Rob Zombie
Photo: Kevin Winter/ Getty Images

There are a lot of words you could use to describe Rob Zombie, but "indolent" isn't one of them. The shock rocker's always got a full plate, and is constantly working. Whether he's thumbing through scripts or writing riffs, Zombie is always thinking about the next project. At the moment, it's the follow-up to 2006's Educated Horses that's taking up most of his time.

"We're almost finished," Zombie told Metal File this week, about his forthcoming, still-untitled solo LP. "We'll probably finish with the record completely before Christmas, and it's great. The unique thing about this record is, it's the first time since White Zombie broke up [in 1998] that I've actually recorded with a band, in the sense that these are the guys that I tour with, that I hang out with, and we're a band, and we'll record as a band."

Zombie said he's been working on his next album — which he hopes to release this spring and which will feature the tracks "Jesus Frankenstein" and "Sick Bubblegum" — for the last few months, alongside guitarist John 5, drummer Tommy Clufetos and bassist Piggy D.

"The record's hard to describe, but it's just got a much more solid vibe, and it's going to be a much more intricate, interesting record just due to the fact that we have four people that are in the room all the time, contributing and working on it," he explained. "For me, it's great, because my solo records have been somewhat disjointed because there's always a changing roster of people. Great things usually come out of situations where you have a great vibe and you can usually feel it. And that's what's going on here."

The feel of the album, according to Zombie, is "all over the place." He said he didn't head into the studio with any specific goals in mind, other than to evolve his sound naturally.

"We just go into the studio and let it happen," he said. "Having a band helps because we change things at the spur of the moment. We'll start with something in the morning, and by the end of the day, it's morphed into something completely different. The lyrics — I'm pretty loose with that, in how I approach it. You just bang your head against the wall until something comes out. But I'm always trying to do something [with my records] that sounds fresh without making it so different that it's not you anymore. That's the problem with anything you do, as time goes on. If it's too different, everybody complains, and if it's too much of the same, everybody complains. So I'm always trying to find that tight rope, that middle ground, where it's your vibe and your thing, but it still sounds fresh."

On November 25, Zombie releases Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, a career-spanning five-disc box set, featuring everything White Zombie ever recorded. Zombie said he compiled the entire package on his own, not seeking the help of any of his former bandmates, whom he said he hasn't even spoken to since the group's last gig. But putting the box set together was an interesting exercise that made Zombie appreciate his current setup that much more.

"It made me appreciate the new band more, because going back and putting the box set together brought up a lot of things that I had forgotten about, and unfortunately, some of it was negative," he said. "So you really appreciate when you're in a good situation with a good group of musicians and a good group of guys. It took 20-something years, but I feel like I've finally found the three perfect people to work with."

Zombie, who claimed he'll be touring the States after next summer, said the time was right to release a White Zombie box set, and that it's been a project he had wanted to wrap up for years. "I would let everything take precedence over it — movies, records," he said. "I'm not big into revisiting the past. I like to move forward all the time, so whenever anything else would come up, [the box set] would go on the backburner. I had a little bit of a window and just knocked it out, and I also figured, 'If not now, when?' If I'd waited any longer, CDs aren't even going to exist."

He said that, with Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, he's essentially closing the door on White Zombie for good.

"There's really nothing more to be done," he said. "There's other crappy demos and stuff we could release, but they're probably not worth listening to. This is the last thing that will come from the band.

"The funny thing was, when I was putting it together, it seemed so long ago," he explained. "It felt like I was putting together a box set of somebody else's band, because even though it's not that long ago, it just seemed like forever ago, and some of the early songs are 20 years old. It seemed weird. Most of the really old tracks I hadn't listened to since we recorded them. It was just kind of weird. I found a lot of old flyers and junk. I was just happy I had saved a bunch of that stuff, because I was saving it for no apparent reason. Now, there's a reason, so I can throw it all away."

Zombie said he doesn't really miss the White Zombie days at all, and is glad that this chapter in his life has finally reached its end.

"When the band started, everyone was so young, and then you go through a lot of changes," Zombie said. "You start a band when you're 18, and I don't remember how old I was when it ended, but you're basically right out of high school. So you're not in a mind frame to sometimes handle what it takes to put that together, and then you do mature, and being in a band becomes a weird situation, because it's almost like the situation hasn't matured with you. So that band had a lot of growing pains and a lot of baggage all the way through. I think we did a lot of good stuff, and we were kind of ahead of the curve in the beginning, and we did some groundbreaking stuff. But it was a painful situation most of the time."

