Posted in Whathaveyou on May 31st, 2021 by JJ Koczan
Imagine taking nearly 20 years to put out your debut album and still being ahead of your time. As Yawning Man have steadily grown into a touring and recording act over the last 15 years, the trio-sometimes-more have gradually come to be recognized for their work among the progenitors of desert rock. At the time they first released Rock Formations (discussed here) in 2005 through Alone Records, that was hardly the case. The album was a soundscaping curio, marked out by the guitar tone of Gary Arce and defining pieces like “Perpetual Oyster” and its title-track, but still not really received with the due respect it deserved. One expects a forthcoming LP reissue through Ripple Music will work to change that.
Yawning Man working with Ripple is notable. The band had been and may still be for all I know signed to Heavy Psych Sounds, but it was Ripple that put out the Arce-inclusive Yawning Sons album this year, so following up with a Yawning Man reissue may be a precursor to working a next studio full-length or it may not. Either way, as I said, notable.
And as far as the record goes, at this point it’s inarguable. Reissue it every week until the entire planet has a copy. It’s the ‘Bright Side of the Sun’ of desert rock.
From the PR wire:
Ripple Music to reissue YAWNING MAN’s cornerstone debut ‘Rock Formations’ on vinyl this August 6th; preorder available now!
Ripple Music teams up desert rock godfathers YAWNING MAN to reissue their long sold-out cornerstone debut album ‘Rock Formations’ on vinyl this summer. It will be available on black vinyl and limited colored vinyl on August 6th, 2021, with preorder up now!
Ripple Music presents the much-demanded re-release of the first album from the legendary Palm Desert band YAWNING MAN, once known as the favorite band of Brant Bjork and among the biggest influences on Kyuss. Although formed in 1986 by Mario Lalli on bass, Gary Arce on guitar, Alfredo Hernandez on drums, the band only released their debut full-length in 2005 on Alone Records. ‘Rock Formations’ has been called “a melancholic mix of acoustic space rock with elements of surf music as well as middle eastern guitar style,” and it represents the primordial statement from one of the most important bands ever to emerge from the California desert.
YAWNING MAN bassist Mario Lalli declares: “This album truly reflects a point in our evolution as musicians where we touched on a sound that resonated with us to this day, while the band has been together since 1986 this album was essential to our growth and is very dear to us, we are very excited to be working with Ripple Music on this reissue.”
‘Rock Formations’ will be reissued on August 6th via Ripple Music, and available to preorder on: – Limited Edition Gatefold LP (200 copies pressed on pure white and royal blue color-in-color vinyl with gold splatter + 8-page art book included) – Worldwide Edition Gatefold LP (black vinyl + 8-page art book included)
Monster Magnet‘s first covers record could just as easily have been a compilation. Over the band’s 30-plus years, they’ve taken on a range of artists and songs, from Black Sabbath, MC5, Grand Funk Railroad, Hawkwind and The Stooges to Depeche Mode, Donovanand The Velvet Underground. A Better Dystopia — released in a continuing association with Napalm Records — is nothing quite so haphazard. Perhaps inevitable in its own right, it is a collection of 13 tracks (12 with a bonus) and 47 minutes that purposefully digs deeper into the band’s influences in heavy ’70s rock and proto-metal, and carries with it a more specific feeling of curation on the part of founding frontman Dave Wyndorf. No stranger to visualizing who and what Monster Magnet is on a conceptual level — also in terms of personnel — it’s easy to imagine Wyndorf picking these songs, delighting in the obscurity of some and the for-the-converted recognizability of others.
Before we get any further, the tracklisting:
1. The Diamond Mine (Dave Diamond)
2. Born to Go (Hawkwind)
3. Epitaph for a Head (JD Blackfoot)
4. Solid Gold Hell (The Scientists)
5. Be Forewarned (Macabre)
6. Mr. Destroyer (Poobah)
7. When the Wolf Sits (Jerusalem)
8. Death (The Pretty Things)
9. Situation (Josefus)
10. It’s Trash (The Cave Men)
11. Motorcycle (Straight to Hell) (Table Scraps)
12. Learning to Die (Dust)
13. Welcome to the Void – Bonus Track (Morgen)
Those who’ve done their own explorations of the 1968-’74 underground will know names like Dust, Poobah, The Pretty Things, Macabre, J.D. Blackfoot maybe even Jerusalem and Josefus thanks to reissues. Of course Hawkwind, from whose melted skulls space rock burst, were no less an influence on Monster Magnet‘s early freakouts than Black Sabbath. But Table Sraps, the spoken piece written by Dave Diamond and the Higher Elevation that leads off, and the near-punk of The Cave Men‘s “It’s Trash” — the original is an echoing, teenaged testosterone gnashing of teeth released as a 45RPM in 1966 — plunge deeper into record-collector obscurity, and that’s part of the point. Inevitable as it might be, and as much as it’s a fan-piece for sure and a plague-era holdover until Wyndorf and company can tour again and all that other stuff, it’s also a crash course in what’s made Monster Magnet who they are.
