Posted in Radio on October 28th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Good show. Gets heavy. I started thinking about how my knee hurt and that reminded me of Høstsabbat (where I hurt it) earlier this month and I decided to dedicate the second hour-ish of the program to celebrating that lineup. And, well, that lineup was really god damned heavy — though, I say in the voice tracks too, it was way more sonically diverse a proceeding than it appears on the playlist below. So it goes. I’ll plead guilty on that.
Before that though, each one of the first three tracks is something I genuinely hope people will check out. Brant Bjork because he’s Brant Bjork and 14 records in he’s still trying new stuff. UWUW because Ian Blurton is a master and psychedelic heavy soul rock needed to happen. Dead Shrine because it’s new stuff from Craig Williamson (also of Lamp of the Universe) in a heavy style like Arc of Ascent, but with some different kinds of spaces thrown in. Dude just riffs and riffs and riffs. Yes.
Not saying the rest isn’t worth checking out in Ruby the Hatchet, Love Gang, or The Otolith, which is really the rest of the new stuff. The Otolith I’ve been listening to all week to review it and it’s bludgeoningly beautiful and has me wondering how to add a sixth inclusion to my top five for the year. Ruby the Hatchet are like if 1971 happened in 1981, and Love Gang are like if Motörhead were from Southern California or, in other words, from Denver. I certainly thought that song was killer when I premiered it. And a couple classics, some recent Enslaved, Orange Goblin, then the turn up to Norway for the fest-homage. As I said at the top, good show.
Thanks if you listen and thanks for reading.
The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.
Full playlist:
The Obelisk Show – 10.28.22 (VT = voice track)
Brant Bjork
Bread for Butter
Bougainvillea Suite
UWUW
Staircase to the End of the Night
UWUW
Dead Shrine
The Formless Soul
The Eightfold Path
VT
Ruby the Hatchet
Deceiver
Fear is a Cruel Master
Love Gang
Meanstreak
Meanstreak
The Otolith
Ekpyrotic
Folium Limina
Saint Vitus
The Psychopath
Saint Vitus
Enslaved
Kingdom
Kingdom
Orange Goblin
Cozmo Bozo
The Big Black
VT
Norna
The Perfect Dark
Star is Way Way is Eye
Bismarck
The Seer
Oneiromancer
The Moth Gatherer
The Drone Kingdom
Esoteric Oppression
Dopelord
Your Blood
Reality Dagger`
Graveyard
Please Don’t
Peace
Indian
Directional
From All Purity
VT
Slomatics
Buried Axes on Regulus Minor
Ascend/Descend
Kanaan
Return to the Tundrasphere
Earthbound
The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is Nov. 11 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.
Posted in Questionnaire on October 28th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Jaani Peuhu of Ianai
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
I make art.
It includes producing albums, songwriting for my albums and for other artists as well, being a singer/frontman, a touring musician as a keyboardist, and a bass player.
I also love the visual side, and in IANAI, I have had more opportunities to go deeper with the visual side than in any other project.
Describe your first musical memory.
It could be the guitar I made from some box and my mom’s painting supplies or the space sounds from my dad’s Roland JX-3P synth.
My first c-cassette was Paul Young: No Parlez. I still listen to that beautifully mellow album sometimes.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
I have never actually learned to be happy with the albums I have made or my live performances. The best feelings are those short moments on stage when you feel connected or understood by somebody in the audience and especially when I see tears in their eyes. That moment, you truly feel that you are doing something that touches the soul.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
I am testing my beliefs all the time and tuning and changing them while learning more about life. One thing I have learned is that I don’t know anything, so my beliefs are like sketches these days, and I know that the painting will never be finished.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
Into new adventures. I love to explore new musical genres and let destiny do its job with my career. I am open to anything.
How do you define success?
When your art has had the chance to be seen and felt by many. However, it is most definitely not measured by money, fame or good reviews.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
This first thing I can think of right now is the violence I have seen against animals, nature and humans, but then I know we all share this feeling. As an artist, I find it heartbreaking to often see talent go to waste because of attitude and ego problems.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
A Symphony. I have started with it twice already, but the time wasn’t right yet. I am also working with an IANAI book, and I would love to create my own tarot deck one day.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
Being an outlet for emotions that could be hurtful when creative people bottle them up. Also, it can also serve as a powerful support and comfort for the ones in need of it.
While there are great pieces of art made, it still does not mean anything to me if it does not resonate with me on any deeper level.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
My next match with my new football (soccer) teams!
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 28th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Take two headlining bands — both arguably at the forefront of their generation of heavy rock and rollers in Europe, now veterans both but by no means out of date or ‘old,’ however they might feel after a given gig — and slap ’em out on tour together. It’s a long-proven winning formula and next April Örebro, Sweden’s Graveyard and Berlin, Germany’s Kadavar will head out together to demonstrate its functionality again. Legit.
