Some bands — one or two labels. Frankly, one is impressive. I know I post all the time about bands getting signed and it’s a thing that happens every day, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Bands and imprints both put in a shit-ton of work, and then they need to find each other, coordinate something everyone can agree on, make a release plan, on and on and on — it can be an agonizing, anxious process.

I mention it because as you look through the PR wire info below about The Dry Mouths‘ forthcoming EP, When the Water Smells of Sweat, you’ll notice there are no fewer than seven different labels standing behind the release. Seven. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen that many parties standing behind a single offering. And it’s not even a full-length! I mean, don’t get me wrong — listening to the six-and-a-half-minute closer “Doomental VI: Law Far Low Par,” I get it — but still. That’s a pretty considerable gathering. Imagine getting seven people to agree on anything. Ever.

On the other hand, The Dry Mouths manage to cover a pretty wide swath of sound on the short release, so maybe it’s a case of everyone hearing something different. Whatever got the job done, kudos.

Here’s info off the PR wire:

After 12 years touring around Spain, and five studio albums, The Dry Mouths have made a name for themselves in the Spanish Underground Music Scene.

Over the years, The Dry Mouths have evolved and played their cards between different styles, from psycho rock to alternative rock or stoner. As a result, they bring us “When The Water Smells Of Sweat” (2018), a 6-track EP recorded, produced and mixed at their recording studio, Desert City Studio, and containing the singles “Catalonian Cream” and “Doomental VI: Law For The Law Par”.

“When The Water Smells Of Sweat” is released on 12″ and CD thanks to seven indie record labels: Aneurisma Records, Spinda Records, RadiX Records, Cosmic Tentacles, Surnia Records and Zona Rock Productions from all over Spain, and Tim Tam Records from Germany. The awesome artwork is by local artist Ivan Carreño, who brings the visual experience to the next level, closer to psychedelia.

ALBUM: When The Water Smells Of Sweat
YEAR: 2018
FORMAT: EP/MinilP. 12″ Vinyl and CD
LABELS (Co-Edition): Aneurisma Records, RadiX Records, Cosmic Tentacles, Spinda Records, Surnia Records, Tim Tam Records, Zona Rock Productions

TRACKUST,
1. Low Clouds (2:13)
2. Catalonian Cream (4:34)
3. The Whip (3:35)
4. When The Water Smells Of Sweat (1:13)
5. This Could Be The Beginning Of A Beautiful Friendship (3:54)
6. Doomental VI: Law Far Low Par (6:33)

Produced by The Dry Mouths
Recorded and Mixed at Desert City Studio
Mastering by Mario G. Alberni (Kadifornia)
Artwork by Ivan Carreno
Music and Lyrics by The Dry Mouths

MEMBERS:
Christ O. Rodrigues: Guitar & Vocals
Andy Reyes: Bass, Backing Vocals, Synth, Sax
Josh Morales: Drums, Backing Vocals

www.thedrymouths.com
FACEBOOK.com/thedrymouths
YOUTUBE.com/thedrymouths
thedrymouths.BANDCAMP.com

The Dry Mouths, “Doomental VI: Law Far Low Par”

Swamp blues mysticism, metallic devilry and Americana folk balladeering meet head-on in the new single from Dee Calhoun. Even as the Iron Man vocalist reels from the recent passing of that outfit’s founding guitarist, “Iron” Alfred Morris III, earlier this month, he’s preparing as well to issue his second solo album for Argonauta Records, titled Go to the Devil, on March 30.

The new record’s been a while in the making — it was recorded last winter and details began to emerge not so long thereafter — but as Calhoun gets closer to unveiling the follow-up to 2016’s Rotgut (review here), he starts to reveal a little bit more about his creative process in the interim. For example, the new single “Jesus, the Devil, the Deed” would seem to tell a similar story as a novella Calhoun put out last summer, with a narrative brought to bear in bayou-style darkly Christian themes, told as ever through his powerful voice, ready to soar at a moment’s notice.

I haven’t heard the entirety of Go to the Devil as yet, so can’t necessarily speak to how “Jesus, the Devil, the Deed” interacts with its surroundings in that context, but with the active participation of Iron Man bassist Louis Strachan as a stage and studio partner accompanying Calhoun, the sound of “Jesus, the Devil, the Deed” is full in tone and would seem to offer a sense of breadth expanded from Rotgut just two years ago. Again, that may or may not be the case all the way around, but it’s certainly nothing to complain about as regards a first impression from the new long-player.

