TheGauntlet is reporting that, following a disagreement over money that led to longtime Anthrax bassist Frank Bello striking new vocalist Dan Nelson, Bello has been fired from the band by drummer Charlie Benante. According to reports, it appears that former Armored Saint/Fates Warning bassist Joey Vera - who briefly replaced Bello for a stint in 2004 - will be brought back into the fold. Stay tuned for more updates.

UPDATE: TheGauntlet is now reporting that all parties have resolved their differences. False alarm!

Stop the presses! The highly-anticipated Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards are in the books and Testament walked out as the surprise winners of the prestigious "Album of the Year" award for The Formation of Damnation. The thrashers took the award over runners-up Atreyu, Bullet for My Valentine, Children of Bodom and Down.
 

...Death Magnetic. After teasing fans for all of last week with a slow, coded revealing process, the full title for Metallica's upcoming full-length has finally been officially confirmed. No idea what it means, but I think I like it. Check out this video revealing the album title (and a new riff):

Nashville, Tennessee metalheads got extremely lucky last night when Metallica played a secret show at The Basement in front of a meager 175 fans. Their set list deviated somewhat from their other North American shows this year, with the band playing a few rare tracks, most notably portions of "Frayed Ends of Sanity," a song that the band is notoriously unable to play live.

A move that stirred up rampant speculation recently was the removal of several glowing reviews of Metallica's upcoming album from various sites who were given a chance to sample a rough mix of the LP. The move was seen by many as a bizarre attempt at complete control by the band, especially considering that the reviews were actually uniformly positive. What happened?