Guess this is it, huh? Always bittersweet, the end of a Quarterly Review. Bitter, because there’s still a ton of albums waiting on my desktop to be reviewed, and certainly more that have come along over the course of the last two weeks looking for coverage. Sweet because when I finish here I’ll have written about 100 albums, added a bunch of stuff to my year-end lists, and managed to keep the remaining vestiges of my sanity. If you’ve kept up, I hope you’ve enjoyed doing so. And if you haven’t, all 10 of the posts are here.

Thanks for reading.

Quarterly Review #91-100:

Hazemaze, Blinded by the Wicked

This is one of 2022’s best records cast in dark-riffed, heavy garage-style doom rock. I admit I’m late to the party for Hazemaze‘s third album and Heavy Psych Sounds label debut, Blinded by the Wicked, but what a party it is. The Swedish three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Ludvig Andersson, bassist Estefan Carrillo and drummer Nils Eineus position themselves as a lumbering forerunner of modern cultist heavy, presenting the post-“In-a-Gadda-da-Vida” lumber of “In the Night of the Light, for the Dark” and “Ethereal Disillusion” (bassline in the latter) with a clarity of purpose and sureness that builds even on what the trio accomplished with 2019’s Hymns for the Damned (review here), opening with the longest track (immediate points) “Malevolent Inveigler” and setting up a devil-as-metaphor-for-now lyrical bent alongside the roll of “In the Night of the Light, for the Dark” and the chugging-through-mud “Devil’s Spawn.” Separated by the “Planet Caravan”-y instrumental “Sectatores et Principes,” the final three tracks are relatively shorter than the first four, but there’s still space for a bass-backed organ solo in “Ceremonial Aspersion,” and the particularly Electric Wizardian “Divine Harlotry” leads effectively into the closer “Lucifierian Rite,” which caps with surprising bounce in its apex and underscores the level of songwriting throughout. Just a band nailing their sound, that’s all. Seems like maybe the kind of party you’d want to be on time for.

Hazemaze on Facebook

Heavy Psych Sounds store

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Elephant Tree, Track by Track

Released as a name-your-price benefit EP in July to help raise funds for the Ukrainian war effort, Track by Track is two songs London’s Elephant Tree recorded at the Netherlands’ Sonic Whip Festival in May of this year, “Sails” and “The Fall Chorus” — here just “Fall Chorus” — from 2020’s Habits (review here), on which the four-piece is joined by cellist Joe Butler and violinst Charlie Davis, fleshing out especially the quieter “Fall Chorus,” but definitely making their presence felt on “Sails” as well in accompanying what was one of Habits‘ strongest hooks. And the strings are all well and good, but the live harmonies on “Sails” between guitarist Jack Townley, bassist Peter Holland and guitarist/keyboardist John Slattery — arriving atop the e’er-reliable fluidity of Sam Hart‘s drumming — are perhaps even more of a highlight. Was the whole set recorded? If so, where’s that? “Fall Chorus” is more subdued and atmospheric, but likewise gorgeous, the cello and violin lending an almost Americana feel to the now-lush second-half bridge of the acoustic track. Special band, moment worth capturing, cause worth supporting. The classic no-brainer purchase.

Elephant Tree on Facebook

Elephant Tree on Bandcamp

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Mirror Queen, Inviolate

Between Telekinetic Yeti, Mythic Sunship and Limousine Beach (not to mention Comet Control last year), Tee Pee Records has continued to offer distinct and righteous incarnations of heavy rock, and Mirror Queen‘s classic-prog-influenced strutter riffs on Inviolate fit right in. The long-running project led by guitarist/vocalist Kenny Kreisor (also the head of Tee Pee) and drummer Jeremy O’Brien is bolstered through the lead guitar work of Morgan McDaniel (ex-The Golden Grass) and the smooth low end of bassist James Corallo, and five years after 2017’s Verdigris (review here), their flowing heavy progressive rock nudges into the occult on “The Devil Seeks Control” while maintaining its ’70s-rock-meets-’80s-metal gallop, and hard-boogies in the duly shredded “A Rider on the Rain,” where experiments both in vocal effects and Mellotron sounds work well next to proto-thrash urgency. Proggers like “Inside an Icy Light,” “Sea of Tranquility” and the penultimate “Coming Round with Second Sight” show the band in top form, comfortable in tempo but still exploring, and they finish with the title-track’s highlight chorus and a well-layered, deceptively immersive wash of melody. Can’t and wouldn’t ask for more than they give here; Inviolate is a tour de force for Mirror Queen, demonstrating plainly what NYC club shows have known since the days when Aytobach Kreisor roamed the earth two decades ago.

Mirror Queen on Facebook

Tee Pee Records store

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Faetooth, Remnants of the Vessel

Los Angeles-based four-piece Faetooth — guitarist/vocalist Ashla Chavez Razzano, bassist/vocalist Jenna Garcia, guitarist/vocalist Ari May, drummer Rah Kanan — make their full-length debut through Dune Altar with the atmospheric sludge doom of Remnants of the Vessel, meeting post-apocalyptic vibes as intro “(i) Naissance” leads into initial single “Echolalia,” the more spaced-out “La Sorcie|Cre” (or something like that; I think my filename got messed up) and the yet-harsher doom of “She Cast a Shadow” before the feedback-soaked interlude “(ii) Limbo” unfurls its tortured course. Blending clean croons and more biting screams assures a lack of predictability as they roll through “Remains,” the black metal-style cave echo there adding to the extremity in a way that the subsequent “Discarnate” pushes even further ahead of the nodding, you’re-still-doomed heavy-gaze of “Strange Ways.” They save the epic for last, however, with “(iii) Moribund” a minute-long organ piece leading directly into “Saturn Devouring His Son,” a nine-and-a-half-minute willful lurch toward an apex that has the majesty of death-doom and a crux of melody that doesn’t just shout out Faetooth‘s forward potential but also points to what they’ve already accomplished on Remnants of the Vessel. If this band tours, look out.

