are Kvelertak, Crowbar, and Electric Wizard, and along with the rest of the new additions to the line-up, brings the total number of bands announced for Sonsphere UK this Summer up to a total of 34.
Download Festival 2009: Black Stone Cherry @ Main Stage – Sunday, 14 June 2009
June 16th, 2009
Twelve more names for Download Festival 2009
March 17th, 2009
Download Festival 2009 has beefed up its billing with a dozen new names added to the bill. Topping the list of additions is Trent Reznor’s chief object of scorn, Chris Cornell, Southern metal uber-group Down, and yet another classic rock act to join those already on the line-up – San Francisco’s Journey.
Video: Black Stone Cherry – ‘Please Come In’
December 5th, 2008
Black Stone Cherry have released ‘Please Come In’ as a digital single to coincide with a tour across the UK and Ireland. It’s only the second single they’ve released off their second album, Folklore and Superstition.
Album: Black Stone Cherry – Folklore And Superstition
July 29th, 2008
Black Stone Cherry
Folklore And Superstition
Roadrunner Records
19 August 2008
by Hugh Platt
‘Kentucky rockers’ are the first two words on the press blurb that comes with Folklore And Superstition. Kentucky is where Jack Daniel’s comes from – where could be more rock’n’roll than that? [Read more →]
New tours and releases roundup – 26 June 2008
June 26th, 2008
A whole bunch of new albums have been announced these past few days. The most exciting has to be Trvium’s fourth full-length effort, Shogun. Unleashed on 29 September 2008 through Roadrunner Records ahead of their co-headline Unholy Alliance tour with Slayer, early reports suggest that they’re back to actually sounding like Trivium and that it’s rather a good album.
Undoubtedly less exciting but definitely more unit-shifting is the announcement that dour, 12 million-selling alt-metallers Staind have joined the Roadrunner stable. Their sixth album, The Illusion Of Progress is released on 8 September 2008, just before they tour arenas with their new labelmates, Nickelback (inexplicably pictured above).
September
12 Belfast Odyssey
13 Dublin RDS Simmonscourt
15 Manchester MEN Arena
16 Sheffield Arena
18 Birmingham NEC
19 London O2 Arena
21 London Wembley Arena
Something that Thrash Hits .com is definitely looking forward to is the debut album from Rolo Tomassi. Recently signed to Hassle Records – home to Alexisonfire, Cancer Bats and Juliette & The Licks among others – Hysterics will be released on 22 September 2008 with a sweat-drenched free launch party that day at London’s Old Blue Last.
The best tour that we’ve heard about has Australian metalcore masters Parkway Drive and Boston legends Unearth headlining it this November. The Never Say Die Tour also has Architects, Protest The Hero, Whitechapel and Carnifex frequenting some odd parts of the country.
November
10 Yeovil Westland
11 Manchester Academy 2
12 Glasgow Arches
13 Sheffield Corporation
14 Peterborough Cresset
15 London Forum
Thin Lizzy are releasing a 15-track live album from their historic UK Tour ’75. The full set will be released on deluxe CD with a 20-page booklet of previously unseen live photos and liner notes on 8 September 2008 through MLP.
Tracklisting:
‘Fighting My Way Back’
‘It’s Only Money’
‘Wild One’
‘For Those Who Love To Live’
‘Still In Love With You’
‘Showdown’
‘Suicide’
‘Rosalie’
‘The Rocker’
‘Sha La La’
‘Baby Drives Me Crazy’
‘Me And The Boys’
‘Cowboy Song (Derby Blues)’
‘Little Darling’
‘Sound Check Jam’
Canadian gym-metallers Blessed By A Broken Heart are going to release their much-anticipated debut album Pedal To The Metal on 18 August 2008 and will follow it up with a UK tour almost four months later with I Am Ghost, Devil’s Gift and Fei Comodo in tow.
December
04 Cardiff Barfly
05 London ULU
06 Poole Mr C’s
07 Wrexham Central Station
08 Liverpool Barfly
09 Glasgow Cathouse
10 Birmingham Barfly
11 Nottingham Rock City
12 York Fibbers
13 Brighton Concorde 2
Kentucky’s Black Stone Cherry are a band that are clearly hitting both sides of the rock fence. Having performed at both Isle Of Wight and Download Festival on the same weekend, they have announced a new album, Folklore And Superstition to be released on 18 August 2008 via Roadrunner Records. Currently supporting Def Leppard and Whitesnake on their arena tour, BSC have announced winter dates.
December
5 Manchester Academy
6 Newcastle Academy
7 Glasgow Barrowlands
9 Sheffield Octagon
10 Birmingham Academy
11 Bristol Academy
13 Oxford Academy
14 London Brixton Academy
Emo kings Hawthorne Heights are staying busy in preparation for the release of their third album, Fragile Future on 4 August 2008 through Victory Records. They will be touring with Linkin Park on the Projekt Revolution tour across the US from 16 July to 27 August. A UK tour is threatened later in the year.
Download Festival – Sunday 15 June 2008: Interviews and photos
June 16th, 2008
Thrash Hits .com is backstage at Download Festival 2008 getting all the latest gossip from as many bands as we can lay our hands on. Check out a few interviews and some great live photos below.