Machine Head Tickets

Perhaps no metal band has been as instrumental as Machine Head in proving that heavy music could be both true to its core roots while also having an eye looking forward toward other genres and new futures.

Frontman and guitarist Rob Flynn formed the band in 1991 in the San Francisco Bay Area with bassist Adam Duce, who had just parted ways with thrash metallers Vio-lence. They soon recruited another guitarist and drummer and began jamming in a nearby warehouse.

Their debut album Burn My Eyes was released in 1994 and set the tone for their furious, aggressive musicianship. Boasting songs like Davidian, Block, A Thousand Eyes, Old and Blood For Blood which focussed on themes of social disorder, it reached No.25 on the UK albums chart and set itself apart as an era-defining work.

Machine Head’s sophomore album The More Things Change… arrived in 1997 after being plagued with problems including master recordings going missing and guitar and vocal tracks getting erased. Charting at No.16 in the UK, it continued along the lines of their canon and produced hits with the cathartic Take My Scars and atmospherically foreboding Down To None.

Their next two albums – 1999’s The Burning Red and 2001’s Supercharger – saw Machine Head make a turn towards a nu-metal sound that wasn’t as popular with audiences and resulted in them being dropped by their label.

Machine Head’s fifth album, Through The Ashes Of Empires, arrived in 2003 and contained the fan-favourite track Imperium plus saw the band return to the heavier groove metal sound of their debut.

In 2007, their masterpiece The Blackening was unveiled. Critically acclaimed, it’s widely considered to be one of their greatest albums and was followed by another brilliant collection with 2011’s Unto The Locust. Recorded in Green Day’s Jingletown Studios, the band promoted it with a huge tour named The Eighth Plague that included support from Bring Me The Horizon, DevilDriver and Darkest Hour.

In 2013, co-founder Duce split with the band. Throughout its existence, Machine Head have gone through a number of line-up changes as well as a rollercoaster ride with high and low points in their career as Flynn liked to cut loose and experiment.

The band’s eight album Bloodstone & Diamonds was an example of this. The 12-song record played for 71 minutes with the opening track Now We Die clocking in at over seven minutes. Bloodstone & Diamonds also saw Jared MacEachern take over on bass for Duce.

Following the release of 2018’s No.12-charting Catharsis and a world tour, the line-up changed dramatically once again. The next year brought guitarist Waclaw Kieltyka and drummer Matt Alston into Machine Head’s fold with Flynn and MacEachern.