KROQ recently spoke with Rise Against members Tim McIlrath and Joe Principe. The interview took place this past Saturday (May 17th) while the band was about to do their show at this year's Weenie Roast, which included Bad Religion, Metallica, The Offspring and Pennywise. The Rise Against members talk about their career, a vide about wrestling on YouTube, their upcoming tour, and the new album they have been working on earlier this year.

When asked what the current status of the new Rise Against record was, one of the members said that the band was in the middle of recording it because of their touring schedule. They also mentioned that they had tapped Bill Stevenson and Jason Livermore as the producers for the album. The band is aiming for a late 2008/early 2009 release for the follow up to The Sufferer & the Witness.

You can check out the interview here.

PETA2 has posted it's 2008 list of the "sexiest vegetarians/vegans" for your voting. The list includes Aaron Dalbec of Bane, Adam McGratch of Cave In, Adam Carson of AFI, Andy Hurley of Fall Out Boy, Ari Katz of Lifetime, Cedric Bixler-Zavala of The Mars Volta, Chris Hannah of Propagandhi, Chris #2 of Anti-Flag and many others.

You can vote or check out the full list here.

Germany's Kamikaza Records have announced plans for a tribute to Groovie Ghoulies. The label promises plenty of Ramones-style pop punk but also horrorpunk acts, rockabilly, surf and garage bands.

Confirmed acts include Electric Frankenstein, McRackins, Nikki Corvette, The Independents, The Peacocks, The Hawaiians, Zombina and the Skeletones, The Popsters and more covering 30 Ghoulie tracks in all. The record will be titled When The Kids Go Go Go Crazy

Speaking of the Ghoulies, we're still streaming two new albums from former Ghoulies frontman Kepi. You can find them on his Punknews.org Profile.

According to reports from Bombshellzine.com, Australia's finest, The Living End, will be releasing their new album, White Noise on July 19, 2008 in Australia through Dew Process Records.

Frontman Chris Cheney added:

A lot of the songs have a depth and weight to them that people havent neccesarily heard from us before. The songs sound really huge. I wouldn't say heavy metal as such, although there are definatly a bunch of metal licks and influences in there. There's more of a hard rock element, but I think you really need to hear it to understand it properly

The album was recorded in Hoboken, New Jersey with producer John Agnello ('Sonic Youth', 'The Hold Steady', 'Dinosaur Jr.') and will be mixed by Brenden O'Brien ('AC/DC', 'From First To Last'). The record follows State of Emergency released in 2006 via EMI in Australia and via Adeline in North America.

Our friend Terry of Ryan's Hope interviewed Chris around the release of their last album. You can check out the interview here.

On a related, but completely surreal note, here is some video of "Prisoner of Society" being performed by Jesse Blaze Snider, the son of Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider.

Our stream today comes from Vicenza, Italy-based punk rock heroes Sun Eats Hours. The band celebrated ten years together in 2007, and is one of the best known Italian punk bands in the world. The band put together a special compilation album titled Ten Years which covers the best of the past decade of output from the band.

You can check out the entire thing on their Punknews.org Profile.

Danzig has announced the 2008 edition of his Blackest of the Black series of tours. This year the trek will cover all of the U.S. and will include select Canadan dates. More information will be made available soon.

The previous 2006 edition focused on the U.S. West Coast and featured headliner Danzig alongside Lacuna Coil, The Haunted, Belphegor and Asesino. The festival debuted in the Summer of 2003 with Danzig, Superjoint Ritual, Opeth, Nile, Lacuna Coil and Behemoth. In most years of the tour, the event has included a Misfits set. Danzig released The Lost Tracks of Danzig last year.

Fake Problems have posted a new b-side from their 2007 album, How Far Our Bodies Go. The track also appeared on the European version of the album released by Gunner Records.

You can check out "Fast Maria" on their myspace page.

H2O have a full album stream of their long-awaited new album. The record is titled Nothing to Prove and is due out May 27, 2008. It is the follow-up to All We Want which was released in 2002. The band will be hitting the road in support of the album beginning next month.

You can check out "Nothing to Prove" right here.

MxPx and Lagwagon will be co-headlining a tour together this fall. The bill will feature support from Only Crime and TAT.

More dates are expected soon. You can click Read More for the dates so far.

LaGrecia have posted a formal break up notice. The band announced their breakup on their myspace, saying:

It saddens us to say LaGrecia is no longer a band. Unfortunately, Jason made the decision to leave the band a few weeks ago. This is probably not surprising to some of you who know Jason and have followed his past bands. Sal and I did not want or anticipate the band to end as early as it did. Sal and I were excited with the way things were progressing and we are extremely disappointed and hurt with Jason's cold departure.

Upon leaving the band, Jason stated he no longer wanted anything to do with playing music. He further said that music never meant that much to him. It was something that came easy to him, granted him success and that was it. He wanted to sell off his equipment and focus on furthering his career in broadcast. Although supportive of his decision, this was very upsetting to hear.

Despite the breakup, LaGrecia says that they are still releasing their record, On Parallels on June 24, 2008. Frontman Jason Shevchuk announced that his previous band, None More Black would be reuniting for a show on July 4th.

Shevcuck posted a response on the None More Black myspace page:

LaGrecia formed in May of last year. By July, Dana and I found ourselves in a Romantic Relationship. The band rolled on at a good pace. It was fun. We had a fun summer. Dana decided it would be a good idea to end our relationship in January. The band pressed on and ended up becoming more a burden and an awkward situation for me. How could it not. When your escape becomes your prison things can feel crazy. I'm sorry Sal was caught in the middle.

I left the band in March with the intentions of never playing in a band again. NMB getting back together was never in the back of mind. In April, Colin came up to NYC to hang with Paul and I. We had a great time, as we always do. We kicked around the idea of playing again on a casual level. NMB is going to be playing shows again.

Napster, the P2P pioneer reborn as a digital music store has opted to switch to DRM-free MP3s for their entire six million song library.

The store claims to be 50% larger than any other MP3 store and touts the largest major label MP3 catalog in the industry, as well as the largest library of independent music available anywhere. Pricing for download sales will remain at 99 cents for single MP3 tracks and $9.95 for most MP3 albums,

Napster is the latest store to fire a DRM-free shot across iTunes' bow, with Amazon previously picking up steam for a similar approach to their downloadable digital music. In both cases, the DRM-free MP3s make it possible for music to be played on Apple's iPods.

Long-running New York Hardcore Punk/Ska outfit Murphy’s Law will be embarking on a tour beginning tomorrow and running for a month. In 2005, the band released Covered and The Best on NYHC Tattoos Records.

You can click Read More for the dates.

Scary Kids Scaring Kids, Finch, Foxy Shazam and Tickle Me Pink will be hitting the road together this summer.

You can click Read More for the dates.