You know, the thing about DesertFest Belgium 2014 is that, if you look at the poster, it’s like every logo on the damn thing should be huge. Colour Haze, Blues Pills, YOB, Toner Low, Brant Bjork, Conan, Pallbearer? Seriously, what, is everyone headlining? I know there are some bands on there who aren’t necessarily as huge as the likes of Electric Wizard, but thus far, the inaugural Belgian edition of the DesertFest has over 40 bands, and there isn’t a dud in the bunch. If you were putting on a show with half as many killer acts, I’d want to know about it.

Barring a fiscal miracle, I’ve got no hope of getting over to see this festival, but still it’s worth the daydream while I kick around in my jammies and dwell on the thought of seeing Colour Haze again, or Death Alley — who were awesome at Roadburn this year — or 1000mods, and on and on. Good times.

Here’s the latest from the fest and the stream of Death Alley‘s debut single (review here), in case you missed it:

MORE BANDS!

Less than a month to go and we’re not done just yet! Proud to welcome Colour Haze (GER), Death Alley (NL), Cowboys & Aliens (B), 1000mods (GR), Bloodnstuff (US) and BRUTUS (B)!
To find out what day each band is playing, take a look at our line up page!

There’s been a tiny change to our starting time on Friday;

Friday:
Doors – 6PM
1st band – 6:30PM

Saturday and Sunday:
Doors – 3PM
1st band – 3:30PM

Ticket sales are going faster and faster, don’t hesitate! Hotel tickets are completely sold out! If you’re coming from abroad, we suggest you have a look at Booking.com to find the best accommodations in Antwerp.

Don’t forget Belgians can head to FatKat (Antwerp) and GigaSwing (Hasselt) to pick up their hard ticket!

https://www.facebook.com/desertfestbelgium
http://www.desertfest.be/

Death Alley, Over Under/Dead Man’s Bones (2014)

One of the things I enjoy most about these Roadburn streams every year is that not only do they allow the people who were there to relive the awesome (and in many cases, fuzzy) memories of seeing these bands, but they allow everyone, whether they were there or not, to get a glimpse at some of what they didn’t get to see. Because you can try your damnedest to catch everything at Roadburn every year — I know I have on the years I’ve been fortunate enough to go — but it’s just not going to happen. At any point during the three days of the fest-proper, there are at least four stages running simultaneously, and there’s just no way to be everywhere at once. I saw Noothgrush at Roadburn 2014, but I missed Brutus, saw Samothrace and missed Windhand.

With the audio streams — diligently recorded at Roadburn 2014 by Marcel van de Vondervoort and his team, as ever — that doesn’t matter. It would be something if the fest set up a security system for the audio one of these years that you had to be there to hear it (actually it would suck, aside from being a logistical/coding nightmare), but fortunately that’s not the case, and whether you were at the 013 or in the Netherlands or not, you can enjoy the fruits of Roadburn‘s considerable labors. If it sounds utopian, it is.

To listen and enjoy:

Age of Taurus – Live at Roadburn 2014

Bong – Live at Roadburn 2014

Brutus – Live at Roadburn 2014

Noothgrush – Live at Roadburn 2014

Regarde Les Hommes Tomber – Live at Roadburn 2014

Samothrace – Live at Roadburn 2014

Whitehorse – Live at Roadburn 2014

Windhand – Live at Roadburn 2014

Thanks as always to Walter and the Roadburn crew for allowing me to host the streams. The first batch is still available as well, and for all of the Roadburn 2014 coverage, click here.

Norwegian classic heavy rockers Brutus released their second album, Behind the Mountains, earlier this year. They were the first band I found out about through The Obelisk Forum, so they’ll always hold a special place in my heart. All the better then that they’ve been added to the 2014 Roadburn festival. No telling at this point if I’ll get there to see them — I seem to be losing jobs faster than I can keep up with this week — but good for the Oslo five-piece either way. The 013 won’t know what hit it.

Roadburn put it thusly:

Brutus Added to Roadburn 2014 Lineup

Over the years, we have been mining Scandinavia for the best heavy 70?s inspired rock and invited the likes of Witchcraft, Abramis Brama, Graveyard, Dead Man, Horisont, Troubled Horse, Spiders, Blues Pills et al to previous festivals.

To keep in line with our tradition – not just because they are part Swedish, part Norwegian, but simply because they deliver the 70s in spades with a healthy dose of soulful hardrock, head down boogie and amped up blues luster – we’re excited to announce that Brutus will appear at Roadburn Festival 2014 on Thursday, April 10th at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Inspired by proto metal pioneers such as Dust, Budgie and Buffalo, with nods toward Sabbath and Grand Funk Railroad as well, Brutus know how to throw a good keg-party, as both their self-titled debut album and the recently released Behind The Mountains reek of a good time; these albums could easily be the alternate soundtrack to Dazed and Confused – muscle cars, pick up trucks, high school chicks in flares, denim, beer, sweat, smoking those doobies and anything else you’d imagine to happen when school’s out for summer.

