Here’s a fun game I’d recommend playing with Vol. 1, the debut full-length from Westmont, New Jersey, metallers Clamfight. You take the main riff to album opener “Fuck Bulldozers” (which you can hear on their MySpace; you’ll know the riff I’m talking about when it comes on), and in time with it’s monstrously-proportioned groove, you say the word “bananas.” It works out to something like, “Ba-nanas, ba-na-nas, ba-nanas, ba-na-nas, ba-nanas, ba-na-nas, BA-NA-NAS.” Good fucking times, my friend.

Clamfight are my favorite unsigned, non-pedigreed American band. I say this with zero pretense of impartiality. I know them, consider them friends, and am glad to say I’ve seen them perform on more occasions than I can count. Sound-wise, I put them in a similar category as Oklahoma City rockers Bloodcow, but the more abrasive shouts of Clamfight drummer/vocalist Andy Martin, peppered on “Ghosts I Have Known” with deathly growling, add a dimension of metallic heaviness that offsets the stonerly riffs and lead work of guitarists Joel Harris and Sean McKee. Captured on Vol. 1 by engineer Steve Poponi of NJ’s Gradwell House studio, all the elements that make up Clamfight sound clear and professional without sacrificing the immediacy or hunger in the material.

The band credits Poponi with much of the album’s outcome, but there’s no denying that the Southern shuffle of “Swordfishing is an Ancient and Noble Art” comes from the players themselves. The nautical fascinations of Martin play out across several of Vol. 1’s tracks, informing the lyrics to “Sowrdfishing,” the aforementioned “Ghosts I Have Known,” and more loosely, closer “Viking Funeral.” “Ghosts I Have Known” is my personal pick of the record, as the tempo slows a bit, Martin successfully attempts a cleaner vocal approach for the verses than on the track previous (the chorus being where the growling happens), and the songwriting feels tightest and shows the band has more to offer than the pounding grooves they’ve so far offered. Though, for most acts, said pounding grooves would be enough. But as Clamfight kicks into the thrashy last two minutes of the song, the ease with which they transition speaks to a sonic diversity still just developing among Harris, McKee, Martin and bassist Louis Koble.

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1:26AM: Made it into the valley about an hour ago. Not bad time. The Patient Mrs. did her undergrad in Waltham, MA, which essentially means I can do the Masspike-to-84-to-91-to-95-to-287-to-287 (the highway so nice you have to drive on it twice) thing with my eyes closed. Helpful in situations such as tonight, when I basically did.

I still have Solace songs stuck in my head after the drive. They were finished with “Disillusioned Prophet” when I left, 9:20PM by my watch, and were talking about starting tomorrow with “The Immortal, the Dead and the Nothing,” since it’s the longer and potentially more complicated of the two songs left to do. As for the rest of the night, there was some talk of drinking, some talk of going up the road to see Doomriders, but mostly I think Tommy wanted some ice cream and Justin wanted to not smell anymore. Both reasonable desires.

So ends my in-studio adventure with Solace. I don’t know how done A.D. will be by the time the two guitarists head back to Jersey tomorrow — it’s an album and anything can happen — but of course I wish them all the best with the rest of the work they put into getting it out, and thank them for letting me come up and observe for a bit. Anyone who’s ever made a record knows it can get tedious even in this technologically advanced age, but as someone perpetually fascinated by even the boring parts of the process, I’m happy to witness it whenever I can, whether I’m in the band or not. Thanks again to them as well as Benny Grotto (whose band, Motherboar, I’m looking forward to checking out) and Mad Oak Studios for their hospitality, and to you for reading. Hope you enjoyed it half as much as I did.

7:54PM: A little dinner (okay, a lot of dinner) later and spirits are up. Work is resumed on “Disillusioned Prophet” and universal opinion in the room — that is, mine, Justin’s, Tommy’s and Benny’s — is that the song is kicking ass. I don’t imagine much if anything will be done when this song is “finished,” but given how much work has gone into the two tracks that were worked on today, if I was required to judge one way or the other, I’d say it’s a win.

Still to be done are the songs “The Immortal, the Dead and the Nothing” and “Six Year Trainwreck,” which will likely be tackled tomorrow, but as far as closing out the work this evening, the decision to walk away for a bit and have a bite to eat was definitely the right one. Everyone feels better and as I hear “Disillusioned Prophet” closer to closer to being done, I can easily imagine it being the opener. The song has great energy and sets a good tone for the rest of the cuts (at least the ones I’ve heard so far; unless they go blackened folk metal on the others, it should fit nicely into its intended spot).

