Recorded over the course of two days in Oct. 2015 and released in Feb. 2016, the seven-song/43-minute debut album from Wrocław, Poland, heavy psych rockers Spaceslug, dubbed Lemanis (review here), is an album that still feels new in my mind. The trio of guitarist/vocalist Bartosz Janik, bassist/vocalist Jan Rutka and drummer/vocalist Kamil Ziółkowski offered it through Oak Island/Kozmik Artifactz on vinyl, BSFD Records on CD and Southcave Records on tape, and it almost immediately put them at the forefront of their country’s heavy underground for the richness of its tone, the languid nature of its groove and the flowing, laid back delivery of its vocal melodies that corresponded.

With headphone-ready depth in their mix — handled by the band with Jacek Maciołek, who also helmed the recording — and no wrong answer to either way of hearing them, Spaceslug‘s songs could either be experienced with glossed-over eyes or mined for details like the dual layers of feedback ringing out circa 4:30 into “Grand Orbiter” (with its sample of American president JFK at the start talking about going to the moon), 0r the particularly Sleepy riff that pays off the aptly-titled eight-minute side A capper “Supermassive,” slowing with classic stoner rock righteousness into a churn like the black holes at the center of the galaxies slowly sucking the cosmos into oblivion. By no means is that the only in-genre dogwhistle on Lemanis, either, but the fact that Spaceslug were conscious of what tropes they wanted to celebrate in their work — and which ones they didn’t — was a part of what made the songs feel so aesthetically complete.

Take the manner in which opener “Proton Lander” — one of the longer cuts at 7:45, with just “Supermassive” and the album-closing instrumental title-track (9:17) surpassing — comes apart at the finish. By the time the three-piece get there, they’ve built the song up from nothing, an initial hum fading gently in over some ambient noise, bass and guitar seeming to yawn themselves awake before the drums — who’ve already been up for a while and seem to have had their first cup of coffee — join in the procession. By the one-minute mark, they’re already rolling, but the abiding vibe is warm, cozy and easy to engage, and that remains true as they as volume and meter, shift into through verses, grow bigger in sound and seem to find multiple next-levels of density to their rich, lush fuzz. But after the six-minute mark, “Proton Lander” takes kind of a meandering turn, and rather than fading out the comedown, they jam through it and present the full ending of the song. They’re letting the listener in the room with them until there’s nothing but some noodling guitar left and the track ends organically, fluidly, decisively small after having been so grand and consuming only a few minutes before.

This is emblematic of what Lemanis accomplished across its whole span in terms of bringing to life a genuine sense of mellow-heavy. Spaceslug were by no means static in tempo either within or between their tracks, but even as “Hypermountain” picks up from that ending of “Proton Lander” and invigorates with a more directly forward movement, or as “Grand Orbiter” pushes through its open, half-time drum hook and surrounding effects swirl on vocals and guitar alike, the band remains steady in their presence. The vocals — the arrangements of which would flesh out and broaden in scope over the next several years with more aggressive takes sneaking in gradually and naturally — are never too far forward in the mix as to dominate the tones surrounding, and their placement is key and perfectly suited to the wall-o’-fuzz largesse being conveyed.

As the mostly-instrumental “Galectelion” (just a spoken part in the midsection) follows “Supermassive” as the centerpiece of the record and the start of side B — again carrying echoes of Sleep‘s riff worship but set to the band’s own earthier psychedelic intention, moving at a decent clip but consistent with the flow of its surrounding cuts — the affect is hypnotic in highlighting their jammier side, expanding on that impression at the end of “Proton Lander,” fleshing out the vibe on the whole in a way that makes the more lumbering bass and guitar effects barrage in the hooky “Grand Orbiter” stand out that much more. The 1:36 penultimate interlude “Quintessence” works in not entirely dissimilar fashion, picking up from the cold-cut feedback of “Grand Orbiter” with guitar floating in space before “Lemanis” announces its arrival with a distinct and welcome initial thud.