The rest of the week's metal news:

Deftones bassist Chi Cheng remains in a coma after sustaining injuries in a car accident two weeks ago. "Chi's condition remains the same — serious, but stable," the Deftones said in a statement. "He still lies in a coma, however his vitals (heart, lungs and blood pressure) all exhibit very stable functions and doctors have begun removing much of the excess monitoring equipment. Chi remains strong in his fight to recover." ...

The Dillinger Escape Plan are putting the finishing touches on a new DVD, as well as their next album. "We're wrapping up a DVD — a documentary on early-years Dillinger, from the beginning, all the way through the end of the Calculating Infinity cycle, which is going to be really cool for the 10 of you out there who weren't in elementary school when this band started," the band said in a statement. "For everyone else, it'll be a history lesson well worth watching, to see how this beast got started." ...

Is anyone else tired of these incessant Chimaira updates? The band's been hard at work on their new album, and it feels like every week, they're posting information about how that's been going. According to the most recent update, they're almost 40 percent finished with tracking the record, which will hit stores April 28. Hey, guys — how 'bout you save the next update for when the record's actually finished? ...

At last weekend's Vision of Disorder reunion show, the band revealed that they're eyeing a fall 2009 release for their next studio effort. Sweet! ...

Unearth will be hitting the road early next year with Emmure, Impending Doom and Born of Osiris. The F--- School, F--- Work, Let's Rage! Tour kicks off January 9 in Detroit, and dates are booked through January 30 in Portland, Maine. ...

God Forbid will release their forthcoming album Earthsblood on February 24 through Century Media. Metal File has heard some of the disc, and it's beyond brutal. ...

Cattle Decapitation, Psyopus, Book of Black Earth and Gigan will be hitting the road together starting January 21 in Santa Barbara, California. Gigs are scheduled through February 13 in San Marcos, California. ...

Extreme black metal outfit Satyricon have signed a North American recording deal with Koch Records. The band's forthcoming seventh studio album, The Age of Nero, lands in stores January 13, and will feature the tracks "Black Crow on a Tombstone," "My Skin Is Cold" and "Last Man Standing."

• White Zombie
• Rob Zombie
• Dillinger Escape Plan
• Chimaira

Haste the Day
Photo: Tooth and Nail

For musicians, inspiration can strike at any moment and can come from a variety of sources. For Indianapolis metalcore act Haste the Day, past efforts have been inspired, in large part, by the band members' faith. They're Christian men and make no apologies for it — nor should they. The band's latest LP, Dreamer — which hit store shelves this week — was provoked by a number of themes ... and a notebook they'd found in their studio, which had been left behind by some nameless aspiring rapper.

"We recorded the record in Indianapolis, in this studio, and all the other studios were always occupied by hip-hop acts and rappers," bassist Mike Murphy recalled. "There were a lot of rappers in Indianapolis, trying to get their thing on, and Brennan [Chaulk], our guitar player, found a notebook from months ago that had been left in our studio. It had all these really funny hip-hop lyrics, and our singer [Stephen Keech] took one of our songs, called 'An Adult Tree,' and sang the lyrics over the music.

"The lyrics were about hanging at the club and having breakfast in bed — it was pretty sweet," Murphy continued. "We recorded the song with those lyrics, but it didn't make the final version of the album. Maybe we'll release it as a special edition or on a re-release. Maybe we'll just put it on our MySpace page. The lyrics, especially the breakfast-in-bed part, just sounded really, really funny over our music. No offense to the mystery lyricist — he was just trying to do his thing."

The final version of Dreamer tackles a handful of themes, including the fall of man. "One lyric I really like is, 'I am my own disease/ I am the one you will call the destroyer.' The album talks about how we sometimes sabotage our own lives with the way we are, and we try to blame it on other things, but you have to realize a lot of these things are internal and they're personal and they're you — that emotional side of one's self. And some songs deal with redemption, through the fall of man."

