Posted in Whathaveyou on January 25th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
To be sure, this is information that would’ve been handy to have yesterday, when I posted Stoned Jesus‘ new single “Thoughts and Prayers”, but, well, I was already days late on that news and so this coming in on what seems like such a quick turnaround isn’t actually that quick a turnaround at all. I’m just trying not to be behind, which I’ve been already since last week (or like four years ago?) and so posting this now rather than letting it sit. If you could see the Google Doc that I use to keep my notes in where I organize my days, weeks, months, it would make probably only a little more sense, but still a little more.
Check out Stoned Jesus though, keeping good company with Elephant Tree, Psychlona, Samavayo, and fellow Ukrainians and Season of Mist labelmates Somali Yacht Club, as they head out on the beginning of their tour cycle supporting the upcoming album, Father Light, which, as noted yesterday, is out March 3. They’ll do Heavy Psych Sounds Fest in Italy — Torino and Bologna — and hit Sonic Whip in the Netherlands, which I hope is recorded this year as well as it was last year, resulting in live releases from Elephant Tree, among others.
These won’t be the last shows Stoned Jesus announce supporting Father Light, but this’ll be their first tour following the album’s arrival, so here are the dates as seen on the social medias. You’ll find the three album singles streaming at the bottom of this post:
Behold the first cities of #FatherLightTour – with more dates and territories to be added along the way! Looking forward to share the stage with Somali Yacht Club, Elephant Tree and Samavayo and to play the new and the old songs for y’all :)
28.04.23 (AT) Innsbruck, pmk (w/Elephant Tree) 29.04.23 (IT) Bologne, Heavy Psych Sounds Fest 2023 30.04.23 (IT) Turin, Heavy Psych Sounds Fest 2023 01.05.23 (CH) Aarau, KIFF (w/Elephant Tree) 02.05.23 -TBA- 03.05.23 (DE) Stuttgart, Goldmark’s 04.05.23 (DE) Fulda, Kulturkeller (w/Samavayo) 05.05.23 (DE) Cologne, Club Volta (w/Somali Yacht Club & Psychlona) 06.05.23 (NL) Nijmegen, Sonic Whip 07.05.23 (DE) Hannover, Faust (w/Samavayo) 08.05.23 (DE) Dresden, Beatpol (w/Samavayo) 09.05.23 (CZ) Brno, Kabinet MUZ
Recording line-up Igor Sydorenko (Arlekin, Voida, Krobak, Snakerider) – lead and backing vocals, electric and acoustic guitars, organ on track 3 Dmytro Zinchenko (Doomed City, Orkectr Che, Sekunda Kota, Smeyushiysa Tigr, Small Depo) – drums and percussion, backing vocals Sergii Sliusar – bass, backing vocals
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 24th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
There’s a fair amount of important info included in the blue PR wire text below. I mean, important if you’re looking forward to the new Stoned Jesus album, Father Light, anyhow. If not, I might ask why you’re reading this, or maybe you just kind of stumbled on this site out of the blue researching ancient phallic monuments? If so, hi. This site isn’t so much about monuments as heavy rock and roll, and Stoned Jesus are a band from Kyiv, Ukraine, about to put out their fifth album, called Father Light, through Season of Mist, which is a long-running and well-respected underground record label specializing mostly but not exclusively in metal, on March 3. I think you’re pretty much caught up.
Anyway, among the prudent details — that release date, the preorder links, recording info and so on, is the fact that the new single “Thoughts and Prayers” was written in 2019. That means before the plague, and more specifically to Stoned Jesus‘ situation, before Vladimir Putin’s Feb. 2022 invasion of Ukraine. With a pointedly Graveyardian sway — Graveyard are a band from Sweden who play a very blues-informed kind of heavy rock specifically derived from bands of the early ’70s — “Thoughts and Prayers” examines our experience of the tragedies of others, the numbing effect of social media and life behind a screen. The lyrics of the chorus, “In gardens of stone/We die alone/Waiting for someone to guide us back home/But nobody’s there/And nobody cares/Our only answer is still thoughts and prayers,” should tell you a lot about where they’re coming from.