Faetooth on Facebook

Dune Altar on Bandcamp

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Behold! The Monolith, From the Fathomless Deep

Ferocious and weighted in kind, Behold! The Monolith‘s fourth full-length and first for Ripple Music, From the Fathomless Deep finds the Los Angeles trio taking cues from progressive death metal and riff-based sludge in with a modern severity of purpose that is unmistakably heavy. Bookended by opener “Crown/The Immeasurable Void” (9:31) and closer “Stormbreaker Suite” (11:35), the six-track/45-minute offering — the band’s first since 2015’s Architects of the Void (review here) — brims with extremity and is no less intense in the crawling “Psychlopean Dread” than on the subsequent ripper “Spirit Taker” or its deathsludge-rocking companion “This Wailing Blade,” calling to mind some of what Yatra have been pushing on the opposite coast until the solo hits. The trades between onslaughts and acoustic parts are there but neither overdone nor overly telegraphed, and “The Seams of Pangea” (8:56) pairs evocative ambience with crushing volume and comes out sounding neither hackneyed nor overly poised. Extreme times call for extreme riffs? Maybe, but the bludgeoning on offer in From the Fathomless Deep speaks to a push into darkness that’s been going on over a longer term. Consuming.

Behold! The Monolith on Facebook

Ripple Music website

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The Swell Fellas, Novaturia

The second album from Nashville’s The Swell Fellas — who I’m sure are great guys — the five-song/32-minute Novaturia encapsulates an otherworldly atmosphere laced with patient effects soundscapes, echo and moody presence, but is undeniably heavy, the opener “Something’s There…” drawing the listener deeper into “High Lightsolate,” the eight-plus minutes of which roll out with technical intricacy bent toward an outward impression of depth, a solo in the midsection carrying enough scorch for the LP as a whole but still just part of the song’s greater procession, which ends with percussive nuance and vocal melody before giving way to the acoustic interlude “Caesura,” a direct lead-in for the noisy arrival of the okay-now-we-riff “Wet Cement.” The single-ready penultimate cut is a purposeful banger, going big at its finish only after topping its immediate rhythmic momentum with ethereal vocals for a progressive effect, and as elliptically-bookending finisher “…Another Realm” nears 11 minutes, its course is its own in manifesting prior shadows of progressive and atmospheric heavy rock into concrete, crafted realizations. There’s even some more shred for good measure, brought to bear with due spaciousness through Mikey Allred‘s production. It’s a quick offering, but offers substance and reach beyond its actual runtime. They’re onto something, and I think they know it, too.

The Swell Fellas on Facebook

The Swell Fellas on Bandcamp

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Stockhausen & the Amplified Riot, Era of the Inauthentic

For years, it has seemed Houston-based guitarist/songwriter Paul Chavez (Funeral Horse, Cactus Flowers, Baby Birds, Art Institute) has searched for a project able to contain his weirdo impulses. Stockhausen & the Amplified Riot — begun with Era of the Inauthentic as a solo-project plus — is the latest incarnation of this effort, and its krautrock-meets-hooky-proto-punk vibe indeed wants nothing for weird. “Adolescent Lightning” and “Hunky Punk” are a catchy opening salvo, and “What if it Never Ends” provokes a smile by garage-rock riffing over a ’90s dance beat to a howling finish, while the 11-minute “Tilde Mae” turns early-aughts indie jangle into a maddeningly repetitive mindfuck for its first nine minutes, mercifully shifting into a less stomach-clenching groove for the remainder before closer “Intubation Blues” melds more dance beats with harmonica and last sweep. Will the band, such as it is, at last be a home for Chavez over the longer term, or is it merely another stop on the way? I don’t know. But there’s no one else doing what he does here, and since the goal seems to be individualism and experimentalism, both those ideals are upheld to an oddly charming degree. Approach without expectations.

Artificial Head Records on Facebook

Artificial Head Records on Bandcamp

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Nothing is Real, The End is Near

Nothing is Real stand ready to turn mundane miseries into darkly ethereal noise, drawing from sludge and an indefinable litany of extreme metals. The End is Near is both the Los Angeles unit’s most cohesive work to-date and its most accomplished, building on the ambient mire of earlier offerings with a down-into-the-ground churn on lead single “THE (Pt. 2).” All of the songs, incidentally, comprise the title of the album, with four of “THE” followed by two “END” pieces, two “IS”es and three “NEAR”s to close. An maybe-unhealthy dose of sample-laced interlude-type works — each section has an intro, and so on — assure that Nothing is Real‘s penchant for atmospheric crush isn’t misplaced, and the band’s uptick in production value means that the vastness and blackened psychedelia of 10-minute centerpiece “END” shows the abyssal depths being plunged in their starkest light. Capping with “NEAR (Pt. 1),” jazzy metal into freneticism, back to jazzy metal, and “NEAR (Pt. 2),” epic shred emerging from hypnotic ambience, like Jeff Hanneman ripping open YOB, The End is Near resonates with a sickened intensity that, again, it shares in common with the band’s past work, but is operating at a new level of complexity across its intentionally unmanageable 63 minutes. Nothing is Real is on their own wavelength and it is a place of horror.

Nothing is Real on Facebook

Nothing is Real on Bandcamp

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Red Lama, Memory Terrain

Copenhagen heavy psych collective Red Lama — and I’m sorry, but if you’ve got more than five people in your band, you’re a collective — brim with pastoral escapism throughout Memory Terrain, their third album and the follow-up to 2018’s Motions (discussed here) and its companion EP, Dogma (review here). Progressive in texture but with an open sensibility at their core, pieces like the title-track unfold long-song breadth in accessible spans, the earlier “Airborne” moving from the jazzy beginning of “Gentleman” into a more tripped-out All Them Witches vein. Elsewhere, “Someone” explores krautrock intricacies before synthing toward its last lines, and “Paint a Picture” exudes pop urgency before washing it away on a repeating, sweeping tide. Range and dynamic aren’t new for Red Lama, but I’m hard-pressed to think of as dramatic a one-two turn as the psych-wash-into-electro-informed-dance-brood that takes place between “Shaking My Bones” and “Chaos is the Plan” — lest one neglect the urbane shuffle of “Justified” prior — though by that point Red Lama have made it apparent they’re ready to lead the listener wherever whims may dictate. That’s a significant amount of ground to cover, but they do it.

Red Lama on Facebook

Red Lama on Bandcamp

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Echolot, Curatio

Existing in multiple avenues of progressive heavy rock and extreme metal, Echolot‘s Curatio only has four tracks, but each of those tracks has more range than the career arcs of most bands. Beginning with two 10-minute tracks in “Burden of Sorrows” (video premiered here) and “Countess of Ice,” they set a pattern of moving between melancholic heavy prog and black metal, the latter piece clearer in telegraphing its intentions after the opener, and introducing its “heavy part” to come with clean vocals overtop in the middle of the song, dramatic and fiery as it is. “Resilience of Floating Forms” (a mere 8:55) begins quiet and works into a post-black metal wash of melody before the double-kick and screams take hold, announcing a coming attack that — wait for it — doesn’t actually come, the band instead moving into falsetto and a more weighted but still clean verse before peeling back the curtain on the death growls and throatrippers, cymbals threatening to engulf all but still letting everything else cut through. Also eight minutes, “Wildfire” closes by flipping the structure of the opening salvo, putting the nastiness at the fore while progging out later, in this case closing Curatio with a winding movement of keys and an overarching groove that is only punishing for the fact that it’s the end. If you ever read a Quarterly Review around here, you know I like to do myself favors on the last day in choosing what to cover. It is no coincidence that Curatio is included. Not every record could be #100 and still make you excited to hear it.

