As they’ve now established their own label in Bonebag Records and overseen the release of last year’s sophomore LP, Part II – Breach (review here), as well as an outing from Troy the Band and one impending from Terra Black — the news of which I haven’t even had a second to post here yet — it likely won’t be super-duper long before Swedish conceptualist epic doomers Cavern Deep start the gears grinding to issue their next album. Since their 2021 self-titled debut (review here), they have shown a creative urgency well-suited to the increasingly DIY ethos with which they operate.
Nonetheless, whatever shape their next record takes — and the reason I’m even talking about such a thing is because they finished recording it a month ago — in continuing the creepy, dark and engrossing narrative, there’s a decent chance it could be out before the end of 2024. You wouldn’t hear me complain. Likely recorded during those same recent album-three sessions, “The Peeler” arrives as a standalone single with an accompanying stop-motion animated video by Bob in Dope — might be like a stoner-doom Flat Stanley, if you have any idea what that is? — and is duly unsettling in its vibe. Stately in the manner of traditional doom, Cavern Deep‘s sound resonates an exploratory feel all the more as the band introduces Johannes Behndig (Sarcophagus Now) as their now-full-time synthesist.
You can certainly hear Behndig adding to the drama as “The Peeler” culminates, finding new breadth in the grim surroundings of the atmosphere cast around it, pushing deeper into the subsurface-horror narrative that has threaded through Cavern Deep‘s work to-date (a couple of covers notwithstanding). Behndig played on Part II – Breach as well, but it seems reasonable to expect him to become more of a presence in the songs by virtue of, you know, he’s actually in the band now rather than doing a guest spot. Being in the room when the song is written makes a difference.
I wouldn’t call myself early on posting it by any stretch, but if you haven’t seen it out there yet on the big wide internet, enjoy the “The Peeler” clip below. PR wire info follows after:
Cavern Deep, “The Peeler” official video
Swedish Doomsters CAVERN DEEP Hunt Monsters on Gripping New Single ‘THE PEELER’
Hailing from Umeå in Northern Sweden, the trio have carved out a name for themselves in recent years with hulking doom that has got the underground listening… ‘The Peeler’, the brand-new single from Cavern Deep is out now via Bonebag Records
Founded in 2019 by Max Malmer and former members of Swedish death metallers, Zonaria, and retro rockers, Gudars Skymning; Sweden’s Cavern Deep has established itself as one of the Scandinavia’s finest new doom metal bands.
Having released their first album in 2021 on the Polish label Interstellar Smoke Records, the band has since formed and issued music under their own Bonebag Records imprint, most recently releasing their latest record, Part II – Breach, to critical acclaim across Europe.
Returning this month for a one-off release, new single ‘The Peeler’ was originally intended to be a bonus track on the band’s forthcoming album. But while all good things come to those who wait, some things are too awesome to not share immediately. For those impatient souls itching for new material from the Umeå trio, this sleeping giant of a track focuses its attention on a lost mythical monster who resides in the deep cavernous realms of a long-lost civilisation. A hideous beast that hypnotises and oozes slime from its jaws, peeling skin from its still-stirring victims, and feeding off them piece by piece.
Towering guitars and drums soundtrack the ensuing chaos and seek to capture the creature using stark riffs and crushing strokes of colossal doom metal. Coupled with fantastic stop motion footage – assembled, and animated by artist, “Bob” – for the single’s visualiser video, ‘The Peeler’ is out now via Bonebag Records –bonebagrecords.com
Cavern Deep is: Kenny-Oswald Duvfenberg – Guitars and Vocals Max Malmer – Bass and Vocals Dennis Sjödin – Drums, Backup Vocals and Keys Johannes Behndig – Synth
Cork, Ireland-based atmospheric sludge/post-metal four-piece Coroza will release their second album, As Within, through Cursed Monk Records on May 20. Today they’re premiering their video for the title-track, which takes the familiar notion of a band-in-a-place-type clip and uses it as a means of emphasizing the mood and character of the music. As the 10-minute finale of the LP that bears its name unfolds, its quiet intro pulls back from the colorful stained glass of the initial shot and shifts into black and white as the pullback from the window reveals Coroza set up on the floor of what looks to be a fancy university library or some such. At about a minute in, both the song and the clip burst to life around a heavier part change, the color returns with vivid clarity and the band play through the closing cut that gives the album its name.
That visual change is thoughtful, not haphazard, and like the various mirror effects and swirls throughout, it coincides with where the song is going and highlights the considered aspects of Coroza‘s craft. In following their 2019 debut, Chaliceburner (review here), guitarist/vocalists Jack O’Neill and Ciarán Coghlan, bassist Tomás O’Brien (who makes his first recorded appearance on the album) and drummer Oliver Cunningham depart from some of the ultra-extended fare on offer such that, where only one song on Chaliceburner was under 10 minutes long, on As Within, the only track that crosses the same line is “As Within” itself, however close others might come.
It’s not a huge upheaval in aesthetic terms, but at five songs and 42 minutes, As Within gives a more efficient impression even in the take-a-moment-to-commune-with-the-deity-or-deities-of-your-choice-before-the-riff-hits break in the penultimate “Scorched Earth.” Whether that’s a purposeful change of approach, mindful creative progression or simply the shape the songs took as the bludgeoning nods were compiled, I don’t know, but like when the color pops back on in the “As Within” video, the methodical manner in which the bordering-on-extreme heft of “Immersed” is delivered, and the way the instrumental “The Shifting Sands” follows its quiet-loud-quiet pattern as something of an interlude-plus for the centerpiece of the digital and CD versions of the album, it feels like they meant for it to happen.