Both groups were recently announced as part of Desertfest London 2023’s lineup (info here), but I hardly put together from that that they’d be on tour together — oh me of small mind, narrow view — but I happened to catch Graveyard earlier this month at the second night of Høstsabbat 2022 (review here) in Norway, and it’s been a minute since I saw Kadavar that one time, but I’ve got no doubt they’re similarly up to the task of heading out on a co-headlining bill like this. This kind of tour makes everyone play better.
I guess some tickets are on sale now and more will open up next week? That’s how I read the below, anyhow, which is what Graveyard posted on the ol’ socials:
Glad to announce that we’re hitting the european spring roads together with Kadavar. Get your tickets and hope to see you out there.
Tickets go on sale today, Friday 28th and Monday 31st of October – check your local dealer for more info.
19.04 Hamburg DE Grosse Freiheit 36 21.04 Stuttgart DE LKA Longhorn 22.04 Frankfurt DE Zoom 24.04 Munich DE Backstage Werk 25.04 Vienna AT Arena 28.04 Nijmegen NL Doornrosje 29.04 Amsterdam NL Melkweg 30.04 Paris FR Trabendo 01.05 Lessines FR Roots & Roses 03.05 Bristol UK SWX 04.05 Manchester UK Academy 3 05.05 London UK Desertfest 06.05 Luxembourg LUX Den A
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 27th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
And now for the heartwarming tale of a band getting bigger. Early Moods come along and start kicking ass and yesterday I’m reading they’re starting to work with Nanotear for booking (you might know Nathan Carson from Witch Mountain if not the booking end of things) and now today they’re announcing a (prior booked) trip to the East Coast supporting no less than High on Fire. From here to where? Europe? Oh that’s gotta be in the works. They’re too good at what they do for Europe not to have noticed. Is their self-titled (review here) the best debut album of 2022? I don’t know. I hadn’t thought about it yet. But I know it’s on the damn list.
Also somewhat curious that their post hashtags Nuclear Blast. I know that’s Municipal Waste‘s label now, and fair enough, but it honestly wouldn’t surprise me if they saw something they liked in a young band taking on classic doom metal at such a high level and with their kind of nascent stage presence. I don’t know anything in that regard, mind you — the self-titled came out on RidingEasy Records, and if their next one does too, it’ll only be to the band’s benefit; Daniel knows how to make a band happen — but it’s something that caught my eye just the same. If that announcement comes, I’ll just make another post, pat myself on the back for noticing what turned out to be a dropped hint.
So anyway, tour dates, huh? Here you go:
We’re hitting the road this December w/ @municipalwaste @highonfireband & @gelhc !
Tickets go on sale Friday, October 28th at 10:00AM Local Time at the link in bio.
Dec 1 – Hampton Beach, NH – Wally’s Dec 2 – Brattleboro, VT – The Stone Church Dec 3 – Hartford, CT – The Webster Theater Dec 4 – Patchogue, NY – 89 North Dec 6 – Asbury Park, NJ – House of Independants Dec 7 – Mechanicsville, PA – Lovedraft’s Brewing Co Dec 8 – Virginia Beach, VA – Elevation 27 Dec 9 – Greenville, NC – The State Theatre Dec 10 – Columbia, SC – The Senate Dec 11 – Tampa, FL – The Orpheum
Mos Generator will release their awaited full-length, Time//Wounds, on Dec. 16 through Music Abuse Records and Pale Wizard Records. And as I tell you it’s been four years since the Tony Reed-led, Port Orchard, Washington-based heavy rock trio released their last album, 2018’s Shadowlands (review here), understand that the count of years comes with the caveat of a steady stream of EPs, remasters, compilation appearances, live recordings, side-projects from Reed and sundry other one-offs. I’ve said on multiple occasions that Tony Reed — joined on Time//Wounds by bassist Sean Booth and drummer Jono Garrett after briefly reuniting the original lineup of the band this year for a couple live shows; wonder if they were recorded — has a work ethic that I consider deeply inspiring on a personal level in that he wakes up each morning and hits it. These are the levels of productivity to which one aspires.
Time//Wounds states its central themes plainly, and “Aja-Minor” (premiering below) arrives as the opening track and the leadoff for a deeply progressive and intricately arranged collection of progressive but classically structured heavy rock. Songs like the acoustic-led “(Don’t) Wait Until Tomorrow” and the subsequent melodic roller “Burn Away the Years” lay out the premise in lines like, “Until it’s over, never look behind,” etc., amid intricate fuzz and fluidly arranged keyboard/Mellotron. I’d be surprised if “Getting Good on Revenge” isn’t released as a single after “Aja-Minor” since it’s a rocker and the component barn-burner, setting up the more extended reach of “Only Yesterday” and the 14-minute “Until We Meet Again,” parts of which, if they came from Belgium, would probably be hailed as groundbreaking post-black metal but are nonetheless a grand unfolding that is distinctly the band’s own in that it is executed with a surprising lack of pretense for something that’s both so long and so grandiose in style.
