In Memory of David Gold, Cover of WOODS OF YPRES - FINALITY

Hello everyone,

Last year in December the world lost one of it's best people and most talented musicians, David Gold (front man of Woods of Ypres).

In remembrance of his passing, and as a tribute to his art and him as the great person that he was, I've put together this little humble cover of one of my favorite songs of all time; "FINALITY" which is on the last release from the band Woods of Ypres.

Do check out the cover in the video below:

I met David in Kuwait when he made a work trip down there for a few months. David had previously been in touch with Sajid "Sarj" Masood over the internet (a few years before the whole "work in Kuwait" thing came up). Back then David was in Korea and while looking for metal bands to check out in Korea on Metal Archives, he saw "Kuwait" right next to it and wondered "Kuwait? There are metal bands in Kuwait?"

At that point he found out about Sarj's band "Nocturna" and basically got in touch with him and talked some metal.

A few years down the road, coincidence or not, David got a job opportunity in Kuwait and prior to arriving he got in touch with Sarj once again to meet up and what not while he's there. We met up with David about a week after his arrival in Kuwait, once he got settled into his new apartment and all that transitionary stuff.

We all hung out quite a bit, listened to a whole lot of Rammstein, Katatonia, Opeth, Meshuggah, and all that while driving around town. We even talked about doing a remote band that's along the lines of Rammstein (the working title of the project was "SANDSTEIN"). I actually still have the recorded demos that we did.

David had to cut his stay in Kuwait short once his band Woods of Ypres were signed to Earache Records and they were getting ready to tour in support of Woods 4: The Green Album, in addition to start with writing and recording the album Woods 5: Grey Skies and Electric Light.

After David left, we all kept in touch with each other a whole lot...we talked about a Benevolent and Woods of Ypres tour out here in the Middle East or Europe.

He was a great person, a very deep musician, and though he is no longer amongst us he truly lives in his music.

Carpe Diem.

Hadi Sarieddine

NEW BENEVOLENT LOGO / EMBLEM

Hey guys!

So we got some REALLY exciting things coming from the Benevolent camp in Dubai, we'll be revealing things one at a time as they come to life. The first cool thing to share with you guys is our new band Logo and Emblem.

HAVE A LOOK

The Emblem (circular thingy) has more to it than just being the sexy design that it is. The circles and rectangles that are spread around the main circle basically represent letters in Morse Code. The letters spell out the word "Benevolent", how cool is that?

Check out the breakdown of the letters below:

B: _ . . .
E: .
N: _ .
E: .
V: . . . _
O: _ _ _ 
L: . _ . .
E: .
N: _ . 
T: _

We are toying around with this whole Morse Code thing on a couple of more things which we'll be sharing with the coming of our upcoming album (featuring ANDOLS HERRICK on the drums).

Stay tuned for some more updates on our cool new toys coming in from IGNITE AMPS in Italy and more REALLY awesome things.

ALSO, DON'T FORGET TO GIVE US A LIKE ON FACEBOOK

We are psyched as hell!

Hadi

Line 6 POD Farm / POD X3 Live Rhythm Tone DOWNLOAD

Hey guys!

So if you've checked out the video entry I did for the Kevin Talley Guitar Contest, I was quite happy with the rhythm tone I crafted for that specific song / shindig. So I thought I'd share the settings that I used on POD Farm and upload the tone for you to download off of the official Line 6 Custom Tone website.

DOWNLOAD THE TONE HERE

THE SIGNAL CHAIN

The overall signal chain of the patch is a basic Noise Gate - Drive Pedal - Amp - Compressor - Chorus.

THE NOISE GATE

The settings on the Noise Gate are a bit loose, that's mostly because I like to keep the tone sounding like it's "breathing" rather than being choked out and sliced.

THE DRIVE PEDAL

For the Drive Pedal, I used the Boost + EQ model, which I find that I always resort to for all rhythm tones, and even to drive clean channels too sometimes. It just allows further frequency control with the Bass, Treble, Mids, and Mid Frequency knobs in addition to have a crunchy / liquified character about it. I've also pushed the Gain over the mid point to give things a bit more umph (I like to experiment a lot between increasing / decreasing gain levels between the drive pedals and the amp's gain and compare results).

THE AMP

Next in line is the Cali Diamond Plate amp, which is a Mesa Boogie Triple Rectifier model. This is hands down one of my favorite models on POD Farm. I've pushed the Mids, Treble, and Presence while rolling off the Bass to below the center. The settings may seem a bit extreme, but I like to craft tones with my ears rather than my eyes.

THE COMPRESSOR

Next I've placed a Compressor unit in the signal chain, this works the attack and spank so the picking really comes out.