But to be sure, the crux of As Within is in its crush, conveyed immediately upon the start of opener “Myrrh,” which has well-I’m-sure-this-is-about-as-heavy-as-it’ll-get written all over it until “Immersed” comes on some nine minutes later and is even more trenchantly apocalyptic. Given space in the reverb on that low distortion as well as in the vocal tradeoffs between Coghlan and O’Neill — a guttural rasp reminiscent of Celestial-era Isis meeting with chant-like meditative melodies in the cleaner parts — As Within opens further in “The Shifting Sands” en route to the renewed intensity of “Scorched Earth” and the title-track’s subdued intro and ensuing productive destruction resolved in mood and thoughtful in execution. If it’s never occurred to you to say the phrase, “Hail Irish heavy” out loud, the monolithic lumber and roiling tension of “As Within” might get you there.
They provide a bit of relief around six minutes in, and the leads in the second half carry an airier reach not entirely removed from the plod-and-tremolo finish of “Myrrh,” the opener and closer giving a symmetrical feel to As Within while further emphasizing the sense of purpose brought to the album as a whole work. They know of what they obliterate — which is to say they’re schooled in genre and I don’t think anyone here would try to get away with saying they’d never heard Neurosis — but Coroza‘s second full-length takes significant strides in establishing the band’s place in the harder-hitting depths of the post-metallic sphere, doing so with distinct, affecting and cathartic force.
Coroza will play at Cursed Monk Records‘ 2024 edition of Monk Fest on July 6, performing As Within in its entirety. I hope someone gets video with soundboard audio.
More on that (including the ticket link) and about the record (including the preorder link) follows the video premiere below, courtesy of the PR wire.
Please enjoy:
Coroza, “As Within” video premiere
Cursed Monk Records are thrilled to announce that we will be releasing Coroza’s sophomore album “As Within.”
Not only will Coroza be joining us for this year’s Monk Fest, but they will also be playing their new album “As Within” in full! Monk Fest 2024 will take place on July 6th. Monk Fest is in aid of Temple St. Children’s Hospital. Tickets are available here:https://www.eventbrite.com/e/monk-fest-2024-tickets-765729105367
Coroza was formed in Cork, Ireland in mid-2015 and over the course of two years honed their sound into a devastatingly heavy form, which encompasses heavy blues, metal, sludge, doom and stoner elements, leading to the release of their well-received self-titled demo in 2017.
Extensive gigging cemented them into the local scene and soon Coroza began appearing on bills around Ireland, landing support slots to international touring bands such as Conan, Bolzer and Tusker. 2019 saw the release of their debut album Chaliceburner which was met with positive reviews.
Coroza’s second album titled “As Within”, was recorded and mixed by renowned producer Aidan Cunningham and mastered by Magnus Lindberg (Cult of Luna).
Says the band: “We would like to thank Aidan Cunningham – Mixing for recording and mixing this album. All tracks were recorded live in the room with some overdubs added afterward. Aidan’s work ethic, knowledge and insight was invaluable and we cannot thank him enough for how this album turned out. He captured the exact sound we were hoping for. Also, a huge thanks to Magnus Lindberg Productions for mastering the album and ensuring it gets heard perfectly in all formats.”
‘As Within’ releases May 20th on LP, CD, Cassette, and Digital!
With the clarion riff of its title-track sounding the call to worship at its outset, experiments in folk and synth more realized than the band had yet attempted, an emergent progression of sound, arguably the first party-rock riff in “Sabbra Cadabra” and performances that find the young Black Sabbath hitting their stride as players, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath was released in Dec. 1, 1973 on Vertigo Records. That put it just 14 months after Vol. 4 (discussed here), the band’s forward momentum taking a hit after the cancelation of their Spring 1973 tour either as a result of burnout, drugs, or both, depending on who’s telling the story, but it’s still about the same turnaround as that between Vol. 4 and its predecessor, 1971’s Master of Reality (review here). They were a working band.
And the eight songs and 42 minutes of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath sound like it. Gone is the willful cultish slog of their self-titled (discussed here), somewhat contrary to the impression of Dan Struzan‘s cover art, and the gritty judgementalism of Paranoid (discussed here) — at least mostly — as the returning four-piece of vocalist Ozzy Osbourne, guitarist Tony Iommi, who branches out instrumentally on various keys, flute on “Looking for Today,” bagpipes on “Spiral Architect,” etc., bassist Geezer Butler (also some synth and Mellotron) and drummer Bill Ward dug into an expansion of ideas that began to come forward on the album prior to find a more rousing and uptempo take. Accordingly, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, as the fifth Black Sabbath full-length from the original lineup and the entry into the back half of their multi-genre-defining eight-record run, is also the first LP in their catalog that truly comes across like a follow-up to the one before it.
There are positive and negative aspects to that, and its audible in the expanded arrangements throughout as well as in the production around the guitar, bass, drums and vocals. As the Narrative (blessings and peace upon it) saw cocaine, alcohol and whatever other substance abuse famously rooting itself into the already-wasn’t-lacking-for-shenanigans culture of Black Sabbath as a group, they were also more confident and more self-aware in recording themselves than they’d yet been. Working with engineer Mike Butcher following writing sessions in Los Angeles (unsuccessful) and at Clearwell Castle in Gloucestershire, UK (successful), where the likes of Led Zeppelin, Queen and Deep Purple, among others, had composed and/or recorded (you can get married there now), the band stepped forward with a crunch in Iommi‘s tone audible right at the outset of “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” — reportedly the first riff he wrote for the album — that was consistent with Vol. 4 in a new and purposeful way. It was the first time Black Sabbath sounded like they actively chose how they wanted to sound on a recording.
