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 VLOG

Hey guys!

How's everyone doing?

We got a new VLOG up! This one covers our experience from Gulf Bike Week and Mental Issues.

I'll be posting up a full post of our experience at the Mental Issues show this past weekend.

We are working on tons and TONS of things! Really can't wait to share it with you all!

In the mean time, I will leave you with the VLOG.

Speak soon all!
Hadi

The Gulf Bike Fest Experience

Hello everyone!

It's been an absolutely great month for us, on October 18th 2012 we performed live at the Live & Local stage at Gulf Bike Week festival which was HEADLINED BY MEGADETH!

As soon as we were confirmed for the gig the preparation and planning began!

Prasad and Gad's tickets to come down to Dubai were in place, hotels booked, rehearsal space arranged, and we were ready to get to it!

During the weeks leading up to the show, and seeing as we're in different countries, each member of the band prepared for our setlist from the comfort of their own home playing along to the studio recordings of Divided EP (WHICH YOU CAN STILL DOWNLOAD FOR FREE BY CLICK HERE). Also, we decided to play a cover song this time around; the choice was Nemesis by Arch Enemy. So, we all basically just hammered it out in our own space until we got together as a band to rehearse and get it working together.

We had a great time, the guys flew in a couple of hours before the rehearsal was scheduled so we got to have a quick meal and did some fast catching up right before rehearsal time came about. Right after finishing up the rehearsal we packed our gear and went straight to the Gulf Bike Festival venue for setup and soundcheck. It was great that we got to do that at night, we didn't feel like we were racing against the clock to make it in time before people start walking in!

Sound was great! We could hear each other clearly on stage, and the house mix to the crowd was pretty killer too!

Show day came and we were all feeling great! (I am usually the one getting super nervous before a show, but for this one I felt a lot calmer than usual). Unfortunately, a lot of times you get caught up worrying about the sound being right and over-thinking every note that you're about to hit on the guitar; however, this time around I had a serious conversation with myself and convinced me to just enjoy that time on stage, and enjoy the entire day. We were playing the Gulf Bike Festival, at Dubai Festival City, and Megadeth was the headlining act; that's a bunch of awesome things happening and nothing ever beats that feeling of being on stage and sharing your music with a live audience and feeling their reaction to your music as it happens. It worked out! I enjoyed it and had an absolute BLAST! (I guess I can be pretty convincing)

We had a great time at the show, we met some awesome people and made some new friends! I wanna thank Ryan Noronha for being the awesome person that he is and of course none other than Barney Ribeiro for being absolutely epic, booking the show and making this all happen! You guys are awesome!

[IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BOOK BENEVOLENT FOR A CONCERT / TOUR CONTACT OUR BOOKING AGENT BARNEY RIBEIRO AT AAR@SPELLBINDRECORDS.COM]

After the show, we grabbed a few beers, celebrated, and then had a great time seeing our good friends Absolace and then the headliners MEGADETH kill it! (Unfortunately, we missed Sandwash's set because we were packing our gear and what not!)

We've got a few more exciting things coming up so STAY TUNED!

HINT: News about our epic work with IGNITE AMPS and some more juicy stuff is coming!

Thank you for reading!
Hadi

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

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

Guitar Pick Up Match EQ Testing

Hey guys!

So I've been doing some testing with Match EQing comparing my guitar pickups to other popular ones. If you're not familiar with the concept of Match EQ, in a nutshell, it's the use of designated plugins to analyze the EQ of your signal (whether it is a fully blown guitar tone through an amp or a DI signal of just your guitar's pickups), and then analyze a "targeted" signal's EQ, and then basically create an EQ curve that makes your tone match the targeted one. It's pretty simple and straightforward, however, to achieve stellar results it requires some trial and errors.

Here's my demo recording where I compare the match EQs of EMG707, Seymour Duncan Vintage Rails, Seymour Duncan SSL5, and of course the sound of the original pickups in my Schecter C-7 (Note that I used the same rhythm and clean tones for all pickup match EQs):

Here's how I went about doing this:

1. Find DI recorded signals of pickups online. (Luckily, I've found some EMG707 DIs, and some Seymour Duncan ones as well!)
2. Open up your DAW (I use Logic)
3. Open a new track
4. In the effects, load up "Match EQ" under Logic's EQ effects
5. Import the recorded DI of the pickup you wanna steal
6. On the same track, record yourself playing the same riff (or at least something close!)
7. On the Match EQ window, click on "Template" and play the DI you downloaded (Let it play for a bit so it can capture as much frequencies as possible)
8. Now, on the Match EQ window, click on "Current" and play the just wankery you recorded
9. And finally, click on "Match" on the Match EQ window
10. Voila!

Here are some screen shots of the process:

STEP 1: ANALYZE THE TARGETED PICKUP'S EQ

STEP 2: RECORD THE SAME RIFF AND ANALYZE THE BUILT IN PICK UP'S SIGNAL

STEP 3: CLICK MATCH SO THE PLUGIN CAN CREATE AN EQ CURVE TO GET YOUR PICKUP TO SOUND THE SAME (OR CLOSE)

Keep in mind that you may have to do some post tweaking to get better results, and also note that the current amp settings may not sound as great with your new pickup EQ, so spend a bit of time getting a great tone down and enjoy!

