In case the references regularly dropped around here aren’t enough of an indicator, I’ll say it outright: The Big Lebowski is my favorite film of all time. Since it has an ever-growing cult behind it, I know I’m not especially unique in this regard, but I don’t care. It is my cinematic ideal.

I could but won’t linger on the topic of the film’s memorability, easily-impersonated lines and characters. Suffice it to say this is a project I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Since before I was podcasting. Since before there was The Obelisk. The idea is a relatively simple one — interspersing clips from Lebowski between songs — but the execution is much more complex.

Foremost, how to choose what to include? In a movie where virtually every line is pull-worthy, how does one decide what stays out? Was I right to sacrifice “I can get you a toe” for “I’ll suck your cock for a thousand dollars — Brant can’t watch though, or he has to pay a hundred?” I don’t know. All I can say is I did my best and I hope you enjoy.

Click here for audiObelisk Transmission 003: The Dude Abides.

Contained within, you’ll find new music from Sardonis, The Brought Low and Church of Misery (live), as well as classics from Kyuss, Melvins, Sleep, Electric Wizard, Orange Goblin and more. Full track list is after the jump…

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I don’t know if all the crap in the title of the above video is true or not. It sounds like a load to me, but on the other hand, the audio within of Deep Purple doing “Maybe I’m a Leo” from Machine Head live at the BBC rules, so I’ll put up with whatever the title wants to say about it. I’m partial to this song not only because I’ve been feeling the old man rock lately, or The Atomic Bitchwax covered it, and they’re Jersey like me, but also because I think it’s one of the earliest and best examples of the stoner rock bop that bands today still try and emulate. Killer riff, and I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you about it.

Was a hell of a week around these parts. Thanks again to everyone who checked in to read the Solace in-studio stuff. There was a lot of it, but the report from Justin is that they got through the two songs the next day and, pending the approval of vocalist Jason and one final go-over, the long-awaited A.D. is mixed. Pretty badass if you ask me.

One thing I think got overshadowed and maybe shoved off to the side by all the Solace posts was the news Karl Daniel Lidén revealed in our brief Q&A about his new project with Dozer‘s Tommi Holoppa and Johan Rockner, called Dahli. If you missed that, it’s here.

Enjoy your weekend and get some rest if you can. I know I’ll be trying. If all goes according to my evil plan, next week starts off with a new podcast, so keep it tuned in. Hopefully it’ll be up at some point over the next day or two.

A while back, I did a Buried Treasure piece on the second album by Toner Low, appropriately dubbed II, and the near-universal response I got was, “You think that’s some shit, you need to get their first record.” Well, I’m basically a slave to peer pressure anyway, so I figured the recommendations of those who took the time to make them could only be steering me in the proper direction.

There’s a line in a Nine Inch Nails song from The Fragile (their last album worth a damn) that goes something like, “I listened to everyone, now I know everyone was right.” That fits very well here.

As massive as II was — and it was — Toner Low‘s Toner Low has the dubious honor of being the first album I’ve ever run through my computer speakers that vibrated the mouse as I moved it. I could feel the vibrations of the bass in my hand while “Praying for Murphy’s Law to Arise” was on, and that only made me want to play the record even louder. So I did.

I promised myself I wasn’t going to get hyperbolic as I wrote this, because I’m still going on first impressions, but god damn, if you haven’t heard this record yet, you should seriously get on that as soon as possible. My suggestion is you do what I did following the advice of Obelisk attendee and commenter Bufftbone: get in touch with guitarist/vocalist Daan via the band’s MySpace to begin the purchasing process. Thanks to Bufftbone and everyone else who prodded me to do so.

Not sure quite what the hell I expected from Dismal Times, the 2009 debut demo EP from Chicago traditional doom outfit Earthen Grave, but I am pretty sure the problem was with my expectation. Having heard a lot of top notch trad doom lately from the likes of The Wounded Kings and Apostle of Solitude, it’s hard to think of a reason I shouldn’t have dug immediately into Earthen Grave’s first half-hour of output as well, but something about the five tracks the six-piece outfit delivered just didn’t sit right in my head.

Maybe the bar was set too high in my mind because of how much Trouble’s name has been tossed around in companion to Earthen Grave’s. Sure, the band features former Trouble bassist Ron Holzner, but that doesn’t necessarily mean Dismal Times is going to be Manic Frustration. His mere presence (and neither that of Trouble’s Jeff “Oly” Olson nor Rick Wartell) wasn’t enough to save Wet Animal, so I don’t know why it would make so much of a difference in Earthen Grave.

Or maybe it was the violin thing. Earthen Grave aren’t the first band to tout strings, and Rachel Barton Pine’s talent is obvious from the outset, but there’s something gimmicky about it, isn’t there? Like, “Hey, check us out, we have this thing, and that makes us different?” so it can be a songwriting crutch? It’s possible that’s what did it, and all the more so because Pine rarely steps out of the parameters of the riffs of guitarists Tony Spillman and Jason Muxlow (The Living Fields), or even when she does, as on the solo of “Life Carries On,” it doesn’t do much to enhance the song another guitar solo couldn’t have accomplished. I’m sure it’s exciting to watch live, stringed instruments in a rock context usually are, but the standout factor isn’t really there on the recording. It works in some spots and is awkward in others. That’s life.

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Raucous riff and roll from the Midwest isn’t something that comes across my desk every day, so when Must Destroy, the third album from Madison, Wisconsin, trio Droids Attack landed, robot-laden artwork facing up, I was immediately interested. Not only did the record live up to song titles like “The Great Wall of ‘Gina” and “Koko Beware,” but it proved to operate on a deeper level than just that surface goofiness as well. A win all around.