I’ll also argue that Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and its July 1975 successor, Sabotage, represent this version of Black Sabbath at the peak of their powers. That isn’t to say it’s necessarily their ‘best’ album — I’m not picking — but it’s among the best played. Between Vol. 4, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and Sabotage, Osbourne, whose first statement with the band in the eponymous “Black Sabbath” was that, yes, he could reach those notes organically, found new levels of accomplishment as a singer. Here, he’s grandiose with Butler‘s lyrics in “A National Acrobat,” emotive and sincere in the realization at the end of “Spiral Architect,” and the swagger and lighthearted spirit he brings to “Sabbra Cadabra” is enough to make its generic met-a-girl-feel-good-about-it storyline come through as sweet instead of hollow as did the sappy “Changes” a year earlier.
He’s credited with composing the side B standout “Who Are You” on synthesizer — Rick Wakeman of Yes sat in on keys; maybe also for “Sabbra Cadabra” — and demonstrates a range between the creeper cinematic vibe that makes it the darkest track on the album and the still-melodic shoutier approach on “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” that uses the instrument of his voice in more complex ways, also incorporating different effects so that the bluesy swing in “Sabbra Cadabra” and the back half of “Killing Yourself to Live” could exist alongside the more adventurous instrumental arrangements in “Fluff” and the closing salvo of “Looking for Today” and “Spiral Architect.” In a singularly influential discography spanning more than five decades, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath could easily be a candidate for Ozzy‘s best work as a singer, though admittedly it’s not the only one in the running.
But Ozzy wasn’t the only one to step up, either. While Ward would always be defined by his swing and the creativity with which his fills gave force and character in complement to Iommi‘s riffs, he sets a march in “A National Acrobat” that conveys drudgery without actually being it, gives nodding shape to “Who Are You,” and double-times the hi-hat in the verse of “Looking for Today” — more strut than march — to bring a sense of energy without taking away from the vocals and guitar or Butler‘s bass, which could by this point in the original Sabbath‘s tenure be well relied upon for righteousness. As Iommi dug into the sunny folkishness of “Fluff” and the not-guitar elements noted above brought to “Looking for Today” and “Spiral Architect,” one could not say his core modus had been abandoned, even if broader ambitions were coming to the surface around that. A greater depth of structure overall makes the sudden blues-rocker turn of “Killing Yourself to Live,” which might otherwise be thought of as a mirror atmospherically for “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath,” natural, and as far out as “Spiral Architect” goes after its acoustic introduction, it signals nascent maturity in its patient unfolding and finds space atop its central groove enough that neither the strings nor Butler‘s nose flute feel out of place.
As composers and musicians, Black Sabbath were growing, and things were only going to get weirder from here, but they had found the band they wanted to be and set themselves to chasing that ideal on Sabbath Bloody Sabbath in ways that would inform their work for the next five years and heavy music for the subsequent 50-plus so far. If I call it essential, I mean it speaks to the very heart of what Black Sabbath were at the time.
Like always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.
—
Busy week, busy weekend. You know I’m still not caught up on news from last week’s Quarterly Review? I was a little embarrassed yesterday putting up that Inter Arma album news a week after the fact of the actual announcement, and there are a couple things that I’m probably just going to have to drop because more has come in. I don’t particularly enjoy that, which is putting it mildly, but I remind myself that the stakes are pretty low, content-urgency is an illusion, and that I do as much as I can. I’m trying. There’s just a lot out there.
Anyway. The kid had half-days Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday because of parent-teacher conference, so it was hands-on parenting time for most of the week, which not at all shockingly does not allow for much concentrated writing. That the news was good from her kindergarten teacher — she reads well, has stopped putting what we call “the claw” in other kids’ faces, got a perfect score on her last math assessment, etc. — I won’t say makes it worthwhile, because it’s worthwhile anyway spending time with your kid, but was encouraging just the same. She’s different at home and at school, and though we have a hard time sometimes — she started ice skating lessons again on Wednesday and that claw was dug into my throat as I carried her nervous-to-go self to the car so her mother could take her — every time I step back and look at the progress she’s made and the difficult work she’s done and does every day, I can only admire her strength. Less when she’s using that strength to punch me or The Patient Mrs. for turning off the Switch at bedtime or coming downstairs an hour later to whine in her Bluey voice that she’s hungry for another yogurt, but still.
I have a bio to write today and a call scheduled with Jack from Elephant Tree ahead of doing the liner notes for their upcoming PostWax split with Lowrider. I haven’t heard any music yet from it, so don’t ask. I think they’re still mixing. I guess I’ll probably ask about that, too. But hopefully there will be some downtime in there as well. The Patient Mrs.’ mother’s birthday was yesterday and she’s coming down from Connecticut to NJ for tonight and tomorrow, which will be great, and I think her sister and her sister’s kids are coming Saturday too? I’m not sure, but also wedged in the next two days is The Pecan at a mermaid-themed pottery-painting birthday party. I don’t know how all of this will shake out, but it won’t be the first tired Monday I’ve ever had, so whatever. See “worthwhile,” above.
I’m gonna leave it there.
Thanks again for reading. I hope you’re digging the Sabbath (though if not you’re probably not still reading either) and I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Next week is once more booked front-to-back, and I look forward to again feeling both like I’m doing way too much and like I can’t keep up at all. See you Monday.
On the record, the melancholic build of “Critical Mass” follows guitarist, vocalist and songwriter Caroline Cawley‘s short story recitation “She From Up the Drombán Hill,” and with a switch from third to first-person point of view, “Critical Mass” takes on the voice of its central character, a young woman — a “…comfortable learned woman, a competent speller” — who gets pregnant out of wedlock in very-Catholic Ireland and is sent away to a common shame and death not actually of her own making, though naturally the blame would’ve been hers. Cawley, responsible for the craft at root in Dystopian Future Movies and the emotive performance that drives the band’s 2022 album, War of the Ether (review here), explores this theme with sadness, an unflinching eye, due judgment and depth of perspective. Like the title-track and others surrounding, “Critical Mass” is heavy well before it actually gets loud.