Haste the Day, who will be touring with Sky Eats Airplane, Emarosa and Inhale Exhale starting December 9 in Joplin, Missouri, consider Dreamer their most experimental offering to date — and believe it's also their darkest.

"It's a super-honest record, and I'm obviously biased, but I haven't really felt this way about our other records," Murphy said. "I listen to it, and I get a vibe from the whole thing. It makes you feel something. It gives you all these weird emotions. I think it's our most creative, and it definitely blends our melodic side really well with our heavier side. That's something we've has always loved doing, because we love both types of music. The idea is to get better at it every time, and I think we've accomplished that. It's a very personal record that I think a lot of people can identify with."

One track, called "Labyrinth," is a song that truly sticks out on the record. It's a real departure for Haste the Day — very slow, dark and rather creepy. "It's definitely the most different song we've written," the bassist commented. "It never gets heavy. We've done songs where it's quiet and creepy and, all of sudden, it's heavy. But this song's the same vibe the whole way through. It's just slow and really different.

"This whole record is experimental for us," Murphy added. "It still has that hardcore vibe, but the melodic stuff is heavy too. We've done it a little bit in the past, but a lot of times, with hardcore bands, it's super-heavy and then really light and pretty, and there isn't a very good mesh between the two. These songs, when they're melodic, they're still very heavy. It's definitely a different record for us, and it's a very dynamic record. I don't get bored listening to it. But I have gotten bored listening to our other records. It's dark and epic and emotional and just feels like something."

Earlier this month, Haste the Day ventured out to New York City to shoot a video for the album's first single, "Mad Man." Fittingly, the concept behind the clip involves a boy who thinks he's losing his marbles.

"Think Van Gogh meets the movie 'What Dreams May Come,' with some dark twists and some sweet special effects," Murphy said of the clip, which was shot entirely in front of a green screen. "It's like a kid goes to an art museum with his parents, and all of a sudden the paintings start coming to life as he looks at them, and he thinks he's going crazy."

The rest of the week's metal news:

A four-CD/ single-DVD White Zombie box set called Let Sleeping Corpses Lie is being eyed for a November 25 release. The collection will feature — get this — 63 tracks, including "Future Shock," "God of Thunder," "Thunder Kiss," "Super Charger Heaven," "Grease Paint and Monkey Brains," "More Human Than Human" and "Ratfinks, Suicide Tanks and Cannibal Girls." ...

On November 14, Mötley Crüe will be taking the stage at the newly renovated Hollywood Palladium. The show will be part of the venue's monthlong celebration of the Palladium's reopening, which kicked off Wednesday with a performance by Jay-Z. ...

According to Blabbermouth.net, Opeth's Mikael Åkerfeldt has contributed vocals to a song called "Stockholm" for OSI's upcoming, yet-untitled LP. OSI (an acronym for Office of Strategic Influence) feature Fates Warning guitarist Jim Matheos and former Dream Theater keyboardist Kevin Moore. The record should land in stores sometime next year. The disc will also feature Porcupine Tree drummer Gavin Harrison. ...

A Life Once Lost, Arsonists Get All the Girls and the Tony Danza Tapdance Extravaganza will be hitting the road together next month. They'll kick off their tour November 4 in Manchester, Connecticut, and dates are booked through November 18 in Reading, Pennsylvania. ...

At the Throne of Judgment have reunited, if only for a short while. The band called it quits late last year, after just a single release. "We are not going to be a full-time band (full-time meaning we drop everything just to tour the country)," the band said in a statement. "However, we will go back to being a part-time band. As you know, we are spread out all over the place because all of us attend different colleges in different cities and states. So this isn't going to be easy, and it's definitely going to take a little bit of time. What we plan on doing is writing a new album (which we have already started on). We have decided to do a concept album. We are in the beginning process of all this, but [we] can assure you there will be another ATTOJ album." ...

The rumors were true: New Jersey's own E. Town Concrete will be reuniting for a single show next year. Set for February 21, the gig will go down inside the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville, New Jersey. Tickets will go on sale Friday (October 17) for $25.

• Haste The Day
• White Zombie
• Motley Crue

Rob Zombie in 1998
Photo: MTV News

Where do old interviews go to die? Since 1988 they've gone into the MTV News vault, but we've been exhuming them to bring you these classic natterings. Here's the latest in the series, which runs every Tuesday.