NOTE: The matched EQ may NOT exactly match the pickup that you're aiming at, HOWEVER, it WILL give you a whole new sound to work with!

Hadi

Download my Line 6 Rhythm Tones

Hey guys!

As you all know I have been using Line 6 gear extensively for a long time now, so I figured why not share my main recording Rhythm tones with you all!

I went ahead and uploaded the two main Rhythm guitar tones to the Line 6 Custom Tone site, CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE TONES.

The below tune was recorded using those tones, check it out:

Be sure to drop me a line on what you think of those tones and do share your tracks recording using the tones in the comments section or on Facebook.

Have fun!
Hadi

Footage of us Performing in Dubai

Hey guys!

Check this montage of our set in Dubai on June 29th.

I used my Line 6 POD HD500 straight into the PA, sounded epic!

Hadi

New YouTube layouts! BOOM!

Hey guys!

So I designed new YouTube backgrounds/rearranged and updates the pages for both my personal channel and Benevolent's YouTube channel.

Czech it awt!
Hadi

Benevolent LIVE IN DUBAI - VLOG PART 1

Hey guys,

Check it out! GOOD TIMES!

Best,
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

NEW TOY DAY: LINE 6 POD HD500

Hey guys!

Another new toy day! I've just picked up the Line 6 POD HD500 and it is KILLER!

I'd like to thank the guys at Thomsun Pure Music for being awesome and helping me get a hold of this new baby! (Do check out their music institutes at Popular Music Institute and Sing and Swing Training Centre)

I'll post a proper full length review of this pretty soon! For now, I will leave you with the usual unboxing photos:

Cheers,
Hadi

Opening for Nervecell: June 29th Show Poster

SWAGGER

Hadi

Settling in Dubai; Exploring the Metal Scene; Writing/Recording Solos for the NEW BENEVOLENT ALBUM

Hey guys!

So I've been busy settling into my new life out here in Dubai, loving it! I've been to a few shows already and I am really enjoying how vibrant the scene here is here. Fadi and I went to the Avenged Sevenfold and Anuryzm show back in early May, and it was phenomenal! Both bands really rocked out and we had a blast. The other show I've been to was the Hate Eternal / Perversion / Creative Waste show done by Spellbind Records and the bands were freaking crazy good!

Besides settling in, snooping around my new home, and getting to know Dubai, we've been hard at work on finishing the Benevolent record. Vocals and solos are underway! We are having a blast putting this thing together!

I have kind of found that I am taking to a more organic way of writing the solos for the new album. I think that I am reaching a deeper and more sincere level of intimacy with recording the solos on my laptop in the room on my own without the studio pressure of having to get the very next take down. I think both recording in a studio with an engineer/producer guiding you through things AND recording on your own have advantages and disadvantages.

I often worry that the solos I am writing may sound good to me because I am engulfed by the wavelength of creativity that I am feeding off of. Although, what I am doing is am keeping Sarj involved in the production process so I keep sending him the takes in scratch tones for some feedback, alongside the rest of the band obviously. My good friend Bader Nana is also one the trustful ears that I turn to for feedback. Those guys say it as it is, and I find myself always seeking their "approval" over bits before they are confirmed as the final ones for the record!

Much to talk about, stay tuned for more updates! And give us a like on Facebook HERE

Take care now.

Hadi

First Day Tracking Vocals

Hey guys!

Today was the first day of vocal tracking, Fadi jumped right in with great energy and ripped through his parts.

What we're going to do is finish all the growl vocals (Fadi's bits) first, and then after that I'll step in to do my vocals and finish up my solos as well along the same time.

Here are some shots from today's session:

Stay tuned!
Hadi

Fresh Album Making Updates

Hey guys!

So we're closing in on the making of this record! HOORAH!

We've got a couple of songs to track the guitars and bass for, vocals/lyrics finalization are happening next week, solos and finalization of all production/sound design layers elements is on the menu for the upcoming weeks as well!

Andols Herrick has one more drum tracking session taking place through the next week and then we start pooling all the pieces together to finalizing this record.

We're extremely excited to share it with everyone! You are definitely going to be hearing our hearts and souls flowing through this album from start to finish. The songs are beefy, rich in many elements, and it's the soundtrack of the next chapter of the Benevolent family's life!

Stay in touch and be well! (Keep up with our updates on Facebook)

Hadi

Sorry Have Been Busy Relocating

Hey guys!

I am extremely sorry for the delay in blogging, I've been busy relocating to the UAE and I am now officially living in Dubai. Feels great! It's a very vibrant city with lots going on, lots of concerts and the metal scene is pretty great out here! I can't wait to explore the country further as I stay here and will definitely keep you guys posted on album progress and my production/songwriting rants!

Be well!