THE CHORUS PEDAL

And finally, my favorite part of the signal chain: the Analog Chorus pedal. I really really really dig placing chorus pedals at the end of the signal chain of rhythm patch and roll out the mix so it's almost not noticeable that there's a chorus pedal in there, but the sound just gets richer, precise, and liquified. Something about the sound of a very subtle chorus effect in the chain really gives me the chills!

And there we have it! You can download the tone by click on the below link.

DOWNLOAD THE TONE HERE

Cheers!
Hadi

Line 6 POD HD500 Warm Clean Tone

Hey guys!

So I spent the night toying with my Line 6 POD HD500 in pursuit of a warm clean tone (something along the lines of what Opeth were beautifully tormenting our senses with on their album Damnation).

I plugged the POD right into my MacBook Pro via USB, opened up the POD HD500 Edit software (which is a ridiculously simple and comfortable way to craft your tones, it's just fascinating). I tried a few amps looking for the texture I was looking for and the Hiwatt amp model immediately felt like home.

I got a nice clean and round tone with just about everything at flat settings on the Hiwatt amp model, with the default cab/mic settings as well. From there on I basically started toying around with different compressors before the amp to give the roundedness a warm attack and definition. That worked out well! I ended up adding another compressor after the amp in the signal chain to in-turn give stronger definition to the "processed" tone coming out of the amp.

To emphasize depth and give the tone a certain liquidity, I added a chorus pedal (this was placed as the compressor following the amp in the signal chain). When I add those chorus pedals to tones that don't require that extra wobbly tone, I just set the mix down to a very minimum level where the listener may not necessarily hear that the chorus effect is in there BUT it's adding to the tone's richness and liquifying it.

Last but not least, the cherry on the cake: the Ping Pong Delay pedal. I dropped the Mix to about 30% and gave the Feedback a notch up. AND VOILA!

Give it a listen and make sure you DOWNLOAD THE TONE if you own a POD HD500.

Best!
Hadi

My Entry to the Kevin Talley Guitar Contest

Hello everyone!

So I decided to partake in the Kevin Talley Guitar Contest for September 2012, my entry take video can be found below.

Basically the contest includes a drum track recorded by Kevin Talley and the challenge is to write riffs over it. The drumming is pretty nuts and there's a few odd signatures in there! It was the very fun yes.

The guitars were all recorded with Line 6 POD FARM, I'll be sharing the rhythm patches used later on.

Check it out and Enjoy!

Cheers,
Hadi

My New Filmscore Track (Arabesque one)

Hey guys!

So this one's a bit different from the norm. Being another one of the filmscore tracks I've recently worked on, this one has a cool flavoring of Arabesque instruments and melodies being played on top of a stabbing bass flow and a rich percussive rhythm.

Enjoy!
Hadi

Benevolent live at Ratsky 3 Gig Experience

Hey guys!

So it's been an awesome few days, my brothers-in-metal came down from Kuwait and Bahrain to slug out a Benevolent gig and boy was it a great experience.

Our new session drummer Prasad Jayaruwan flew in on Tuesday night, Fadi and I drove down to Sharjah pick him up. It was awesome meeting Prasad, we've been buddies through the interwebs for a while and been talking metal for long enough to finally get to not only meet up but also gig it out together. The cool part was that Prasad and ourselves IMMEDIATELY hit it off with great chemistry and the excitement vibes were all over the place for the gig. We were really psyched to be opening for Nervecell and to be playing in Dubai again!

After picking up Prasad and chilling for a bit, Fadi and I made our way to pick up Sarj (from Sarj's Studio) who came down to be here at our gig and hang out with us! It was great seeing Sarj again and was awesome catching up on geek gear talk with him.

Wednesday night cometh, Fadi, Prasad, and myself went to In The Mix studios for our first official rehearsal (Sarj joined us too, he's the band's babysitter when he's not making us sound awesome). It was such a fun experience playing those songs straight up from the get go with Prasad, it's crazy thinking that this is the very first time we get together as a band (well, half the band that night) and the very second day that we hang out as peeps. CRAZY!

The rehearsal was electric, we all vibed right off of each other and had an absolute blast.

Right after rehearsal, we all went out for dinner and hang out right until it was time for Mohammed Gad and Hisham Khalil to arrive in town. The guys arrived safely, it was great seeing the guys once again. I haven't seen Hisham since leaving Kuwait back in March, but I did see Gad when I was in Lebanon last since he came down to visit.

The next day (Thursday) was when it all got pretty crazy, the very first (and only) pre-show full band rehearsal. The entire gang head over to In The Mix studios once again to prepare for show day. The rehearsal was great! We all prepared for those songs individually as per the album and since we're playing those songs live down to the tick it all just came together neatly. Again, it's pretty crazy that with just one rehearsal we all managed to put it all together for the show!

