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Friday Full-Length: Druglord, Enter Venus

Druglord‘s sound was truly monstrous, in the actual sense of a huge, fur-covered, lumbering beast with six-inch Tyrannosaur teeth razor-sharpened on the bones of any meat and bone so unfortunate as to be in its path finding you, stalking you, and at last, devouring you entirely. All things considered, the Richmond-based trio had a decent run, starting out in 2010 with a self-titled demo (review here) before 2012’s Motherfucker Rising (review here) paved the way for guitarist/vocalist Tommy Hamilton, bassist Greta Brinkman (ex-L7) and drummer Bobby “HufKnell” Hufnell (Unseen Force) to align with STB Records for the crucial follow-up you see above.

I know for a sciency-fact that I already had 2013’s Enter Venus on tape (review here) and vinyl (review here), but in preparing to write this piece, I hit up the band’s Bandcamp to grab the embed code for the player above and saw that both Motherfucker Rising and Enter Venus were still available on CD for what, with domestic shipping, worked out to be $7. Seven dollars? For the disc with art and all the rest, and got the download of Enter Venus with that? Those are some get-this-shit-out-of-my-house prices on the part of whoever will be sending them to me, presumably Hamilton. In any case, I’m also pretty sure I already have both albums on CD, but hell’s bells, the one download is worth seven bucks, never mind the physical product.

Revisiting Enter Venus, hearing the opaque, organ-laced murk of “Feast on the Eye,” the Conan-worthy heft and crush of “Grievous Heaving,” the gut-wrenching crawl in the title-track and the lumbering misery of closer “Let Us Bleed,” its noisy back-half solo cutting through the surrounding filth-nod only to be subsumed by it as the next verse takes hold, I regret shelling the seven dollars even less. A decade later, looking back on the rise of this band, it was a particular moment of generational awakening. 2012. Special-edition vinyl was not nearly as ubiquitous 10 or eight years ago as it is now, and the work STB Records did to change that is somewhat under-discussed at this druglord enter venuspoint — not that stoner metal historians are out there chasing down these events, mind you, or, you know, existing — but Enter Venus remains one of the most gorgeous LPs I own. The multi-textured art, from gloss to matte, and the artwork by W. Ralph Walters that offers a three-dimensional pop all the more for its detail, is likewise beautiful and unsettling. The record’s only 27 minutes long, but I swear by the end of that time, there’s no question Druglord have gotten the point across. Anything more would be superfluous, and to call it anything less than a full-length isn’t doing justice to the wretchedness on display.

The recording job by Garrett Morris has to be mentioned as a factor in harnessing those depths. His work as a founding member of Windhand on guitar and production for some of their earlier work results in some similarity of the rolling fog that is Druglord‘s riffing, but the willfully excruciating dynamic of Druglord makes the trio altogether a harsher listening experience despite the fact that there’s still a sense of atmosphere to the material. It just happens to be that the atmosphere is made of sulfuric acid and is currently bubbling away your flesh. Sulfuric acid rock. Definitely corrosive. Use with caution. If poured in eyes, seek immediate medical treatment.

But consider how many acts came out around the same time and have continued (or not) to push boundaries in varying directions for the sundry heavy microgenres. Druglord offered a particularly extreme take on sludge that remains relevant and punishing now. There’s a sample at the outset of “Grievous Heaving” that puts the album in a kind of Southern Baptist context, and if one digs hard enough, there’s elements of guitar progressions that feel born out of impulses pioneered by the likes of Jimmy Bower or Buzzov*en or any number of ’90s-era Southern riffers, but Druglord are a perfect example of a band taking what was done before them and crafting something new from it. There’s little sense of showmanship throughout; the plod is genuine, the misanthropic sensibility unmistakable. It is brutal, a hyperbole-ready litmus for nasty stoner sludge that, these years after the fact, feels emblematic of the moment of its creation without sounding dated either in method or production. Again, whether I’ve got another copy floating around here or in a box in the storage unit, I don’t regret making the purchase.

Maybe they were too volatile for the long-term. Druglord offered up the Deepest Regrets EP (review here) in 2015 and 2018’s third long-player, New Day Dying (review here), which introduced new bassist Julian Cook to the fold. Issued through Sludgelord Records on tape, it continued the collaboration with Morris (who also produced the EP) and seemed to assure that the sort of lurking march of “Enter Venus” would continue unabated despite the lineup change. They continued to do shows up to celebrating their 10th anniversary in March 2020 — that might’ve happened, might not — and as late as Sept. of that year they were reportedly working on new material, but nothing has yet surfaced. Maybe next week. Maybe two weeks. Maybe never. If you could predict everything, it wouldn’t be as much fun.

One way or the other — if Druglord ever return from the grim ether of their own making or they don’t — Enter Venus stands as a particularly devastating proof-of-life from the band they were at the time, and it retains its make-your-skin-crawl vibe perhaps even more for the spiderwebs in which time has covered it. If it’s their destiny to be a cult act, known to those whose consciousness may be suitably warped in order to process what they’re actually doing, I have to imagine that’s fine by them. Otherwise why bother being who they are in the first place. Among STB‘s roster at the time and in the context of the greater movement of bands of which they were undeniably a part, they are still dug into a muddy pit all their own. Fucking a.

As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.

I could use a shower. Desperately. Maybe I’ll go do that and come back. Hang on…

There. 20 minutes well spent. It’s a gorgeous spring day in New Jersey where I live, perhaps not at all captured by the death-stench of Druglord, but there’s only so many times one can go to the well of Amorphis’ Tuonela for such seasonal appropriation. Rest assured, I’ll have it on at some point this weekend nonetheless.

But sitting in the sunshine waiting for The Pecan’s bus to bring him home is no hardship, and I seriously doubt the idea would’ve even occurred to me if not for the shower, so yeah. Maybe that’s where the Druglord thing came from. I was duly gross before.

Errands to run this afternoon, including to the dentist with the kid, but he’s pretty good about that. I’ll speak to him in calm tones, remind him of the things we talked about, and hopefully the dentist or hygienist will be patient. He’s four, so you expect some tumult. First time he was great, last time less so. Would be nice to have him back on track. He’s eaten a lot of sugary shit though in all of our please-pee-in-the-toilet bribes, none of which have been effective. Costco and grocery shopping after that, The Patient Mrs.’ Family down later this evening, and then family day tomorrow. It’ll be a good time even if it’s supposed to rain. Whatever.

Anyone see the Star Trek: Discovery season finale last night? I did. What fun. Not the show’s best season so far — hate to say it but I think that prize might go to all the Spock stuff — but they wrapped it beautifully and in very Trek fashion. High-minded optimistic speeches and Stacey Abrams? Sign me up for that shit.

Anyhoozle, bus should be here soon, so time to punch out/in. Thanks for reading this week. Next week is jammed as well, so stay tuned. Have fun, stay safe, hydrate, watch your head. Back Monday with more.

FRM.

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