My plan is to split out of here in either an hour or so or when this song is done, whichever comes first. Doomriders are reportedly playing down the street at this or that bar, but hitting the road back to Jersey wins. Real life was bound to come back into it sooner or later.

5:35PM: Work has begun on “Disillusioned Prophet,” and yes, that is as ominous as it sounds. The song is set to be the opener of A.D., and for the last two hours or so, Benny has been going track by track — that’s “track” as in the individual layers of instrumentation and vocals making up the songs, not the songs themselves — making sure all the frequencies and whathaveyous are where they should be. At first, he kicked Justin and Tommy and I out of the room, but I cited freedom of the press and wormed my way back in for what he aptly called, “The Boring Part.”

Everyone’s a little tired, a little hungry, a little on edge. By yesterday at this time I had at least three PBRs in me, but more than that, I think all parties involved were hoping today would go a little faster than it has been. Getting “Down South Dog” (or maybe “The Down South Dog Boogie,” I don’t think a final call has been made as regards the title) to where it was supposed to be proved a monumental task, and since it’s the opener, the same applies in an ongoing tense for “Disillusioned Prophet.” The layers of guitar alone — acoustic coupled with electric, solos, harmonies, etc. — could probably take two days to work out.

But that’s mixing, and if my arsty-fartsy black and white photo of a plastic cup and stack of CDs that were on the counter in the lounge proves anything, it’s that downtime can do strange things to people in a given physical space. Tommy spent much of the time working out his restlessness on the Asteroids machine and he and Justin wrote a honky-tonk song in the live room (sorry no video), so there’s that. I have half a headache and could stand a shower, but that’s heavy metal. Earlier on, we all gathered around Benny’s laptop to watch the over-the-top ridiculousness that is Dream Evil’s video for “The Book of Heavy Metal.” I imagine when and if that book is ever written, afternoons such as these will be left out in favor of giving space to tits, beer and moshing, but this is how shit really happens. Life is not what you see on VH1 or read on self-indulgent music blogs.

2:48PM: We’ve been asked to leave the control room so Benny can concentrate. Reasonable. When putting together the semi-final version of “Down South Dog,” one of the several hundred of Jason’s vocal tracks went missing, so there’s some work to be done there. The thing is, these songs were recorded in at least three separate sessions, over the course of more than three years, so a major challenge for Mr. Grotto has been making it cohesive. You know, like an album. Fortunately he seems up to the task.

Miraculously, I fell back to sleep on the floor of the live room this morning. Breakfast was at around 10:30AM at a cafe up the street. Kind of a hippie place, local art on the walls and all that, but not too crowded and not too pretentious — and a killer breakfast burrito goes a long way. Some gorgeous collegiate-types directed us a couple blocks down to In Your Ear Records, where Tommy picked up his fair share of vinyl and then some. I grabbed some CDs that I’ll likely detail at another time.

If there’s anything I’ve noticed in listening to these tracks, it’s the growth. The last five years have not left Solace the same as they were. Even since their last EP, 2007’s The Black Black, the change is audible in the songs. There are rampant harmonies in the vocals and guitars — of course guitars are a central focus since I’m here with the two guitarists — but as much as we’ve been throwing around dick jokes and one-liners about anal beads, there’s no question the process is incredibly important to these dudes.

It’s worth noting these aren’t to be the final final mixes of the A.D. record. Although the tracks are complete in terms of the recording, there’s more to putting it all together. Jason, for example, still has to okay the vocal mixes, and there will probably be another round of tweaks for the instruments as well. But it’s working out and as odd as it is to think of the words “Solace” and “mature” in the same sentence, musically at least there’s a sense that the long time they’ve taken to make this record happen hasn’t been for nothing.

John Arzgarth was here and gone, but it was good to see him however briefly. A sample of his then-infant son is set to open “Down South Dog.” Plans are to head to a dive bar for drinks later, but that probably depends on how much is left to do with these songs. Time’s always a factor. It’s after 3PM now and we’re back in the control room, but there’s still a ways to go. It wouldn’t be doom if it didn’t take a long time.