Show day comes, June 29th, no kidding, it's happening! We were up to an early start, had breakfast together as a band and then went out to buy some last minute things (new picks, spare strings, etc). Right after, we immediately made our way to the venue and arrived around 3:00 pm. The drums were still being setup and we just carried our gear inside and made ourselves comfortable with the location.

We helped the crew setup where we could, hung out, took some videos and photos, looked around the area, warmed up on our instruments, ate again, and what not.

When it was time for us to get onto our soundcheck, we got up on stage and put our pedalboards up (I was using my new POD HD500, which sounded unbelievable! Hands down the best live tone I've ever had...more on this!). Everything was plugged in perfectly and we played The Quantum Paradox at sound check. I was really psyched about how insanely HUGE my tone sounded straight into the mixer, I wasn't plugged into any amp and could hear myself perfectly through the monitors. I only had the new POD for a couple of days before the gig but I've just toyed around with some of the built in presets and downloaded a few tones from the Custom Tone site and with some tweaking I've found the right tone, it just sounded amazing and made me play better!

The guys from Nervecell came into the venue straight from their earlier all ages show while we were going through The Quantum Paradox and hailed us as they walked by. The entire time after getting off stage from sound check we just hung out with these guys (whom if you haven't met, are the nicest most genuine people you could meet), the crew, the band, and just everyone around.

People started coming into the venue and the energy was great! Echoes With Laughter kicked off the show playing a killer set of rock n' roll/metal covers by Iron Maiden, AC/DC, Metallica, some originals, and more! They had a great energy about them on stage and played with great enthusiasm and got everyone going and singing along, awesome band!

We were up next, we got right up on stage and put up all the gear in place and plugged everything in and got our metal faces on. Our setlist for the show was:

1. Haunting Shores
2. Purgatory
3. The Quantum Paradox
4. The Tyrant

Halfway through our first song, Haunting Shores, I realized that the backing tracks weren't playing through the PA and are only playing through Prasad's in-ears (the backing tracks basically have all the atmospheric stuff that sit in the back, which is important to our full sound and basically would be damaging to play the show without). Right after we finished playing through Haunting Shores, I jumped down to the house board to check on what's going wrong and Barry helped out immediately in solving the problem.

From that point onwards, the show went in a great direction. We all got into our muse and had a blast playing the songs. The 4 songs we played felt like we were up there for no longer than one minute, it all flew by really quickly. I definitely cannot wait for our next outing! It was a great pleasure for us to be performing alongside Nervecell and to have met so many great people and made some new friends at the gig.

Huge thanks to Spellbind Records, Thomsun Pure Music, the organizers (Sary, you the man!), the awesome guys at Nervecell and Echoes With Laughter.

And finally, thank you to all for coming out and I can't wait to see you all soon!

Don't forget to check out our page for more updates on dates and news on the new record at HERE

Hadi

AMT B-1 through Ignite Amps TPA-1

Hey guys!


Here's a new test! AMT Electronics' B-1 through the TPA-1 by Ignite Amps (It is an upcoming Tube Power Amp plugin that I'm beta testing)

Cheers
Hadi

[PRESS RELEASE] Benevolent Lead Guitarist Hadi Sarieddine now on AMT Electronic's Official Artist roster

Hadi Sarieddine, Lead guitarist of extreme experimental metal band Benevolent, has been added to AMT Electronics' lineup of official artists, marking him as the first Lebanese musician to be featured on the Russian comany's roster of artists.

Hadi Sarieddine had this to say about AMT's products, "I've recently picked up the E-1 from AMT Electronics' line of Legend Amps and was shocked by the quality from the get-go"

"The E-1's tone fits perfectly with the tone that I go for with Benevolent and I absolutely cannot wait to take this beast out live, and the best part is it can fit in my guitar gig bag's pocket" 

The Legend Amps series line from AMT Electronics features the emulation of legendary amplifiers in a full analog designed based on JFET technology, all in a stomp box design. The stomp boxes feature 2 output options, one that is a dry signal output and is designed to go directly into the effects return of your amplifier head; while the other output option features an emulated speaker cabinet intended to go directly into the PA or sound card.

Hadi Sarieddine added, "if you were to listen to a clip of how tuneful those little stomp boxes are without being told where all the preamp sounds are coming from, there's no way you'd guess it's coming out of something as small as a cell phone; I've never been so psyched about a tone like this before" 

Benevolent released their debut EP in November 2010, received rave reviews around the region; the band is currently in the recording process of their debut full length record which is due for release with Spellbind Records. You can listen to Benevolent's music on their Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/Benevolent.band

Check out Hadi Sarieddine's profile on AMT Electronics on http://www.amtelectronics.com/artisty/hadi_sarieddine/, and make sure you check the rest of AMT Electronic's products on their website.