While we continue to wait for specifics on Calhoun‘s impending European tour dates, you can check out the clip for “Jesus, the Devil, the Deed” here, followed by more info from the PR wire.

Please enjoy:

Dee Calhoun, “Jesus, the Devil, the Deed” official video

Go to the Devil, the second solo album from IRON MAN vocalist DEE CALHOUN is going to be released by ARGONAUTA Records on March 30th, 2018.

“A very cold, very rainy autumn night. An unnamed man walks the barren streets, at the end of the line and at the end of his rope. His life has gone awry, and he seeks the one man who can perhaps remedy it. That man’s name is Jesus Christ.”

“When the man finds Jesus, he won’t ask for help or mercy; he’ll instead ask for the return of his soul, a soul that he pledged as a child, but now wants repossession of. A new buyer has come along, you see; a buyer in a top-dollar black suit, and whose malevolent presence has guided this man’s quest, every tormented step of the way…”

DEE CALHOUN “Go to the Devil” CD is available here: http://bit.ly/2rvQDz9

DEE CALHOUN, with the accompaniment of bassist LOUIS STRACHAN (both in studio and on stage), will tour Europe next Spring, with gigs in Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, France, Belgium, Hungary, Austria, Czech Republic, Switzerland. Details to follow soon.

Dee Calhoun website

Dee Calhoun on Thee Facebooks

Argonauta Records webstore

Argonauta Records on Thee Facebooks

Well, the year just got better. March just got better. Pretty much everything just got better. You want to make something better? A new Dead Meadow LP should do the trick. The Los Angeles-based heavy psych/shoegaze masters will issue their new album, The Nothing They Need, via their affiliated Xemu Records imprint on March 2, which as it just so happens is the same day they kick off a month-long, coast-to-coast US tour. Amazing how that kind of thing happens. You know, when stuff is coordinated. By professionals. Who know what they’re doing.

Speaking of professionals who know what they’re doing, Dead Meadow‘s newly-streaming single “Keep Your Head” shows them very much to qualify. Six minutes of glorious psychedelic drift, you say? Can do.

The PR wire brings art and details and tour dates and audio and whatnot:

DEAD MEADOW ANNOUNCE NEW ALBUM THE NOTHING THEY NEED TO BE RELEASED ON MARCH 2, 2018

FIRST SINGLE “KEEP YOUR HEAD” REVEALED
SPRING TOUR DATES ANNOUNCED

Dead Meadow are happy to announce they will be releasing a new album, The Nothing They Need (Xemu Records), on March 2, 2018. Today they share the album’s first single, “Keep Your Head” which perfectly exemplifies the band’s unique marriage of Sabbath riffs, dreamy layers of guitar-fuzz bliss, and singer Jason Simon’s melodic croon.

In support of The Nothing They Need, Dead Meadow will be touring the US with dates kicking off March 2 and hits, among others, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Boston, Toronto, and Chicago before concluding at Levitation in Austin, TX on April 26. Further, Dead Meadow will be playing in Los Angeles at Orpheum (Night on Broadway) on January 27. The full tour is listed below and tickets are on-sale now.

With the release of The Nothing They Need, Dead Meadow’s Steve Kille and Jason Simon celebrate twenty years of the band with eight songs that feature everyone that has been musically involved with the band over the years. They’re joined by original drummer Mark Laughlin, Stephen McCarty (the drummer throughout the Matador years), and current drummer Juan Londono. Cory Shane joins them on guitar for some Feathers era dual guitar interplay. The album was recorded in Dead Meadows’ studio/rehearsal space, The Wiggle Room.

As with the rest of their catalog, Dead Meadow assert The Nothing They Need is meant to be an escape – “a surreal journey.” Yet Kille notes, “I think there is a touch of apocalyptic vibes to the new album especially with the cover art that is being assembled. There is so much rhetoric and negative energy in the bigger picture of the world it is hard to not to have that show through in art. Though in the small world of people I know and we meet on tour everyone is still just as optimistic though it gets harder every day.. I think a lot of the album’s lyrics mirror that sentiment.”