That the song has become more relevant since the time it was written is testament to its relevance in the first place. It is one of six tracks on Father Light and the third single to be released ahead of the album’s arrival behind “CON” and “Porcelain,” both of the videos for which are also streaming below. If you listen through those and think to yourself, “Hey, each of these songs sounds kind of like it’s doing something different,” that’s on purpose and the disparity is no less a running theme throughout Father Light than the band’s engagement with their proggier tendencies and the straight-up heavy riffing on which they made their rather weighty name. Wait until you spend 11 minutes with “Season of the Witch.”
From the PR wire:
STONED JESUS Premieres Music Video for New Song, Reveals New Album Details
Ukrainian psychedelic rock trio STONED JESUS will release its new album, ‘Father Light,’ on March 3, 2023 via Season of Mist, making it the band’s debut to the label! The band is now sharing a music video for its brand new song, “Thoughts and Prayers.” The song and video can be found at THIS LOCATION while album art and other details can be found below!
Lead vocalist and guitarist Igor Sydorenko comments: “I wrote these songs mostly in 2019, we worked on them through 2020, recorded them in 2021 and were ready to release them in 2022…and finally the first batch of them is coming out as ‘Father Light’ in 2023! So this is neither our ‘pandemic’ nor our ‘war’ record, this is something I was really obsessed about many months ago – climate change, media numbness, corporations’ impact, social divisions…
“But revisiting these issues years later shows that they’re still important and this is still something that resonates with us – and hopefully will resonate with many other people, too. Musically, I think this is our most diverse and mature record to date, but there’s a good dose of old school Stoned Jesus there too!
“Anyway, enjoy this one and fingers crossed for 2024’s release of ‘Mother Dark’ – the moodier, more personal, more experimental sister album to ‘Father Light.'”
Recording studio – Spivaki Records, Ukraine Producer / sound engineer – Artem Altunin and Dmytro Zinchenko Mastering: Metropolis Studio, London, UK – Andy “Hippy” Baldwin
Shot at the club Hydrozagadka (Warsaw, PL) hours before actual Stoned Jesus concert there. Camera work by true fans and filmmakers from Poland Aleksander Kwapień and Stasiek Nietrzebka. “Thoughts and Prayers” video edited by Sergii Sliusar (who also happens to play bass for Stoned Jesus since late 2010). “Thoughts and Prayers” track recorded and mixed in 2021 by Dmytro Zinchenko (who actually plays drums in Stoned Jesus since mid-2017). “Thoughts and Prayers” song written in 2019 by Igor Sydorenko (who sings and plays guitar for Stoned Jesus, which he started back in 2009 as a solo bedroom project).
Tracklist “Father Light” 1. Father Light 03:35 2. Season of the Witch 11:34 3. Thought and Prayers 06:22 4. Porcelain 08:09 5. CON 04:10 6. Get What You Deserve 09:08
Total: 43:00
STONED JESUS recently announced their appearance on the mighty Hellfest of 2023! More information on tours/festival for 2023 will be announced on a later stage.
Recording line-up Igor Sydorenko (Arlekin, Voida, Krobak, Snakerider) – lead and backing vocals, electric and acoustic guitars, organ on track 3 Dmytro Zinchenko (Doomed City, Orkectr Che, Sekunda Kota, Smeyushiysa Tigr, Small Depo) – drums and percussion, backing vocals Sergii Sliusar – bass, backing vocals
Posted in Whathaveyou on December 23rd, 2022 by JJ Koczan
The other day, Ukraine’s Somali Yacht Club posted the kind of year-end summary on social media that’s become more or less standard practice for bands who, say, give a crap about engaging their fanbase. Earlier in 2022, the Lviv trio released The Space (review here) on Season of Mist, and toured alongside Greenleaf and countrymen labelmates Stoned Jesus, and for sure those came up, as well as hints of this tour that was then TBA.
Obviously they also talked about the war that’s ravaged their home country for most of the year. This week, Ukraine’s president traveled to the US and spoke to congress, etc., shoring up commitment to the aide and weaponry the US has provided thus far. To say it’s a shitty situation generally, but gosh my home nation lives a proxy war with Russia, and if Ukrainian citizens and infrastructure are slaughtered and destroyed in the interim, well, that’s eggs and omelets, innit? I honestly don’t know what the answer is there, between ‘how can you not help when your military budget is by far the highest in the world and you’ve held yourself up — wrongly, but still — as a global moral authority since the end of the Second World War’ and ‘what the fuck business is it of ours if they’re not in NATO.’ Consider it’s probably where the trillions of dollars that went to Afghanistan so girls wouldn’t be allowed in libraries now should’ve gone, but no question it’s a diplomatic conundrum well beyond my paygrade to solve, and I’m not making light of it. Unfortunately the loss of life is real, whether the American people are the ones experiencing it or not. But America has never really given a shit about that either.