What allows for that is atmosphere, of course. As might be hinted by an album that builds up its introduction around nine minutes of spoken storytelling, words are important on War of the Ether, and that holds for “Critical Mass” as well, but Dystopian Future Movies set that narrative to a sound that has grown capable across now-three-LPs to encompass aspects of downer heavy indie and goth-ish melodic pull — if you can take Crippled Black Phoenix‘s oppressive-sky modus, the mood here resonates similarly — as well as noise rock, atmospheric sludge metal and in the later reaches of “No Matter,” a flourish of guitar float that is more clear-eyed than heavygaze but brings some ethereal sense to War of the Ether just the same. As noted when it was being released, Cawley took inspiration from the scandal surrounding Tuam Mother and Baby Home in Ireland, where nearly 800 dead bodies were discovered of the pregnant women who went and the children they birthed there. Perhaps with this frame it’s inevitable War of the Ether would hit hard, but again, its impact is in more than just its volatile pieces.
Dystopian Future Movies — in which Cawley is joined by Bill Fisher, Marty Fisher and Rafe Dunn — played this past weekend at Masters of the Riff III in Hackney, performing alongside Elephant Tree, The Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell, and scores of others. Two more UK fests are locked in for this Spring in Leeds and Bradford, about which you can see more in the info that follows the clip below. One last note to mention that the lyrics to “Critical Mass” also appear under the video player. I don’t always post lyrics with whatever might be streaming on a given day, but I think the relevance in this instance makes it appropriate. If it throws you off visually or whatever, I apologize. I assure you it made sense to me at the time, which is right now, as it happens.
Please enjoy:
Dystopian Future Movies, “Critical Mass” official video
From the album ‘War of the Ether’ out on Septaphonic Records
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Video by Zorad Music by Dystopian Future Movies Recorded by Bill Fisher at XII Chambers Nottingham England Produced by Dystopian Future Movies Mastered by Lira Wish at Film-Maker Studios ‘War of the Ether’ Art & Design by Rafe & Zorad
Dystopian Future Movies live: StrangeForms Festival – Brudenell, Leeds 6th – 7th April Ruination Festival 2024 – Underground, Bradford 11th May
“Critical Mass” lyrics: Looking back it’s clear to know I should have lied So ashamed to admit that now, I didn’t even try In a land that is so drenched in weeping, I know that I’m alone When a hand that should heal is tormented to steal and corrupting your mind
Where is love, where is love and I should go Where is love, where is love and I could go
Only in retrospect can we blame the time And that seems but a weakened stance when it mars entire lives When we wait on unforthcoming promises from a state content with lies When we wait for the order of things to change, while we die
Where is love, where is love and I should go Where is love, where is love and I could go
Your dissent Your descent, I know Your dissent Your descent, I know I’ll await for you
And you hide behind robes And you hide behind robes Despite how we strove Despite how we fought
Where is love, where is love and I should go Where is love, where is love and I could go
Where is love, where is love and I should go Where is love, where is love and I could go
Your dissent Your descent, I know Your dissent Your descent, I know I…
Dystopian Future Movies are: Caroline Cawley – Guitar & Vocals Bill Fisher – Drums Rafe Dunn – Guitar Marty Fisher: Bass Guitar
Today, Indianapolis doom metallers Apostle of Solitude announce the longest stretch of European touring they’ve done. Anchored by appearances at Grand Paris Sludge, Wonnemond Festival and Desertfest Oslo, it’s not their first time abroad, but it’s special both because they’re going places they’ve never been and it’s how the band are celebrating their 20th anniversary.
Following a pair of formative demos, their debut album, Sincerest Misery (discussed here), came out in 2008 through Eyes Like Snow, and set them on an innovative course that helped define an emotive strain of doom which continues to flesh out today. After the warm-but-for-the-artwork reception their second full-length, Last Sunrise (review here), garnered upon release in 2010, the band offered a pair of splits in 2011 and restructured the lineup around founding members Chuck Brown (guitar/vocals) and Corey Webb (drums), bringing in Bob Fouts (who passed away in 2020) on bass and Steve Janiak of heavy rockers Devil to Pay as a second guitarist and singer.
The addition of Janiak to Apostle of Solitude shouldn’t be discounted as a landmark in the band’s 20-year run. I remember picking up their 2012 Demo (discussed here) at Days of the Doomed in Wisconsin that year and listening to the CD on the long drive home. It wasn’t a full conceptual reset for the band — they were doom before and doom after — but it was the start of a new era, and I’ll gladly put the three records they’ve done since, 2014’s Of Woe and Wounds (review here), 2018’s From Gold to Ash (review here), and 2021’s Until the Darkness Goes (review here), forth as examples of their progression in style and songwriting.
They’ve been talking about their next record for a while now, which is kind of how it goes. In the video interview below, which was conducted this past Sunday afternoon as the band met for rehearsal in Brown‘s basement (recognizable from any number of shared pics over the years), they talk a bit about new material and how they might or might not put it together for a sixth LP, but there’s no concrete recording or release plan at this point, and three years out from the last record, that’s fair. But if it’s 2025 or even 2026 before Apostle of Solitude make their next offering, what, you’re gonna be like, “No, this took too long so I won’t listen?” Probably not.
From Webb and Brown as originals, to Janiak now tenured for 13 years, to bassist Marshall Kreeb, who joined last summer, Apostle of Solitude have a range of perspectives on the band’s history, and I felt fortunate to be able to talk to all of them about it. And let the record show that when called upon to stand up for 20 years of Apostle of Solitude, they indeed stood. I say it to them and I’ll write it here: congratulations on 20 years of Apostle of Solitude.
Enjoy the interview. The tour announcement (fresh today) follows in blue.