While Dead Meadow met in and around Washington, D.C.’s punk/indie scene, the trio draws more of its sound from such classic rock legends as Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and Black Sabbath. The trio formed in the fall of 1998 and their widely-acclaimed self-titled debut album was released in 1999. Within a relatively short period, the D.C. trio received offers to tour with everyone from local D.C. acts like The Make-Up and Fugazi to psychedelic rockers Brian Jonestown Massacre. What has followed since are seven studio albums – three via Matador records (Shivering King and Others (2003), Feathers (2005), and Old Growth (2008)) – two live albums which includes Three Kings, a feature length live film and soundtrack and more tours across the USA and Europe than the band can count. And while the person behind the drum kit has changed over the years, the core of Dead Meadow – Jason and Steve – have continued to play together throughout. Since 2007 they have been based in Los Angeles.

The Nothing They Need Tracklisting:
1.) Keep Your Head
2.) Here with the Hawk
3.) I’m So Glad
4.) Nobody Home
5.) This Shaky Hand is Not Mine
6.) Rest Natural
7.) The Light
8.) Unsettled Dust

TOUR DATES
1/27 Los Angeles, CA @ Orpheum (Night on Broadway)
3/02 Tucson, AZ @ Flycatcher
3/03 Albuquerque, NM @ Sister
3/04 Oklahoma City, OK @ 89th Street Collective
3/05 Ft Worth, TX @ City Tavern
3/06 San Antonio, TX @ Period Modern
3/07 Houston, TX @ White Oak
3/08 Little Rock, AR @ White Water Tavern
3/09 Nashville, TN @ Springwater
3/10 Atlanta, GA @ Drunken Unicorn
3/11 Birmingham, AL @ The Firehouse
3/13 New Orleans, LA @ Santos
3/14 Pensacola, FL @ Chizuko
3/15 Tampa, FL @ Crowbar
3/16 Miami, FL @ Gramps
3/17 Orlando, FL @ Will’s Pub
3/18 Jacksonville, FL @ Nighthawks
3/20 Wilmington, NC @ Reggie’s 42nd Street
3/21 Asheville, NC @ Mothlight
3/22 Raleigh, NC @ Kings
3/23 Washington D.C @ Black Cat
3/24 Richmond, VA @ Strange Matter
3/25 Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts
3/26 Brooklyn, NY @ Rough Trade
3/28 Boston, MA @ Sonia
3/29 Quebec City, QC @ la Source de La Martinière
3/31 Toronto, ON @ Velvet Underground
4/01 Rochester, NY @ Bug Jar
4/03 Detroit, MI @ Deluxx Fluxx
4/04 Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen
4/05 Kansas City, MO @ Riot Room
4/06 Denver, CO @ Globe Hall
4/07 Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban
4/08 Las Vegas, NV @ Bunkhouse Saloon
4/26 Austin, TX @ Levitation

https://www.facebook.com/DeadMeadowOfficial/
https://www.instagram.com/thedeadmeadow/
https://twitter.com/Deadmeadowltd
http://www.deadmeadow.com/
http://www.xemu.com/

[Click play above to stream ‘Carnal Sacrifice’ from King Witch’s Under the Mountain. Album is out March 16 via Listenable Records.]

Some heavy metal makes its impact with raw, blistering fury. It speaks to something primitive and disaffected in its audience, manifesting a sense of violent otherness that, at times, pushes the limits of sonic endurance to its very extremes. King Witch don’t play this kind of metal. They play the other kind. As the Edinburgh-based four-piece make their noteworthy debut with the nine-song Under the Mountain via Listenable Records, they do so with an overriding sense of poise and clarity of purpose. Their sound is crisply-presented, their songwriting efficient, their performances energetic and powerful.

Individual tracks present different vibes, whether that’s the rolling undulations and progressive forward drive of third cut “Solitary” or the thrashier thrust of the later “Possession,” but especially with a foundation of hooks like those of “Carnal Sacrifice” and the near-seven-minute centerpiece “Approaching the End,” which recalls finer moments of post-Ozzy-era Black Sabbath in its sense of class and stage-presence-in-the-studio spirit, Under the Mountain is unafraid either to blaze ahead at top speed directly in the face of the listener or to stand back and manifest its ideas with a precision bordering on the graceful. As Under the Mountainwas preceded only by a 2015 EP titled Shoulders of Giants, it is all the more impressive to consider for being the band’s debut, and with the lineup of vocalist Laura Donnelly, guitarist Jamie Gilchrist, bassist Simon Anger and drummer Lyle Brown, King Witch emerge from their first album having showcased present realization and future potential in kind. That’s the kind of metal they play.