DAY TWO, 8:23AM: It’s early yet and so far I am the only one awake. I’ve been up for about an hour now and I can hear periodic snoring from the lounge where Justin is sleeping. My campsite was/is in the live room, next to a large translucent blue floor tom. The floor wasn’t all that comfortable, but the acoustics of my night farts were fantastic. I used a sleeping bag I brought along as a mattress pad and covered myself with a blanket provided by the studio. I’d be willing to bet that at one point or another it was inside a bass drum.

Last night’s jam session, of which a clip was posted, went on in progressively drunker fashion until at around 12:30AM it petered into lampooning Gilligan’s Island characters with raunchy Tenacious D-style verses in A minor. The specifics are fuzzy, but I recall something about Ginger sucking leopard cock, if that helps paint the picture. Shortly, Star Trek: The Next Generation came on, and a discussion was had about whether William Riker was “a pussy.” Riker proved his mettle throughout the show, but at the end of the episode, Picard was still captured by the Borg, so I suppose there are arguments to be made on both sides.

The plan for the day as I understand it is breakfast whenever Tommy and Justin wake up, then work on mixing four more tracks when Benny gets here. I’m not sure whether or not they’ll be staying over again and I don’t think they are either. There’s still some Guinness left from last night, so anything’s possible. The snow has stopped and the sun is out now. Could go either way, probably.

This just happened where I am. I hope where you are it also kicks ass.

Tommy and Justin are working out an acoustic part to a song not yet written. So far as I know, it doesn’t have a name.

10:37PM: Howls of laughter are coming from the lounge where dinner was just a bit ago. There’s a documentary on about Black comedians. We ordered the meal from some Italian place down the road on the recommendation from Benny or one of the other Mad Oak dudes. It came delivered by an old man, who I immediately felt bad about having made drive in the snow. Food was alright. You don’t come to Massachusetts for the pasta — or, rather, if you do, you’re an asshole.

Mixing ended at around 8:30PM. The aforementioned Benny (last name Grotto) is in charge of the board, though I think it’s pretty clear to all involved this is Tommy’s ship. His ear has been driving what of the session I’ve been here to witness, and almost universally to its betterment. That’s not a slight against Benny at all, he seems incredibly capable at his job. I mean in terms of emotional investment.

And why shouldn’t Southard be emotionally invested in making A.D. the best album he can? It’s been five years in the works. Hardly seems reasonable to throw out some undercooked garbage now, even if the anticipation for it is at an all-time high because it seems now more than ever that it’s actually coming out. The songs I’ve heard this evening — “From Below,” “The Skull of the Head of a Man,” “Down South Dog” and “Borrowed Immunity” — all sound finished or at least well on their way. It’s a bummer new drummer Keith Ackerman didn’t join the band in time to make it onto this album, but I guess with all the time Kenny Lund put in, he earned his place.

It’s beers for the rest of the night, and tv and shit-shooting. The snow is still coming down but I don’t think there were plans to head out anywhere anyway. There’s apparently a Mad Oak mouse somewhere around, but I haven’t seen it yet. The night is young. Johnny Arzgarth from StonerRock.com was supposed to make an appearance tonight, but the weather kept him home. When and if he comes tomorrow I’ll have to make sure I mention it took me four hours to get here. Ha.

To the commenter who said “How about an exclusive track premiere?” I don’t think we’re there yet, but when the time comes I’ll try to make it happen.

6:00PM: Got here about an hour and a half ago and found Solace guitarists Tommy Southard and Justin Daniels playing Asteroid in the lounge of Mad Oak Studios, which, if you’d think about it, is pretty much what you’d expect. The Mad Oak crew was hard at work mixing a song called “From Below.” Of course, my opinion is going to be biased, because I’m here — like the press embedded with the military that tries to be impartial; good fucking luck — but when we sat down to listen to it, it was pretty god damn huge.

It took me about four hours solid to get here with the snow and traffic. 95 was shitty, 91 was shittier, 84 was fine, the Masspike was, well, full of people from Massachusetts, so you have to watch your ass anyway. One way or another, I was relieved when I found this place.

The current project in the control room — from whence I’m reporting live — is a track called “The Skull of the Head of a Man.” I’ve only heard the instruments so far, no vocals, but if unimonikered-singer Jason were to come on with some NYHC growls, it wouldn’t be inappropriate. Tommy has been sitting with Justin talking about the hardcore scene and how it’s changed and, frankly, how it sucks, and I’ve been trying to figure out how to make pictures go from my camera to my computer. Damn complicated technology.