Simply put: no frills, good time hard rock, played from the heart, the gut and the crotch!

Roadburn Festival 2014 will run for four days from Thursday, April 10th to Sunday, April 13th, 2014 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Brutus, “Personal Riot” official video

There’s little I find more inspiring than someone putting in the time and effort to coordinate and execute a festival. It’s something I’ve thought of doing more times than I can count but have yet to be able to muster the backing or the location to get it done, so when I see the news below about the upcoming Høstsabbat in Norway, it makes me want to take to the north even more than I usually do. Which is plenty, I guess.

Norway’s heavy rock scene is widely varied and from the roster of acts playing the upcoming Høstsabbat in Oslo on Sept. 13 and 14, it seems the intent is to capture a bit of that variety in a weekend and present it to the masses. An admirable goal no matter how you look at it.

Best wishes. I hope they pull it off without a hitch. The PR wire has lineups and links:

HØSTSABBAT – NEW NORWEGIAN FESTIVAL

HØSTSABBAT is a newborn initiative, brought to life by people involved in the underground scene in Norway.

It’s a DIY-festival, in collaboration with the student-organisation at Betong in Oslo, focusing on presenting the best underground bands Norway has to offer.

Over two days you can experience slow doom, heavy bluesrock, proto-heavy metal, psychedelic spacerock and prog. The concerts will be held on two different stages, located in the same venue.
In addition to this, you’ll find stands, food, beverages and diverse stimulation for your ears and mind. Dj’s from the norwegian scene will accompany your days with the right soundtrack.

HØSTSABBAT takes place on friday 13th, and saturday 14th of September.

Cheap accomodations are located nearby the venue, and the damage for a two-day ticket is about 50 euros.

Complete lineup HØSTSABBAT 2013:

Friday 13th:
Lonely Kamel
Devil
Tusmørke
High Priest of Saturn
Spectral Haze
Hymn

Saturday 14th:
Lamented Souls
Brutus
Tombstones
Resonaut
Dunbarrow
Purple Hill Witch
The Devil and the Almighty Blues

Facebookpage:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Høstsabbat/493336370734335

Facebookevent:
https://www.facebook.com/events/118739448332674/

Link for tickets:
http://www.billettservice.no/event/hostsabbat-2013-billetter/396189

Brutus, “Personal Riot” official video from Behind the Mountains (2013)

In my seemingly-unending quest to purchase things with Electric Wizard logos on them, I recently fired up the intertubes and made my way to the venerable All That is Heavy webstore to pick up a Black Masses t-shirt. While I was there, shopping cart open, I figured I’d grab a couple other goodies as well, which was probably the right move (it always is), since the shirt didn’t fit anyway. Depressingly, that’s probably not the shirt’s fault.

Anyway, here’s the rest of what I got in the order, alphabetically:

Brutus, Brutus
Floodstain, Slave to the Self-Feeding Machine
Saint Vitus, Hallow’s Victim/The Walking Dead
Stoned Jesus, First Communion
Vibravoid, Burg Herzberg Festival 2010
Wo Fat, The Gathering Dark

There’s a couple clunkers in there. Although its title serves as an appropriate summation of how I felt about myself after the Electric Wizard shirt didn’t fit, the Floodstain album was a more metal than I was looking for in that lunk-headed moshing kind of way. Stoned Jesus sounded so much like Sleep they should be paying them royalties, but they have a song called “Red Wine,” they’re from the Ukraine and — for crying out loud — they’re called STONED JESUS! Charm goes a long way in my book.

Brutus were the first new band I found out about on the forums, and though I’ll probably always think of them first for that, their self-titled album on Transubstans also rules. “Swedish Lady,” dude. Wo Fat I got while the getting was good, and I had the bootleg CD of Hallow’s Victim/The Walking Dead, but couldn’t resist SST‘s recently-issued official version. It’s Saint Vitus. Sometimes it’s okay to have doubles.

Occasionally Vibravoid‘s studio work — though I like it — tends to meander more than it means to and get lost in itself (and thus get lost on me), so I grabbed their Burg Herzberg Festival 2010 at import price thinking it might be a little more grounded, and it was. The decade-spanning German psychedelic acid rockers/clothing outfitters open with a cover of The Beatles‘ “Tomorrow Never Knows” and work in some Strawberry Alarm Clock as well, so even though it cost me more than the t-shirt, I still feel like I came out on top.

Some you win, some you lose, but overall not a bad get. Money’s been tight lately, so this and the arrival of another long-awaited package (next BT post) should do much to hold my buying impulse in check for the time being. Okay, probably not, but that’s what I’ll tell myself while I debate bidding on Clutch promos on eBay.

Yeah, I’d call the new Obelisk Forums a win for the number of people signed up, posts posted and awesome pictures of birds making pasta, but more so, because (thanks to user diasdegalvan) I’ve found a new band to dig on. They’re called Brutus and they’re Norwegian. I thought I’d share the clip below in case anyone else didn’t catch it in General Discussion or hasn’t signed up for the forums yet.