As they would, tracks range in style, tempo and structure, but the intent at the outset is to build momentum. “The Diamond Mine” sets an almost manic tone in Wyndorf‘s delivery, and “Born to Go” from Hawkwind‘s 1971 classic In Search of Space follows suit in its unmitigated thrust, which J.D. Blackfoot‘s “Epitaph for a Head” meets with two minutes of shred-forward jabbing that Wyndorf uses as a backdrop for a horror show in gleefully odd fashion. The current lineup of the band is Wyndorf, guitarists Phil Caivano and Garrett Sweeny (the latter also now in The Atomic Bitchwax), bassist Alec Morton (Raging Slab) and drummer Bob Pantella (also of Bitchwax and Raging Slab fame), but who’s playing what on a given song on an album is a crapshoot at the best of times, never mind in the middle of a pandemic lockdown, which is when A Better Dystopia would’ve come together. Still, the turn toward straight-ahead riffer fare in The Scientists‘ “Solid Gold Hell” provides a sense of repetition that serves to fluidly lead into Macabre/later-Pentagram‘s “Be Forewarned” and Poobah‘s “Mr. Destroyer,” both high points of the outing in terms of hooks and the latter settling into a righteous jam along the way. Behold Monster Magnet, digging in. Right on.
So is it time to get weird? Yeah, probably. “When the Wolf Sits” rules like the lost-classic it is, and is handled with care as one would hope, and as the band plunge into side B with C still to come — the 2LP edition of A Better Dystopia has an etching on side D — it’s with the sitar-esque sounds of The Pretty Things‘ “Death” from 1968’s bizarro-prog concept opus S.F. Sorrow that the band most reinforce their ability to range where they will. The trilogy that follows in “Situation,” “It’s Trash” and “Motorcycle (Straight to Hell)” is fast — three songs in under eight minutes — but brings three likewise differing vibes, with the scorched lead guitar clarion that culminates “Situation” leading to the push and swagger of “It’s Trash” and “Motorcycle (Straight to Hell)” a dive into willful simplicity made more complex through call and response echoes and some later-in-the-party lysergic malevolence.
A more fitting lead-in for Dust‘s “Learning to Die” would be difficult to find. Performance-wise, the pre-bonus-track closer of A Better Dystopia is an easy favorite, with Wyndorf nailing the emotional urgency of the original while of course doing so as the song is brought into Monster Magnet‘s sonic context. A maddening tension of rhythm ensues. “Learning to Die” is the longest inclusion at 6:28 and the inarguable apex, but with Morgen‘s “Welcome to the Void” behind it, there’s one last bit of psycho-delic, Echoplex’ed chicanery to be had, and that’s just fine. Think of it as a victory lap more than a song that just didn’t fit anywhere else on the album. It’s more fun that way.
And fun is a not-insignificant portion of the motivation here, it seems. There’s an edge of educate-the-people too, make no mistake, but if Monster Magnet found certainty in uncertain times by regressing in their listening habits to early inspirations — pops and hisses of worn vinyl as security blanket — they’d hardly be the only ones. If the last decade of the band’s career has proved anything, it’s that their reach goes wherever they want it to go. Their most recent LP, Mindfucker (review here), arrived early in 2018 with a turn away from some of the spacier aspects that typified the two prior redux outings, 2014’s Milking the Stars (review here; discussed here), which reworked and freaked-up 2013’s Last Patrol (review here), and 2015’s Cobras and Fire: The Mastermind Redux (review here), which had a similar if more arduous task in doing the same for 2010’s Mastermind (review here). But even for its less-psychedelic pulse, it remained petulant, energetic, archetypal. With A Better Dystopia, the view of where that defining attitude came from is made that much clearer.
Monster Magnet, “Learning to Die” (Dust cover) lyric video
Monster Magnet, “Motorcycle (Straight to Hell)” (Table Scraps cover) lyric video
Monster Magnet, “Mr. Destroyer” (Poobah cover) lyric video
Posted in Whathaveyou on May 31st, 2021 by JJ Koczan
I was very, very, very much looking forward to seeing Finland’s Swallow the Sun come through Dingbatz in April 2020 on an anniversary tour that, of course, was canceled. And of all the shows missed out on over the last year-plus, that was continues to sting as very few do. What a special night that would’ve been. A band with a sound so huge in a space small enough that the floor would’ve vibrated under your feet. For those who showed up, it would’ve been a gig to remember for decades. Swallow the Sun are undervalued anyway. Too extreme for the rock crowd, to melodic for the extreme metallers. I’ve seen them before, but still. What a night. What could’ve been.