I don’t see that war ending anytime soon. If the US pulls the rug out, Ukraine is likely sunk, and that’s basically a setup for genocide. If we send more missiles, what, Kyiv takes Moscow? Or Putin kicks off and all is forgiven? That doesn’t seem likely either. It’s a mess, ugly, and there’s no good answer. Hey, anyone see that trailer for Oppenheimer? Let’s not forget the latent threat of nuclear war hanging over our heads, as if to prove once and for all that humanity has learned jack squat in the last seventy years.
So anyway, happy holidays.
I guess what I’m trying to say is if Somali Yacht Club are somewhat disheartened despite the successes of the band in 2022, well, they’re human beings in a roiling shitshow of a situation, so that seems well justified. What can you do to help? Buy a record? Buy a shirt? I don’t know. That won’t end a war, but it might at least let them know someone gives a shit about what they’re doing.
Okay, that’s my piece. Here’s tour dates. They’ll be out with Psychlona. Sláva Ukrayíni:
Tour. May. 2023. Special guest Psychlona!
First time in Netherlands, UK, Croatia, Sweden, and Denmark! Don’t miss it.
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 2nd, 2022 by JJ Koczan
The YouTube warning that comes up is all like, ‘hey, you don’t mind witchy boobs, do you?’ So it goes. The Abbey are a new project spearheaded by guitarist/vocalist Jesse Heikkinen and vocalist Natalie Koskinen, and the pedigree in the darker realms of progressive-ish metal go beyond the two of them as well. I get a strong codified The Devil’s Blood vibe from lead single “A Thousand Dead Witches,” in terms of what’s basically black metal-style riffing born again with cultish melody overtones, but in keeping with that, I wouldn’t expect the single to speak for the whole record.
The band just signed to Season of Mist, and while they’re established players who might draw some eyes and ears on name recognition alone, there’s still a feeling of the label taking on some element of risk in pushing essentially something completely new. Given that it’s Season of Mist, who’ve by now earned audience trust for decades, that’s a prospect more exciting than quizzical, but if you find yourself feeling like there’s nothing fresh or interesting happening, here’s one that might change your mind.
No announced release date yet for their debut album, which will be called Word of Sin, but I’m kind of assuming it’ll roll out in the Spring, and given the style, I wouldn’t be surprised if they showed up in the Roadburn lineup either, though of course that’s not anything close to confirmed. For all I actually know, they might not be interested in playing live at all.
The signing was heralded thusly by the PR wire:
THE ABBEY Signs to Season of Mist, Unveils Bewitching First Single + Music Video
Season of Mist is proud to announce the signing of THE ABBEY, the emerging progressive doom metal band ft. Natalie Koskinen (SHAPE OF DESPAIR), Jesse Heikkinen (HENGET, ITERUM NATA, etc), Vesa Ranta (SENTENCED, THE MAN-EATING TREE), and Janne Markus (THE MAN-EATING TREE)! In conjunction with the announcement, the band is now revealing their bewitching first single, “A Thousand Dead Witches,” along with a chilling music video that will certainly get you in the spirit of Samhain! The clip, which was directed by Ranta, can be seen at THIS LOCATION.
THE ABBEY comments on the signing, ” We feel honored and privileged to get to write a new chapter in the history of Season of Mist – a distinguished label that has the courage and vision to do something extraordinary. We do believe that the collaboration between Season of Mist and The Abbey is going to lead us to great things.”
Regarding the single, the band adds, “Our first single has all the basic The Abbey elements: big vocals, dissonant harmonies, hauntingly beautiful melodies and tempo changes. This is The Abbey’s ode against oppression and tyranny.”
“A Thousand Dead Witches” is taken from THE ABBEY’s upcoming debut album, ‘Word of Sin,’ which will be released next year via Season of Mist! The cover artwork can be found below while more information will be revealed soon!
