EYEHATEGOD is one of the most influential bands to ever emerge from the New Orleans music scene despite their sparse output. Formed in 1988, the sludge metal legends have only managed to release 5 albums due, in part, to the band members’ penchants for heavy drug use and side projects. Singer Mike Williams, in particular, has fought a very public battle with heroin addiction. Guitarist Jimmy Bower is a multi-instrumentalist who has also been in Crowbar and Phil Anselmo’s supergroups Down and Superjoint Ritual. In his absence, the other four members of the band have a side project known as Outlaw Order.

This week’s Massive Metal Monday track is “Medicine Noose” from EYEHATEGOD’s self-titled 2014 album
EYEHATEGOD. Sadly, it is the final album to feature founding drummer Joey LaCaze, who passed away in 2013 from respiratory failure.

This MMM is dedicated to the memory of Joey LaCaze.

When I was growing up in rural Indiana in the early ’80s, there was very limited access to heavy music. These were the days before MTV blew up with the whole hair metal, Headbangers Ball phenomenon. But on Sunday nights, there was a two-hour radio show that came from WOXY, just across the state line in Oxford, Ohio (home of Miami University of Ohio). It was called Massive Metal for the Masses, and I would wait all week for it to air. It was through this show that I was introduced to bands like Venom, Bathory, WASP, Michael Schenker Group, Slayer, and countless others. This Monday weekly column is my tip of the hat to that show. I call it Massive Metal Monday. Every week, I pay tribute to defining moments by the artists that laid the groundwork for heavy metal to become the worldwide cultural bond for all of us metal heads.