DAVE GROHL Nixes UNLEASHED Frontman For PROBOT Project Over Questionable Politics

FOO FIGHTERS mainman Dave Grohl contemplated approaching UNLEASHED frontman Johnny Hedlund to contribute lead vocals to one of the songs for his upcoming metal project, PROBOT, but changed his mind after learning of the Swedish death metal vocalist's rumored Nazi leanings, Grohl revealed in an interview with Sweden's Close-Up magazine.

"I love UNLEASHED's music — it's fucking cool," Grohl told the magazine. "[But] one of the guys involved [in putting the PROBOT record together], Matt Sweeney [who is credited as being the album's executive producer and 'riff consultant'—ed.], pointed out that [Johnny] wouldn't be appropriate for this."

PROBOT, the much-anticipated project recently described by Grohl as "the most kick-ass death metal compilation ever", remains unreleased despite having been in the works for much of the last three years. While RCA Records are said to have been interested in issuing the album (via Grohl's Roswell imprint),no release date has yet been announced, even though the album has been done for over a year.

"On the QUEENS OF THE STONE AGE tour, a 55-year-old mother of two came up to me and asked, 'When is PROBOT coming out?'," Grohl recalled. "I gave her a strange look and said, 'Ehhh… I don't think you're gonna like it.' [And she was like] 'Yes, I just went out and bought VOIVOD's first three records, and they're great.' [And I was like] 'What, you like 'War And Pain'? You're an old mother and everything.' I didn't even like 'War And Pain'. 'Rrroooaaarrr', that's a different story."

As previously reported, PROBOT's upcoming CD will include a dozen-or-so tracks featuring some of metal's most celebrated and respected vocalists, including Lemmy (MOTÖRHEAD),Cronos (VENOM),King Diamond (MERCYFUL FATE, KING DIAMOND),Tom G. Fischer (ex-CELTIC FROST),Snake (VOIVOD),Eric Wagner (TROUBLE),Max Cavalera (SOULFLY, ex-SEPULTURA),Mike Dean (C.O.C.),Wino (ex-THE OBSESSED) and Lee Dorrian (CATHEDRAL).

Among the tracks that are set to appear on the effort are the following:

01. Dictatorsaurus (feat. Snake)
02. Centuries Of Sin (feat. Cronos)
03. Access Babylon (feat. Mike Dean)
04. Sweet Dreams (feat. King Diamond)
05. Ice Cold Man (feat. Lee Dorrian)
06. My Tortured Soul (feat. Eric Wagner)
07. Big Sky (feat. Tom G. Fischer)
08. Emerald Lies (feat. Wino)
09. Shake Your Blood (feat. Lemmy)

In a recent interview with Canada's Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles, Grohl explained how the idea for the project came about.

"It started out as a project in my basement," Dave stated. "At first I was just recording a bunch of instrumentals for fun and I had no intention of releasing it and I had no intention of having anyone else sing on it. And then after recording the first seven songs, I thought it would be kind of funny to almost make fun of that SANTANA record that had come out recently, with a different vocalist on every song. And then I played on the Tony Iommi [self-titled solo] record that is kind of the same concept, and I thought wow, maybe this will work. But instead of having the mainstream or more popular singers, I decided to restrict it to this genre of underground metal from 1982 to 1989. So we started calling people and I wasn't sure everyone would be cooperative, just because it was kind of out of left field that a guy from NIRVANA would be calling people, like Cronos from VENOM or Tom G. Warrior or Lee Dorrian. And everybody was really, really excited to do it. And from there it was a really simple process of simply calling up and saying, 'Would you like to be a part of it.' And if they agreed, I would send them a copy of the song that I thought they should sing on, they would call me back and either say yes or no and everybody said yes. And then we would just send them the master tape, give them money for the studio, then they would sing on it and they just sent them back. And one by one, they started coming back and they were just fucking awesome! Every one of them was just... I just waited for them to come in the mail."