About that thud. While a large part of the impression Lemanis made and still makes seven years later comes from the mellow-heavy mood, the tones of the guitar and bass, and the laid back delivery of the vocals, even Ziółkowski‘s kick drum is worth mentioning in so clearly serving their purpose. It has a kind of muffled tone, the edges of the hammer’s impact rounded off and smooth in the recording, and where there’s a risk that the drums on the whole could detract from the liquidity of the material, they instead become the calming pulse at the core of it, definitely there but somehow gentle in how they punctuate the songs; one more aspect of craft that makes Spaceslug‘s debut such a standout even as they cap with the further trance induction of “Lemanis” itself, summarizing the abiding roll that has carried them and their audience through a deceptively cohesive breadth of turns and volume dynamics.

Spaceslug quickly affirmed the strengths of Lemanis with 2017’s sophomore LP, Time Travel Dilemma (review here), and set themselves on a course of progression across EPs and LPs that continues today — 2021’s Memorial (review here) was their fifth full-length and crowning achievement to-date; they’ll play Desertfest London this Spring and Høstsabbat in October, perhaps by then supporting or heralding a new release — and while they’ve added new elements to their style, they’ve never quite let go of the soothing nod of Lemanis. At the time, I couldn’t get away from a Sungrazer comparison, and I can still hear what in the songs put me in that place — worth noting that Spaceslug brought in former Sungrazer bassist for a guest spot on Time Travel Dilemma, so there’s some acknowledgement of the influence there — but listening to Lemanis seven years after the fact, it’s plain to hear even more just how much this record is the beginning of the band searching out their identity as a group, finding the niche they’d occupy and from which they’d grow and flourish as, fortunately, they have in the years since.

This is a pretty special record, and maybe that’s part of why it still feels new, because even looking back at it in hindsight, it’s so easy to lose oneself in the potential for expansion in its songs. As far as I’m concerned, that they’ve brought and are still bringing that potential to realization only makes it more of a landmark.

If you’ve been paying attention the last few weeks — and if you haven’t, it’s okay — I’ve been doing kind of an unofficial miniseries in these posts of Polish bands, with Sunnata last week, Elvis Deluxe the week before, Dopelord before that, and Tortuga starting off. Over a decade ago, I did a similar look at a few Polish acts in a category of posts called ‘On the Radar’ that I don’t really do anymore, and this has been a follow-up to that at least for me if not anyone else, and it’s been interesting to hear the various paths that these groups have taken, those who’ve come and gone, etc. Whether you’ve followed along or not, I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing Lemanis again, and I thank you as always for reading.

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The Pecan opened his door at 4:30AM, and while I love him dearly, my heart sank thinking of the morning’s productivity evaporating in the face of demands for yogurt and more Sesame Street. I put him back to bed before he even started down the stairs, and he was willing to go, with was something of a surprise. It’s 5:57 now and that’s already later than he’s slept all week.

I’ve been having trouble sleeping as well. Wednesday was probably as bad as it’s gotten; I woke up at 1AM and never really fell back out, got up and decided to get to work at about 2:30. Yesterday was 3:30-ish, which felt like a gift as I also wasn’t really up overnight rolling over or needing to go to the bathroom like the old man I am. Today was 3AM. Generally speaking, my days don’t really need to be longer than they already are when the alarm goes off at 4. I’ve been pretty wrecked by the time the kid goes to bed around 7:30PM, and even last night was nodding off watching Star Trek: Picard bring back Worf in violent fashion. Ups and downs.

Ups and downs to everything, I guess. Yesterday started out awesome as I had a total blast writing that Enslaved review — so, so much fun; I don’t usually get much of a response when I write about that band, but I always enjoy doing so and that makes it worth it — and went swimming and that felt good in my body and the kid and I had a decent morning without really butting heads on random bullshit as we so often do. But then the driver and aide on his morning bus let me know he’s been yelling and generally being a jerk on the ride to school, which is kind of part of broader ongoing behavioral concerns — transitions, always a challenge, probably always will be to some yet-unsettled extent — and it just flattened the whole day.

By the time The Patient Mrs. got back from getting her haircut, which of course looks lovely, I was in a hole compared to where I’d started out. It sucked, in short. And the day never really found that groove again. He came home from school and was difficult, and I got mad, and The Patient Mrs. tried to be a go-between, and it’s just a shitty dynamic that doesn’t really make anyone feel good and I don’t know what to do about any of it. I ate a gummy and got stoned and at least that helped calm me down, but golly, it would be nice to get through a day without feeling like an absolute garbage parent. Hasn’t happened yet, but I’ll keep you in the loop if I ever get there.