The artwork for ‘Word of Sin’ was created by Alexander Reisfar and can be found below! The tracklisting and additional info will be revealed at a later date!
Lineup: Jesse Heikkinen – Guitar, keyboard, percussions, vocals Natalie Koskinen – Vocals Janne Markus – Guitar Vesa Ranta – Drums Henri Arvola – Bass
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 18th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Some day, Weedeater aren’t going to be a band anymore, and you’re going to be sorry you only saw them 10 or 15 times. In all seriousness, there are few news stories that, on my end coordinating, putting together the back end, SEO — all that useless bullshit I do for this site, probably incorrectly, that isn’t actually the writing — are as easy to put together as Weedeater announcing a tour. I don’t know how many times this exact story has lumbered down the PR wire like the band’s still-worth-showing-up-to-see-live riffage in the last seven years since their last record came out, but I sure remember the last couple years when it didn’t, and I’m glad as hell it can do so once more.
Telekinetic Yeti are returning tour partners for the North Carolinian sludge mainstays — Tone Deaf Touring pairs its acts well — and Donnie Doolittle will open the shows. You can see the singularly badass poster art by Brian Mercer below — it was a deciding factor in my putting this together at all, even with the convenience of being able to cut and paste links and all that — followed of course by the dates themselves, which find the three-piece heading up and back down the East Coast around a stop at Snowblind Fest in Atlanta, with which I’d like to be friends.
Goes like this:
WEEDEATER Announces Headlining U.S. Tour
Cape Fear metal legends WEEDEATER will be hitting the road again across the East Coast U.S. next month with support from TELEKINETIC YETI + DONNIE DOOLITTLE! The trek will kick off on November 10 in Johnson City, TN and will conclude in the band’s home-state of North Carolina in Chapel Hill on December 10!
In addition, the band will also be appearing at Snowblind Fest in Atlanta, GA on November 12. The full itinerary can be found below! All tickets can be found at THIS LOCATION:https://weedmetal.com/tour.html
WEEDEATER w/special guests Telekinetic Yeti and Donnie Doolittle 11/10/2022 Johnson City TN @ The Hideaway 11/11/2022 Charlotte NC @ Snug Harbor 11/12/2022 Atlanta GA @ Snowblind Fest – no Telekinetic Yeti, Donnie Doolittle 11/14/2022 Baltimore MD @ Ottobar 11/15/2022 Boston MA @ Crystal Ballroom 11/16/2022 Brooklyn NY @ St Vitus 11/17/2022 Rochester NY @ Bug Jar 11/18/2022 Philadelphia PA @ Kung Fu Necktie 11/20/2022 Richmond VA @ The Canal Club 12/10/2022 Chapel Hill NC @ Local 506 – w/ASG only
All of WEEDEATER’s albums are now available at fine record stores nationwide and online at the WEEDEATER Bandcamp page:https://weedeater.bandcamp.com/
Posted in Reviews on September 23rd, 2022 by JJ Koczan
See you back here Monday, huh? Yeah. If onslaughts of new music are your thing and you’ve been following along throughout this week — first, thank you — and second, we’ll pick up after the weekend with another 50 albums in this double-wide Fall 2022 Quarterly Review. This was a good week though. Yesterday had some genuine killers, and I’ve added a few to my best-of lists for the end-of-year stuff to come. There’ll be another Quarterly Review then too. Never any trouble filling slots with new releases. I’ve already started, in fact.
Madness. Didn’t I say something yesterday about one thing at a time? Ha.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
Crippled Black Phoenix, Banefyre
There are times where I wonder if Crippled Black Phoenix aren’t just making fun of other bands, their audience, themselves, and everything, and then there are times when I’m pretty sure they are. To wit, their latest outing for Season of Mist, Banefyre, is nearly an hour into its 90-plus-minute runtime before they offer up the 10-minute “Down the Rabbit Hole,” and, well, if we’re not down it by then, where the hell are we? See also “Wyches and Basterdz” near the outset. Whatever else they may be, the long-running, dynamic, progressive, dark heavy rock troupe surrounding founding songwriter and guitarist Justin Greaves are like nothing else. They offer shades of influences, discernable elements from this or that style, this or that band — “The Reckoning” has a bit of The Cure, “Blackout77” filters that through Katatonia, etc. — but are never working to be anyone but themselves. Accordingly, the thoroughly British depressive triumphs throughout Banefyre — looking at you, “I’m OK, Just Not Alright” — are part of an ongoing narrative of creative development that will hit its 20th year in 2024 and has offered listeners an arc of emotive and stylistic depth that, in whatever genre you want to try to confine it, is only ever going to escape. The only real tragedy of Banefyre is that they’ll probably have another record out before this one can be properly digested. That’ll take a few years at least.