Echolot on Facebook

Sixteentimes Music store

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I’m in it. The only reason I even know what day it is is because I keep notes and I set up the back end of these posts ahead of time. They tell me what number I’m on. As for the rest, it’s blinders and music, all all all. Go. Go. Go. I honestly don’t even know why I still write these intro paragraphs. I just do. You know the deal, right? 10 records yesterday, 10 today, 10 more tomorrow. At some point it ends. At some point it begins again. Presumably before then I’ll figure out what day it is.

Quarterly Review #71-80:

James Romig & Mike Scheidt, The Complexity of Distance

James Romig is a Pulitzer-finalist composer, and Mike Scheidt is the founding guitarist/vocalist of YOB. I refuse to cut-and-paste-pretend at understanding all the theory put into the purported ’13:14:15′ ratio of beat cycles throughout The Complexity of Distance — or, say, just about any of it — but the resulting piece is about 57 minutes of Scheidt‘s guitar work, as recorded by Billy Barnett (YOB‘s regular producer). It is presented as a single track, and with the (obviously intentional) chord progressions in Romig‘s piece, “The Complexity of Distance” is a huge drone. If you ever wanted to hear Scheidt do earlier-style Earth guitar work — yes, duh — then this might satisfy that curiosity. There’s high-culture intersecting with low here in a way that takes Scheidt out of it creatively — that is to say, Romig did the composing — but I won’t take away from the work in concept or performance, or even the result. Hell, I’ll listen to Mike Scheidt riff around for 57 minutes. It’ll be the best 57 minutes of my god damned day. Perhaps that’s not universal, but I don’t think Romig‘s looking for radio hits. Whether you approach it on that theory level or as a sonic meditation, the depths welcome you. I’d take another Scheidt solo record someday too, though. Just saying.

James Romig website

Mike Scheidt on Facebook

New World Records store

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Mythic Sunship, Light/Flux

Copenhagen’s Mythic Sunship turned Light/Flux around so quick after 2021’s Wildfire (review here) they didn’t even have time to take a new promo photo. There is no question the Danish five-piece have been on a tear for a few years now, and their ascent into the psych-jazz fusion ether continues with Light/Flux, marrying its gotta-happen-right-this-second urgency to a patience in the actual unfolding of songs like the sax’ed out “Aurora” and the more guitar-led “Blood Moon” at the outset — light — with the cosmic triumphalist horn and crashes of “Decomposition” leading off side B and moving into the hey-where’d-you-come-from boogie of “Tempest,” presumably flux. Each half of the record ends with a standout, as “Equinox” follows “Blood Moon” with a more space rock-feeling takeoff pulse, right up to the synth sweep that starts at about 2:50, and “First Frost” gives high and low float gracefully over steady toms like different dreams happening at the same time and then merging in purpose as the not-overblown crescendo locks in. May their momentum carry them ever forward if they’re going to produce at this level.

Mythic Sunship on Facebook

Tee Pee Records store

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Deville, Heavy Lies the Crown

What a fascinating direction the progression of Sweden’s Deville has taken these 15 years after Come Heavy Sleep. Heavy Lies the Crown finds the Swedish journeymen aligned to Sixteentimes Music for the follow-up to 2018’s Pigs With Gods (review here), and is through its eight tracks in a dense-toned, impact-minded 33 minutes with nary a second to spare in cuts like “Killing Time” and “Unlike You” and “A Devil Around Your Neck.” Their push and aggressive edge reminds of turn-of-the-century Swedish heavy rockers like Mustasch or Mother Misery, and even in “Hands Tied” and “Serpent Days” — the two longest cuts on Heavy Lies the Crown, appearing in succession on side A — they maintain an energy level fostered by propulsive drums and a rampant drive toward immediacy rather than flourish, but neither does the material feel rushed or unconsidered right up to the final surprising bit of spaciousness in “Pray for More,” which loosens up the throttle a bit while still holding onto an underlying chug, some last progressive angularity perhaps to hint at another stage to come. One way or the other, in craft and delivery, Deville remain reliable without necessarily being predictable, which is a rare balance to strike, particularly for a band who’ve never made the same record twice.

Deville on Facebook

Sixteentimes Music store

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Superdeluxe, Superdeluxe

Guitarist/vocalist Bill Jenkins and bassist Matthew Kahn hail from Kingsnake (begat by Sugar Daddie in days of yore), drummer Michael Scarpone played in Wizard Eye, and guitarist Christopher Wojcik made a splash a few years back in King Bison, so yes, dudes have been around. Accordingly, Superdeluxe know off the bat where their grooves are headed on this five-song self-titled EP, with centerpiece “Earth” nodding toward a somewhat inevitable Clutch influence — thinking “Red Horse Rainbow” specifically — and seeming to acknowledge lyrically this as the project’s beginning point in “Popular Mechanix,” driving somewhat in the vein of Freedom Hawk but comfortably paced as “Destructo Facto” and “Severed Hand” are at the outset of the 19-minute run. “Ride” finishes out with a lead line coursing over its central figure before a stop brings the chorus, swing and swagger and a classic take on that riff — Sabbath‘s “Hole in the Sky,” Goatsnake‘s “Trower”; everybody deserves a crack at it at least once — familiar and weighted, but raw enough in the production to still essentially be a demo. Nonetheless, veteran players, new venture, fun to be had and hopefully more to come.

Superdeluxe on Instagram

Superdeluxe website

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Esel, Asinus

Based in Berlin and featuring bassist Cozza, formerly of Melbourne, Australia’s Riff Fist, alongside guitarist Moseph and drummer 666tin, Esel are an instrumentalist three-piece making their full-length debut with the live-recorded and self-produced Asinus. An eight-tracker spanning 38 minutes, it’s rough around the edges in terms of sound, but that only seems to suit the fuzz in both the guitar and bass, adding a current of noise alongside the low end being pushed through both as well as the thud of 666tin‘s toms and kick. They play fast, they play slow, they roll the wheel rather than reinvent it, but there’s charm here amid the doomier “Donkey Business” — they’ve got a lot of ‘ass’ stuff going on, including the opener “Ass” and the fact that their moniker translates from German as “donkey” — and the sprawling into maddening crashes “A Biss” later on, which precedes the minute-long finale “The Esel Way Out.” Want to guess what it is? Did you guess noise and feedback? If you did, your prize is to go back to the start and hear the crow-call letters of the band’s name and the initial slow nod of “Ass” all over again. I’m going to do my best not to make a pun about getting into it, but, well, I’ve already failed.