They did manage to get a few anniversary shows in before lockdown hit though, and it’s from those that the upcoming live album, 20 Years of Gloom, Beauty and Despair – Live in Helsinki, is made. Set to release July 30 through Century Media, maybe it’ll give me some idea of what I missed out on, because it seems like too damn much to hope that that show might ever get scheduled again.
Alas:
SWALLOW THE SUN ANNOUNCES LIVE ALBUM – 20 YEARS OF GLOOM, BEAUTY AND DESPAIR – LIVE IN HELSINKI
PRE-ORDERS START TODAY
Finnish doom stars SWALLOW THE SUN announce their first ever live album 20 Years Of Gloom, Beauty And Despair – Live in Helsinki! The live album is set for release on July 30th via Century Media Records.
“Finally some good news after a year of cancellations and shitshow! We managed to play only 10 of these special 20th anniversary gigs before the whole world shut down in March 2020 and the rest of the tour got cancelled. Luckily we filmed and recorded one of the gigs, which we now release as our very first live album as we wait to be able to get back on stages again,”, states Swallow The Sun vocalist Mikko Kotamäki.
About the production Kotamäk adds, “We played the whole ‘Songs from the North II’ with a string quartet—comprised of very professional musicians, two of whom played on our previous album and appeared with us on the 70000 Tons of Metal cruise in 2018. For the first time, we also asked our fans on social media to vote for their favorite songs from each album. We then played the most-voted songs from every album.”
The vinyl version will be available in the following colors: – Black vinyl, unlimited – Golden vinyl, limited to 200 copies worldwide, only available at Levykauppa Äx – Dark green vinyl, limited to 200 copies worldwide, available at CMDistro – Deep blood red vinyl, limited to 200 copies worldwide, only available at EMP – Mint colored vinyl, limited to 200 copies worldwide, only available Nuclear Blast – Glow in the dark vinyl, limited to 200 copies worldwide, only available at the official band store
Swallow The Sun is Mikko Kotamaki (vocals), Matti Honkonen (bass), Juuso Raatkainen (drums), Jaani Peuhu (keys and vocals), Juho Raiha (guitar), and Juha Raivio (guitars).
Posted in Whathaveyou on May 31st, 2021 by JJ Koczan
Stay with me on this one, because it’s more of a tangle than the usual band-has-release thing. The Sonic Dawn are releasing a new single, covering “666,” which originally appeared on Dave Bixby‘s 1969 album, Ode to Quetzalcoatl. The single isn’t part of a new The Sonic Dawn offering though. Rather, it will appear on an upcoming compilation/collaboration work Dave Bixby’s Harbinger Orchestra, which will feature covers like The Sonic Dawn‘s, among others, and new Bixby originals. Sounds weird? Yeah, well, it probably is. You got a problem with weird?
It gets weirder in that the Harbinger Orchestra is to be an ongoing project with an open sphere of collaborators — you can apply on Bixby‘s site, linked below — and hear The Sonic Dawn’s “666” starting this coming Friday.
Info all follows:
DAVE BIXBY ANNOUNCES HARBINGER ORCHESTRA COMPILATION ALBUM. HEAR THE FIRST SINGLE, THE SONIC DAWN’S COVER OF “666” OUT 6.4
DAVE BIXBY’S HARBINGER ORCHESTRA ALBUM FEATURING FIRST NEW STUDIO RECORDINGS FROM DAVE HIMSELF IN OVER 50 YEARS AND NEW ARTISTS COVERING HIS PSYCH FOLK CLASSICS
AVAILABLE FALL 2021 PRESSED BY GUERSSEN DISTRIBUTED BY HARBINGER RECORDS
LISTEN TO SONIC DAWN SINGLE – OUT 6.4 (Art by Robin Gnista)
On June 4th, Harbinger Records will release “666” by The Sonic Dawn, a cover of the Dave Bixby original from his first record, 1969’s Ode to Quetzalcoatl. This interpretation is the lead single off of the upcoming Dave Bixby’s Harbinger Orchestra Compilation. The album is composed of covers of songs from Bixby’s first and second albums, Ode to Quetzalcoatl (1969) and Harbinger Second Coming (1970), as well as 4 new Dave Bixby originals, marking the first official Dave Bixby release in over 50 years. The covers on the album have been recorded by an international collective of musicians known as the Harbinger Orchestra.