An Oklahoma hardcore-born circus of sludge-toned tragedies personal, cultural and socioeconomic played out across nine songs/42 minutes held together at times seemingly most of all by their disenchantment, Chat Pile‘s debut album, God’s Country is arthouse angularity, raw aggression and omnidirectional intensity. As the UK’s post-industrial waste once birth’d Godflesh, so now come vocalist Raygun Busch, guitarist Luther Manhole, bassist Stin and electronic-drummer Cap’n Ron with brilliantly constructed tales of drugs, murder, suicide, loss, violence, misery, and general wretchedness of spirit, presented instrumentally with quick turns that draw from hardcore as noted, but also death metal, sludge, industrial doom, and so on. The lyrics are masterful drug poetry and delivered as such, semi-spoken, shouted, some singing, some acting out, such that you never know from what direction the next punch is coming. “Why” tackles homelessness, “Pamela” demonstrates the impossibility of coping with loss, “Slaughterhouse” is what it says, and closer “Grimace_Smoking_Weed.jpeg” resolves its nine minutes in long-held feedback and crashes as Busch frantically screams with decreasing intelligibility until it’s even words anymore. A perfect finish to a stunning, terrifying, moving first album. Don’t go into it expecting listenability. Even as “I Don’t Care if I Burn” offers some respite, it does so while describing a murder fantasy. It’s not the only one.
Fuck yes Gen-Z doom. Yes. Yes. Yes. Show the old men how it’s done. Please. Not a gray hair in the bunch, or a bullshit riff, or a lazy groove. Early Moods got their influences in line with their 2020 debut EP, Spellbound (review here), and you can still hear some Candlemass in “Broken,” but their self-titled debut LP stamps its foot to mark their arrival as something new and a fresh take on classic ideas. Vocalist Alberto Alcaraz is a distinct presence atop the hard-distorted guitars of Eddie Andrade and Oscar Hernandez, while Elix Feliciano‘s bass fuzz-rumbles through the interlude “Memento Mori” and Chris Flores‘ big-room-ready kick counts in the Trouble‘d early highlight “Live to Suffer.” Later on, “Curse of the Light” leans into the metal end of classic doom metal ahead of the chugging roll of “Damnation” and the finisher “Funeral Macabre,” but Early Moods have already put these things in play by then, as demonstrated with the eponymous title-track. Songs are tight, crisply produced, and executed to style with a promise of more growth to come. It’s an easy record to get excited about, and one of 2022’s best albums. I might just buy the tape and the CD.
Less than a year after a return born of celebrating the project’s 10th anniversary with the Ink fo’ Blood (review here) full-length, prolific visual artist, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and singer Alexander von Wieding returns with Larman Clamor‘s latest, With a Deadly Hiss. As ever, formalities are dispensed with in favor of deceptively intricate arrangements of slide acoustic and electric guitar, whatever’s-around-style percussion and von Wieding‘s telltale throaty vocals, which on “Swamp Jive” and even a bit of the six-minute finale “Eleventh Spell to Cast” draw back the throaty grit in favor of a more melodic, somewhat less performative delivery that suits the material well. Songs are mostly short — there are 11 of them and the aforementioned closer is the longest by about three minutes — but each is a blinking glimpse into the humid, climbing-vine world of von Wieding‘s creation, and in instrumentals like the manic percussion of “Monkey and the Trash Goblins” and the distortion-backed algae-delica of “Iguana at the Fountain,” the brashness of “Tortuga” and the playful falsetto of the leadoff title-track are expanded in such a way as to hint of future paths to be explored. One way or the other, Larman Clamor remains an entity unto itself in concept, craft and delivery, and if With a Deadly Hiss is just another forward step en route to the next stop on down the road, even better.