Esel on Facebook

Esel on Bandcamp

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Blue Tree Monitor, Cryptids

With riffs to spare and spacious vibes besides, London instrumentalists Blue Tree Monitor offer Cryptids, working in a vein that feels specifically born out of their hometown’s current sphere of heavy. Across the sprawl of “Siberian Sand” at the beginning of the five-song/38-minute debut album, one can hear shades of some of the Desertscene-style riffing for which Steak has been an ambassador, and certainly there’s no shortage of psych and noise around to draw from either, as the cacophonous finish manifests. But big is the idea as much as broad, and sample-topped centerpiece “Sasquatch” (also the longest cut at 8:41) is a fine example of how to do both, complete with fuzzy largesse and a succession of duly plodding-through-the-woods riffs. “Antlion” feels laid back in the guitar but contrasts with the drums, and the closer “Seven” is more straight-ahead heavy rock riffing until its second half gets a little more into noise rock before its final hits, so maybe the book isn’t entirely closed on where they’ll go sound-wise, but so much the better for listening to something with multifaceted potential in the present. To put it another way, they sound like a new band feeling their way forward through their songs, and that’s precisely what one would hope for as they move forward from here.

Blue Tree Monitor on Facebook

Blue Tree Monitor on Bandcamp

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Astrometer, Incubation

Vigilant in conveying the Brooklynite unit’s progressive intentions, from the synthy-sounding freakout at the end of “Wavelength Synchronizer” to the angular beginning of “Conglobulations,” Incubation is the first two-songer offering from Astrometer, who boast in their ranks members of Hull, Meek is Murder and Bangladeafy. The marriage of sometimes manically tense riffing and a more open keyboard line overhead works well on the latter track, but one would at no point accuse Astrometer of not getting their point across, and with ready-for-a-7″ efficiency, since the whole thing takes just about seven and a half minutes out of your busy day. I’m fairly sure they’ve had some lineup jumbling since this was recorded — there may be up to three former members of Hull there now, and that’s a hoot also audible in the guitars — but notice is served in any case, and the way the ascending frenetic chug of the guitar gives way to the keyboard solo in “Wavelength Synchronizer” is almost enough on its own to let you know that there’s a plan at work. See also the melodic, almost post-rock-ish floating notes above the fray at the start of “Conglobulations.” I bought the download. I’d buy a tape. You guys got tapes? Shirts?

Astrometer on Facebook

Astrometer on Bandcamp

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Oldest Sea, Strange and Eternal

Somewhere between a solo-project and an actual band is Oldest Sea. Led by songwriter, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and recording engineer Sam Marandola — joined throughout the four tracks of debut EP Strange and Eternal by lead guitarist/drummer Andrew Marandola and on 10-minute closer “The Whales” by bassist Jay Mazzillo — the endeavor is atmospherically weighted and given a death-doom-ish severity through the echoing snare on “Consecration,” only after opener “Final Girl” swells in distortion and melody alike until receding for string-style ambience, which might be keyboard, might be guitar, might be cello, I don’t know. Marandola also performs as a solo folk artist and one can hear that in her approach to the penultimate “I’ll Take What’s Mine,” but in the focus on atmosphere here, as well as the patience of craft across differing methodologies in what’s still essentially an initial release — if nothing before it proves the argument, certainly “The Whales” does — one hears shades of the power SubRosa once wielded in bringing together mournful melody and doomed tradition to suit purposes drawing from American folk and post-metallic weight. At 25 minutes, I’m tempted to call it an album for its sheer substance. Instead I’ll hang back and just wait and get my hopes up for when that moment actually comes.

Oldest Sea on Facebook

Oldest Sea on Bandcamp

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Weddings, Book of Spells

Based in Austria with roots in Canada, Spain and Sweden, Weddings are vocalist/guitarist Jay Brown, vocalist/drummer Elena Rodriguez and bassist Phil Nordling, and whether it’s the grunge turnaround on second cut “Hunter” or the later threatening-to-be-goth-rock of “Running Away” — paired well with “Talk is Cheap” — the trio are defined in no small part by the duet-style singing of Brown and Rodriguez. The truly fortunate part of listening to their sophomore LP, Book of Spells, is that they can also write a song. Opener “Hexenhaus” signals a willful depth of atmosphere that comes through on “Sleep” and the acoustic-led gorgeousness of “Tundra,” and so on, but they’re not shy about a hook either, as in “Greek Fire,” “Hunter,” “Running Away” and closer “Into the Night” demonstrate. Mood and texture are huge throughout Book of Spells, but the effect of the whole is duly entrancing, and the prevailing sense from their individual parts is that either Brown or Rodriguez could probably front the band on their own, but Weddings are a more powerful and entrancing listen for the work they do together throughout. Take a deep breath before you jump in here.

Weddings on Facebook

StoneFree Records store

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The Heavy Crawls, Searching for the Sun

A classic rock spirit persists across the nine songs of The Heavy Crawls‘ sophomore full-length, Searching for the Sun, as the Kyiv-based trio of guitarist/vocalist/keyboardist Max Tovstyi, bassist/backing vocalist Serj Manernyi and drummer/backing vocalist Tobi Samuel offer nods to the likes of the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix, among others, with a healthy dose of their own fuzz to coincide. The organ-laced title-track sounds like it was recorded on a stage, if it wasn’t, and no matter where the trio end up — looking at you, Sabbath-riffed “Stoner Song” — the material is tied together through the unflinchingly organic nature of their presentation. They’re not hiding anything here. No tricks. No BS. They’re writing their own songs, to be sure, but whether it’s the funky “I Don’t Know” or the languid psych rollout of “Take Me Higher” (it picks up in the second half) that immediately follows, they put everything they’ve got right up front for the listener to take in, make of it what they will, and rock out accordingly, be it to the mellow “Out of My Head” or the stomping “Evil Side (Of Rock ‘n’ Roll) or the sweet, sweet guitar-solo-plus-organ culmination of “1,000 Problems.” Take your pick, really. You’re in good hands no matter what.

