Drowning Pool, platinum and award-winning hard rock band from Dallas, Texas, have been gathering a prolific buzz about them recently throughout the online community in the political areas of the internet, and from those who are concerned with issues that surround the American troops currently abroad. The band recently completed the USO tour and came back with sincere concerns surrounding the return of the soldiers upon their return home from the middle-east.

?Once home in the United States, we connected with Iraq/Afghanistan war veterans who have returned home,? said Stevie Benton, Bassist and Founding Member of Drowning Pool. ?Though back on safe shores, these individuals are facing a steep uphill battle to reclaim their health after facing the trauma of war.?

Recently, the office of the public liaison at The White House received a letter written by Drowning Pool addressing the issues of healthcare and concerns for the troops on their return home, which was placed in the President?s personal reading file. Several interior cabinets of The White House have been opened to the team of Drowning Pool. One of which contacted Congress directly and are now awaiting a Congressional hearing date, where Drowning Pool will testify to the majority and minority parties of the U.S. Congress, addressing the facts of treatment of the American soldiers upon their return home from the Middle East. The band hopes to accomplish a shift of political and national attention toward the problems at hand concerning the well-being of those who fight and give their lives for the United States. Drowning Pool is preparing for their meeting with Congress by asking their fans, friends, and families to sign their online petition regarding the issue (the link is at the bottom of this article).

The White House is not the only government outlet that has given attention to the letter written by the band. Several of the 2008 Presidential candidates have accepted the letter and issue with open arms from Drowning Pool.

?We are seeking an opportunity to testify before Congress on behalf of these troops and veterans who need mental, emotional and medical support services,? said Benton. That goal will be accomplished with the return of Congress from over the weekend as the calendars and agendas in Washington are being marked to welcome Drowning Pool during the course of the next 6 months.

Drowning Pool are currently touring and preparing for the release of their new record, Full Circle, which features the single ?Soldiers? that they wrote for the troops after being inspired by them on the USO tour. If you would like to support Drowning Pool?s efforts for the American troops over seas, regardless of your political denomination, please follow the link and sign the petition online.

Click Here To Help Drowning Pool Support the Troops

In a recent post by Bad Religion, they explain the measures they went through to protect the chances of their new album from being leaked. Read more:

One of the things we didn?t do this year is send out a lot of albums to get reviewed by magazines because previously when we sent out like 500 demo CDs for review, one of them would invariably end up on the internet and the entire album is downloaded three months previous to release,” laments Jay.

“We decided to release things through the Epitaph site or the Myspace page, it seems more of our fan base is there that we can kind of target, rather than a bunch of magazines who don?t care what we are doing.

From First To Last plan to record their new album after touring with Hawthorne Heights. This album will be their first album with Sonny Moore since their debut EP. This will also be their first album with Suretone Records.

Listening Party ahead….

Evergreen Terrace – Wolfbiker, off their new album, Wolfbiker

As Cities Burn – Come Now Sleep, off their new upcoming album, This Is It! This Is It!

Kelly Clarkson – Sober, she’s hot, oh and this is off her new album, My December

Reggie & The Full Effect – 2 songs, off their new album, She Loves Me Not

Tokyo Rose – Less Than 4, off their new album

I know, a short list, but thats all I got right now.

Rolling Stone has reported that the guys from No Doubt plan on starting to lay down tracks for music despite the fact that Gwen Stafani is on tour promoting her recent release, The Sweet Escape. They plan to just do the music of the songs and wait for her return to record the vocals. This potential upcoming release will be No Doubt‘s first album since Gwen Stefani has gone solo, nearly 6 years ago. Album is looking for a 2008 release date. Further details are still to come.

The Blackout has posted a new blog entry on their myspace about their upcoming debut album in the works as well as a possible headlining tour. Read more:

Bono Estentay!

Just a short blog to let you all know what’s going on in the world of ‘The Blackout’. We’re currently writing material for our forthcoming debut album. We start recording June 15th and we’re hoping to have everything finished around July. We’re really excited about the new material as it’s the best we’ve ever written. We’ve got gun fire, high fives, chants, cheesy riffs, dirty riffs, epic riffs, wild choruses and sing-alongs and we’ve even got some filler… ONLY JOKING!! THERE’S F**K ALL FILLER! There’s also a chance we might have a little dvd on the album for you little roustabouts too!

But yeah, be patient and hopefully we’ll have a release around September and a headline tour shortly after. So if you’ve been wondering what we’ve been up to then this is it. So stop wondering you wondering wonderers! As soon as we’re done recording the album we’ll be on the road again doing some festival shows. We’ve got a couple confirmed already, a Ripcurl festival in Newquay UK and the Pukkelpop in Hasselt Belgium. Hopefully we’ll have confirmed some more in the next month or so.

We’ll keep you posted with our monthly blogs, so keep in touch!

One love

Rhys x

A Wilhelm Scream has recently updated their progress of their new album. Read more from their myspace post:

We’re finishing up the sequencing. It’s gonna be a 13 song joint this time. A few songs are over the five minute mark. They’re for the stoners. The vast majority of the record is fast. Very very fast. Actually, I think the whole thing’s fast. The other two songs we recorded will find their way to you in special ways after the record’s out. Those two songs aren’t that fast (comparatively) so they didn’t make the record. We really like them alot, so they will get released, but hey, they weren’t fuckin’ fast enough!! OK?! This one’s built for speed.

Anyway, we’re now compiling our ideas for artwork together and hopefully will be working with some particularly talented fellows soon to make our random ideas come to life. As fans of Mute Print and the Ruiner maybe could tell, we take the artwork very seriously (even though, as I’m told, nobody buys cds anymore! this shit true?!) and we put lots of effort and time and thought into making sure it goes way over most people’s heads! Avoid success!!! We’re going for a nice mix of both records’ art in style and tone, I think we really got it musically, which was the goal. We fuckin’ killed ourselves on this one to make sure we didn’t disappoint you guys, the ones who have come see us play live the past two years. These are “live” songs for sure. Some are very Mute Print-esque, some remind me of Smackin’ Isaiah, our biggest influence!

Underoath plans on releasing a new DVD that will contain more than 90 minutes of live footage as well as other exclusive material. The DVD is scheduled to be released on July 17th.