Back in his artsy early days, Rob Zombie had done a bit of production-design work for MTV, so it was sort of fitting that he should return in August of 1998, in the midst of officially vaporizing White Zombie — the New York horror-metal band he'd led for the previous 13 years — and striking out on his own with a solo album called Hellbilly Deluxe. Only two further studio albums have followed, but then Rob has been busy, mainly with movies.

Zombie's love of old schlock exploitation films was already clear in his music, in song and album titles like "Spiderbaby" and The Sinister Urge, and in the name White Zombie itself, which is also the title of an old Bela Lugosi fright flick. After lobbing a number of his songs onto the soundtracks of movies ranging from "The Matrix" to "Bride of Chucky," Rob finally went totally Hollywood in 2003, writing, directing and scoring his own schlock epic, "House of 1000 Corpses." This, as you know, was followed two years later by the similarly depraved "The Devil's Rejects," and by last year's "Halloween" remake. Next up will be "The Haunted World of El Superbeasto," an animated feature based on Zombie's own comic book, and featuring Paul Giamatti voicing the villainous Dr. Satan.

Back in 1998, when we spoke to Rob on our own "Headbangers Ball" set, the emphasis was still on music. We learned, for instance, that he had little use for rock stars with messages in their music ("I don't care what I'm thinkin'; why do I care what he's thinkin'?"). In fact, his relationship to rock culture was ultra-basic in every regard. "You're supposed to go to a show and get hurt," he mumbled. Are you still allowed to say things like that on TV?

Enjoy digging through The Loder Files? You'll find more here, and there's much more to come from the vaults — check back every Tuesday!

• The Loder Files: A Trip Inside The MTV News Vaults

• Rob Zombie
• White Zombie

Rob Zombie
Photo: Frederick M. Brown/ Getty Images

Rob Zombie is not the sort of guy who'd be content just resting on his laurels. The shock rocker likes to keep busy: It seems as though the man is constantly touring (he'll be out with Ozzy Osbourne and In This Moment through January 21), and his proverbial plate is spilling over with various music and film projects he plans to deliver to the masses over the course of the coming year.

Not only does Zombie hope to record another studio LP in 2008, he's still working on the companion DVD to his recently released album, Zombie Live, Zombie's inaugural live offering, which sold 15,000 copies during its first week to debut at #57 on the Billboard top 200. He'd like to have the DVD finished for a spring 2008 release, he said during a recent teleconference with reporters.

"I'm not sure [when the DVD will be in stores], 'cause right now, the editor who I'll have edit that is editing [this] behind-the-scenes documentary, documenting the making of 'Halloween,' " he said, referring to his re-imagining of the 1978 classic, which hit theaters last summer. "So when he's done doing that, he's then going to go do this one. So, who knows?

"I didn't want to really just make a live DVD, because I felt like, 'Ah, who cares?' " he continued. "What I really did was [make] a tour documentary similar to the documentary I made for the DVD for 'Devil's Rejects,' where it starts with the first rehearsal through the building of the stage, through traveling and flying and playing every show and after the show and this and that."

So what of that long-rumored, oft-delayed White Zombie box set, a compilation of every piece of music the band ever put to tape?

"I don't know when it's going to come out," he explained. "I always keep putting it on the backburner to do other projects. What my plan for what to put on it was basically every single thing ever, so that I could put out the box set and go, 'That's everything. Don't ask me about anything else. That is absolutely everything that band's ever recorded.' There [won't be] a lot of extra stuff, but there's tons of stuff that was never even on CD that was just on these limited vinyl releases. I'm not real good at going back and wanting to redo old stuff. I always want to do new stuff, so that's why the project keeps dragging on forever."

Zombie is not sure whether the box set will see the light of day in 2008, but he admits that "if I wait much longer, no one will even know what a box set is."

Zombie is also still working on his much-anticipated animated comedy "The Haunted World of El Superbeasto," which features the voice talent of Paul Giamatti, Geoffrey Lewis and Zombie's wife, Sheri Moon. Zombie said he's "almost 100 percent done" with the flick, though it still has to be edited and soundtracked for an expected 2008 release.

"The problem is, I have too many projects," he said. "So, now I'm on tour, and as soon as I get off tour, we'll go home and wrap that up, and then that'll be finished."