The Heavy Crawls on Facebook

Clostridium Records store

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Now allies with the likes of Old Horn Tooth and Jointhugger, Copenhagen trio Dirt Forge join the ranks of Majestic Mountain Records with intentions pointed toward largesse of riff, sludge aggression and an overall will to crush in atmosphere and tone alike. Their label debut, Interspheral, will be their second full-length overall behind 2017’s Soothsayer (streaming at the bottom of this post), and it is comprised of a still-digestible seven songs and 43 minutes that work their way between outright onslaught and ambient tension. I would tell you it’s not for the faint of heart, but fuck gatekeeping. Sometimes everybody needs a song to punch them in the face, and Dirt Forge stand ready to oblige, whether that’s the emergent gallop in “Highest Low” or the later brooding moments of the near-12-minute “Miscommunison” and the double-kick-laced Monolordian lurch that pays it off.

Those songs and the rest of Interspheral are held back for now ahead of the Nov. 11 CD/K7/DL release (vinyl later), but third track “Ascension” has a video by Chariot of the Black Moth premiering below and acquits the band well in tone and movement into and through bouts of intensity, and it’s the most rousing shove of the bunch, so if you’re looking for something to motivate, its loosely post-metallic atmosphere and gutturalism should do the trick just fine.

Off you go:

Dirt Forge, “Ascension” video premiere

Majestic Mountain Records are pleased to announce the signing of Copenhagen’s brutal, hardcore sludge merchants, Dirt Forge!

Please give this spectacular riff machine a warm welcome to the Majestic Crew!

Today we get to also experience the premiere of the first single ‘Ascension’ and the corresponding video from their upcoming album ‘Interspheral.’

‘Interspheral’ will be released digitally, and on CD and cassette on the 11th of November. Vinyl to follow soon and information on that will be forthcoming!

The band tells us that the track “Ascension” deals with thoughts surrounding the eternal void that awaits after we die, as well as the stress and anxiety that follows these ponderings.

The video is made by Chariot Of Black Moth whose style and approach was perfect to communicate the themes of dread and despair in the track.

Dirt Forge shared that “Making this deal with Majestic Mountain Records is everything we ever hoped for with this record. Ever since we got to know the label we have been blown away by the amount of quality around everything they do from the music they put out to the packages produced, making it a tremendous honour to work with MMR. Our upcoming record, “Interspheral”, has been a long way coming, and we can’t wait for all of you to get to hear it!”

Majestic is thrilled to welcome Dirt Forge into the fold and we are extremely proud of the incredible release they have produced which we will, of course, receive the full Majestic treatment.

Dirt Forge have hammered out a monster of an album with ‘Interspehral,’ and throughout each of the seven tracks, their sludgy crucible boils over with molten aggression flowing pyroclastically from a gorgeously chaotic and heaving mass of hardcore, post-metallic heart.

Relentlessly bludgeoning waves of torrential tone and chugging, rhythmic pressure ebb and flow effortlessly between righteously thrilling riffing and abyssally cavernous walls of mercilessly crushing atmosphere in both scale and mood but also in the textural sense, exceptionally positioned between bestially brutal bashing teetering on the edge of utter collapse and near-constant, deeply discordant vocal animosity.

This is THE heavy, folks.

Dirt Forge is:
Yannick Kristensen – Bass, Vocals (backing)
Nicolai Lomholt – Drums
Alexander Kolby – Guitars, vocals

http://www.dirtforge.net/
https://www.facebook.com/dirtforgeband
https://twitter.com/dirtforgeband
https://www.instagram.com/dirtforge/

https://majesticmountainrecords.bigcartel.com
https://facebook.com/majesticmountainrecords/
https://instagram.com/majesticmountainrecords/

Dirt Forge, Soothsayer (2017)

In a convenient bit of timing, in between starting the back end for this post and sitting down to actually write this part of it, the promo for Mythic Sunship‘s new album, Light/Flux, came down the PR wire. Listening to it for the first time as I set fingers to keyboard, its psych-jazz reinventions and varied purposes in heavy psychedelic exploration feel in line with and expanded outward from where the Danish outfit were on last year’s aptly-named Wildfire (review here).

Their sound is growing more unmistakable even as it becomes more encompassing, and in the brooding guitar-forward jam of “Blood Moon,” the tense, wobbly-sax-go of “Tempest” and the serenity-until-it’s-a-freakout of the 10-minute “Decomposition,” Mythic Sunship continue to execute with a sense of class that is entirely their own and balances well against the organic feel of their tones and groove. It’s a record you can get into, and I know that because I’ve just lost 20 minutes sitting here, staring at this screen while listening.

More to come? Shit, I hope so. Light/Flux releases on Sept. 30 through Tee Pee Records, and you can stream the aforementioned “Tempest” now, penultimate on the album as it is to the duly Decemberish “First Frost.” Preorders are up if you’d like to get a jump on your Fall listening. Six records in,

Info and links follow:

Worship at the Altar of the Cosmos with MYTHIC SUNSHIP | New Album LIGHT/FLUX Out in September

With five acclaimed releases in as many years, Mythic Sunship have long since established themselves amongst Europe’s finest purveyors of psychedelic music, effortlessly bridging the gap between heavy riff worship and expansive, free-jazz experimentation.

This September, the Copenhagen-based quintet (and self-proclaimed practitioners of ‘Anaconda Rock’) team up once again with New York’s legendary underground label Tee Pee Records, for the release of their sixth studio album, Light/Flux.

Simultaneously opening a new chapter on their journey, while razing the very foundations on which their previous output was built, the Scandinavian outfit are notorious for erratic, visceral, untameable musical singularities unleashed through improvisatory interplay. Showcasing that essence rare in its most primal form, unlike last year’s Wildfire, Light/Flux is the result of a more composed, melodic, and harmonious process, despite retaining the band’s signature penchant for unhinged spontaneity.

Recorded in Stockholm’s legendary RMV Studios over the course of four, chilly December days, Mythic Sunship’s unique sound and approach to creating records evokes the sound of John Coltrane joining Talk Talk. Wonderful moments of melancholy and bleakness, perched perfectly amidst the traditional fiery peaks the band is so well known for.

As exhilarating and electrifying as psychedelic records come, Light/Flux showcases Mythic Sunship’s scorched-earth approach in the search for new ideas and will be released on 30th September via Tee Pee Records.