- ENDS -

Andols Herrick (Ex-Chimaira) to record with Benevolent

UAE-based extreme metal band BENEVOLENT to feature ANDOLS HERRICK on upcoming debut Full Length Album

UAE-based metallers Benevolent are in the recording process for their upcoming debut full length album, the band is adding drum-icon Andols Herrick (ex-Chimaira) as a featured musician on the album to record one track on the record. Hadi Sarieddine, the band co-founder and lead guitarist states "It is pretty crazy thinking that Andols Herrick is going to be drumming on one of our songs; if I go back in time and tell past-me that this was happening I'd probably get a pretty sarcastic reaction." He added "The last couple of years since we started the band have been absolutely insanely great for us; getting such great reviews for the debut record, getting signed to Spellbind Records, and now this? I can't think that things could be any better for the band, I'm really proud of how things are coming together"

Andols Herrick commented on his work with Benevolent and how this all came together and stated "I was approached by Hadi Sarieddine awhile back about the possibility of tracking drums for Benevolent. I was quite impressed with the quality of the music and vocals."

"I love having the opportunity to work with a great band, who happens to represent the Middle East metal scene very well. I do know it is very vibrant having had the pleasure of performing with Chimaira at the Desert Rock Festival in Dubai back in 2009."

The band hit the Middle East scene with strong waves with the release of their debut EP titled DIVIDED in the year 2010, placing the band as the top names in the metal scene on regional levels garnering fans across the world as well in Europe, USA, Japan and Asia, and Oceania. Benevolent was signed to Spellbind Records in September of 2011 (alongside label mates and Middle East metal icons Nervecell).

The band has provided previous information to the press about the direction of the next album as being a technical, dark, and progressive album that picks up where Divided left off whilst expanding the band's sound identity. Hadi commented on the material further saying "It's definitely a lot more technical than Divided; the songs have a lot going on and while it preserves that sound that we've created in our debut EP this is a step forward on many levels and it tells a story about lots of dark themes with the lyrical and instrumental direction on the album."

As for the specific song that Andols Herrick is recording, Andols commented stating "This song presented numerous rhythmic challenges as I was learning it. If you were a drummer with limited music theory experience, I'd just say "Good luck trying to learn it!" The song is loaded with "over the bar line" guitar riffs, and I found myself, on occasion, discovering some of my transcriptions would be a sixteenth note off here or there!"

The band is set out to release the debut full length through Spellbind Records in the spring of 2012, and will be performing across the Middle East and beyond to promote the new release.

On a final note, the band's frontman and co-founder, Fadi Sarieddine, stated "We all can't wait to share this album with the world; I believe we have a very strong set of new songs and it's going to be great to share the new stuff with the world. Once the album is done, it will be the begin of the next phase of this observation's life cycle, and that is to get it all out there to as many listeners as possible worldwide; we're excited and we absolutely cannot wait!"

To keep up with the band's news and updates be sure to check out their official pages on the links below: (ALSO, BE SURE TO DOWNLOAD THE BAND'S DEBUT EP WHICH IS AVAILABLE ON FREE DOWNLOAD HERE http://benevolent.bandcamp.com)

http://www.facebook.com/benevolent.band

http://www.twitter.com/benevolent_twitter

http://benevolent.bandcamp.com

-ENDS-

NEW TOY DAY! AMT ELECTRONICS E-1

Hey guys!

So I just received the pictured baby in the mail today, ordered it from Thomann.de and it’s the AMT Electronics E-1 pedal which is a JFET-based preamp pedal cloning the gain channel of the ENGL Fireball.

It’s the size of my hand, so it’s pretty small (unless I have a big hand, that is), and it’s got five knobs on it so operating it is no rocket science; and even better, getting a sick tone out of this machine is no hard task!

The pedal was designed as a preamp to go into the power amp section of an amplifier, it sounds like it was hand-wired by Satan in his gear workshop in deepest lair of hell. 

UNBOXING PHOTOS:

The AMT E-1 also allows you the option of going direct into the mixer out of the cabinet emulated out! But I think this pedal shines when taken seriously and plugged right into a tube power amp OR into an impulse response on your computer.

I’ll post up some clips soon! I haven’t had a chance to demo this baby yet, but I know it’s its own beast from all the research I’ve done prior to purchasing it.

Oh, and, it’s only $129.99; ENGL tone for that much? Get outta here! 

Hadi