In September of 2020, acid-soaked psychedelic folk legend and onetime cult hymnist Dave Bixby was struggling alongside thousands of musicians with the creatively stifling effects of the pandemic. Discouraged by these creative barriers and the emotional weight of a world on fire, he hung up his guitar and abandoned his notepad, retreating from his music. In the following months, Dave began correspondence with Copenhagen-based psychedelic rock band The Sonic Dawn who he had met years earlier while performing in Denmark. The trio were considering recording their own interpretation of one of his early tracks. “The idea that my encounter with The Sonic Dawn all those years ago could result in such a fantastic relationship in a time as dire as this is serendipitous. I consider them minstrels and troubadours of the rock renaissance and they have created something truly special from a song I had nearly forgotten about.” (Dave Bixby, 2021).
A short time after that, an artist from Mexico City, Ana Karen G. Barajas of Karen y Los Remedios contacted Dave about covering another of his songs. Dave was suddenly very aware of the presence his music had around the globe and the fog muffling his creativity dispersed. He would assemble a group of musicians unrestricted by geography, each adoring of his music. He appointed the collective “The Harbinger Orchestra” and in December of 2020 announced it publicly, launching the companion project Harbinger Magazine the following month.
Dave Bixby’s Harbinger Orchestra is simultaneously the culmination of 50 years of Dave Bixby’s cult influence on psychedelic and folk music as well as the genesis of a new era in his legacy that expands beyond the mythos of the man and embraces the sonic and thematic lineage of his music. While his early work is undoubtedly folk, it is rooted in his mortality-altering experience with LSD which seeps into his music as beautiful, lonely, and occasionally optimistic psychedelia. The Harbinger Orchestra compilation is a distillation of his early work with artists such as The Sonic Dawn approaching their interpretation with purist psychedelia while Dave refines themes explored in his early work with earned wisdom on 4 new tracks.
The album is a meditation on legacy, rebirth, and the cyclical nature of influence. Dave has said that he doesn’t feel ownership over the songs he wrote on those first two albums because he has led so many lives since then and the person he was is so far away from who he is now, effectively making Dave Bixby’s Harbinger Orchestra a passing of the torch.
Posted in Whathaveyou on May 31st, 2021 by JJ Koczan
You wouldn’t be wrong to think of Dust Mountain as a ‘feat. members of…’ kind of band, given the collective pedigrees involved, from Oranssi Pazuzu to Cats of Transnistria to Hexvessel and Death Hawks and Vuono, but as long as you weren’t necessarily expecting them to sound like any of those others, that’s fine. Dust Mountain, who premiered as a part of Roadburn Redux in April, bring new vigor to classic Brit-style progressive/psychedelic folk on “Village on Fire,” which is the first single from their coming Oct. 8 release, Hymns for Wilderness.
Not a surprise that the record is showing up through Svart — their Roadburn appearance was part of the label’s showcase — but nice to have a confirmed date just the same, and while I wouldn’t imagine this one song speaks for the entirety of the band’s stylistic reach given the number of players involved and their backgrounds, let alone anyone else who might show up, what I’m hearing in “Village on Fire” only seems appropriate for autumn. Might fly under the radar of some more rock-minded heads, and that’s fine. I look forward to hearing more just the same.
I assume more complete album info, tracks, etc., will be along sometime between now and October. The PR wire has this announcement for now:
Dust Mountain – “Hymns for Wilderness” – October 8th 2021
Svart Records is proud to release Dust Mountain’s new album “Hymns For Wilderness” on the 8th of October 2021. First single “Village on Fire” out now!
Dust Mountain was founded in 2016 by siblings Toni Hietamäki (Oranssi Pazuzu, Waste of Space Orchestra) and Henna Hietamäki (Cats of Transnistria, Henna & Houreet), accompanied by an exceptional band: drummer Jukka Rämänen (Hexvessel, Dark Buddha Rising) bassist Riku Pirttiniemi (Death Hawks) and guitarist/backing vocalist Pauliina Lindell (Vuono). Having brewed their musical magic potions for an eternity, Dust Mountain are now finally ready to share the fruits of their joined forces with the world, resulting in their debut album “Hymns For Wilderness”.
In April 2021 Dust Mountain performed their international live debut at the legendary Roadburn Festival, Redux edition as part of the Svart Sessions, and instantly captivated audiences around the globe with their shimmering, otherworldly harmonies. Inspired by 1960’s and 1970’s acts such as Fairport Convention, Pentangle, Jefferson Airplane, Coven and Linda Perhacs, with a soft touch of doom riffs and distortions, Dust Mountain’s joyous pagan gospel seeks pieces of a world hidden but not lost.