Digitally pre-save/order the album here: https://orcd.co/lightflux

Or purchase the album physically on CD/LP via Tee Pee Records here: https://teepeerecords.com/products/mythic-sunship-light-flux-lp-cd-out-9-30-22

TRACK LISTING:
1. Aurora
2. Blood Moon
3. Equinox
4. Decomposition
5. Tempest
6. First Frost

facebook.com/mythicsunship
instagram.com/mythicfunship

facebook.com/teepeerecords
teepeerecords.com
twitter.com/teepeerecords
instagram.com/teepeerecords

Mythic Sunship, “Tempest”

The debut album from Lucid Grave, Cosmic Mountain, arrived about two weeks ago through Electric Valley Records. The 45-minute full-length is led off by the massive, rolling lumber of the titular “Cosmic Mountain,” which is both opener and longest track (immediate points) at 11:21. This is important to note because “Old Spirit,” the cut for which the Kobenhavn five-piece have a new video out, is track two.

And it’s the contrast between those two first songs — that sense of going out really, really far, then snapping back to reality — is pretty important when it comes to the album as a whole, and not just because the two songs together comprise more than a third of the LP’s runtime. “Old Spirit” takes the grand, near-operatic declarations of vocalist Malene Pederson in the opener and completely recontextualizes them, surrounding with still-large tonality, but a feeling of motion that is sweeping and as much garage-metal as stoner-punk. One way or the other, you would call it uncompromising, and it is by no means the last turn that Cosmic Mountain has in store.

After you check out the video, you can stream the whole record near the bottom of this post courtesy of the Electric Valley Bandcamp page, and I’d encourage that if you’re at all intrigued by what unfolds in “Old Spirit.” It’s really just scratching the surface of what the entire release offers, but it’s doing so in an intriguing way that leads you down the path to the rest of Cosmic Mountain. See if you can follow the trail markers, maybe.

Enjoy:

Lucid Grave, “Old Spirit” official video

Copenhagen dark heavy psych/doom quintet Lucid Grave’s video for the song “Old Spirit,” taken from the recently released Cosmic Mountain LP. The video is made by DÓRI HALLDÓRSSON & AMANDA JENSEN.

“Old Spirit” is a heavy psych rock song with influence from the early ’80s punk. The song is about a fast spacy universe in-between two worlds. The song is inspired by the lead singer’s days in the high desert in California. The desert heat is hard on everything and everyone. And the wind still tells stories of the Native Americans, the legends of desert rock, and the military base in the unforgiving sun.

Cosmic Mountain is a journey through your favorite drugs of life, the highs and the lows, being chased through the desert and fighting a haze of demons.

The album Cosmic Mountain is available digitally and on four variants of vinyl (Test Press, Solid Yellow, Transparent Red Splatter Black Vinyl, Ultra LTD “Cosmic Edition”) via Electric Valley Records.

Stream Cosmic Mountain: https://smarturl.it/cosmicmountain

Lucid Grave, Cosmic Mountain (2022)

Lucid Grave on Facebook

Lucid Grave on Instagram

Electric Valley Records on Bandcamp

Electric Valley Records on Facebook

Electric Valley Records on Twitter

Electric Valley Records on Instagram

Electric Valley Records website

Week two, day one. Day six. However you look at it, it’s 10 more records for the Summer 2022 Quarterly Review, and that’s all it needs to be. I sincerely hope you had a good weekend and you arrive ready to dig into new music, most of which you’ve probably already encountered — because you’re cool like that and I know it — but maybe some you haven’t. In any case, there’s good stuff today and plenty more to come this week, so bloody hell, let’s get to it.

Quarterly Review #51-60:

Celestial Season, Mysterium I

After confirming their return via 2020’s striking The Secret Teachings (review here), Netherlands-based death-doom innovators Celestial Season embark on an ambitious trilogy of full-lengths with Mysterium I, which starts with its longest song (immediate points) in the heavy-hitting single “Black Water Rising,” but is more willing to offer string-laced beauty in darkness in songs like “The Golden Light of Late Day,” which transitions fluidly into “Sundown Transcends Us.” That latter cut, third of seven total on the 40-minute LP, provides some small hint of the band’s more rock-minded days, but the affair is plenty grim on the whole, whatever slightly-more-uptempo riffy nod might’ve slipped through. “This Glorious Summer” hits the brakes for a morose slog, while “Endgame” casts it lot in more aggressive speed at first, dropping to strings for much of its second half before returning to the deathly chug. The pair “All That is Known” and “Mysterium” close in massive and lurching form, and not that there was any doubt about this group 30 years on from the band’s founding, but yeah, they still got it. No worries. The next two parts are reportedly due before the end of next year, and one looks forward to knowing where the rest of the story-in-sound goes from here. If it’s down, they’re already there.

Celestial Season on Facebook

Burning World Records website

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Noorvik, Hamartia

Post. Metal. Also post-metal. The third full-length from Koln-based instrumental four-piece Noorvik, Hamartia, glides smoothly between atmosphere and aggression, the band’s purposes revealed as much in their quiet moments as in those where the guitar comes forward and present a more furious face. In the subdued reaches of “Ambrosia” (10:00) or even opener “Tantalos” (6:55), the feeling is still tense, to where over the course of the record’s 68 minutes, you’re almost waiting for the kick to come, which it reliably does, but the form that takes varies in subtle ways and the bleeding of songs into each other like “Omonoia” into “Ambrosia” — which crushes by the time it’s done — the delving into proggy astro-jazz on “Aeon” and the reaching heights of “Atreides” (which TV tells me is a Dune reference) assure that there’s more than one path that gets Noorvik to where they’re going. At 15:42, “The Feast” is arguably the most bombastic and the most ambient both, but if that’s top and bottom, the spaces in between are no less coursing, and in their willingness to be metal while also being post-metal, Noorvik bring excitement to a style that’s made a trope of its hyper-cerebral nature. This has that and might also wreck your house, and if you don’t think that’s a big difference, ask your house.

Noorvik on Facebook

Tonzonen Records website

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Doctors of Space, Mind Surgery

Wait. What? You mean to tell me that right now there are some people in the world who aren’t about to dig on 78 minutes’ worth of improvised psychedelic synth and guitar drones? Like, real people? In the world? What kind of terrible planet is this? Obviously, for Doctors of Space — Scott “Dr. Space” Heller (Øresund Space Collective) on synth, Martin Weaver (Wicked Lady) on guitar — this planet is nowhere near cool enough, and while it’s fortunate for the cosmos at large that once shared, these sounds have launched into the broader reaches of the solar system where they’ll travel as waves to be interpreted by some future civilization perhaps millions of years from now that evolved on a big silly rock a long, long way from here and those people will finally be the audience Doctors of Space richly deserve. But on Earth? Beyond a few loyal weirdos, I don’t know. And no, Doctors of Space aren’t shooting for mass appeal so much as interstellar manifestation through sound, but they do break out the drum machine on 23-minute closer “Titular Parody” to add a sense of ground amid all that antigravity float. Nonetheless, Mind Surgery is far out even for far out. If you think you’re up to it, get your head in the right mode first, because they might just open that thing up by the time they’re done.