Here you go:
Apostle of Solitude, Full Band Interview, March 3, 2024
(L-R in video: Steve Janiak, Marshall Kreeb, Chuck Brown, Corey Webb)
Commemorating their 20th Anniversary, Apostle of Solitude embark on a European tour this spring. The tour begins at the Grand Paris Sludge festival in Paris France on April 26th, and includes 14 shows in 7 different countries (including 5 shows and 2 festival appearances with Eyehategod), concluding at Desertfest Oslo in Oslo, Norway on May 11th. Apostle of Solitude have released five full-length albums since the band’s inception in 2004, the most recent being their 2021 release “Until The Darkness Goes”, on Cruz Del Sur Music.
20th Anniversary EU Tour dates are as follows:
April 26 – Paris, France @ Savigny le Temple, l’Empreinte Grand Paris Sludge April 27 – Martigny, Switzerland @ Les Caves du Manior April 28 – Torino, Italy @ Ziggy Club April 29 – Bologna, Italy @ Freakout Club April 30 – Viareggio, Italy @ Circolo ARCI GOB May 02 – Osnabrück, Germany @ Bastard Club May 03 – Berlin, Germany @ Slaughterhouse Berlin May 04 – Vienna, Austria @ Escape Metalcorner May 05 – Budapest, Hungary @ Robot May 07 – Wiesbaden, Germany @ Schlachthof Wiesbaden May 08 – Göppingen, Germany @ Zille May 09 – Düsseldorf, Germany @ Pitcher May 10 – Sebnitz, Germany @ Wonnemond Festival May 11 – Oslo, Norway @ Desertfest Oslo
Apostle of Solitude, Until the Darkness Goes (2021)
Madrid-based instrumentalists Deriva will release their new four-song EP, Nona/Décima/Morta, on March 13 through LaRubia Producciones. The video for the previously-issued single “Aqua Vitae” premieres below, and as its low-lighting balletic undulations unfold amid ambient guitar ahead of the band diving into the 28-minute outing’s most outwardly crushing procession, so too there arrives a poem to set the mood. I’ve included it under hte video player in the original Spanish, and if you have the captions on as I always do because I’m old, you can see the English translation, which relates to the notion of sleep as a kind of death and dreams as visions we forget much as humans live entire lives in denial of mortality. As the band play through the song amid stark spotlights, a ceremonial-feeling cutting of ties, some light fetishism and arthouse mosh from dancer Miroslava Fernández, and so on, these ideas linger like a guided meditation and the music grows correspondingly more intense, the push that takes over following the midsection atmospheric break peppered with double-kick to add physicality to the surge.
Over the course of the outing, Deriva — who made their self-titled full-length debut in 2016, followed with the three-songers Haiku I and Haiku II in 2019 and 2021, respectively, and have apparently had this EP in the works for a while as opener “Ignis ex Cinere” was issued as a single in 2022 — apply metallic precision and progressivism to an atmospheric backdrop. “Ignis ex Cinere” gathers itself over its first minute-plus around jazzy drums from Rory Reagan and bass punch from Javier Justo before evening out to let the intertwining guitars of Javier “Muñi” Muñoz and Daniel “Minchi” Garea lead with tricky up-front float toward the next volume surge, which by the time they’re three minutes into the seven-and-a-half-minute cut, has peaked again in consuming style and dropped to guitar soon joined by violin in a momentarily serene, pastoral stretch, Reagan‘s toms returning to mark the beginning of the build in earnest, and they don’t tease the last payoff long before they’re in it because they don’t need to. A wailing solo over an intentionally angular, choppy closing section cuts out and “Aqua Vitae” arrives with a switch back to post-rocky airiness.
But again, the inevitable burst isn’t far off. Deriva work in volume trades throughout Nona/Décima/Morta — the title with similar flex in having multiple potential translations; I don’t know which is correct and I’d rather not embarrass myself by getting it wrong — but “Aqua Vitae” is both the shorted inclusion on the EP and the most metal, the clear, full production of Alex Cappa at Metropol Studios in Madrid allowing the impact of the kick drum to coexist with the guitar in the midsection break, which is also shorter than that of “Ignis ex Ciniere” and slams starkly at 3:10 into a hard-riffed wall of distortion. Establishing itself with declarative hits before shifting into the actual march that defines the procession for its remainder, “Aqua Vitae” turns corners you didn’t realize were there, a twist of lead guitar and emergent soloing matching the adrenaline of the drums, dark and majestic but not hopeless. It comes to a head and ends, Russian Circles-style, bringing the synthier landscape of “Lux Aeris” — Julio Martin is credited with contributing the synth — as a plotted line of guitar smooths the shift into the next heavy section.
The structural pattern becomes familiar, but Deriva do well in giving each of these four pieces its own character, whether that’s the headbang-fodder bounce of “Aqua Vitae” or the way each song has its movement from a subdued intro to a push of heavy progressive metal but does it a bit differently. Where “Aqua Vitae” can’t wait to dig into its crunch, “Lux Aeris” spreads out over the course of its start. There’s room — it’s the longest track at 8:29 — and they use it. The first two and a half minutes or so build up patiently and don’t so much suddenly ignite in full, distorted tone as draw a more complete line from one end to the other in that time, handing one part to the next, almost seamless. Intricate rhythmic jumps and tremolo guitar, so much organized chaos, persist over a central pattern of groove, and as with “Ignis ex Ciniere” and “Aqua Vitae,” they’ll finish loud, but getting there routes through a resonant, bright clearing, as the more all-at-once shove back to full-impact lurks in the background, never quite gone. In a suitable-enough meta-level manifestation of their aural back and forth, Nona/Décima/Morta also shifts between longer and shorter pieces in succession, “Mortuus Terra” rounds out by finding something of a middle ground between the two extremes of Deriva‘s sound.
