I was saddened to hear that Metal Hammer's podcast was going under as I enjoyed it quite a bit. Searching around for more metal podcasts, I came across the Death Metal Dorkery Podcast. It's a really small operation, but funny and pretty entertaining. Check it out on iTunes or their website: http://deathmetaldorkery.podbean.com/ and add them on Facebook if you dig it.

Any other extreme metal podcasts you guys have found, please recommend them!

Out of all the metal podcasts, i'd listen to No Control podcast with Chuck.

HELLCAST is the best extreme metal podcast out there right now I think. Check it out! Go to their page and your can download all of their episodes free. http://hellcast.hellsheadbangers.com/ You can thank me later

Right people, if you truly love your Metal, please go to the hammer of retribution web site and download this on the 15th jan, then 'like' the facebook page as well. dont talk about it DO IT!
After a four-and-a-half month hiatus, the Ogg-Cast awakes!

Ever since I started this show in May 2009, and even when it wasn't on a monthly schedule, I've made a show in January looking back at previous years ending in the same digit, and 2014 was never going to be any different. This is the first of two new shows for the new year - who knows, if I get a decent enough response, I might bring it back monthly again!

http://www.thorcast.co.uk/

THE HAMMER OF RETRIBUTION OGG-CAST: MISSION STATEMENT

In the beginning, there was Tommy Vance's Friday Rock Show on Radio 1. In 2008, a Yorkshireman by the name of Carl Pickles decided to make a podcast in tribute, and The Wyrd Ways Rock Show was born. It continues to this day, on a weekly basis. After making several contributions to the show, in May 2009 I decided to further celebrate Carl's efforts by cajoling the people of Livejournal's (now near-defunct) Metal Community into making a show of their own; I had a go myself, and so appeared the first two episodes of The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast. The show appeared on a highly irregular basis at random intervals in 2009 and 2010, but in January 2011, finally became a monthly show, an "even Wyrder cousin" to the Wyrd Ways Rock Show.

The rather bizarre name of the show is a combination of the third weapon for the fighter in Raven Software's brilliant first-person hack-and-slash-fest, Hexen (based, of course, on id Software's Doom engine), combined with a nod to the format the show was originally intended to be distributed in (Ogg Vorbis having vastly superior sound quality to MP3). However, as it would work out, Podomatic's servers were only going to take the show in MP3 format - 96 kb/s and 22 kHz originally, now updated to 128 kb/s and 44 kHz. All the shows in the archive are now provided in this format.

The regular shows for 2011 (and beyond...?) all contain at least two hours of musical content, not necessarily featuring bands you've all heard of, but almost always metal of some sort. Almost. And you'll hear a fair bit of me explaining my choices, because I like to educate as well as entertain. Expect the odd rant as well when I need to let off steam, but I intend to keep this to a minimum... and who knows, maybe there'll be a guest slot or two from some of the musicians involved as well?

Incidentally, I wonder if anyone at Raven Software realised that the initials of The Hammer Of Retribution spell out THOR in a highly appropriate manner, thus giving this website its conveniently memorable URL?

There may be some of you who wonder why I make this show, and here I will explain. In a way, it's a viable substitute for the days where I was a DJ at Cambridge's long-running Wake Up Screaming club night. I haven't done that since the end of November 2008, and there's a good reason. Those last three sets of mine, all from 2008, are a perfect example of what I saw my remit as being as a DJ there; yes, I do favour the folk-viking-pagan-heathen-call-it-what-you-will side of metal, bands whose music is inspired by the ways of the past, who eat red meat roasted over an open fire, and drink mead.

However, the crowd that I used to play to has disappeared - many people have tried to tell me that "folk metal is really popular at the moment!" but it isn't - the kids who make up the majority of this alleged crowd are only interested in hearing the same tired old hit singles (Battle Metal, Trollhammaren, Beer Beer, Wenches And Mead) again and again and again ad nauseam, and I have no interest in playing to that crowd, whether in Cambridge (where I'd actually get a chance to do so) or anywhere else (where I almost certainly wouldn't); I'd rather be on right at the beginning when only the hardcore few turn up to be serenaded by ten-minute-plus behemoths from, for instance, Moonsorrow, Bathory, Winterfylleth, Primordial and Wintersun. If I was to whore myself to the unimaginitive bleats of the plastic sword crowd, I would see myself as being part of the problem, rather than part of the solution.