Doctors of Space on Facebook

Space Rock Productions website

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Astral Pigs, Our Golden Twilight

Pull Astral Pigs‘ second album, Our Golden Twilight, out of the context of the band’s penchant for vintage exploitation horror and porn and the record’s actually pretty cool. The title-track and slower-rolling “Brass Skies/Funeral March” top seven minutes in succession following instrumental opener “Irina Karlstein,” and spend that time in nod-inducement that goes from catchy-and-kinda-slow to definitely-slow-and-catchy before the long stretch of organ starts the at least semi-acoustic “The Sigil” and “Dragonflies” renews the density of lumbering fuzz, the English-language lyrics from the Argentina-based four-piece giving a duly ceremonious feel to the doomly drama unfolding, but long song or shorter, their vibe is right on and well in league with DHU Records‘ ongoing fascination with aural cultistry. The Hammond provided by bassist/producer Fabricio Pieroni isn’t to be ignored for what it brings to the songs, but even just on the strength of their guitar and bass tones and the mood they conjure throughout, Our Golden Twilight, though just 25 minutes long, unquestionably flows like a full-length record.

Astral Pigs on Facebook

DHU Records store

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Carson, The Wilful Pursuit of Ignorance

No question, Carson have learned their lessons well, and I’ll admit, it’s been a while since a basically straightforward, desert-derived heavy rock record hit me with such an impression of songwriting as does their second full-length, The Wilful Pursuit of Ignorance. Issued through Sixteentimes Music, the eight-track/36-minute outing from the Lucerne-via-New-Zealand-based unit plays off influences like Kyuss, Helmet (looking at you, title-track), Dozer, Unida, and so on, and honest to goodness, it’s refreshing to hear a band so ready and willing to just kick ass musically. Not saying that an album with a title like this doesn’t have anything deeper to say, just that Carson make their offering without even a smidgeon of pretense about where they’re coming from, and from opener “Dirty Dream Maker” onward, their melody, their groove, their transitions and sharper turns are right on. It’s classic heavy rock, done impeccably well, made modern. A work of genre that argues in favor of itself and the style as a whole. If you were introducing someone to riff-based heavy, Carson would do the trick just fine.

Carson on Facebook

Sixteentimes Music website

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Isaurian, Deep Sleep Metaphysics

Comprised of vocalist Hoanna Aragão, guitarist/vocalist Jorge Rabelo (also keys, co-production, etc.), guitarist Guilerme Tanner, bassist Renata Marim and drummer Roberto Tavares, Brazil’s Isaurian adapt post-rock patience and atmospheric guitar methods to a melody-fueled heavy purpose. Production value is an asset working in their favor on their second full-length, Deep Sleep Metaphysics, and seems to be a consistent factor throughout their work since Matt Bayles and Rhys Fulber produced their first two EPs in 2017. Here it’s Muriel Curi (Labirinto) and Chris Common (Pelican, many others), who bring a decided sense of space that’s measurable from the locale difference in Aragão‘s and Rabelo‘s vocal levels from opener “Árida” onward. Their intensions vary throughout — “For Hypnos” has “everybody smokes pot”-esque gang chants near its finish, “The Dream to End All Dreams” is a piano-inclusive guitar-flourish instrumental, “Autumn Eyes” is duly mellow and brooding, “Hearts and Roads” delivers culmination in a brighter melodic wash ahead of a bonus Curi remix of the opener — but it’s the melodic nuance and the clarity of sound that pull the songs together and distinguish the band. They’ve been tagged as “heavygaze” and various other ‘-gaze’ whathaveyou, and they borrow from that, but their drive toward fidelity of sound makes them something else entirely. They should tour Europe asap.

Isaurian on Instagram

Isaurian on Bandcamp

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Kadavermarch, Into Oblivion

Hints of Kadavermarch‘s metallic origins — members having served in Helhorse, Illdisposed, as well as the Danish hip-hop group Tudsegammelt, and others — sneak into their songs both in the more upfront manner of harsher backing vocals on “The Eschaton” and the subsequent “Abyss,” and in some of the double-guitar work throughout, though their first album, Into Oblivion, sets their loyalties firmly in heavy rock. Uncle Acid may be an influence in terms of vocal melody, but the riffs throughout cuts like “Satanic” and “Reefer Madness” and the galloping “Flowering Death” are bigger and feel drawn in part from acts like The Sword and Baroness, delivered with a sharp edge. It’s a fascinating blend, and the recording on Into Oblivion lets it shine with a palpable band-in-the-room sensibility and stage-style energy, while still allowing enough breadth for a build like that in the finale “Beyond the End” to pay off the record as a whole. Capable craft, a sound on its way to being their own, a turquoise vinyl pressing, and a pedigree to boot — there’s nothing more I would ask of Into Oblivion. It feels like an opening salvo for a longer-term progression and I hope it is precisely that.

Kadavermarch on Facebook

Target Group on Bandcamp

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Büzêm, Here

The violence implied in the title “Regurgitated Ambition Consuming Itself” takes the form of a harsh wall of noise drone that, once it starts, continues to unfurl for the just-under-eight-minute duration of the first of two pieces on Büzêm‘s more simply named Here EP. The Portland, Maine, solo art project of bassist/anythingelse-ist Finn has issued a range of exploratory outings, mostly EPs and experiments put to tape, and that modus very much suits the avant vibe throughout Here, which is markedly less caustic in the more rumbling “In an Attempt to Become the Creator” — presumably about Jackson Roykirk — the 10 minutes of which are more clearly the work of a standalone bass guitar, but play out with a sense of the human presence behind, as perhaps was the intention. Here‘s stated purpose is meditative if disaffected, Finn turning mindfulness into an already-in-progress armageddon display, and fair enough, but the found recording at the end, or captured footsteps, whatever it is, relate intentions beyond the use of a single instrument. Not ever going to be universally accessible, nonetheless pushing the kind of boundaries of what’s-a-song that need to be pushed.