Hadi

BENEVOLENT: TWO YEARS OF ALBUM CREATION (PART ONE)

December 2010: 

Psyched as F*** from Divided EP's reviews, reviews, reviews, and feedback / resulting in early demoing for the upcoming material.

February 2011: 

The song "THE 2011" is born with the main intro riff. Listened to lots of djent bands here so that's been an influence.

March 2011: 

"The USB riff" becomes the new song of focus; also heavily influenced by the djent bands I was listening to then. Sadly this song wasn't completed but didn't make the cut. Check out a half demo of it here!

May 2011: 

At this point the song "The 2011" is in the finishing phases of the writing process and being scheduled for tracking and release in the summer of 2011, hence the name! At this point I had been working heavily on generating other ideas but lightly because I prefer to finish the song at hand before moving on to other ones. I guess that's what happened with "The USB Riff" I just hopped into other things and never got around to finishing it, and I haven't "felt" it since then!

July 2011: 

Tracking "The 2011" takes place at Sarj's studio. We spent quite a bit of time tracking this one since it's got a set of really challenging riffs with specific picking patterns. At this point the working date for the new record's release started popping into mind heavily and whilst working on finishing "The 2011" we began to define a blueprint for the record. This was done in close consultation with Sarj as well! He's kind of like the band's babysitter in a sense.

September 2011: 

Benevolent signs to Spellbind Records. Can I get a hell yea?

Most definitely one of those proud moments for us as a band and myself personally, being on the same record as metal icons Nervecell is a true honor!

At this point "The 2011" was finished but due to so much going on at that moment we were taken away from focusing on the finalizing of this song and decided to let it hang as the album's picture starts to come more clearly into play.

At this point I began working on a song which I finished rather quickly, this was "Nice Introer"; to me this song is kind of like a Dream Theater meets Scar Symmetry with a nice acoustic topping here and there! I would say it's one of the best intros from the songs on the album!

October 2011: 

I started to toy up with two songs back to back at this point, and with working titles of "Paid to Rest" and "Sacramento" you guys can take a wild guess what I was listening to heavily then (Lamb of God FTW). The songs were demoed at my studio and finalized, however, they didn't make the final cut because I felt that they stood out distinctively from the rest, had a much too different feel about them, and I found myself losing interest in fixing them while rather just wanting to move on to fresh and new songs. Those songs were on the main picks of songs to track for the record's final product up until March 2012 (see in PART TWO!)

November 2011: 

Benevolent debut gig in Dubai at Metal Asylum Festival 2011 marking the band's first show in the UAE. We had a blast performing alongside the bands such as Zygnema, Firezone, and the rest!

I remember waking up at 8 am after sleeping at 5 am post the gig, really wired up from the show's energy, grabbed my laptop and started writing what later became the song "OBOBOBZEN"

At the point I was also grappling with a song named "EPIC2", which never got finished but I got a feeling this one will be making an appearance on future Benevolent releases. I remember recording a few ideas with my homie Khalid Al Mansour while we were bored and lonely in Dubai, waiting for rehearsal time.

Early December 2011: 

Demo recording of "OBOBOBZEN" comes to life. This was a turning point for the album's creation; it was the begin of the shift in tuning for the entire (well, most of the) album. I tuned down to E D A D G B E for a maximum sinister feeling when playing guitar.

Unfortunately, "OBOBOBZEN" sounded far too rushed and rather immature as a song, so it was scrapped, however, I feel this one song's presence in the process is key in this album's essence because it paved the way for the upcoming tracks, which in my opinion have made this album!

STAY TUNED FOR PART TWO!

Working with IGNITE AMPS

Hey guys!

So we [BENEVOLENT] have been working with IGNITE AMPS on a little something to be revealed soon (STAY TUNED); what I wanted to do is to take this little moment to chime in about the experience of working with them on this project and the way they process custom orders and deliver gear brutality whether it be through plugins or through hardware units.

I've been in touch with Federico Berti from Ignite Amps for a while now, mainly exchanging ideas and having endless conversations about gear. Along the way and through the webs of our conversations emerged the idea of doing a custom SOMETHING for Benevolent and the experience of working with him and the Ignite Amps team has been absolutely brilliant! They are extremely dedicated, creative, capable, knowledgeable, proactive, and hard working guys! Thorough communication and a very transparent way of dealing with their clients who eventually become friends!

The way Ignite Amps does their custom work is by first developing a VST/AU plugin for you with the specifications of your unit; whether it is an amp, preamp, pedal, etc. The plugins are made to match the exact characteristics of the unit and provide you with a way to demo your gear before it enters the hardware stage, where things become a bit more tricky to change around.

I am happy to be one of the fortunate artists who are working with such a great and dedicated team. When you are dedicated to your craft and you meet people who are as dedicated (and more) and can sit right in with the wavelength of ideas you bring to the table, the work becomes a joyful ride!

If you've got some custom guitar/bass gear unit you want to get together hit these guys up on www.igniteamps.com

Talk soon!
Hadi

AMT P-1 Metal Test

Hey guys!

Here goes the test of the AMT Electronics P-1. The audio speaks for itself!

HELL YES!

Hadi