They execute it by engaging with a number of subgenres, and opener “Beneath the Waves” brims with rolling intention and sets a tone somewhere between Candlemass and less specifically doomed, updated NWOBHM methods. A current of keys adds flourish to the arrangement, but the most striking immediate effect comes from Donnelly‘s vocals, which from “Beneath the Waves” and into the commanding chorus of “Carnal Sacrifice” and even in the more laid back chug of “Solitary;” one can her a trained-seeming vibrato that only works to bolster the coherence of the material overall. She stands up to the Judas Priest-ery of the subsequent title-track, on which Gilchrist offers a particularly choice guitar lead, a bit of shred setting up the dynamic tempo change into the chunkier “Approaching the End,” which is perhaps the most singularly doomed moment on Under the Mountain, though neither the guitar nor the vocals are wanting for showcase moments throughout the proceedings.

The initial shove Under the Mountain elicits in “Beneath the Waves” and the shouting hook of “Carnal Sacrifice,” while still controlled in style and delivery, is an energetic blast to start the record, and though “Solitary” seems to move immediately outward from there with a spacious guitar intro and longer runtime, it remains informs by the vitality of the tracks prior, and the same could certainly be said of the careening title-track that follows, its jabbing riff opening up to a thrash-style chorus that would seem to reveal Anger‘s bass as the secret weapon of the band, subtly thickening and complementing the rhythm while adding flourish to stand up to Brown‘s drums. A slowdown about halfway through gives “Under the Mountain” a break into nod that once more Donnelly guides the audience through masterfully, and when the gallop begins anew to toward a final chorus, it’s a further highlight of the songwriting acumen at work on Under the Mountain as a whole and the sheer efficiency with which King Witch bring their material to bear.

That notion extends to the interactions between the tracks across the record’s span as well as to the songs themselves, as already heard in the tempo shift between “Carnal Sacrifice”‘s riotous finish and the start of “Solitary.” Likewise, “Approaching the End” — which might be the highlight achievement here in blending classic metal, doom and an innate sense of personality in one summary progression — picks up with a slower pulse than the title-track before it, and as by its end it hits a raging payoff, the subdued and bluesy strum that follows in “Ancients” feels like all the more of an aesthetic outward reach on the part of King Witch — a departure from the strictly metallic vibe that they’re no less able to pull off cleanly and with intent. Brown‘s toms signal a kind of middle ground resolution in the subsequent “Hunger,” and sure enough, what emerges there is one of Under the Mountain‘s most resonant chugs, a spacious verse and a sweeping chorus, all of this speaking to perhaps the stylistic melding process that the band might undertake as they move forward from this debut.

Always difficult to speculate on that kind of thing, but if there’s a point being made as King Witch round out Under the Mountain, it’s on the more furious side of their sound, which frankly it sounds like they’re having too much fun executing to expect it to completely disappear anytime soon, whatever their sound ultimately becomes. Both under four minutes long, “Possession” and “Black Dog Blues” make a sharp finishing duo, the former with a vicious forward thrust and the latter with head-spinning percussive turns as if to make the point that the band has only begun to explore the various methods of what will eventually become their style.

The real question coming out of Under the Mountain is whether that style will remain as multi-faceted as it is in these songs or cohere over time into some combination of elements through which King Witch find further individualized expression, but this concern is for the next record, and if anything, Under the Mountain demonstrates with its urgency and ambition that this is a group not just working haphazardly toward whatever ends they may discover along the way. Instead, these tracks clearly indicate a group working as one unit with common goals, and listening to the finished product of Under the Mountain, it’s hard to imagine the first of those common goals hasn’t been realized.

King Witch on Thee Facebooks

King Witch on Instagram

King Witch on Bandcamp

Listenable Records website

Listenable Records on Thee Facebooks

Listenable Records on Twitter

[TO ENTER GIVEAWAY: Leave a comment on this post with your email address in the form. You’ll be contacted at that address if you win.]