While it had been reported that he'll helm an upcoming remake of the 1984 horror film "C.H.U.D.," Zombie said he won't be involved with the project. He wouldn't go into what his next film project will be — at least not in any great detail.

"I'm planning another movie, which, right now, I don't know how that's going to be because the writers just went on strike, and the directors will go on strike soon," he said. "So, I'm not sure how that whole world is going to pan out. Right now is really the worst time to try to plan the next year. The next movie I'm planning isn't really a horror movie."

Would Zombie ever consider casting Ozzy in one of his films? "No, no," he responded. "Acting is not a joke for me, and not everybody can act. There are a lot of people that [have] great personalities, but that doesn't mean they're actors, because acting's hard and it's hard on the actors. And that's why usually musicians are terrible actors, because they have their personality and persona, but it doesn't mean they can act."

Zombie recalled the first time he met Ozzy, and the numerous tours the two have done together since.

"The first time I toured with Ozzy was '99, but I had met him before then," he remembered. "For some strange reason, I don't even remember why I was meeting [him]. It was very early on — I mean it was '95, maybe, or something before then — and I went over to his house. I know that my manager, Andy Gould, had been friends with Sharon Osbourne for a long time, and I'm not even sure what it was all about. Sometimes, you just meet people and hang out for no reason. And it was great. I'd always loved Ozzy, loved Black Sabbath, and at that point, it was very funny because it was me and Ozzy in his house, and he played me the entire album he had made with Mark Hudson that was very Beatles-sounding. It's never been released but it was fantastic.

"I've toured with him so many times that it just seemed like it was that time of year again," he said about reuniting with Osbourne for this latest trek. "It seems like about every two years, I tour with Ozzy. ... This is maybe the fifth time we've done this. I love touring with Ozzy. He's always been super nice to me. He's a really nice guy. I like all the guys in his band, and it's always a very pleasant experience. It's usually a pleasant experience touring with everybody, but [with Ozzy] it's a great time."

Check out everything we've got on "The Haunted World of El Superbeasto."

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• Rob Zombie
• White Zombie

This week in 1995, Pamela Anderson was hard at work on her action flick "Barb Wire." The new Mrs. Tommy Lee swapped her "Baywatch" one-piece and life preserver for a black ensemble and machine guns. In her role as a bounty hunter/nightclub owner, Anderson also had to learn to kickbox. All the activity, the stress involved in starring in a movie, the long working hours and a change in director resulted in the actress suffering a miscarriage.

"Eighteen-hour days ... ugh, it's very difficult. So challenging. It's really, really hard. Now I'm newly married and I just wanna spend time with my husband."

While Anderson said she was no novice when it came to handling firearms, fully automatic weapons were something she needed to bone up on.

"I've gone to target ranges before, but nothing like I've been shooting for this movie," she explained. "I went to the target range and it was pretty funny because there were people lined up there, people were shooting and training and all of a sudden I came in with a little dress on and little platform shoes and I was firing fully automatic weapons. People were coming over going, 'What is that little girl over there doing?' "

Moby's album Everything Is Wrong was a recent arrival on the scene. The album saw his techno move beyond the heavy dance grooves of speed metal, hip-hop and house and blended in a little blues, classical and pop flavor. MTV News caught up with him to talk about how he was finding himself and his music in uncharted territory.

"I don't think it is a techno album," Moby said. "I think most of what I've done in the past few years has been dance-oriented and techno ... but suddenly with this album I was able to make something for people to take into their home and represent the different types of music I've been involved in for the last 20 years."

Moby wanted to continue to challenge the boundaries of techno and push it further away from its conventions.

"Culture doesn't need to be so segregated," he said. "When you watch MTV you have really disparate types of music right next to each other: heavy metal, Janet Jackson next to Metallica next to Nirvana next to Snoop Doggy Dogg next to whatever. And I think that's wonderful and I think that's the way culture works in most people's lives and I wanted to make a record that reflected that."

White Zombie were riding high on the critical success of their recently released LP Astro-Creep: 2000, which the band co-produced.

"We're not really one of those bands that can just go in and the producer tells you what to do," frontman Rob Zombie said. "They either work with you or they get fired. There's really no other way to do it."

"It's always been like that with this band," bassist Sean Yseult added. "We're going on 10 years now and we've always done everything from scratch."

