Rest assured, I haven’t a clue what their name means, but as they’re instrumental, I’m not counting on ÖfÖ Am for wordsmithing anyway. The French trio, who reached out to me only hours before I got the first of several emails recommending I check them out, specialize in an energetic and lightly punk-influenced (listen to the drums on “Goodbye Charles”) heavy groove rock. They’re not strictly stoner, but they’ve definitely heard Kyuss and Karma to Burn seem to have left a mark, tonally as well as ethically.

That’s not a bad thing, and neither is the vitality so evident in the songs of their debut long-player, The Beast Within: A Journey in the Life of Öctaman. To be fair, there are some voices on the album — some gang chants, a spoken intro to the Faith No More-esque “Montée Religieuse” — but it’s the guitar, bass and drums (and on that track, some righteous guest keys) that are meant as focal points. They keep their material quick and to the point and earn almost as much respect for the punningly-titled “The Wieding Present” — the cover for the record is by Alexander Von Wieding — as for the music itself. Hard not to appreciate that.

It’s a big universe and it’s full of cool music. If you’ve the time and the inclination, the Montpellier three-piece do an awful lot of talking for a band with so few words. Check them out on Thee Facebooks or via the Bandcamp player below harvested from their page:

Tags: France, Head Records, Montpellier, ÖfÖ Am

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 2nd, 2011 at 4:46 pm and is filed under On the Radar. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.