I’m not sure if they intentionally paired “Lux Aeris” (‘the light of the air’) and “Mortuus Terra” (‘dead earth’) next to each other for any reason more than the fluidity with which the finale takes hold from the song before it, but given the level of consideration throughout in sound and presentation, I’d be willing to believe it. And “Mortuus Terra” is a build as well — ebbs and flows; that’s life — though it holds back its flood for longer than did “Lux Aeris,” and while it moves into cycles of guitar chug and low-end punctuating, tom runs and snare adding to the round-we-go vibe, lead guitar releases that tension in a way that’s about more than just clicking on this or that pedal, and once they hit thar stride, there’s no real going back. The single movement at the end feels like it’s underscoring the point, and all the more because its execution stands out from its three companions while being rooted in similar tones and atmospherics. A concept, extrapolated, that is emblematic of the sculptor’s care put into Deriva‘s craft and the effectiveness with which they immerse the listener in their dynamic.
It will ring familiar enough on first blush, but the deeper you go, the more you’ll find. I don’t know if the video is NSFW or not. Depends on where you work, I guess. Either way, if you need to click off the tab, the song is still there, and the Bandcamp player that will hold the full release is at the bottom by the links. I know you know. I kept the poem and recording info in Spanish. Minimal language barrier, appropriate to aesthetic and the band’s intent. You’ll be fine.
Enjoy:
Deriva, “Aqua Vitae” video premiere
“Los sueños son pequeñas muertes, tramoyas, anticipos, simulacros de muerte, el despertar en cambio nos parece, una resurrección y por las dudas, olvidamos cuanto antes lo soñado. A pesar de sus fuegos, sus cavernas, sus orgasmos, sus glorias, sus espantos. Tal vez quiera decir que lo que ansiamos, es olvidar la muerte, apenas eso.”
“Aqua Vitae” Grabado en Metropol Studios con Alex Cappa 2023, en colaboración de Julio Martin a los sintetizadores. Video producido por David AJ y protagonizado por Miroslava Fernández.
Grabado en Metropol Estudios Madrid por Alex Cappa
Deriva is an instrumental cinematic post-metal machine from Madrid, Spain. Deriva creates “movies for your ears” that encompass raw emotion ranging from melancholy and contemplation to rage and explosivity. From beginning to end of each composition, each note and phrase is meticulously rendered to perfection to create an emotive effect that draws attention and tells a story throughout the music. Each instrument weaves a delicate tapestry and is highly conversational amongst the instruments. As if in a heavy discussion, the guitars converse in a way that is both supportive and opposing of each other throughout the story. Like the microscopic intermingling layers of carbon fiber, the bass and drums create a rhythmically robust foundation that is both lightweight and extremely strong in which the guitars can float upon. Deriva is the Ennio Morricone, Danny Elfman, and Hans Zimmer of post-metal.
Tracklisting: 1. Ignis ex Ciniere (7:37) 2. Aqua Vitae (5:44) 3. Lux Aeris (8:29) 4. Mortuus Terra (6:30)
Deriva live: Mar 21 Moby Dick Club Madrid, Spain Mar 26 Bloc Glasgow, UK Mar 27 Retro Manchester, UK Mar 28 Little Buildings Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK Mar 30 The Dev, Camden London, UK
Deriva are: Javier Muñoz (Muñi) – Guitar Rory Reagan – Drumms Javier Justo – Bass Daniel Garea (Minchi) – Guitar
Oh, alright, I guess we can talk again about how much Howling Giant outdid themselves with this past Fall’s Glass Future (review here). It’s been about 10 minutes. The Nashville-based outfit appear in the photo above in their recently-announced four-piece incarnation, making it official with James Sanderson on guitar and vocals, who has contributed to their records and songwriting before — as well as, apparently, DM’ing — but their new video for “Juggernaut” still features them as the trio of guitarist/vocalist Tom Polzine, drummer/vocalist Zach Wheeler and bassist/vocalist Sebastian Baltes, who it would appear is also in charge of the hot sauce.
And of course Howling Giant have hot sauce. They had coffee at one point too (review here), so it’s only fair game for a band who so obviously put hot sauce in their coffee in order to obtain their particular melodic consciousness, poppy in a get-off-your-ass kind of way, Glass Future retains substance even in its showy style, with hook after hook after hook and a momentum not at all undercut by the fact that they’re also dynamic and not just doing the same thing all the time. Really, give me two seconds to put the record on and we could take the whole afternoon to talk about it even before we get to the persona on display in the songs manifest in the video as an infomercial for, duh, the hot sauce.
Casting puts Wheeler and Polzine as the salesmen, and with performance footage interspliced, they send up outdated notions of advertising and maybe even a bit themselves. After all, they’re making a joke of selling the hot sauce on tv and joking about torturing Baltes as a captive chef to eventually make it from… his… life force?, but I bet if you put yourself in front of the merch table on the band’s upcoming tour with The Obsessed and Gozu — both also with new records out, the former the most recent of them — that hot sauce will be there waiting for you. Not sure they’ll push it quite as vigorously as they do in the video, but that’s probably fine too.
As for the track itself, it joins Glass Future‘s title-track and “Aluminum Crown,” the clips for which you can see below, and if Howling Giant wanted to bang out three or four more videos before they move on from the record to whatever’s next, I’ll gladly post those too. Few bands who can write songs at their level either do or put the work in afterward to let people know about it as well as Howling Giant — also on their side is the fact that they’re fun but not dicks about it — who also toured Europe this past Fall in the company of Philadelphian labelmates Heavy Temple and will no doubt be headed back that way before too long.
Video’s below, tour dates under that. You know the drill. PR wire and such:
Howling Giant, “Juggernaut” official video
HOWLING GIANT dish out a jar full of spicy news today. First helping is a hot sauce-filled video clip for the yummy track ‘Juggernaut’ taken from the band’s current album “Glass Future”, released in October 2023 through Magnetic Eye Records (order athttp://lnk.spkr.media/glass-future). Next on the menu is a tasty US tour in spring 2024 in support of THE OBSESSED, find all dates listed below!
