This week, Black Friday sales are up, body cams for cops, more cellphone spying, Sony gets hacked (again), a monumental change for music charts, and Daleks are alive and well — and we’re building them. The Force is strong with this week’s show…

Well metalheads, that time of the year has come around again. And whether you’re rockin’ under the mistletoe while headbanging to Twisted Sister’s Heavy Metal Christmas, or whether you’re holed up in a basement listening to Venom’s Black X-Mas, there’s probably a metalhead on your Christmas list who is expecting something other than coal in their stocking.

Well, never fear oh ye holiday headbangers. Geeks of Doom is kind of enough to supply you with the quintessential list of seasonal must-haves for the metal mavens.

Cue the fanfare. Add the trumpets and chorus. The regal Sleeping Beauty: The Legacy Collection was released last month to celebrate the animated film’s 55th anniversary. How does this soundtrack stack up? More importantly, should this music have stayed asleep or been reawakened for new audiences?

Let’s take a look…

Confessions
Buckcherry
Deluxe CD | CD | MP3
Century Media
Release Date: February 19, 2013

Buckcherry is special for a lot of reasons, but the main reason of note is that they’re one of the very few modern bands that have really captured that great sleazy 80’s-era L.A. sound made so popular by bands like Guns n’ Roses and LA Guns. They aren’t putting on an homage to the era and style of music; they’re simply one of those bands.

The band has gone through lineup changes after breaking up completely back in 2002, but Josh Todd on vocals and the neverending riffs of Keith Nelson have kept the band on track regardless of what other changes happened internally or externally as far as what’s popular musically. The band’s first three albums, Buckcherry, Timebomb, and 15, are near hard rock classics with two cuts from 15 (“Crazy Bitch,” “Sorry”) making that album the band’s most popular to date. Their fourth album, Black Butterfly wasn’t as strong as the previous releases and it made me wonder if they had run their course musically. The most popular song on that album, titled “Too Drunk,” was actually replaced with a Deep Purple cover when the album was re-issued. Then we got All Night Long, which was a return to form as far as album oriented music from the band goes. Most of the songs on the album, not just the singles, were great just like those first two albums.

My favorite part of 2012’s year end has been delivered unto the internet. DJ Earworm‘s latest United State of Pop 2012 (Shine Brighter) is online. Are you ready to celebrate all that was pop in 2012?

The United State of Pop series are mash-ups of a year’s top pop songs assembled into a coherent groove by DJ Earworm. For the year of 2012, he’s used the 25 biggest hits in the U.S. as determined by Billboard’s weekly Hot 100 charts. Don’t worry. There’s not a hint of ‘Gangnam Style’ to be heard. At least, I couldn’t decipher that infectious beast from the rest of the catchy hooks.

These days I’m not a fan of a lot of the pop songs that saturate terrestrial radio. So it’s more than strange that I like an amalgam of the year’s popular sounds more than the individual product. Last year’s is the shortest mash-up when compared to all the previous years. I’m not sure what that means for the state of pop music in the U.S.

Have a listen/watch at United State of Pop 2012 (Shine Brighter) here below the cut.