This week marks the arrival of the new full-length from progressive metallers Black Space Riders. Given the title Amoretum Vol. 1 (review here) and set for issue through Cargo Records in the band’s native Germany, MVD in the US and various other parties in different regions around Europe and beyond, it’s an adventurous listen that, like much of the group’s work to-date, remains underappreciated for its stylistic reach and accomplished level of songwriting.

Well, I can’t make everyone everywhere listen to everything I think is cool. What I can do, however, is make sure the platter gets into someone’s hands who’s willing to give it a shot. Maybe you’re a Black Space Riders fan. Maybe you’re a free vinyl fan. Either way, I can think of no reason why you wouldn’t enter this giveaway and take your chances at winning a copy of Amoretum Vol. 1, which gracefully brings together heavy rock, prog, metal and a slew of other forward thinking impulses to take an honest and engaging look at the world in which we live. Quality record. You could own it.

I’m gonna keep this post short because I’d rather have you enter the contest than read my blathering. Three quick things: Thanks to the band for offering up the platter to some lucky winner from somewhere around the world, and thanks to you in advance for taking part in the giveaway. Also, as always please keep in mind that I have no interest in storing email addresses, selling info or anything like that. I’m neither organized enough nor devious enough for that shit. I’m just a dude who likes to talk about music and hook people up with free platters when I can.

So yeah, have at it. If you win, I’ll drop you a line a week from today or thereabouts. In the meantime, you can hear some of the record on the Bandcamp player below and chase down more info at the links that follow. Dig in.

[TO ENTER GIVEAWAY: Leave a comment on this post with your email address in the form. You’ll be contacted at that address if you win.]

Black Space Riders, Amoretum Vol. 1

Black Space Riders webstore

Black Space Riders on Thee Facebooks

Black Space Riders on Twitter

Black Space Riders on Bandcamp

London’s Green Lung will release their first EP, Free the Witch, on Feb. 19. You might recall the band hit on a fascinating stylistic blend of pastoralism, heavy riffing and underlying metallurgy with their 2017 two-songer demo, Green Man Rising (review here). Well, I’m not saying I’ve heard the new four-track outing or anything — oh wait, that is very much what I’m saying, yes — but it would seem at least on first/second impression that Free the Witch finds Green Lung working to solidify a cohesive whole and individual approach from their swath of influences, and, if the eight-minute roll of “Older than the Hills” is anything to go by, getting to where they’re going with little to no trouble whatsoever.

Bottom line: If you’ve dug the work of Elephant Tree or were into the first Sigiriya record when that came along, keep an eye on these guys.

To herald the EP’s impending issue, Green Lung have a new single straming for opening track “Lady Lucifer.” You can check it out at the bottom of this post, of course, but first, the PR wire has its requisite say:

GREEN LUNG announce debut EP Free the Witch, release ‘Lady Lucifer’ single

???Today Green Lung release ‘Lady Lucifer’, a single taken from their upcoming debut EP Free the Witch, set to be released on 19th February on digital and cassette via Deckhead Records. The single (along with b-side ‘When the Axe Comes Down’) is streaming now on Spotify.

‘Lady Lucifer’, the follow-up to last year’s well received demo ‘Green Man Rising’, sees the band encounter a femme fatale straight out of a 70s Jess Franco or Jean Rollin movie. Producer Wayne Adams of Bear Bites Horse Studio (Vodun, Ghold, Riddles) brings the band’s sound into high definition, shearing off the woolly fuzz of the demo and sharpening the impact of their soaring vocals and thundering tone. With an irresistible chorus, barrage of riffs and virtuosic solo, the single harks back to the occult-obsessed catchiness and groove of early 90s purveyors of doom and gloom like Cathedral and Type O Negative, displaying an uncanny ear for melody without sacrificing any of the band’s psychedelic heaviness. The accompanying promo video, directed by Tracy Mathewson, features clips of the band performing alongside a host of leading ladies from vintage horror cinema.

The Free the Witch EP is now available for pre-order on the band’s Bandcamp page, and on Deckhead Records’ Bandcamp for US customers.