Recorded in 2021, The Necromancers‘ third album would seem to have a mind toward picking up where the Poitiers, France-based four-piece left off pre-pandemic with 2018’s Of Blood and Wine (review here). Can hardly blame them, frankly. Now self-releasing (their first two albums were on Ripple), the semi-cult heavy rockers bring an air of classic metal to the proceedings but are remarkably cohesive in their craft, with guitarist/vocalist Basile Chevalier-Coudrain fronting the band even in the studio as demonstrated on the ’80s metal roller “The Needle,” which follows the eight-minute doom-adjacent unfolding of “Crimson Hour” — and that “adjacent” is a compliment, by the way; The Necromancers are less concerned with playing to genre than with it — wherein guitarist Robin Genais adds a short but classy solo to underscore the willful grandiosity. Bassist Simon Evariste and drummer Benjamin Rousseau underscore the grooves, prominent in the verse of the title-track, and while it’s guitars up front in traditionalist fashion, the truth is all four players are critical here, and it’s the overarching affect of the whole that makes When the Void Rose such an engaging listen, rather than the individual parts. That is to say, listen front to back for best results.
Though instrumental across its vast stretches, Les Lekin‘s Limbus — their first full-length since 2017’s Died with Fear, also on Tonzonen, and third overall — begins with a verbal message of hope, lyrics in German, in the beginning intro “Licht.” That gives a specifically covid-era context to the proceedings, but as the subsequent three massive sans-vocal pieces “Ascent” (14:14), “Unknown” (8:18) and closer “Return” (22:00), unfold, they do so with a decidedly otherworldly, deeply-weighted psychedelic verve. The narrative writes itself in the titles, so I’ll spare you the pretense of insight (on my part there), but note that if it was escapism through music being sought on the part of the meditative Salzburg three-piece, the richness of what’s on offer throughout Limbus is generous enough to share that experience with the audience as well. “Ascent” swells and builds as it moves duly upward, and in “Unknown,” the trio explores post-metallic atmospherics in a crunching midsection without ever losing sight of the ambience so central to what they’re doing, while it would be hard for “Return” not to be the highlight, drums and initial bass rumble giving way to a huge sounding, engrossing procession of atmospheric density. Les Lekin have been a critical favorite for a while now, and it’s easy to hear why, but their work here holds far more than academic appeal or to-genre conformity. They embody the release they would seem to have sought and still carry an exploratory spirit despite the clearly charted course of their songs.
LightShower is the fourth session from Hungarian jammers Highbay to see release in the last year-plus, and it arrives with the immediately noteworthy backing of Psychedelic Source Records. In the vein of many of that collective’s offerings, it is live recorded, probably improvised, and wholly instrumental, the trio vibing their way into a groove early on “Walking on Bubbles” and holding gently to that locked-in, entranced feel across the following five jams. The shimmering guitar tone, particuly as “Miracle Under Water” moves into the more extended “Spaceship” and the pleasantly funky “FunKing Dragons Above Fissure Mountains,” is a highlight, but the intention here is a full set, and I won’t take away from the fuzzier, riffier emergence later on in “FunKing Dragons” either, or, for that matter, the ready-to-wander post-rock float of closer “3D(ays) Trippin’.” It’s a big universe, and Highbay have their work cut out for them if they want to feel their way through all of it, but “Spaceship” mellows its way off into a greater beyond, and even “Hungover Sadness (’90s Romance)” manages to not be a drag as filtered through the trio’s chemistry. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t be the last time Highbay are heard from this year, but they’re yet another name to add to the list of Psychedelic Source-associated acts whose jammy sensibilities are helping manifest a new generation of Eastern European lysergic rock and roll.
Think of this as less of a review and more of a general reminder to throw a follow in the direction of Berkeley, California’s dug-in-as-hell Sound Animal, or at very least let your ears pay a visit every now and again to soak up some of the weirdo drone, dance, psych electronics and whatever else might be had on any given afternoon from the prolific solo-project. “Yes, Yes, You” is the latest single, but likely not for long, and it plays out across 3:33 of keyboardian ambience and recitations of the titular reassurance that would be soul-pop were they not so definitively experimental and part of such an ongoing creative splurge. Tucked away in a corner of the Bandcamp dimension, Sound Animal comes across as an outlet for ideas as much as sonics, and with the persistent thud of a beat beneath, one, two, three, four, the melodic serenity of the wash feels like direct conversation, with the listener, the self, or, more likely, both. It is beautiful and brief, as I’m told life also is, and it may just be the thing that came after one thing and before the next, but if you stop for a minute or three and let it sink in, you just might find a more substantial place to reside. Not gonna be for everyone, but the fact that “Yes, Yes, You” is so vague and yet so clearly encouraging rather than accusatory speaks to the artistic purpose writ large throughout Sound Animal‘s e’er expanding catalog. Wouldn’t be surprised or sad to find a subsequent single going somewhere else entirely, but again, just a reminder that it’s worth finding that out.