Büzêm on Facebook

BÜZÊM on Bandcamp

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Electric Mountain, Valley Giant

Can’t mess with this kind of heavy rock and roll. The fuzz runs thick, the groove is loose (not sloppy), and the action is go from start to finish. Electric Mountain‘s second LP, Valley Giant digs on classic desert-style heavy vibes, with “Vulgar Planet” riffing on Kyuss and Fu Manchu only after “Desert Ride” has dug headfirst into Nebula via Black Rainbows and cuts like “Outlanders” and the hell-yes-wah-bass of big-nodder “Morning Grace” have set the stage for stoner and rock, by, for and about being what it is. Picking highlights, it might be “A Fistful of Grass” for the angular twists of fuzz in the chorus, but “Vulgar Planet” and the penultimate acoustic cut “At Last Everything” both make a solid case ahead of the eight-plus-minute instrumental closing jam “A Thousand Miles High.” The band’s 2017 self-titled debut (also on Electric Valley Records) was a gem as well, and if they can get some forward momentum going on their side after Valley Giant, playing shows, etc., they’d be well placed at the head of the increasingly crowded Mexico City underground.

Electric Mountain on Facebook

Electric Valley Records website

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Hush, The Pornography of Ruin

Also stylized all-caps with punctuation — perhaps a voice commanding: HUSH. — Hudson, New York, five-piece Hush conjure seven songs and 56 minutes of alternately sprawling and oppressive atmospheric sludge on their third full-length, The Pornography of Ruin, and if you take that to mean the quiet parts are spaced and the heavy parts are crushing, well, that’s true too, but not exclusively the case. Amid lyrical poetry, melodic ranging, slamming rhythms — “There Can Be No Forgiveness Without the Shedding of Blood” walks by and waves, its hand bloody — and harsh shouts and screams, Hush shove, pull, bite and chew the consciousness of their listener, with the 12-minute “By This You Are Truly Known” pulling centerpiece duty with mostly whispers and ambience in a spread-out midsection, bookended by more slow-churning pummel. Followed by the shorter “And the Love of Possession is a Disease with Them,” the keyboard-as-strings “The Sound of Kindness in the Voice” and the likewise raging-till-it-isn’t-then-when-it-is-again closer “At Night We Dreamed of Those We Were Stolen From,” the consumption is complete, and The Pornography of Ruin challenges its audience with the weight of its implications and tones alike. And for whatever it’s worth, I saw these guys in Brooklyn a few years back and they fucking destroyed. They’ve expanded the sound a bit since then, but this record is a solid reminder of that force.

Hush on Instagram

Hush on Bandcamp

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Danish heavy rockers Lydsyn today release their new single ‘To Syge Skud,’ and with it enter into the promotional cycle for their upcoming debut album, which will be out on Sept. 23. I don’t know the name of the record yet, but it’ll be out through Bad Afro, the imprint which has long-since been responsible for issuing the work of Uffe Lorenzen, aka Lorenzo Woodrose of Baby Woodrose, Spids Nøgenhat, Dragontears and so on. Lorenzen and the new three-piece released their first two-songer, led by the single “Kat Ser Kat” (posted here), last September, and “To Syge Skud,” which translates to English as ‘two sick shots,’ bears some hallmarks of Lorenzen‘s classic-style songcraft.

For example, it’s short. Drawing from garage rock and ’60s psychedelics, Lorenzen and company — Palle Demant plays bass, Jens Eyde drums — dig into a straight-ahead structure that’s catchy even if you don’t happen to speak Danish, and with a foundation of casually strummed acoustic guitar blended with electric, it’s evocative of Lorenzen‘s solo work over the last few years while, obviously, more built out with the additional players involved.

It’s in and out in under three minutes and that’s plenty enough time to make me look forward to the LP to come, which to be fair I probably would anyhow. But there’s a lyric video at the bottom of this post so you can hear it and links below where you can get it, so I’ll leave you to that with best wishes for the brief but pleasant journey ahead.

Here you go:

LYDSYN – “To Syge Skud”

“To Syge Skud” is taken from the upcoming Lydsyn debut album due out September 23th 2022 on Bad Afro Records.

Streaming:
https://lydsyn.lnk.to/skud

Bandcamp:
https://badafrorecords.bandcamp.com/track/to-syge-skud

Lydsyn is Uffe Lorenzen (Baby Woodrose/Spids Nøgenhat) on guitar and vocals, Palle Demant (The Sledge) on bass and Jens Eyde on drums. The band was originally formed out of boredom due to Covid 19 lockdown and was meant as a backing band that would make it possible for Uffe Lorenzen to play songs from his three recent solo albums live. As several tours went down the drain and was postponed also due to Covid 19 the band kept on rehearsing and ended up making their own material.

https://www.facebook.com/lydsyn
https://www.instagram.com/lydsyn/

https://badafrorecords.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/badafrorecords
http://badafro.dk/

Lydsyn, “To Syge Skud” lyric video

You don’t have to go far into Emile‘s new single ‘Diamanter i Solen’ to get a handle on the wistful vibe. It’s certainly there by the time the song has faded all the way in, even more certainly there by the time the first verse starts, Emile Bureau (also of The Sonic Dawn) singing sweetly in layers with some falsetto for good measure, operating under his first-name-only solo moniker as he did for his first record, 2020’s The Black Spider/Det Kollektive Selvmord (review here), which came out through Heavy Psych Sounds.

Emile followed that album with the kind-of-a-live-record-but-no-concerts 2021 complementary offering Nightshade, which was more based around acoustic guitar, but the layers here of organ, the extra vocals, and the psychedelic flourish as the track makes its way into the repetitions of its title line to close out are hypnotic and melancholy both. It’s not the kind of song that’s trying to be uplifting, but neither is it a downer for downer’s sake. It’s a classic psych-pop ballad, in other words. There’s another new song coming in Fall. The more the merrier.

Here’s the PR wire info:

EMILE – Diamanter i Solen

Single Release 13. Maj 2022

Spotify / Apple Music Pre Save: https://push.fm/ps/diamanterisolen

DIAMANTER I SOLEN is a new single release from Danish-French songwriter and music producer, Emile.

Diamanter i Solen (Diamonds in the Sun) is an ode to the early and cold Scandinavian spring, where the first cold but beautiful sunny days divide the winter dark from endless summer nights. It is a balancing act between reality and hallucination, and is dedicated to all day-dreamers alike.

The song is part of a complimentary pair of singles, reflecting the changes in nature and moods during the changing seasons. The second single Efterårsblade will be released in the early Fall 2022.

Emile released his first solo LP ‘The Black Spider / Det Kollektive Selvmord’ in 2020 on Heavy Psych Sounds Records. Aside from playing solo, Emile is also the frontman of the Danish psych band The Sonic Dawn.

https://emilecph.bandcamp.com/
https://fb.com/emilecph/
https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/bands/emile.htm

Emile, Nightshade (2021)