Their stories celebrate the connection to nature and ancient rituals, moving between fictional fantasies and true, close-to-heart beliefs, making “Hymns For Nature” a startling and outstanding debut record. The mandolin riff driven “Village On Fire” is a powerful theme for burning down unjust kingdoms, so kick back and let Dust Mountain blow their magic breath of fiery air through your mind now!
Village on Fire: Song & lyrics: Hietamäki & Hietamäki Lead vocals: Henna Hietamäki Mandolin & organ: Toni Hietamäki Guitar & vocal harmonies: Pauliina Lindell Bass: Riku Pirttiniemi Drums: Jukka Rämänen Percussion: Jaakko Niemelä Recording: Tom Brooke at Tonehaven Studio Mixing: Niko Lehdontie Mastering: Jaime Gomez Cover art: Tekla Valy
From the first “I” of “Them Bones” to the last “you” of “Would?,” Dirt is a once-in-a-generation album, and for the band who made it, a once-in-a-lifetime achievement. Released in 1992 through Columbia Records — stop and imagine that for a second — as part of great major label Seattle-underground mining project that became known as the grunge movement, Dirt was the second Alice in Chains full-length behind 1991’s Facelift (currently receiving a deluxe box set issue for its 30th anniversary, one expects no less for this next year), and like few releases of its era, continues to resonate a sense of the genuine darkness underlying its purposes. I can no more feign impartiality about this record than I could a member of my family; I’ve lived with it for 29 years. Dirt was the third CD I ever owned behind The Beatles‘ Past Masters Vol. 1 (which I found in a drawer) and Metallica‘s Master of Puppets, and even at 10 years old, I understood it was something special. I remember seeing the “Them Bones” video on Headbanger’s Ball. Hearing the songs on the radio. I saw Alice in Chains at Lollapalooza ’93 in Waterloo, NJ. This album was a defining feature of my pubescence.
The sound of Dirt was churning, heavy, deceptive in its rhythmic intricacy — Sean Kinney‘s drumming is among the most underrated in commercial heavy/hard rock; he should be discussed in the same breath as Danny Carey — and of course melodic, defined by the crucial vocal arrangements between guitarist Jerry Cantrell and frontman Layne Staley. With Mike Starr‘s bass beneath Cantrell‘s guitar — mixed low in early ’90s fashion but still subject to highlight moments like the beginning of “Rain When I Die” or the penultimate “Angry Chair” — and the by-now-classic-style heroics of the solos and riffs throughout, Dirt manages to be both a performance album highlighting the best its players could bring to the table at the time and a songwriting album, packed with the kind of tracks that most groups would be lucky to feature one of in a career, let alone on an album. The advent of Nirvana on rock radio may have spearheaded grunge, but it was the brooding, darker turns of Alice in Chains that gave the sound its credibility, as well as set in motion an influence spanning generations of low-in-the-mouth singers almost none of whom could come close to Staley‘s style or emotive reach.
Dirt is of its era in being a 57-minute-long CD. “Would?” appeared on the Singlessoundtrack, and I don’t even know how many videos were ultimately made for its songs. “Would?” was one, and “Them Bones,” and “Rooster” and “Angry Chair.” “Rooster” would become something of a defining success for Alice in Chains — they still make t-shirts; I almost bought one this week — which is somewhat ironic since it was one of the pieces that most departed from the album’s unstated theme of heroin addiction, specifically that which would ultimately claim Staley‘s life. A more purely Cantrell composition, and about his own father, its militaristic story was a lot less fraught to tell in a time when the US hadn’t just spent 20 years at war for nothing.
“Rooster” remains a good song, but it’s by no means the best on Dirt, and I’m sure we could — frankly, I’d love to — have a great time debating what is. The propulsive kick of “Them Bones” or “Dam That River” at the outset? The depressive “Rain When I Die” and pushing-toward-unplugged “Down in a Hole?” The seeming chaos of “Sickman” and the too-high-but-somehow-held-together “Junkhead”? The lines there — “Are you happy? I am, man/Content and fully aware/Money, status, nothing to me/’Cause your life’s empty and bare,” separating addicts not as outcasts but as “an elite race of our own,” the “our” there pivotal not only for what it said about the speaker in the song but for its implication toward the listener — still brutal. The brazenly suicidal “Dirt?” The rawer shove of “Godsmack?” And in the closing trilogy of “Hate to Feel,” “Angry Chair” and “Would?,” is there a flawless moment? How many mixtapes can you shove a single track onto? I damn near found out with “Hate to Feel.”