He starts kindergarten in the Fall, which will be a sea change as the first time he’ll be out of the house on more of a full-time basis. The beginning of a new era of school, basically. I’ve been considering trying to find part-time work outside the house (or in it, remotely) when he goes. Not that I can’t busy myself with domestic concerns or more writing — there’s never enough time for either — but I can’t help but wonder if after nearly six years of being completely out of the labor force, some part of me isn’t missing feeling like I’m contributing to something beyond poisoning my family by being a miserable piece of shit.

I’ve never enjoyed jobs, but money’s been tighter than tight, and even if it’s just money for music and/or weed that I don’t have to take out of the familial coffers, that’s not nothing. I don’t know, but I’m thinking about it. I won’t pretend to have any clue what I need or want. I open my mouth and hear my father’s voice, which crushes me. I look in the mirror and see his stiff lumbering. I have felt a bit haunted, perhaps, by vague and unresolved trauma from that relationship, and I am in terror of paying forward the shitty emotional abuse to which I was treated as a child to my own kid. Already it is glaringly obvious to me that I am the problem. I would not mind dying in my sleep and thereby removing that problem.

6:22 and he’s up and down the stairs on the quick, crying that it’s starting to get light. I tell him it’s part of the coming Spring, that the sun is coming up earlier. I’m fucking trying. Every day, I’m fucking trying. Moments of okay amid continual failure are godsends. I need to buy yogurt today.

Next week is full streams of REZN, Sandrider and Stoned Jesus — three of the best records I’ve heard so far in 2023.

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Have fun, watch your head, hydrate, all that stuff. Monday is a Desert Storm video premiere and it’s a banger so keep an eye out.

FRM.

The Obelisk Collective on Facebook

The Obelisk Radio

The Obelisk merch

 

Thus ends another successful Quarterly Review. And by successful I mean I survived. There were a few minutes there when I actually thought about spreading this out to six days, doing another batch of 10 on Monday, but then what happens? Then it’s seven days, then eight, then nine, and before I know it I’m just doing 10 reviews every day and it’s more of a daily review than a quarterly one. Next week we’ll get back to whatever passes for normality around this place, and at the end of June, I’ll have another batch to roll with. Maybe the beginning of July, depending on time. In any case, thank you for reading this week. I hope you’ve found something in all this that you’ve dug, and that this final round offers something else that resonates.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Chron Goblin, Backwater

Calgary party rockers Chron Goblin pay homage to Seattle with a song named after the city on their third album, Backwater (on Ripple Music), but they continue to have way more in common with Portland, Oregon. The follow-up to 2013’s Life for the Living (review here) pushes into psychedelic groove early in its title-track and gets bluesy for most of the subsequent “The Wailing Sound,” but it seems even that song can’t resist the urge to throw down and have a good time by the end, and cuts like “Give Way,” the galloping opener “Fuller” and the requisite “Hard Living” reaffirm the band’s commitment to heavy riffs and positive vibes. The stylistic elephant in the room continues to be Red Fang, but as they’ve done all along, Chron Goblin work in shades of other influences in heavy rock – if they were from the Eastern Seaboard, I’d call it Roadsaw – and put a stamp of their own on the style.

Chron Goblin on Thee Facebooks

Ripple Music

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Slabdragger, Rise of the Dawncrusher

“Mercenary Blues” is near-immediate in telegraphing the level of heft Slabdragger will emit across their second album, Rise of the Dawncrusher, which tops an hour in five tracks (one of them four minutes long) and shifts between clean vocals, screams and growls from bassist/vocalist Yusuf Tary and guitarist/vocalist Sam Thredder as drummer Jack Newham holds together tempo shifts no less drastic. The shorter cut, “Evacuate!,” is an extreme take on heavy rock, but as Slabdragger move through the extended “Shrine of Debauchery” (12:23), “Dawncrusher Rising” (15:16) and “Implosion Rites” (17:20), their methods prove varied enough so that their material is more than just an onslaught of thickened distortion. I wouldn’t call it progressive exactly, but neither is it lunkheaded in its intention or execution, as the chanted melodies buried deep in “Shrine of Debauchery”’s lumber, derived perhaps in part from Conan and Sleep but beholden to neither so much as its own righteous purposes.

