Avenged Sevenfold debuted at the plum spot of number one on this week's Billboard sales chart, with their new album 'Nightmare' selling nearly 163,000 copies its first week in stores and finally toppling Eminem from his month-long reign atop the charts.

That's a huge amount of records in today's marketplace, and the band has been clawing its way to the top since the early '00s, so it's a testament to their work ethic and to the devotion of their fans, who rallied behind the band when drummer Jimmy 'The Rev' Sullivan unexpectedly passed away in late December. Moreover, it's one of two key factors that are proving that in a down music industry, metal is recession-proof.

In addition to 'Nightmare' outpacing its self-titled predecessor by nearly doubling its first week's sales tally, the third annual Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival, featuring the likes of Korn, Rob Zombie, Lamb of God, Five Finger Death Punch, Hatebreed and Shadows Fall, among others, is bucking the summer tour trend that has seen acts like Christina Aguilera and Limp Bizkit cancel entire tours and more mainstream-leaning jaunts like the all-female Lilith Fair and the 'American Idol' tour axing dates.

The touring market is sluggish, with ticket sales plummeting to alarming, code red lows, but with Mayhem, it's full steam ahead. The tour is enjoying a 30 percent increase in sales this summer, thanks to an attractive and affordable ticket price for a 10-hour day of quality metal entertainment. Fans are turning out in droves, showing up for the side stage bands and staying through the headliner encore.

While there is no denying that the economy is in a tenuous state, the metal community is still looking for quality entertainment with value-friendly prices. The headbangers are still buying records and showing up for concerts. We may be flirting with a recession overall and record and ticket sales continue to dip, but Avenged Sevenfold, who will co-headline the Uproar festival starting later this month, which picks up where Mayhem leaves off, and Mayhem are two shining example of metal circumventing the recession and serving as a bright spot! Music heals and cures and metal fans are letting it the genre do its job.

 

Avenged Sevenfold recently hit a milestone in their career, landing at #1 on the Billboard top 200 chart with the band's fifth studio-album "Nightmare." After the passing of drummer James "The Rev" Sullivan, Avenged Sevenfold tapped Mike Portnoy of Dream Theater fame to handle the drum recording duties on the album and fill in for touring duties.
Just prior to the recent release of the music video for the title track on the new album, Bassist Johnny Christ spoke with Metalunderground about the new album and the band's future. Commenting on the death of The Rev and how it influenced the album, Johnny stated "...when he passed it kind of took the record to a darker place than it already w








                                   

Nightmare (2009—present)

In January 2009, M. Shadows confirmed that the band is writing the follow-up to their self-titled fourth album within the upcoming months.^[30] They also announced that they will be playing at Rock on the Range, from May 16–17, 2009.^[31] On April 16, they performed a version of Guns N' Roses' "It's So Easy" onstage with Slash, at the Nokia Theater in Los Angeles.^[32] M. Shadows was featured on Slash's debut solo album Slash in the song "Nothing to Say".
M. Shadows and the rest of the band has expressed interest in making a follow-up to their self-titled record. They announced that they plan to start writing in June 2009 and recording in October 2009. M. Shadows also said in an interview with Loveline that the next record would be a more traditional heavy metal, more rock-oriented record, since the self-titled record was very experimental. He also said it would feature more progressive, longer songs and would be the "biggest Avenged Sevenfold record ever." Additionally, he said they were possibly thinking about a concept record.
On July 15, 2009, their website and MySpace profile were updated with a statement from M. Shadows implying that work on the next album has started, but they are still "throwing around ideas". The update was on the same day that Waking the Fallen went Gold.
In an interview, M. Shadows has revealed that after the band will complete their tour with a final performance at the Sonisphere Festival on August 2, they will get in the studio to write and record a new studio album, a follow-up to their self-titled album.^[33]