Lamb of God to Take a Break

Last year wasn’t exactly a very good year for Lamb of God especially when frontman Randy Blythe was being accused of contributing to the death of a fan during a show. The court case went away when it was proven that Blythe had nothing to do with it and the band went on to continue touring.

Now, after weeks of speculation among fans in the metal world, Blythe has come out and confirmed that the band will in fact be taking a break after the end of their current tour which ended a few days ago.

Blythe released a lengthy letter to fans on Instagram alongside a photo from their recent show in Johannesburg, South Africa. The letter reflects on Blythe’s journey and his plans for the future.

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And so another album cycle comes to an end. This has been a very eventful, at times VERY STRESSFUL, album cycle, & it's been about three years since we started on this one in our practice space- I need a break. Tomorrow is a 19 hour flight back to the USA, & then another one home to RVA, & except for two festival shows in 2014, I will not be thinking about lamb of god, touring, playing heavy metal, writing new lamb of god material- NONE OF THAT STUFF- AT ALL- for a good long while. Time to do other things for a bit, & let my brain regroup, & be a somewhat normal human being. This has been a pretty wild ride though, & to end it in AFRICA of all places still amazes the crap outta me. So thanks Johannesburg for an awesome end to the Resolution tour cycle, & to all you other bands, hear this: the game has been stepped up, & the ante has risen. You are not a REAL G until you come to South Africa & your fans throw one of THESE to you on stage- a warthog skull. Takes the cake for the strangest thing throw at me on stage ever, & I've had some weird shit thrown at me- I named him Jeff. Jeff, the South African warthog. Top that, y'all. Don't front like your ballin' if you ain't rockin' that wart hog shizzy. I figured I'd finish up the cycle with a nice self-portrait. Me & Jeff are outty. Peace, & one love.

A post shared by D. Randall Blythe (@drandallblythe) on Jan 25, 2014 at 6:01pm PST

“And so another album cycle comes to an end. This has been a very eventful, at times VERY STRESSFUL, album cycle, & it’s been about three years since we started on this one in our practice space- I need a break.

Tomorrow is a 19 hour flight back to the USA, & then another one home to RVA, & except for two festival shows in 2014, I will not be thinking about lamb of god, touring, playing heavy metal, writing new lamb of god material- NONE OF THAT STUFF- AT ALL- for a good long while.

Time to do other things for a bit, & let my brain regroup, & be a somewhat normal human being. This has been a pretty wild ride though, & to end it in AFRICA of all places still amazes the crap outta me. So thanks Johannesburg for an awesome end to the Resolution tour cycle, & to all you other bands, hear this: the game has been stepped up, & the ante has risen. You are not a REAL G until you come to South Africa & your fans throw one of THESE to you on stage- a warthog skull.

Takes the cake for the strangest thing throw at me on stage ever, & I’ve had some weird shit thrown at me- I named him Jeff. Jeff, the South African warthog. Top that, y’all. Don’t front like your ballin’ if you ain’t rockin’ that wart hog shizzy. I figured I’d finish up the cycle with a nice self-portrait. Me & Jeff are outty.

Peace, & one love.”

For a band that started in 1990 and to still be going and having the amount of fans that they do is an incredible thing. Nowhere in the letter does it say that Lamb of God are no more, so if you’re a fan and are sad over the hiatus news, it’s not the end.

Lamb of God Frontman Acquitted of Manslaughter

A panel of Czech judges ruled earlier this week that the promoters, not Lamb of God frontman, Randy Blythe, were to blame for the tragic death of a fan about three years ago. The judges also found that the frontman’s action did not constitute a crime like it was previously stated.

Concertgoers who testified in court told the judges that 19-year-old Daniel Nosek was pushed off the stage, violently with both hands, by Blythe during Lamb of God’s show in Prague in May of 2010. But the contradicts started shorty after that when some of the initial statements started to go against each other like which way the kid was facing when he was pushed and when it was that he breached the security’s barrier.

What did become clear was the fact was that less than 12 hours after the incident, Nosek started to complain of a headache and started to vomit, violently, which led to him being hospitalized. Later that night, he underwent emergency brain surgery, but fell into a coma and eventually died.

An expert in biochemics was called in to testify on behalf of Blythe’s defense to help determine if the frontman’s pushing had a major affect on the fan’s death. The expert did reveal that the kid must have fallen backwards because if he had fallen forward, his hands would have shot out forward to help protect him from the fall.

The biggest defense from the expert was the fact that had the teenager been pushed, he would not have fallen beyond the first row of fans, just like two of the witnesses had stated originally. But even though it was a great defense, state attorney Vladimir Muzik, took an issue with the experiment because it was not a complete recreation of what had taken place that evening.

While most of the evening’s show had been recorded by fans, the exact moment when Nosek was pushed from the stage had not been captured on camera. The presiding judge, Tomas Kubovec, put most of the blame for the tragedy on lax security and safety precautions at the club, which allowed fans the opportunity to get on the stage.

Kubovec also said “ninety percent of the audience” must have known that there was a “no stage diving” policy at the concert and added on that Nosek must have misunderstood Blythe’s hand gesture as a “come on stage” because of the language barrier between the two.

While that case might have been acquitted, Kubovec went on to tell Nosek’s family that the $500,000 lawsuit against the singer should be dropped and taken with the promoters of the event since evidently, it was their fault that the death occurred.

After the ruling Blythe released the following statement to the family:

“I can understand that pain as only the father of a dead child can. This has been a very sad and emotive experience for me, but I’ve tried to remain as objective as possible because my emotions have no impact on what is for me and for the family of Daniel Nosek the most important thing: the truth. He was just a boy. I wish he were still here.”

When it was first revealed that there was a chance that he would be going to jail for manslaughter, Blythe promised to take his sentence as a man and to work hard to prevent something like that from ever happening again.