Green Lung bio:

Green Lung combine crushing heaviness with soaring hooks, summoning up the proto-metal spectres of Black Sabbath and Pentagram, the psychedelic heft of heavy prog and the anthemic gloom of Danzig and Type O Negative; all the while dragging those influences into the 21st Century and sculpting them into a sound that is entirely their own.

Hailing from South London and made up of vocalist Tom Templar, guitarist Scott Masson, bassist Andrew Cave and drummer Matt Wiseman, the band released a demo, ‘Green Man Rising’, in 2017 which will be followed by a debut EP, Free the Witch, on February 19th 2018. The band have been critically acclaimed and have shared the stage with a host of UK heavy titans including the likes of Desert Storm and Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard.

Green Lung is:
Tom Templar – Vocals
Scott Masson – Guitar
Andrew Cave – Bass
Matt Wiseman – Drums

https://www.facebook.com/greenlungband
https://www.instagram.com/greenlungband/
http://www.greenlung.co.uk/
https://greenlung.bandcamp.com/
https://deckheadrecords.bandcamp.com/

Green Lung, “Lady Lucifer”

On March 16, Denver four-piece Green Druid will release Ashen Blood, their debut full-length, via Earache Records. The label is quick to break out the reminder that once upon a quarter-century ago it stood behind a relatively unknown riffy band called Sleep, and neither is the comparison moot in terms of the various influences under which Green Druid might be working, though the harsher screaming that emerges in the now-streaming-hey-there-it-is-at-the-bottom-of-this-post-amazing-how-these-things-work-sometimes-isn’t-it video for “Dead Trees” speaks to sludgier and more extreme vibes, and if you listen hard enough, there’s some Electric Wizard poking through as well.

As Denver’s heavy underground has bloomed in the last couple years around varied bands like Primitive Man, The Munsens, Cloud Catcher and events like The Decemburger and Electric Funeral Fest, the city is quickly developing a reputation for quality alongside its quantity, and nothing I hear so far from Green Druid — Earache has a couple tracks posted and the band released a self-titled EP in 2015 — should do anything to change that. Isn’t it funny how weed gets legalized and then all of a sudden there are a bunch of killer bands coming up? The damnedest thing.

Just kidding, obviously. I don’t want to go around making assumptions about anyone’s lifestyle or anything.

Info from the PR wire:

GREEN DRUID: Psychedelic Stoner Doom Collective To Release Ashen Blood Debut Full-Length Via Earache Records This March; Album Details Revealed Plus New Track Streaming

Psychedelic stoner doom collective GREEN DRUID will release their debut full-length Ashen Blood via Earache Records this March. Brooding, atmospheric, and isolationist with weighty riffs summoning the Lovecraftian horrors of the cosmos, GREEN DRUID’s music entrances listeners with tales of the Old Blood and of dismal worlds too soon forgotten.

From the label that brought you Sleep… welcome to the stage Green Druid. Brooding, atmospheric, isolationist… with weighty riffs summoning the Lovecraftian horrors of the cosmos, Green Druid’s psychedelic doom entrances listeners with tales of the Old Blood and of dismal worlds too soon forgotten.

Hailing from the land of Denver, Colorado – the first US city to legalize marijuana – GREEN DRUID worships at the feet of the monolithic amplifier, and performs holy communion with the tremorous onslaught of murky tones that emanate from its maw. Written during ‘the most chaotic and depressing of circumstances’ Ashen Blood is over an hour and fifteen minutes of crushing Psych-Doom.

“While our first EP and foray into the world of doom could be viewed as us learning the ins-and-outs of the genre, Ashen Blood is where we really started to hone in on our own voice,” issues the band. “Taking influence from the dark fantasy landscapes of games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne, we strove to create a truly doomed psychedelic experience.”

Ashen Blood will descend upon the ears of the worthy on March 16th on CD, LP, and digital formats. For preorder bundles, go to THIS LOCATION.

In related news, GREEN DRUID will rumble the stages of several venues in the coming weeks with additional performances to be announced soon. See all confirmed dates below.

