Greetings from Trinec Czech Republic! I'm in my room at the Hotel Steel, which on the outside looks like a war-torn '70s modern communist building but on the inside has clean functional rooms and great espresso.

I've been in Europe since May 31, all over the place. I spent the first two weeks doing promotion for the new Anthrax record Worship Music (coming in October through Megaforce/RED/Sony....PLUG). Basically traveling from city to city doing interviews and photo shoots.12 hours a day, sometimes 14-16 hour days. Cry for me Suicide Girls!

London, Paris, Madrid, Milan, Helsinki, Stockholm and Oslo. It was a brutal schedule but the reaction to the new songs has been amazing!!!! I have an iPod with the new mixes on it and the writers get to hear them right before they sit down to talk to me. This is the way it's done in the world of stealing music my friends. No more advance CD's.

The instant reactions are great. It really makes me excited for all of you to hear it!!! It really feels like the press/media is hearing the songs the same way I hear them. They can hear all the energy and time and blood and sweat and hard work that we put into this record. The two years we spent writing and then the six months we spent recording were some of the toughest and best times I have ever had in Anthrax and listening back to the finished songs now I can say it was well worth it.

This new record is the best representation of our career that I could ever imagine and our new singer Dan Nelson sounds like he's been with us forever. We're playing the fuck out of these songs and to quote my buddy Patton Oswalt; "Playing them like we're going to jail tomorrow."

Anyway, wait until you hear this record. Worship Music is a fucking great metal record and it will be out on October 12.

After the two weeks of promo we started our summer tour in Estonia. It was our first time in Tallinn and we had a blast!! Found a killer bar called Hell Hunt and we drank a hellish amount of beer! Tried all the local Estonian brews and found them to my liking. My friend Renee offered to take me to a poker room but I was too drunk and thought it would be a bad idea to be playing with hardcore Estonians and Russians drunk.

The show in Estonia was great (even though it was raining really hard) and the new songs went over great. We've been playing three new ones; "Fight'em 'Til You Can't," "New Noise," and "Earth On Hell," and the reactions everywhere have been thrash-fucking-tastic.

We played the Metal Hammer Awards in London and that was a blast as well. Since then we've been in Paris, Luxembourg, Clisson France for Hellfest (which was amazing, best show of the tour so far), Bilbao Spain, Bologna Italy, Lucerne Switzerland (another gem), Zagreb Croatia and now Trinec, a sunny little town, not so much grim as it is plain, right near the Polish border. Somehow amongst all of that I've been eating OK as well.
Meal of the tour was at the Trattoria Marano outside of Bologna. All home-made, all delicious. The mascarpone dessert was the best thing I've ever had for dessert. I'd still be eating and drinking there if it wasn't for this damn tour schedule!

Oh, another highlight...at the Hellfest in France after our show I got to watch Heaven & Hell from the side of the stage and they were incredible. Ronnie Dio is metal perfection. He really is the best singer ever. And, getting to stand so close to Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler is so surreal. I know these guys and have had conversations with them and I know they are just normal guys but they INVENTED HEAVY METAL. It's like standing next to Gods.

That's it for now. More food and booze next time and more tour reports.

And don't forget to WORSHIP MUSIC!!!

Cheers,
Scott

PS RIP MJ. Besides the musical, dance and technical genius of the man, and the influence he's had on four decades of artists, Michael loved Zombies.
Cheers,
Scott

PSS Here's a cool blog from Andy Buchanan, pro photographer and Kiss lover. He's been out here with us.

Image: Hellfest in France. 40,000 maniacs make me fly. Photo by Andy Buchanan.



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Scott Ian is SuicideGirls' monthly Food Coma columnist. Click HERE for more of his musing on sustenance and libations. He plays guitar for revolutionary metal band Anthrax and also for Pearl.