If the evening so far is any indication, it’s looking like the night’s going to be filled with a lot of PBRs and a lot of guitar tracks. Fine by me. More later.

A quick shower (and maybe some packing) from now and I’ll be on the road heading north to the famed Mad Oak Studios in Allston, Massachusetts, to join Jersey doomers Solace as they mix their upcoming Small Stone Records debut, A.D. I’m not sure yet what format the actual in-studio feature is going to take — mostly I think it depends on how much drinking is done at any given time — but I’ll be checking in one way or another with updates, so stay tuned.

It was that special kind of cold that renders pants pointless because the wind goes right through them anyway. Nonetheless, I and the pants I decided to wear despite the futility made our way to The Clash Bar in Clifton, NJ, in plenty of time to catch Nimdok, ClamFight and headliners Iron Man in the surprisingly swanky venue. The floors were clean, the bar freshly wiped down, the lighting expensive. I’d never been to The Clash Bar before, and it hardly looked like the kind of place that would have a doom show, but hey, where Iron Man guitarist Al Morris goes, so go I.

Nimdok was up first; a kind of noisy throwaway trash rock that took elements from the ’90s AmRep scene probably without realizing it. The vocals were bad on purpose in a kind of punk rock way, but not really pulled off, and the impression I got was the young trio didn’t give a fuck about what they were doing. Sometimes that’s cool. Sometimes it just doesn’t sit well. I guess I was anxious to see the next bands, because I wasn’t buying it.

Needless to say, I survived, and they actually weren’t bad dudes and stuck around for most of the show despite being musically disparate to the other acts. You can’t ask for more than that really, when it comes to local bands. Everyone’s going to do what they do and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t and some like it and some don’t. You stand there anyway. That’s just the way it is.

With Diane Kamikaze of the famed WFMU DJing the evening, there were plenty of between-band moments of righteousness. She hit tracks from Darkthrone, Kreator, old Mastodon (you always forget how good that shit was until you hear it again after a while), and plenty of doom/stoner stuff, including “Avon” from the first Queens of the Stone Age, which sent me on a binge with that record from which I’ve yet to recover. Could be worse.

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If you look at the math, I should be there. It’s Clutch, it’s New Year’s, it’s Jersey, they’re performing the entire self-titled and filming it for a DVD, and I still have use of both my legs. Really there’s no excuse for my absence, and I can only imagine the heartbreak the band will feel at my not being there. I can just see Neil Fallon on stage now, gleefully bouncing his way through “50,000 Unstoppable Watts,” suddenly looking out on the already-melted Starland Ballroom crowd, realizing I’m not there, and — perhaps not mentioning it out loud, because he’s a professional — but maybe tearing up a bit. Little tear in his eye.

But, although the reasons for going are plentiful, the unfortunate rationality of sitting this one out seems to have won the day. I will not recommend you follow me in this course of action — if you’re lucky enough to have Clutch tickets for a New Year’s show, you damn well better use them — but here are my reasons for not seeing one of my favoritest bands rock in 2010:

01. Starland Ballroom.
I’m not even going to debate the matter. Last year around this time, Clutch played Starland and it was so packed I had to leave early. When Starland Ballroom fills up, it is not only a fire hazard, but one of the most unpleasant places to exist in the entire world. You know that scene in Rambo: First Blood Part II when the Russian guy comes after the not-Viet Cong have been torturing Rambo and cuts open his chest for no good reason? It’s like that, only with overpriced Bud Light. Plus, they charge $6 to park in their parking lot, which as far as I’m concerned is like paying the gorilla to rape you.

02. I don’t have a ticket.
And the show’s sold out. Might make things difficult if I suddenly decided to make the trip.

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Aside from being closest to the valley, Sound Exchange in Wayne on Rt. 23 is one of the few genuine small mom and pop stores left around these parts. I can’t even think of another in North Jersey — maybe that one in Passaic County I can never remember the name of. There used to be Mr. Muck’s right down the road, but that closed a couple years back. And even CD World (owned by FYE) and Coconuts (I think also owned by FYE) on 46 have gone and are going out of business. So really, Sound Exchange is it.

And it’s a record shopper’s store. CDs, vinyl, cassettes, used and new, with some t-shirts and books for good measure. It’s crowded, expertly organized (side-projects next to main outlets; Brant Bjork in with Kyuss, for example), and usually being perused by one or more of the local record store types. You know the type. Anywhere else in the world, they just don’t fit, but flipping the racks, they’re right at home.