Somewhere between classic metal and doom, heavy rock’s riff-led impulses and cultish atmospheres there resides the Pesaro, Italy, trio Warcoe and their debut album, The Giant’s Dream. Led by guitarist/vocalist Stefano — who also plays bass on some of the later tracks — with bassist Carlo and drummer Francesco proffering thickened roll and punctuating rhythm all the while save for the early acoustic interlude “Omega Sunrise,” the band nestle smoothly into a modern-via-not-at-all-modern sphere, yet neither are they retro or aping ’70s methodologies. Maybe that moment has passed and it’s the ascent of the ’80s metal and doom we’re seeing here — or maybe I just slated Warcoe and Early Moods the same day and both bands dig Trouble and Death Row/Pentagram, I won’t pretend to know — but the bass in “Fire and Snow” is more of a presence than bass was pretty much ever 40 years ago, so to call The Giant’s Dream anything but ‘now’ is inaccurate. They lean into rock on “Thieves, Heretics and Whores” and manifest grim but stately lurch before the fade of the penultimate “Scars Will Remain,” but wherever each piece might end up, the impression is abidingly dark and offers a reminder that Italy’s history of cult doom goes farther back than most. Paul Chain, Steve Sylvester, your legacy is in good hands.
Hard to find info on the Boston or Boston-adjacent extreme-metal-inflected, sludge-toned dark hardcore outfit DONE — and that may just as well be anti-social-media mystique creation as the fact that their name is ungooglable — but the tape slays. Aged and Untreated hammers 15 scathing tracks into its 28 minutes, and dies on a hill of wintry black metal and barking hardcore mostly but not completely summarized in the turns of “Soulsplitter.” The fun part is when they bounce back and forth, throw in some grind on “To Curt on Waverly,” scratch your eyes out with “Dance for Them” — the second cut behind says-it-all-in-a-minute opener “Nah” — and willfully crash into a wall on the comparatively sprawling 2:35 “I Fucking Hate Thinking About You.” Haven’t seen a lyric sheet and probably won’t if my success rate in tracking down relevant factoids is anything to go by, but shit, I lived on the South Shore for seven years, including the record-breaking winter of 2014, and it sure felt a lot like this. Maybe they’re from Arizona, and if they are, I’m sure some hack would say the same thing, but hell’s bells Aged and Untreated is an intense listen, and its wreck-your-shit violence is meted out such that even the slightly-slower punch in the first half of “Hope Trickle” makes the song feel sarcastic. I wouldn’t put it on every day, but yeah. Righteously pissed.
Posted in Whathaveyou on September 15th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
A little curious that even though Ukrainian heavy rock forerunners Stoned Jesus have issued two singles/videos from their upcoming Season of Mist label debut, Father Light, in “Porcelain” and “CON” — both streaming below — no actual release date for the album has been announced. Of course, I say this even as the Kyiv trio announce a new stretch of November touring, and I’m writing before the daily glut of 10AM East Coast US press releases come in, so it could well be that word of such a thing will come through after this is posted — that kind of thing happens from time to time; I see something on a band’s socials and jump the gun with what later turns out to be half the news and need to adjust — probably about five minutes after, if past is prologue. I hear going on tour around an album launch is a thing that happens, so it would make sense.
And you’ll no doubt note that they’ll do cuts from the largely inescapable Seven Thunders Roar even as they play new songs — I very much enjoy how stubbornly not-stoner everything they’ve done since has been — and one assumes they’ll find welcome either way. They’re Ukraine’s biggest export in heavy rock, and even the fact that they’re calling the run with countrymen VOVK the ‘Heavy Resistance’ tour speaks to the fact that they know it. Guitarist/vocalist Igor Sydorenko has been outspoken on social media in providing historical and cultural context to the Russian war of aggression in his home nation that’s been going on for the last seven months, up to and including launching the Jams for Victory series, a third installment of which has been released.