GREEN DRUID:
2/02/2018 3 Kings Tavern – Denver, CO w/ Palehorse, Palerider, Weathered Statues
2/09/2018 Bar Bar – Denver, CO w/ The Hazytones, Green Mountain, Pennysick
2/22/2018 Bar Bar – Denver, CO w/ Ghosts of Glaciers, Kenaima, Vexing

Ashen Blood Track Listing:
1. Pale Blood Sky
2. Agoraphobia
3. Dead Tree
4. Cursed Blood
5. Rebirth
6. Ritual Sacrifice
7. Nightfall

GREEN DRUID:
Graham Zander – guitar
Chris McLaughlin – guitar/vocals
Ryan Sims – drums
Ryan Skates – bass

http://www.facebook.com/greendruidband
http://twitter.com/GreenDruidBand
http://www.instagram.com/greendruidband
https://greendruid.bandcamp.com/
http://www.earache.com
http://www.facebook.com/earacherecords

Green Druid, “Dead Tree” official video

Like a good challenge? Sweet, because if you think you’re up for it, Baltimorean guitar-eschewing foursome Snakefeast throw down a rampaging tumult of weirdness on their impending long-player, In Chaos, Solace. Their second album for Grimoire Records and set for release on March 2, it’s an eight-song, 31-minute excursion into brutalist angularism, noise and pummel, and if that sounds scary, rest assured, it is. But what’s truly terrifying? There’s a plan at work. It’s a plan like something out of a nightmare that would keep Mike Patton up in the wee hours, but a plan just the same.

To wit, the blends of jazzy runs between Aran Keating‘s tenor sax and the start-stop bass staccato of from Carson Korman on “Ruin” or the way the earlier “Shroud” screeches out before leaning into its groove coming out of the deceptively atmospheric opener “Pyre.” Whether it’s drummer Dave Cavalier (also of Black Lung) matching Keating‘s jumping notes with pops on his snare or providing a foundation of tom runs beneath the largely indecipherable growls of Grimoire‘s own Phil Doccolo in the second half of the penultimate “Era,” or the simple choice on the part of the band to cap the record with a take on Queen‘s “Ogre Battle” from Queen II — which would also seem to be the only track the band has recorded with a title more than one word long — Snakefeast‘s sophomore full-length may indeed be living up to its title for the group itself, but it offers precious little quarter to those who’d be bold enough to take it on front to back.

It can be a fine line between experimentalism and progressivism when it comes to a given band’s style. As regards Snakefeast, I lean more toward the latter and think of In Chaos, Solace as a fusion of jazz, metal, weighted-groove grind and post-hardcore, but however many subgenres they may or may not be throwing into their scorching aesthetic melting pot, they’re unquestionably working on a wavelength of their own and seem only too proud to showcase that fact in their material. That plan that underlies all the outward bombast and torrential intensity? They pull it off.

You’ll find a track premiere for “Pyre” at the bottom of this post. More info on the album, including a quote from the band, follows:

Snakefeast – In Chaos, Solace

Snakefeast’s 2018 full-length “In Chaos, Solace” is the long awaited follow up to their 2015 album “The Pythoness,” which was their first proper album, following a short split they did with fellow Baltimore band Queenwolf in 2014.

Snakefeast is a 4 piece, totally guitar-free band, featuring blues-prog riffs galore on bass, groovy-yet-crisply-technical drumming, sprawling saxophone parts woven throughout, and Phil Doccolo on amorphous screams.

This is their first full-length that was written with a dedicated sax player in the band for the songwriting, as opposed to just adding sax during the recording process, which is what they had done on their previous releases. You may recognize their drummer, Dave Cavalier, from his role as guitarist and vocalist in Baltimore’s Black Lung.

Tracklisting:
1. Pyre
2. Shroud
3. Itch
4. Ruin
5. Tome
6. Coven
7. Era
8. Ogre Battle

Releases March 2, 2018.

Snakefeast on “Pyre”:

“We used to be a three-piece with intermittent saxophone, but now the saxophone is a key part of our sound and composition. We started treating the sax like a vocalist, and the vocals as more of a textural element. We’ve always sought to combine jazz and metal aesthetics and continue to explore new ways to achieve this through our choice of instruments and song structures.”

Snakefeast is:
Dave Cavalier – Drums
Carson Korman – Bass Guitar
Phil Doccolo – Vocals
Aran Keating – Tenor Saxophone

https://www.facebook.com/Snakefeast/
https://snakefeast.bandcamp.com/
http://www.facebook.com/GrimoireRecords
https://grimoirerecords.bandcamp.com/

Snakefeast, “Pyre” track premiere