The nostalgia factor is, period. I can’t and won’t try to get away from it. I wonder how a younger listener — someone in their early 20s approaches Dirt, what they hear in it. I hear Gen-X’s heroin crisis for sure, and the loss of Staley in 2002 — a hard decade after this album’s release — and a lifetime of associations. I’ve lost friends and relatives to opiates, and I’ve said on multiple occasions that if not for the stabilizing force of having met my wife when I was 15, I’d have probably been right in there as well. And I don’t say it lightly. It’s a hard album to work out the separation between art and artist — its feel is so confessional lyrically — but as it should be, Dirt‘s abiding appeal is in its songs, whatever the context might be in which a given audience hears them.
Alice in Chains of course toured the universe supporting this record. They were headliners at the aforementioned Lollapalooza, along with Primus, and they deserved to be. In 1994, they released the Jar of Flies EP, which was the second mostly-acoustic short-form work they’d done behind earlier-1992’s Sap (discussed here), and though they’d return in 1995 with their self-titled third album (discussed here), and that’s not actually that long a break, it sure felt like forever waiting for that to show up at the time. That record pulled back on some of Dirt‘s sheer impact in favor of a more atmospheric approach, and was by all accounts mostly composed by Cantrell with him in a more forward position vocally owing to Staley‘s ongoing drug addiction, but was nonetheless both the grimmest work the band would ever do and still resolute in its craft. It was the end of the Staley era, and for a while, the band, who would eventually return in the mid-aughts before putting out Black Gives Way to Blue in 2009 with vocalist and rhythm guitarist William DuVall (also of Cantrell‘s solo group and Comes with the Fall) joining as the fourth member alongside Cantrell, Mike Inez (who had also played with Seattle legends Heart in the interim) and Kinney.
Reborn as a recording and touring act, Alice in Chains followed Black Gives Way to Blue with The Devil Put Dinosaurs Here in 2013 and 2018’s Rainier Fog (discussed here), the latter of which brought them to the point of having released as many albums without Staley as with him, and having developed a dynamic between Cantrell and DuVall that was more than mere reminiscence of things gone by, however obligated they might be (and rightly so, I wouldn’t say otherwise) to continue to perform Alice in Chains‘ ’90s work on stage. No getting away from the classics.
As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading. And of course I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Magnetic Eye Records‘ Dirt [Redux] compilation (review here), which came out late last year and featured artists from the heavy rock sphere taking on Dirt track for track. Well worth the headfirst dive.
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New Gimme Radio show today. 5PM on their app. Thanks if you can listen.
I’ve been trying desperately all week to keep my email under 40 unread/needing response. It’s currently at 50, so you can tell how well it’s been going. A couple press releases need doing-something-with. A few responses just aren’t going out. I can’t do everything, and I hate not getting back to people — especially people taking the time to send music because they possibly give a crap what I might have to say about it — but I made the decision long ago that if it was writing or email, I need to be doing the thing that has people reaching out to me in the first place. But still, email, Facebook messages, Instagram messages. That stuff piles up and gets overwhelming. I’m fortunate for it, I know. I remember when nobody got in touch.
Of course, having a three year old with a broken leg did not make the week any easier. We’ve been doing stuff all the while though. Yesterday we went to the Turtle Back Zoo, which is a Northern New Jersey cultural institution as far as I’m concerned. I went there as a kid too, and it’s way nicer now. The Pecan and I rode the train a couple times, rode the carousel, he rode the pony twice. I pushed him in the stroller — which I’m too tall for, so I have to lean forward to push it without kicking the wheels; it’s a pain in the ass (and back) and I do not particularly care for the stroller on principle, though there is some appeal in having him strapped into a thing rather than running all over the place, and given the busted shin, it’s the best option I’ve got — and put him on my shoulders for a while. He’s clearly less uncomfortable than he was a week ago at this time, which was just fucking miserable, and just starting to put weight on the foot and walk a bit while holding hands. He’s not ready to traipse around the zoo yet, but he can go from the stairs to the couch in the living room with help. We’ll get there. He’s certainly enjoying the time off from school.
It’s a holiday on Monday but I’m posting anyhow because Memorial Day is jingoistic bullshit. Maybe doing a video premiere? I’m not sure. Haven’t heard back. If not that, I’ll probably do myself a favor and review the Monster Magnet covers record. The rest of the week is fairly well packed with stuff. It’ll be good. I’m also filling out the next Quarterly Review, which currently looks to be six days minimum. I’ve got a seventh in with a question mark. Hope to start that June 28 and just let it roll through the July 4 holiday, but that requires some scheduling with The Patient Mrs., because, well, writing about 10 records a day for a week gets time-consuming.