HOWLING GIANT will embark on an extended US tour as direct support for THE OBSESSED in March and April this spring. The now quartet from Nashville, TN will hit the roads in support of their highly acclaimed current album “Glass Future”, which is also the official introductory round for new rhythm guitarist and backing vocalist James Sanderson.
HOWLING GIANT welcome their new member: “James started working with us while we were writing ‘Masamune’, helping break down lyrical barriers and working on song arrangements, and followers of our online shenanigans might recognize him as the Dungeon Master in our streamed D&D campaigns”, drummer and vocalist Zach Wheeler reveals. “We are stoked to welcome James officially into the Howling Giant fold, and can hardly wait to show off the four-piece fury that we’ll be bringing forth on our upcoming run with The Obsessed and Gozu. See you all on the road!”
HOWLING GIANT live US Spring 2024 + THE OBSESSED +GOZU 13 MAR 2024 Philadelphia, PA (US) Milk Boy 14 MAR 2024 Baltimore, MD (US) Metro Gallery 15 MAR 2024 Richmond, VA (US) Cobra Cabana 16 MAR 2024 Wilmington, NC (US) Reggie’s 42nd Street Tavern 17 MAR 2024 Asheville, NC (US) The Odd 19 MAR 2024 Atlanta, GA (US) Boggs Social & Supply 20 MAR 2024 New Orleans, LA (US) Siberia 22 MAR 2024 Fort Worth, TX (US) Tulips 23 MAR 2024 Austin, TX (US) The Lost Well 25 MAR 2024 Albuquerque, NM (US) Launchpad 26 MAR 2024 Mesa, AZ (US) The Nile Underground 27 MAR 2024 Los Angeles, CA (US) Resident 28 MAR 2024 Palmdale, CA (US) Transplants Brewing 29 MAR 2024 San Diego, CA (US) Brick By Brick 30 MAR 2024 Las Vegas, NV (US) The Usual Place 31 MAR 2024 Salt Lake City, UT (US) Aces High Saloon 01 APR 2024 Denver, CO (US) Hi-Dive 03 APR 2024 Chicago, IL (US) Reggies 04 APR 2024 Lakewood, OH (US) The Foundry 05 APR 2024 New Kensington, PA (US) Preserving Underground 06 APR 2024 Rochester, NY (US) Montage Music Hall 07 APR 2024 Brattleboro, VT (US) The Stone Church 09 APR 2024 Cambridge, MA (US) Sonia 10 APR 2024 Portland, ME (US) Geno’s Rock Club 11 APR 2024 Hamden, CT (US) Space Ballroom 12 APR 2024 Brooklyn, NY (US) The Meadows
Recording line-up Tom Polzine – guitar, vocals Zach Wheeler – drums, vocals Sebastian Baltes – bass, vocals
Guest musicians Drew David Harakal II – organ, piano, synths James Sanderson – additional vocals on ‘Siren Song’, ‘Hawk in a Hurricane’, and ‘There’s Time Now’
Current line-up Tom Polzine – guitar, vocals Zach Wheeler – drums, vocals Sebastian Baltes – bass, vocals James Sanderson – rhythm guitar, backing vocals
My general tendency when it comes to the original era of Black Sabbath, from their 1970 self-titled debut (discussed here) up through 1978’s Never Say Die!, is to break the total of eight LPs into three groups:
The first three albums are one group. They represent the transition from hard blues to heavy rock and the codifying of dark atmospheres from cult folk and psychedelia into something new and the foundation of Black Sabbath‘s sound. Black Sabbath, its same-year follow-up Paranoid (discussed here) and 1971’s Master of Reality (discussed here) all happened within about 17 months of each other, and the shock waves of their impact are still rippling out more than five decades later. They are superlative within heavy music. Arguably the founding principles thereof.
Vol. 4, its iconic and oft-imitated cover art with Keith McMillan‘s photo of Ozzy Osbourne conveying the excitement of the band on stage brought to the studio, is the start of the second group, which is comprised of it and the two records that followed, while the last two from the original lineup make up the third. Appropriately titled Black Sabbath Vol. 4, it the first LP that Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward would release at more than a year’s remove from the one before it, and the first record without the involvement of producer Rodger Bain. Patrick Meehan, who also managed the band until 1975, produced Vol. 4 with engineers Vic Coopersmith-Heaven and Colin Caldwell, and the band have said in their sundry autobiographies and elsewhere that they consider it self-produced, which is believable as well given that the 10-song/42-minute album began an expansion of styles and ideas that would continue through the end of Sabbath‘s initial run.
And that expansion feels natural coming to fruition in new sounds. Black Sabbath didn’t happen in a vacuum, and you could spend a lifetime exploring the heavy rock of what RidingEasy Records‘ Brown Acid compilation series calls ‘The Comedown Era,’ loosely from about 1968-1975. Some of Led Zeppelin‘s countryside pastoralism would show itself on Vol. 4 in “St. Vitus Dance” or perhaps under the thicker lumber of “Cornucopia,” and “Tomorrow’s Dream” has a radio-friendly melody in the guitar and vocals in a way that feels far removed from the bleak visions wrought the year before in “Children of the Grave,” though that song finds a spiritual successor in Vol. 4 closer “Under the Sun,” which on some North American pressing or other would gain a subtitle to become “Under the Sun/Every Day Comes and Goes.”