Over the years I’ve accrued more buried treasure from Sound Exchange than perhaps any other single physical store, and this time, in addition to the latest Satyricon, I was happy to find used a copy of the 1996 debut full-length from Texas doomers Las Cruces, S.O.L. When last I heard from the band (last year at around this time, actually), they were looking to hook up a release for a new LP, Dusk, through Brainticket. That may not have happened yet, but that doesn’t make S.O.L. any less enjoyable on its own.

Las Cruces was a trio in ‘96, consisting of Mark Zammaron on bass and vocals, Michael Hosman on drums and Mark Lopez on guitar. None of them are in the band since the 2005 reunion, and the sonic differences even between S.O.L. and 1998’s Ringmaster are palpable. Ringmaster may have been thicker sounding, but S.O.L. puts an unmistakable Trouble influence to excellent use on straightforward doom cuts “Sophia,” “Valley of Unrest” and “Shotgun.” Lopez’s guitar is often double-tracked, and though it’s somewhat simplistic, the album is more than welcome to doom its way into my collection. For $6.98, you can’t really go wrong.

The issue was that I’d been standing in Vintage Vinyl for nearly an hour already and wasn’t any closer to finding a single thing I wanted to buy. Okay, that’s not exactly true, but there was nothing I was willing to shell out for at the new or used prices. I’d been all through the used bins, back and forth through the alphabet of the new stuff too, and nothing.

I could have just left. That probably would have been the reasonable course of action. But I’m not a reasonable man, and so — as I stared at the racks one more time and the archetypal cute record store girl behind the counter in the SunnO))) hoodie and Mastodon t-shirt with the dyed red hair began, increasingly, to give me funny looks because there weren’t that many other people in the store and I was the guy who’d been pacing around for almost 60 minutes — I finally just decided to grab something and go. That something was Across Tundras‘ 2008 full-length, Western Sky Ride.

It was right there, I was standing in front of the ‘A’ section, and I just wanted to get out of there. I panicked. And because I remembered liking the first Across Tundras record, 2006’s Dark Songs of the Prarie, well enough, I figured I’d be alright.

Wrong-o.

Out in the parking lot, I disrobed the disc of its shrinkwrap and popped it in, taking out the Them Crooked Vultures CD which I’d been listening to for the umpteenth time. The first song up was “Carrion Crow.” I don’t know what I expected of it — maybe something more atmospheric, � la Earth — but what I got was sloppy post-metal that sounded like it was recorded in a basement (and not in a good way) and immediate buyer’s remorse. And the only good riff in the song? They fucking WHISTLED over it. Hey man, I’m all for experimentation, more than most, but throw me a bone.

I didn’t make it all the way through “Thunderclap Stomp” before just skipping to the last track, “Gallow’s Pole” to see if it was a Zeppelin cover. Once I ascertained it wasn’t, out came Western Sky Ride. Maybe permanently. There goes $14 I’ll never see again. Too much hip, not enough good.

It’s a pretty god damn complicated process to figure out who’s who when it comes to East of the Wall and Biclops, since the two bands have been basically sharing lineups, but now they’ve cleared it up and officially made it all under the banner of the former. Biclops‘ Resentiment, due out next summer, will now be an East of the Wall album, and everything else they do from here on out will be as well. Confusion be gone!

The PR wire has names and places:

East of the Wall is excited to announce its new lineup. Joining the band are guitarist Chris Alfano and drummer Seth Rheam. Both played in the band Biclops with East of the Wall bassist Brett Bamberger and guitarist Kevin Conway. Due to the merging of the two bands� lineups, all music created by the aforementioned collective, along with guitarist Matt Lupo, will be released under the name East of the Wall. This will include the release of the group�s next record, Ressentiment, due out next summer through Translation Loss Records.

With this lineup change, East of the Wall has parted ways with original drummer Mike Somers. The band would like to thank Mike for his outstanding musicianship and hard work since the inception of the band. Stay tuned for more info about the lineup change and other upcoming projects, and read more about the band merger here.

East of the Wall will also play a record release show in support of their three-way split with Year of no Light and Rosetta, to be released shortly on Translation Loss Records:

12/19/2009 Brighton Bar – Long Branch, NJ w/ A Fucking Elephant, Fake Gimms