And video interviews coming up in the next couple weeks with Heavy Temple (that’s tomorrow; I wanted to review the album first) and All Souls. The latter I really just wanted to give their livestream another plug, anything to help out, but I haven’t talked to Tony Aguilar since the Totimoshi days, so I’m looking forward to it just the same. It’ll be him and Meg Castellanos together. I like doing couple interviews haha. It somehow reinforces my fantasy of starting a podcast with my wife. Not about music, necessarily. I think it would more likely be about politics/news, likely with a good dose of Star Trek.
Dream for another day.
Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Hydrate, watch your head, all that stuff.
We’re inching inexorably closer to the June 4 release of King Buffalo‘s third album, The Burden of Restlessness (review here). “Silverfish” is the second and likely final single to come ahead of the record itself, and it brings out some of the moodier atmospherics that perpetuate throughout the release, the feeling of internalizing covid-era isolation as a state of being, almost Kafka-esque in the lyric complementing its multi-legged tension of riff. It’s short at under three minutes, and of course in the video you don’t get a sense of how it ties into the songs around it, either “Locusts” before or “Grifter” after — both also documents of the time of their making and emblematic of the album’s overall progressive crux.
But still, it’s another slice of the whole, and all the more satisfying with the visual effects in Mike Turzanski‘s accompanying video here, turning the cracks duly inward while also emphasizing the interpersonal connection between players in the band perhaps as a means of reaching out from one human being to another. As the band has announced their first round of touring for 2021 — and there are more dates to come — and news to be told of the second of their three intended albums for 2020, things would seem to be proceeding according to plan for King Buffalo, which, you know, is nice that it’s going that way for anybody at this point.
Is The Burden of Restlessness album of the year? I won’t pretend to know. I’ve got two more King Buffalo LPs to listen to before I’ll be willing to make that determination, let alone anything anyone else puts out. You know I keep a running list though, and it’s certainly right on there. We’ll see how the rest of 2021 shakes out.
The Burden of Restlessness was written and recorded by King Buffalo in Rochester, NY at the Main Street Armory in December of 2020 & January 2021. Produced, engineered & mixed by Sean McVay, and mastered by Bernie Matthews. The artwork was created by Zdzislaw Beksinski with cover fonts by Mike Turzanski and album layout by Scott Donaldson.
2021 Tour Dates (Tickets on sale NOW atkingbuffalo.com) 9/10 Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge 9/11 Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge 9/14 Los Angeles, CA @ Moroccan Lounge 9/15 San Francisco, CA @ Bottom of the Hill 9/17 Seattle, WA @ Barboza 9/18 Vancouver, BC @ Fox Cabaret 9/19 Portland, OR @ Lola’s Room 11/5 Philadelphia, PA @ Johnny Brenda’s 11/6 New York, NY @ Mercury Lounge 11/11 Pittsburgh, PA @ Club Café 11/12 Detroit, MI @ Loving Touch 11/13 Indianapolis, IN @ HI-FI 11/14 St. Louis, MO @ Off Broadway 11/16 Madison, WI @ The Bur Oak 11/17 Minneapolis, MN @ 7th St. Entry 11/18 Milwaukee, WI @ Colectivo 11/19 Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall 11/20 Cleveland, OH @ Beachland Ballroom
King Buffalo is: Sean McVay – Guitar, Vocals, & Synth Dan Reynolds – Bass & Synth Scott Donaldson – Drums & Percussion
It has been years of waiting leading to a debut album from Philadelphia’s Heavy Temple. They have since their dawning amassed a not-insignificant catalog of short releases — their self-titled EP (review here) in 2014 was followed by 2016’s Chassit EP (review here), and there was that same year’s take on Type O Negative‘s “Love You to Death” (discussed here) and last year’s P-Funk covers split with Wolf Blood benefitting Black Lives Matter (discussed here) — as well as a likewise not-insignificant amount of alumni. Founding bassist/vocalist High Priestess Nighthawk has overseen multiple full-lineup changes for the three-piece now comprised of herself, guitarist Lord Paisley and drummer Baron Lycan, and would seem to have hammered out the sound she envisioned for the band on the road rather than in the studio. Heavy Temple arrive at their first full-length with no shortage of anticipation and with years of touring behind them and performances as festivals far and wide, among them Psycho Las Vegas, Shadow Woods, SXSW, going back to Eye of the Stoned Goat 2 (review here) in Delaware in 2013.