Furthermore, if you're not there when I'm behind the decks, all I can do is post the setlist and tell you what you missed. If I make a Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast instead, it's there for as long as I've got the hosting space. You can all go to the archive and listen to the first ever show if you want, from back in May 2009, or my getting-ever-more-drunk experiment recorded live and spontaneously at the Cambridge Beer Festival, or the beginning-of-2010 "When The Year Ends In Zero" special in which I geared up for a year of greatness which ultimately fell flat... but, hey, at least we had 1980 to fall back on.

And finally, I'm not stuck with playing one specific genre for the whole two hours; if I want to throw in thrash, NWOBHM, stoner rock, black metal, death metal, or even something completely out of the ball park - rest assured that I can, and I will.

June 2014 seems to be a month given over to tributes and memorials. And this latest Ogg-Cast is no different. With the tenth anniversary of the sudden death of Quorthon a few days ago, this latest episode was always going to be given over to him.

http://hammerofretribution.podomatic.com/entry/2014-06-15T03_32_31-07_00

Of the 38 tracks on the show - one for every year of Quorthon's life - he was personally responsible for 25 of them. Every Bathory album has been included, even the ones that everybody hates; not just one cover version has been included because ten will do, and there are even a few bits and pieces that you'd all thought I'd forget, but didn't. Pretty much everything else is provided by bands that took the blueprint Quorthon had set out in the early 90s and ran with it in their own way. So, if this isn't the finest tribute that there could possibly be, then I'm buggered if I know what is.

Listen to it or forever be a false.

The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast shared a link.
15 August
http://hammerofretribution.podomatic.com/entry/2014-08-15T08_56_09-07_00

I don't think I need explain too much about this show. I've been to Wacken, I saw lots of bands, and here they all are...

Twelve of these are from the Metal Battle, so there's a fair representation of what all those far-and-wide countries who sent their very best to northern Germany contributed - and the *true* winners (i.e. not the judges' decision) is announced in the Awards section. Just about every band I saw for more than two minutes is represented here, so it is the comprehensive review I promised.

Plus, there are some extra bits and pieces to stand for the journey there and back - including an all-new band that even Lennard hasn't discovered yet!

The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast XLVII: A Blast To The Northern Sky
For the twelfth time in thirteen years, I've been to Wacken - and I've come back brandishing an action-packed Ogg-Cast to review it with. There is the most in-depth coverage of the Metal Battle I've ever brought, featuring twelve of the 29 bands who competed, as well as...

The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast shared a link.
Yesterday
http://hammerofretribution.podomatic.com/entry/2014-09-15T12_21_29-07_00

And here it is - Bombay Mix Mark Two, featuring the best of the bits that I've had to leave out of the last year's worth of material - although this time I've bulked the show out with all the extra features that the Ogg-Cast has ever had. So Shut It! officially returns, Covered has always been a mainstay, the World Tour and Ogg-Casts Of The Past get ten tracks between them, and the six that comprise the World Tour should all be new bands to everyone. Lennard's back with some Tunes of Yore as well going into just as much detail with each track as I do.

The final track is... let us say, controversial. Switch it off at your peril, though.

The Hammer of Retribution Ogg-Cast XLIX: The King Of The Forest


"I love trees!" - Chris Mole, 1980-something to the present day

Chris would approve of this show on two fronts. First, this show has been built around the release of Northern Oak's all-new album, Of Roots And Flesh, which I've been a contributor to - financially, in the recording process, and in the initial launch of the Kickstarter campaign to get it made in the first place. Those who may have had any doubts as to whether that would work and their promises would be fulfilled, should have them all swept away as the album lives up to everything I'd expected, and more. So, in a Wyrd Ways style Spotlight, there will be four tracks off that album.

Chris loves trees so much that I've decided to make this show a celebration of the mighty oak - it's not just his band who have made reference to it, far from it. In fact, there are plenty of bands I had to cut or the show would have been six hours long instead of four.

Lennard's got his teeth into the theme as well, with his longest contribution yet - bringing more bands that I'd otherwise not have heard of into the mix. Oaks grow all over Germany, so it's far from inappropriate.