Various editions jumble the tracklisting as well, either putting the oh-so-relevant cocaine anthem “Snowblind” — which is to “Sweet Leaf” what “Under the Sun” is to “Children of the Grave,” an extrapolation along a similar path, this one of harder drug use — first instead of the eight-minute original-pressing opener and longest track (immediate points) “Wheels of Confusion,” which remains one of the original Black Sabbath‘s most dynamic compositions, with its flowing, drawn-sounding intro giving over to a more active nod, finding sunshine between the clouds in its still-melancholic lovelorn verses before turning to a jammy bridge and bursting out as it approaches the halfway point led by a crunching riff from Iommi and going back to the verse before another stark transition leads to another sometimes-subtitled solo section, “The Straightener,” atop which the shred is duly winding and for which Butler adds 12-string guitar. It allows itself to give the impression of a jumble, of confusion, without giving up its momentum, and lets “Tomorrow’s Dream” come through as more straightforward and almost optimistic in its shove and lyrical resolve.
Adventurous in its inclusion of Mellotron on the acoustic-led side B interlude “Laguna Sunrise” and the druggy tossoff experimentation guitar noise of “FX,” Vol. 4 finds its greatest charge in “Supernaut,” which heralds accomplishments to come across 1973’s Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and 1975’s Sabotage in songs like “Sabbra Cadabra” and “Hole in the Sky” and represents the emergent command Black Sabbath had over their songwriting and the way that particular version of riff-led mid-tempo heavy could be a foundation they’d return to again and again as the work around it grew more complex. “Supernaut,” with its punches of bass, percussion break and landmark riff, has a force behind its movement that in the next few years and the decades that have followed since would become an essential tenet of metal, and its electricity is all the more crackling after the empty spaces of “FX” and the shift out of “Changes” just before.
And of that famously, in-many-ways-rightly maligned ballad, I’ll note that I almost never skip tracks as a policy. You take the bad with the good. But when I put on Vol. 4, if I can reach the button I’ll bypass “Changes” every time. I’ll even listen to “FX” after rather than go right into “Supernaut,” but not “Changes” if I can help it. The lyrics take the plainspokenness that made “War Pigs” so devastating and attempt to turn saccharine cliché into some kind of emotionality ring hollow, and though Vol. 4remains one of heavy music’s most essential albums, its place on any such list or in any such canon is asterisked in my estimation with “Changes” marring side A. On a critical level, the arrangement of guitar, piano and Mellotron are another example of Black Sabbath reaching into new sonic elements — they’d mellowed before, certainly, but put “Changes” next to “Solitude” from Master of Reality and the shift in intention is clear — but I’ve never been able to take those first lines “I feel unhappy/I feel so sad” seriously, and it undoes the whole thing, pulls me right out of the groove of the album in a way that I very much don’t want to be after “Tomorrow’s Dream.” I listened through “Changes” twice ahead of writing this, and it was a genuine effort. You’re welcome.
Obviously, Black Sabbath would endure despite that perceived misstep — and “Changes” has its champions as well — and as noted, Vol. 4 is among the most revered heavy albums of all time. No argument. They were back on the road in the US shortly after finishing the recording and shared the stage with Humble Pie, Gentle Giant, Groundhogs, Black Oak Arkansas, Wishbone Ash and Blue Öyster Cult ahead of the release, and tour Australia and New Zealand early in 1973 and Europe and the UK that Spring. By the time it was two months old, Vol. 4 moved enough units to get a Gold Record, but the band would cancel their April 1973 US run, and it would be another full year and then some before the arrival of Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. People probably thought they were done.
By virtue of existing, Vol. 4 is an essential piece of the Black Sabbath catalog, but what makes it special even among Sabbath offerings is the evolution that was beginning to take hold in their approach, and if Master of Reality perfected the dark, heavy impulses shown through the first two albums before it, these songs are a forward step onto new ground and in no small way would define the course of Black Sabbath‘s next four releases.
As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.
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Quarterly Review this week was some labor. Wednesday, which was my busiest day (was posted yesterday), was particularly tough, not because of the music or anything, just the crush of other life aspects beyond the 10 records being written about that day. Nothing I’m sure that most humans wouldn’t be able to handle without feeling like their brain’s on fire, but yeah. Kid was pukey sick all last weekend — from Friday night on — through like Tuesday, and is still a little digestively wobbly. I’ve been trying to chase vomit smells to their source all week.
It’s about 10:30AM now. The QR was finished yesterday. This morning I was up at 4:15 and spent the next 45 minutes in and out of consciousness ahead of the alarm. At least I was ready to get up by the time I did. Plugged away on Vol. 4 till the kid got up, then did that routine, and after dropoff, The Patient Mrs. and I volunteered taking down the school book fair and whatnot. I’m awkward. That’s the moral of the story. Around normal people, I absolutely wilt. If I could physically shrink myself, I would. At one point, I said I was going to go sit in the car with the dog.
I don’t know what the weekend looks like. On the potential docket are driving to Connecticut tomorrow to see family — generally pleasant but not a minor or particularly relaxing day — and maybe going to the Nintendo store in NYC, as we’re currently wrapping up Tears of the Kingdom after putting in over 810 hours playing as a family with the three of us. It’s a big deal. I invited my mom to come watch us fight Ganon. I’ve got three pristine Gerudo Claymores ready to go. 130-plus Big Hearty Radishes! 600 Bomb Flowers! I’m dying to write about the game but probably won’t ever have time.
So maybe that’ll happen, maybe not. Sunday I’m interviewing the dudes from Apostle of Solitude about their 20th anniversary and it’s Author and Punisher in Brooklyn, which I said I want to see and do — not the least with Morne opening — but probably won’t because getting my ass into New York is pretty tough these days.
Whatever you’re up to, I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Have fun, watch your head, hydrate. I’m gonna go have an egg sandwich (thanks to The Patient Mrs.) and try to do some Duolingo before school’s out. Next week is full front to back. So’s the week after, actually. No substitute for keeping busy.