Slabdragger on Thee Facebooks

Holy Roar Records

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Jupiter, Interstellar Chronodive

Finnish heavy psychedelic rockers Jupiter take a decidedly naturalist position when it comes to their style. Yeah, there are some effects on the guitars throughout Interstellar Chronidive, the trio’s second album behind 2014’s Your Eccentric State of Mind, but it’s more about what the three players can accomplish with dynamic tempo and mood changes than it is creating a wash, and that gives songs like “Stonetrooper” and “Dispersed Matter/Astral Portal” a classic feel despite a decidedly modern production. “Premonitions” provides raucous fuzz worthy of any next-gen stoners you want to name, and the 14-minute “In Flux” answers its own initial thrust with and expansive, liquefied jam that’s all the more emblematic of the organic core to their approach, Hendrix-derived but not Hendrix-emulating. Bright guitar tone, rich bass and swinging drums aren’t necessarily unfamiliar elements, but the touches of space rock narration on “Dispersed Matter/Astral Portal” and the consuming nod of closer “Vantage Point” assure there’s no shortage of personality to go around.

Jupiter on Thee Facebooks

Jupiter on Bandcamp

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Izo, Izo

Also stylized as IZ? with a long accent over the ‘o,’ Izo is the self-titled debut from Italian double-guitar instrumental four-piece Izo, who bookend four flowing and densely weighted progressions with an intro and outro to add to the atmospheric breadth. Rather than choose between heaviness or ambience, Izo – guitarists Paolo Barone and Maurizio Calò, bassist Francesco de Pascali and drummer Luca Greco – play both into each other so that a song like “Hikkomori” is as engaging in its heft as it is hypnotic. That might be easier to do without vocals, but it’s essential to Izo’s approach, and something that, for their debut, sets up future expansion of post-metal and psychedelic elements. I’m not sure if there’s a theme or narrative for the album, but consistent use of Japanese language and imagery ties the material together all the same, and Izo emerge from their first album having shown a clearheadedness of purpose that can only continue to serve them well.

Izo on Thee Facebooks

Acid Cosmonaut Records

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Cultist, Three Candles

Cultist made their introductory statement in the early hours of 2016 with Three Candles, a five-song EP from the social media-averse Cleveland, Ohio, trio featuring members of Skeletonwitch, Mockingbird and Howl. In the wall of fuzz they construct, the swing injected into their rhythms and the use of multiple vocalists, there’s a strong undercurrent of Uncle Acid to “Path of the Old One,” but “Consuming Damnation” distinguishes itself with a more aggressive take, rawer in its melodies, and the creeping closer “Eternal Dark” is up to something entirely more doomed. How this balance will play out with the more familiar riff-patterning in “Follow Me” is the central question, but for their first tracks to be made public, Cultist’s Three Candles offers fullness of sound and the realization of an aesthetic purpose. Yes, there’s room to grow, but they already have a better handle on what they want to do than a lot of bands, so it should be interesting to keep up.

Cultist on Instagram

Cultist on Bandcamp

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Haoma, Eternal Stash

Ultra-thick, ultra-dank, Haoma is the work of Swedish duo R (bass/vocals) and S (drums), and the three-tracker Eternal Stash is their second self-released EP. The offering takes its title from the opener and longest track (immediate points), and wastes no time with subtlety in getting down on molten Cisneros-style stoner-doom grooves. Sleep meets Om isn’t a huge divide to cross, but there’s a blown-out sensibility to the vocals as well that speaks to some element of Electric Wizard at play, and the overarching roughness suits Haoma’s tonal crunch well. Even when they break to wah bass in the second half of “Eternal Stash” to set up the ensuing jam, this underlying harshness remains, and “Unearthly Creatures” and “Orbital Flight” build on that, the latter with a march that feels more decidedly individual even if constructed on familiar ground. Heavy, raw, unpretentious celebration of groove is almost always welcome by me, and so Haoma’s Eternal Stash is likewise.