I've also given a few other trees a mention, because though the oak may be the king of the forest, it needs other types of trees to rule over...

http://hammerofretribution.podomatic.com/entry/2014-10-15T06_56_41-07_00

The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast
New Podcast of The Hammer Of Retribution.


http://hammerofretribution.podomatic.com/?/2015-02-15T05_26?
I've done it - it's here! Fifty episodes after the first time I attempted to make a live Ogg-Cast, I've had a second shot at it. It's gone much better this time - even if, because I had no script to read from, I tended to ramble on even more than usual. And, I got a bit carried away with the live requests (what, you mean I've actually been sociable?) and so the show has grown into a four-and-a-half-hour monster.
Lennard was the one who challenged me to have this second shot at a live Ogg-Cast, so I told him to get into the spirit of things as well and record his Tunes of Yore live at the Hamburg outpost of Brauhaus Johann Albrecht. And here I am telling to you, there can into being Metallenglisch speaked.
Now have a few pints (of real ale, obviously) and enjoy the sounds of Derby on a Thursday and Friday night!

It's coming, on Tuesday: the Ogg-Cast I've been working on for the last three months, a joyous celebration of four decades of the Best Fuckin' 'Eavy Metal Band In The World (so said Bruce Dickinson in 1999). It is the longest show I've done since #40 and will crack the five-hour mark, but a band like Iron Maiden deserve no less. As it was with the Bathory tribute show I have gone out of my way to leave no stone unturned - so as well as 21 Iron Maiden tracks (one per album, one demo and four B-sides) I've included side projects, solo albums and other bands who feature members of Iron Maiden either before or after they joined their ranks - or, in some cases, both (e.g. Samson).
I'd hope you all recognise the seven faces on the top row, but I'm going to fill you in on the rest:
Middle row (L-R):
Paul Todd (guitar, 1979)
Paul "Mad Mac" Cairns (guitar, 1978-79)
Tony Parsons (guitar, 1979)
Doug Sampson (drums, 1977-79)
Paul Di'Anno (vocals and crazed excess, 1978-81)
Dennis Stratton (guitar and prog-noodling, 1979-80)
Clive Burr (drums, 1979-82, very much missed)
Blaze Bayley (vocals and excessive sideburns, 1994-99)
Roderick "The Wicked Sheriff Of Huddersfield" Smallwood (manager, 1979-present, used to be able to lift up five navvies on the end of a shovel)
Bottom row:
Paul Day (vocals, 1975-76)
Dave Sullivan (guitar, 1975-76)
Terry Rance (guitar, 1975-76)
Ron "Rebel" Matthews (drums, 1975-77)
Dennis Wilcock (vocals and stage magician, 1976-78)
Bob Sawyer (guitar, 1977, a.k.a. Rob Angelo)
Terry Wapram (guitar, 1977-78)
Barry "Thunderstick" Purkis (drums and gimp mask, 1977)
Tony Moore (keyboards, 1977)
Up The Irons, for as long as they continue to exist - and even long after they don't!
The Hammer Of Retribution Ogg-Cast's photo.

Metal Breakfast Radio. Hosted by Dave Ingram (long time/ex-Benediction vocalist and Warlock in the Church Of Satan) and other co-hosts. I fucking love it.

http://www.metalbreakfastradio.com/mbr/DEATHPOD/DEATHPOD.html

Toilet ov hell
Can be pretty funny, taking the piss out of the black metal scene mainly. But then they kind of take the piss out of everyone and everything after awhile, kind of come across as douche bags.

The Jasta show
Pretty good, Jasta likes to go deep. Though he interviews a lot of band members I'm not really interested in.

Talking to ghost
Good for interviews with some more underground artists.

Full metal hipster
Don't think this guy is the best podcaster around, but he interviews some cool interesting bands. Falls of Rauros, Woe, Neckbearddeath camp to name a few.

Turned out a Punk
Obviously not metal but Damian Abraham vocalist of the band Fucked up does some super in depth interviews with all the biggest names in punk, Roger Miret, Fat Mike, Lars Frederiksen, Stza crack just to name a few.

Are You Morbid
Three metal nerds pick a metal genre or metal topic and run through the bands associated with it. Podcasts are pretty long and can get tedious, but I have found a few bands and learnt a few fun facts listening to the podcasts.