Lupi Amoris, which sees release through Magnetic Eye Records, is the beneficiary of this experience. Recorded by Will Spectre at Red Water Recordings (points for another Type O reference) and mastered by Dan Randall at Mammoth Sound with striking, symbol-laden cover art by Alex Reisfar, the five-song/33-minute offering follows a theme recasting the folktale Little Red Riding Hood — at least mostly; I’m not sure how opener “A Desert Through the Trees” ties into the narrative, but neither have I seen a lyric sheet — as a tale of feminine empowerment and realized sexual agency. Through “The Wolf,” “The Maiden,” “Isabella (with Unrelenting Fangs)” and “Howling of a Prothalamion” — the latter term refers to a wedding poem — and indeed the prior leadoff cut, Heavy Temple bring the payoff toward which they’ve been working for years. When they issued Chassit, I argued in favor of it being their debut LP for its flow and the complete-feeling sensibility underlying the songs. It was more than the sampling an EP designation implied. Listening to Lupi Amoris half a decade later, the difference is abundantly clear. In sound and style, in the substance and breadth of its songs, Lupi Amoris brings Heavy Temple to a new level entirely.
The imagine of “unrelenting fangs” is a standout, but not necessarily the whole of what Lupi Amoris has to offer. “A Desert Through the Trees” fades in smoothly and builds up quick with a post-Songs for the Deaf weighted-fuzz shuffle, slowing its roll to open wide in the verse before a winding transition that calls to mind half-speed The Atomic Bitchwax leads to the chorus. The song is spacious, vital, full and melodic. Layering of vocals adds further character, and in the second half’s guitar solo, Lord Paisley unfurls the soundscape-minded intent that becomes one of the record’s strengths, blending atmosphere and momentum atop the strong rhythmic foundation of the bass and drums. Much of the focus here will inevitably be on Nighthawk, who is a powerful and charismatic presence in the songs as well as the driving force behind the band, but the contributions of neither Paisley nor Lycan should be discounted when it comes to taking the proceedings as a whole. Everybody’s performance has stepped up, and if this is to be at last the permanent lineup of Heavy Temple — something no less awaited than the record — it would only be to the benefit of the group and their listenership alike. One must keep in mind that while Heavy Temple as a unit have been together since the end of 2012, this incarnation only came together in 2019. In some ways, they’re just getting started.
And given what they achieve throughout Lupi Amoris, that’s an even more exciting prospect. “A Desert Through the Trees” caps furiously as a preface for some of what the nine-minute “Isabella (with Unrelenting Fangs)” will offer later, and “The Wolf” fades in its wah-echoing guitar over the first minute-plus as an intro before the bass arrives to mark the beginning of the creeping groove that ultimately defines the track. It’s a righteous riff in the tradition thereof, and the vocals duly howl upward from the mix, flourish of harmony arriving late in the guitar but no less welcome for its arrival, the band showing a patience of craft that underlies their more forward aspects and only continues to serve them well as “The Wolf” surges its transition directly into the feedback-and-guitar-and-bass beginning of “The Maiden.” The centerpiece of Lupi Amoris might also house the record’s most scorching progressions, pushing, shoving, running all the while, and the vocals join the wash late to emphasize the point, capping cold with quick noise before “Isabella (with Unrelenting Fangs)” takes hold, a psychedelic guitar winding in to build upward toward the eventual marching verse.
Immediately the spirit is looser, the focus more on swing. The nod. And fair enough. At 4:14 into its total 9:30, the drums drop out for a moment and Heavy Temple begin a slower, more thoroughly and willfully doomed stretch. It’s another minute-plus before howling vocals — lower in the mix at first — arrive, but as the song moves past the six-minute mark, a chaos of crashes and vast-echo guitar crescendos and recedes. There’s a pause. And then the guitar goes backward and the drums go forward and they jam their way back into the central riff so long left behind and top it with dual-channel shred and end cacophonous as is their apparent wont, leaving only the key-laced “Howling of a Prothalamion” to close out. Those keyboards bookend the instrumental finale, which likewise offers bounce and gallop, ebb and flow enough to summarize the proceedings on its own while pushing outward from where the prior song’s apex left off. The ultimate moral of the story here is that whatever Heavy Temple do to follow Lupi Amoris, they’ve got their work cut out for them.
One hesitates to speculate on direction or forward intent. It may be another seven or eight years before there’s a follow-up to Lupi Amoris. Or it won’t. And their sound may push into the sinister outer reaches that “Howling of a Prothalamion” hints toward in some of its riffing, or their next outing might find them moving along another path entirely. Universe of infinite possibilities. Another record may never happen. What matters is that after years of hammering out who and what Heavy Temple are and stand for, the accomplishments of this first LP can’t be undone, and they not only justify the band’s wait-until-it’s-right approach, but make a dodged bullet of their possibly having done anything else. There’s a fair amount of year left, and again, universe of infinite possibilities, but this is the best debut album I’ve heard thus far into 2021. Recommended.