"We have complete control over everything we do," Zombie said. "I always find it kind of strange when people make a record, write a song, whatever, and then they just hire some stranger to come conceptualize the whole thing for them. It's kind of bizarre. I always hear bands say, 'Oh yeah, we never even thought of that when we wrote the song,' but that's the way it's being presented to the world so it's kind of stupid."

White Zombie knew that, while touring in support of Astro-Creep: 2000, one thing they wouldn't be doing to fill their downtime was songwriting.

"We never write on tour," guitarist J. said. "Those are the kinds of bands where there's a resident genius who does everything, who just locks themselves in the hotel room to write songs, but we're not like that. We have to all get in a room and yell at each other 'til it's done."

For more "This Week In ...", check out the This Week In Archive

• Moby
• White Zombie

Rob Zombie
Photo: MTV News

Sixteen months after Universal Pictures was literally scared away by Rob Zombie's feature film debut, "House of 1000 Corpses" has finally found a new home.

"MGM is gonna put it out," Zombie told Ben Affleck on the set of "Daredevil," where the shock rocker interviewed the actor for MTV's "Movie House."

Zombie said the movie will be released in time for his favorite holiday, Halloween, later this year.

Universal — a division of Vivendi-Universal, which owns Geffen Records, Zombie's label — was originally scheduled to release the movie last summer, but chairman Stacey Snider backed out after screening an unfinished version in February 2001 (see ). "The film is a significant accomplishment for Rob, yet there is a visceral tone and intensity that we did not imagine from the printed page," Snider said at the time.

The $7 million "House of 1000 Corpses," which was filmed partially on a Universal lot in the summer of 2000, is about two young couples whose car breaks down near a small town of creepy characters. Zombie, who has directed videos for himself, Ozzy Osbourne and others, wrote and directed the horror flick.

At the MTV Movie Awards on Saturday, Zombie said he had to edit the movie down to an R rating for MGM.

"That's as tame as I could get it," Zombie said. "I just had to edit some scenes, some stabbings, some murder, some mayhem.

"It's her violence that I had to edit so much of," Zombie added, pointing to his date for the awards show, "House of 1000 Corpses" star Sheri Moon, who has appeared in Zombie's videos for "Dragula" and "Living Dead Girl" and on the cover of American Made Music to Strip By.

Before he hits the road on Ozzfest (see ), the former White Zombie frontman will finish recording music for the "House of 1000 Corpses" soundtrack with longtime producer Scott Humphrey.

Once Ozzfest wraps in late summer, Zombie will start work on his second film, another horror project that he's now writing.

• Rob Zombie
• White Zombie

The murder trial of Snoop Dogg — then known as Snoop Doggy Dogg — was well underway this week in 1996, and while Snoop, along with his bodyguard McKinley Lee, were ultimately acquitted of murdering 20-year-old Phillip Woldemariam, the defense hit a speed bump this week when a witness testified she saw Woldemariam walk away from the jeep driven by Snoop when he was shot and killed in 1993 by Lee, who was riding in the jeep's passenger seat.

Snoop didn't stop the music, however, during this trying time. Instead, he was setting up his own label, Doggy Style Records, and he had just signed the imprint's first act, the LBC Crew. He talked about the group on the set of its first video, "Beware of My Crew."

"It's called 'Beware of My Crew' for the simple fact it's letting everybody in the industry know to be aware of my crew," Snoop said. "This is my crew. Snoop Dogg. This is my homeboys. I just want people to recognize and just pay attention to them and hear what they gotta say. You know what I'm saying, not just 'cause they're down with me but just because they got talent and they want to express it."

(The LBC Crew have since broken up— the group's Tray Deee is now one-half of Tha Eastsidaz, and Bad Azz has put out two solo albums.)

There didn't seem to be anything objectionable about a concert by Rob Zombie's former band, White Zombie, that was scheduled to be held in the city of Johnson City, Tennessee, on February 4th, 1996, until a local Baptist minister suddenly discerned in the group's music (gasp!) satanic messages. The minister led his flock to rise up and pressure the city commission to cancel the band's contract to perform at a city venue with the apparently ironic name of Freedom Hall. As for the group itself, it simply relocated its show to Viking Hall in nearby Bristol, where religious leaders planned further protest.