Haoma on Thee Facebooks

Haoma on Bandcamp

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Spaceslug, Lemanis

Another boon to Poland’s emerging heavy rock scene, Wroclaw’s Spaceslug slime their way out of the ground with their debut long-player, Lemanis, a seven-cut paean to weighted tone and laid back roll. Vocally, the trio seem to take a cue from the Netherlands’ Sungrazer, but their riffs are far more dense and while the penultimate interlude “Quintessence” and the earlier “Galectelion” demonstrate a sense of spaciousness, the context in which that arrives is much more weighted and, particularly in the second half of “Supermassive,” feels culled from the Sleep school of Iommic idolatry. No complaints. The record clocks in at 43 minutes all told and in no way overstays its welcome, rounding out with the nine-minute title-track, an instrumental that’s probably not improvised but comes across as exploratory all the same. The CD version is out through BSFD Records, but don’t be surprised when someone picks it up for a vinyl issue, as both the front-to-back flow and the artwork seem to be made for it.

Spaceslug on Thee Facebooks

Spaceslug on Bandcamp

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Slush, American Demons

An element of twang that seems present even in the most uproarious moments of Slush’ American Demons tape comes to the fore with the brief “Leshy,” a quick, fleetly-strummed bit of slide guitar the follows highlight cut “Bathysphere” and precedes “Death Valley,” both of which bask full-on in the garage shake, proto-punk vibe and anything goes swagger the Brooklynite trio have on offer throughout their third EP. That countrified twist plays well alongside the drawling skate rock of “In the Flesh,” which seems to take on some of The Shrine’s West Coast skate vibes with a twist of New York fuckall, and the quick crotchal thrust off “Silk Road,” which serves as Slush’ most purely punkish moment. “Death Valley” closes out with a tale of drugs and the desert, the vocals somewhere between Misfits and early Nick Cave, drenched in attitude and accompanied by fuzz that seems to be likewise. Bonus points for the silver tape and copious included art and info.

Slushies on Bandcamp

Lean on Bandcamp

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Menimals, Menimals

Strange spirits are afoot throughout Menimals’ Menimals, the maybe-debut from the Italian troupe who engage wantonly in the proliferation of post-Mike Patton creepy darkjazz across five cuts of sparse, spacious weirdness. Issued through Phonosphera/Riot Season, it’s a work of high atmospheric density but ultimately more about mood than sonic impact, evoking complex shapes – dodecahedrons, tetrahedrons, octahedrons – as a mirror for its own quizzical mission. The kind of record that those who don’t spend time trying to figure it out are going to have more fun with, it makes its most effective impression on “Transitioning from a Cube to the Octahedron” on side B, evoking minimalist drone rock atmospheres as whispered vocals tie it to the rest of Menimals’ bizarre vibe. That’s not to take away from the noisy finish of closer “Bird on the Wind as a Hinge,” which follows, just to note that Menimals manage to somehow find balance in all the subdued seething and resonant experimentalism.

Menimals on Thee Facebooks

Riot Season Records

Phonosphera Records

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The Linus Pauling Quartet, Ampalanche

By way of a confession, I wanted to end this batch of 50 reviews with something I knew I dug, and that distinction goes to Houston rockers Linus Pauling Quartet, whose latest full-length, Ampalanche, is released via the label wing of Italian ‘zine Vincebus Eruptum. An album that offers some of the most pretense-free rock flute I’ve ever heard on “Slave to the Die,” it’s a down-home weirdo rocker that might, at a moment’s notice, plunge full-on into psychedelia in “Sometimes” or, say, include a 49-minute echoing space-drone “Vi, de Druknede (We, the Drowned)” as a download-only bonus track, and the fact that Linus Pauling Quartet can always be relied on for something different but consistent in charm and the quality of songwriting is not to be taken for granted, whether it’s the Midwestern noise rock of “Brisket” or the fuzzy roll of dreamy album-closer “Alive.” Yeah, I was doing myself a favor by finishing with Ampalanche. I have absolutely zero regrets. Linus Pauling Quartet continue to be woefully underappreciated.

Linus Pauling Quartet on Thee Facebooks

Vincebus Eruptum webstore

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