Disfear is a Swedish heavy metal/crust punk supergroup. The band, which has been active off and on since the early ’90s, includes members of At The Gates and Entombed. Their most recent release was the 2008 masterpiece Live the Storm, which was produced and engineered by Converge mastermind Kurt Ballou.

German thrash titan Kreator is set to kick off 2017 in epic fashion with the release of its fourteenth studio album Gods of Violence. The album arrives January 27th via the Nuclear Blast label and is the follow up to 2012’s excellent Phantom Antichrist.

Polish death metal titan Vader is set to release the twelfth studio album of its legendary, 33-year career on November 4, 2016. This disc is entitled The Empire.

The record comes via the Nuclear Blast label and harkens back to the thrash sound of Vader’s very earliest days as a band. The first single to be released is the blistering “Prayer to the God of War,” which also happens to be our selection for this week’s Massive Metal Monday.

Swedish Metal juggernaut Meshuggah has just released its eighth studio album, The Violent Sleep of Reason, via Nuclear Blast Records. The album is true to the band’s pummeling, polyrhythmic pedigree. Definitely not easy listening, but well worth the journey for the truly progressive metalhead.

“Clockworks,” the album’s jarringly massive opening track, clocks in at over seven minutes, so naturally they made it also the first official video. The visually morphing landscape of the clip is a perfect analogy for the music that accompanies it. But then trying to describe either the music or the visuals is roughly equivalent to trying to describe the power and devastation of a hurricane to someone who’s never been through one.

Thirty years ago tomorrow, September 27, 1986, the metal world lost one of its brightest stars. While on tour in support of their magnum opus Master of Puppets, Metallica were involved in a tragic bus accident that claimed the life of their 24-year-old bass prodigy Cliff Burton.

Burton was asleep in a top bunk near the open escape hatch when the drive of the tour bus lost control on an icy road, causing the bus to flip over. The bassist was ejected through the hatch and crushed by the rolling vehicle. It was a tragic end to a brief but stellar career for a man that many consider to be the greatest metal bassist of all time and the unquestionable heart and soul of one of metal’s most beloved bands.

So, to commemorate this somber anniversary, this week’s Massive Metal Monday is dedicated to the memory and legacy of the immortal Cliff Burton. Here is the master performing his signature song live in 1983. This is “Anesthesia (Pulling Teeth).”