Also doing their part to promote moral decay in the state of Tennessee were AC/DC. The veteran Australian headbangers were touring there six years ago this week to promote their first album in five years, titled, with typical subtlety, Ballbreaker. Keeping the rhythm going for that outing was original AC/DC drummer, Phil Rudd, who had returned to the fold after a 14-year absence.

Guitarist Angus Young and frontman Brian Johnson talked a bit about the good old U.S. and what it meant to their music.

"American music has influenced us — really that's where it all came from," Johnson said.

"Yeah, a lot from the blues side of it, blues and early rock and roll," Young added.

"[Those were] really the stepping stones towards the music the way it is today," Johnson said.

For more "This Week In ...", check out the This Week In Archive

• Snoop Dogg
• White Zombie
• AC/DC

Rob Zombie
Photo: Myriam Santos-Kayda

Three years after the release of his last album of original material, B-movie rocker Rob Zombie is ready to come roaring back this fall with a brand new album and a U.S. tour.

Zombie is nearly finished recording his second solo LP (or third, if you count his 1999 remix release, American Made Music to Strip By), according to his management.

The as-yet-untitled album — which is expected to include a guest appearance by Slayer guitarist Kerry King — is slated for a mid-September release, with a tour set to begin around Halloween.

The artist's Web site (www.robzombie.com) promises that the outing will be his "largest stage show ever." Zombie said in March that the new album uses the same producer (Scott Humphrey) and band as 1998's triple-platinum Hellbilly Deluxe. "Now that the band has been together awhile, it has a much more live, raw sound. It sounds a lot more fluid," Zombie said.

The fate of Zombie's other recent project, the horror movie "House of 1000 Corpses," which he wrote and directed, has yet to be announced. Earlier this year, Universal Pictures backed out of releasing the film, citing its "visceral tone and intensity" (see "Studio Ditches Rob Zombie Movie"). Zombie, former leader of industrial rockers White Zombie, left the band in '98 to start a solo career.

• Rob Zombie
• Slayer
• White Zombie

Fans taking in the new Keanu Reeves thriller "The Watcher" this weekend will also catch a glimpse of what Rob Zombie has up his sleeve for his directorial debut.

Zombie's "House Of 1000 Corpses" doesn't open until early next year, but the first full-length trailer for the film will hit theaters this weekend, tacked on before "The Watcher" in most markets.

After helming videos during his White Zombie days and later handling the clips for his solo work, the rocker penned and directed the film himself. In an interview on the film's official Web site (at houseof1000corpses.com), Zombie explained that the film steers clear of the ironic approach to horror found in flicks such as "Scream" and "I Know What You Did Last Summer," which Zombie described as "big budget Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys mysteries."

For his entry into big-screen horror, Zombie said he pulled together elements of classic horror and '70s exploitation flicks. He also assembled a cast that includes Karen Black ("Nashville," "Capricorn One," "Five Easy Pieces"), Sid Haig ("Jackie Brown," "Foxy Brown," "Chu Chu And The Philly Flash"), and Jeanne Carmen ("The Devil's Hand").

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Macabre rocker Rob Zombie has signed on to write and direct a film called "The House Of 1000 Corpses."

Set to begin production by the end of this month, "Corpses" will mark the former White Zombie frontman's feature film writing and directing debut. Zombie's long-time manager Andy Gould will produce the film, according to Zombie's official Web site.

The film has not been cast yet, and Universal Pictures has slated the flick for an early 2001 release.

To hype the release of "The House of 1000 Corpses," Zombie will provide a sneak peek of the film by designing a maze based on the film for Universal Studios theme parks. The attraction will premiere during the month of October as part of Universal Studios' "Halloween Horror Nights 2000," in both the Hollywood and Orlando Universal parks.

Last year, Zombie designed a maze called "The Thrilling, Chilling World of Rob Zombie" for Universal Studios Hollywood's Halloween Horror Nights series (see "Rob Zombie Finds Inspiration In Strip Clubs, Haunts Halloween Maze").

In 1997, Rob Zombie signed on to write and direct "The Crow: 2037," the third installment in The Crow film franchise (see "Zombie Will Write/Direct Next 'Crow' Flick"). That cinematic enterprise did not come to pass.

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