Tour announcement follows, and again, if and when word shows up about the record, I’ll let you know.
Here you go:
Your favourite psych/grunge/doom/prog trio is back on the road! STONED JESUS are going on Heavy Resistance tour in November, playing live shows in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Romania. Apart from playing the now-legendary Seven Thunders Roar (2012) material, we will premiere new tracks from our upcoming fifth LP (including recently released “Porcelain” and “CON”).
Joining us are fellow Ukrainians VOVK (post-metal/progstoner), who are currently working on the follow-up to their debut album Lair (2019). By visiting the show you can not only enjoy the music but also support Ukraine and help us win on the cultural front as well!
10.11 Kablys – Vilnius, LT 11.11 Sveta Baar – Tallinn, EE 12.11 Vagonu Haal – Riga, LV 13.11 Lemmy – Kaunas, LT 14.11 Drizzly Grizzly – Gdansk, PL 15.11 Pod Minoga – Poznan, PL 16.11 Hybrydy – Warsaw, PL 17.11 Fuga – Bratislava, SK 18.11 Form Space – Cluj-Napoca, RO 19.11 Mixtape 5 – Sofia, BG 20.11 Expirat – Bucharest, RO
Poster by Soares Artwork
Line-up: Lead-Vocals and Guitar: Igor Sydorenko Bass and backing vocals: Sergii Sliusar Drums and backing vocals: Dmytro Zinchenko
Posted in Whathaveyou on August 15th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Even by the terrifying scale of my own self-imposed pity parties, it feels like a real wank to be bummed out about this, but there’s a part of me that is anyway. What started this past March as an ultra-Swedish run with Greenleaf, Truckfighters and Asteroid, then just became Greenleaf and Truckfighters has instead morphed with the also-canceled prior Stoned Jesus and Somali Yacht Club tour to become a powerhouse Sverige/Ukraine triple-whammy, and though I was slated to attend originally in March and then again this Fall, well, my flight’s been canceled and no, I’m not going on this tour, I’m not writing a book about it and I’m not going to see any let alone all of these shows, including that Erfurt date Sept. 23 with Colour Haze, which I don’t give a fuck who you are or how many gigs you’ve seen is some remember-it-for-the-rest-of-your-life shit right there. So yes, pity party.
The reasons for tour jumblage could hardly be more valid. Plague, war in Ukraine, one of the dudes in Truckfighters expecting a baby — pretty sure it’s Niklas, so congrats to his expanding family — and no, it wasn’t really feasible given my own life situation at this point, but on the scale of escapist daydreams, this is probably the shttiest gonna-do-a-thing-then-not I’ve hit into since that time I didn’t go to Australia with Kings Destroy and Radio Moscow. Glad it’s happening though either way, so I guess call it bittersweet.
You’ll recall Somali Yacht Club earlier this year released The Space (review here) as their label-debut for Season of Mist. Stoned Jesus are ramping up to issue their own new album — the announcement for which I expect pretty much as soon as I publish this post — on the same label and have prefaced it with the single “Porcelain” that you can stream below, along with tracks from Somali Yacht Club and Greenleaf, who released Echoes From a Mass (review here) last year on Napalm and announced back in March they’d signed to Magnetic Eye Records for their next LP.
Anyway, with the caveat that that Stoned Jesus news is probably going to hit my inbox in like 40 minutes at 10AM when everyone sends their good-morning press releases out, here are the tour dates. More to come on all three of these bands because they’re rad and I enjoy writing about them. This comes from Sound of Liberation via socials.
Peace:
GREENLEAF, STONED JESUS & SOMALI YACHT CLUB – ROOTS OF HEAVINESS TOUR 2022
Hey friends,
we’re happy to announce that Stoned Jesus, Somali Yacht Club and Greenleaf will hit the road again this September as a triple pack. The two Ukrainian bands Somali Yacht Club and Stoned Jesus are allowed to leave their country again despite covid and war. We are super grateful to have the bands with us and can’t wait to finally see them live again! Teaming up with the mighty Greenleaf from Sweden it will be a tour packed with powerful riffs against war!
Check out the tourdates below, grab your tickets and join the party!