The Obelisk is streaming the album here if you haven’t heard it yet, and of course there’s the review as well, but I thought there might be more to say about Droids Attack, so I dialed up guitarist/vocalist/chief robot constructor Brad Van for a chat about the band’s outlook, past and future. In our extended discussion, presented after the jump, Van details his working relationship with bassist Nate Bush and drummer Tony Brungraber, their writing process, attitude on making music — and yes, robot manufacturing technique.

Please enjoy the Q&A after the jump.

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Born out of some mythically fogless San Francisco, the acid folk/rock collective Citay embody those parts of the afternoon whereby the sun, always present but never so much so as to be blinding, feels like it’s never going to go away and you, lying in the grass of some wonderfully maintained park space or public square, are rendered immortal. Over the course of three albums — 2006’s self-titled, 2007’s Little Kingdom and now, via Dead Oceans, 2010’s Dream Get Together — have delicately balanced avant garde fervor with traditional songwriting, with results both fresh and intriguing. Unlike many in this or that subset of art rock, Citay prove that experimental music doesn’t necessarily have to be abrasive.

Tim Green (The Fucking Champs) once again acts as producer for Dream Get Together, and it seems as though the title is nothing more than an apt description of what, by the estimation of principal songwriter, acoustic guitarist and occasional vocalist Ezra Feinberg, took place on the album. Joining Feinberg in Citay for Dream Get Together are electric guitarists Sean Smith and Josh Pollack, bassist Diego Gonzalez, drummer Warren Huegel and vocalists Tahlia Harbour and Meryl Press, and while the names may not be immediately recognizable in terms of tabloid covers, some were around for Little Kingdom, and it’s abundantly clear in listening to the record that Feinberg knew exactly what he was doing when compiling this lineup of his band.

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The Joel Hamilton-less touring lineup of Neurot Recordings doomers A Storm of Light are set to begin a 19-date US tour that will include West Coast shows with Shrinebuilder and Harvestman. Pretty dern nifty. The whole thing gets started tonight, Feb. 18, at Kung Fu Necktie, in Philadelphia. The PR wire has the specifics:

A Storm of Light tour dates
2/18/2010 Kung Fu Necktie – Philadelphia, PA
2/19/2010 Gallery 5 – Richmond, VA
2/20/2010 The Hideaway – Johnson City, TN
2/21/2010 King Pin Bowl – Athens, GA
2/22/2010 Club 529 – Atlanta, GA
2/24/2010 Rubber Gloves – Denton, TX
2/25/2010 Emo’s – Austin, TX
2/27/2010 23 West – Tempe, AZ
2/28/2010 Club Congress – Tucson, AZ
3/02/2010 Casbah – San Diego, CA w/ Shrinebuilder
3/03/2010 Echo – Los Angeles, CA w/ Shrinebuilder
3/04/2010 Echo – Los Angeles, CA w/ Shrinebuilder
3/05/2010 Voodoo Lounge – San Jose, CA w/ Shrinebuilder + Harvestman
3/06/2010 Oakland Metro – Oakland, CA w/ Shrinebuilder + Harvestman
3/07/2010 The Independent – San Francisco, CA w/ Shrinebuilder + Harvestman
3/09/2010 Neumos – Seattle, WA w/ Shrinebuilder
3/10/2010 Rotture – Portland, OR
3/13/2010 Triple Rock – Minneapolis, MN
3/14/2010 Bottom Lounge – Chicago, IL
3/15/2010 Beachland Ballroom – Cleveland, OH
3/18/2010 Union Pool – Brooklyn, NY

A Storm of Light ‘s 2010 touring lineup is:
Josh Graham (Battle of Mice, Blood and Time, Neurosis): guitar, vocals
Domenic Seita (ex-Tombs): bass, backing vocals
Geoff Summers (Batillus): drums
Zohra Atash (Religious to Damn): vocals

I like newbie bands. I like bands who come out of nowhere, release their own stuff and play music because they love to do it. That’s how the genre grows. I don’t get nearly as psyched about some band putting out their eighth record in 12 years, who haven’t done anything to change their sound for half their career and are just pumping out formulaic songs, as I do about getting a hold of a new demo from a group I’ve never heard before, whose approach is still growing, who maybe haven’t even figured out how they want to sound yet. That’s exciting, because you don’t know what’s going to happen. A song could go anywhere, and even if it doesn’t most of the time, giving it a shot is usually worth the gamble.

In the case of Sydney, Australia’s Arrowhead, who are a novelty right off the bat because of their locale, a self-titled, self-released demo EP is their first excursion into recording. The band formed in 2008, and the four tracks on the CD are over in just under 16 minutes (and all streaming on the Arrowhead MySpace), with few extra frills or niceties. To cap their sound in a word, I’d probably choose “Dozer,” but it’s clear from listening to “Mayflower,” “Edge of the Earth,” “Sorceress” and “Liquid in Motion” that the trio are still finding their way. The closer takes Kyuss’ “One Inch Man” guitar rhythm to a spacier, semi-psych space, while “Mayflower” and “Sorceress” provide straight-ahead riff and roll for those who can’t get enough of it. On “Edge of the Earth,” they get a little heavier (a little more new Dozer than old Dozer, if you catch my meaning), and that track proves to be the highlight of Arrowhead, even if the vocals are a bit high in the mix and cut through probably more than they should.

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