This is basically an album announcement — SO HEY, there’s an album coming! Here’s a song off it! I sincerely hope you enjoy and look forward to having Time//Wounds as a late highlight for 2022, because that’s exactly what it’s gonna be.
Some comment from Reed follows the song below:
Mos Generator, “Aja-Minor” track premiere
Tony Reed on “Aja-Minor”:
Like many of the songs on the Time//Wounds album, Aja-Minor is about time and the decisions that are made as the years pass by. I feel like the lyrics are a message to the young telling them not to waste a moment in this life. Musically, the track goes through many changes and it’s hard for me to pinpoint direct influences, but I think the initial spark for the song comes from the fact that I am using a tuning that Joni Mitchell uses on her Hejira album. Using that tuning allowed for chord voicings I wouldn’t normally use and helped to create a piece of music I’m very satisfied with. I think it’s a condensed representation of the rest of the album. Progressive rock with pop elements.
From the album “Time//Wounds”. Coming December 16th on Music Abuse Records (vinyl) & Pale Wizard Records (cd)
Mos Generator: Tony Reed: guitar/vocals/mellotron Jono Garrett: drums Sean Booth: bass
Posted in Questionnaire on October 27th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Sara Neidorf of Sarattma & Aptera
—
How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
As for me: I play drums, whatever the occasion calls for. I don’t feel very bound to style, though metal was such a big part of my upbringing that it finds its way into a lot of what I do. Also music with a lot of pathos and/or a lot of idiosyncrasy. I don’t like music that’s too cool for school. It has to interact with some brooding and possibly also some autistic part of me. I came to drumming when I was around 10 because it helped me to focus and relax, and also because it was a way of connecting with people, and I kept doing it for that reason, as well as because it helps me connect with myself, to feel grounded, to feel like I’m doing something meaningful and honest.
As for Sarattma: We push each other, try to lock in and lock out, try to explore different trajectories, to create some shit that we’d enjoy hearing, but which we don’t feel has been done a bunch already. We came to play together because we came up in the same music community in Philly and had some of the same music mentors. Eventually one of our mutual friends/teachers, Yanni Papadopoulos from Stinking Lizaveta, said he thought it would be rad if we formed a band, and we did, and we’ve been linking up and doing that over the past 10 years whenever I’m Stateside visiting friends and family. (I’ve been based in Berlin since 2012.)
Describe your first musical memory.
I remember singing the song “Breakdown” by Tom Petty with my mom in the car when I was 4 or 5, getting many of the words wrong and coming up with my own lyrics phonetically. Or singing the song “Montana” by Frank Zappa with my dad in the car around that same age, knowing each word by heart. “I don’t care if you think it’s silly, folks. I don’t care if you think it’s silly folks.” Drumming out the fives in that phrase on my lap, enjoying the rhythmic puzzles in the breaks without consciously knowing they were odd. I also knew how to sing every guitar solo on Metallica’s Black Album when I was 5 or 6. Not their hottest album, I know, but luckily you don’t care about such things when you’re on your way to kindergarten.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
This is honestly impossible to answer because there have been so many occasions that felt like pinnacles, from live performances I’ve witnessed, to shows where I performed in front of dancing, hyper-engaged crowds, to recording sessions that felt fluid, free, and perfectly aligned, to albums I blasted and sang along to with my mother in the living room as a teen, to songs shared with my partner in intimate moments, to jam sessions in a basement or rehearsal space where everything just meshed so seamlessly… I really can’t come up with a hierarchy among these moments. Music is consistently bringing me new joys, new highs and groundings, new reasons to keep pushing forward.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
This is a toughie. Perhaps it was when I did my biggest tour to date as a session drummer, that my ideas of success were definitely thrown into question. It was also the best paid gig I’ve ever had. I guess I believed that it would feel like ‘success’ or ‘arrival’ but it actually tore me down in a lot of ways, destroyed my short term memory for a couple of years due to prolonged emotional distress, basically traumatized me. I learned that recognition ain’t worth shit if you’re not happy. Otherwise there have been lots of other times, involving friendships or relationships, where my ideas about love, commitment, and loyalty have been tested and thrown into turmoil.
People giving me what I felt I always needed most, turning out to be manipulative and abusive, people I thought I’d have forever dying or leaving me in different ways, not knowing at first if I could live without these people, but then finding my way through it. I think the pandemic has also taught me a lot about how to slow down, especially about accomplishment-based things — to not put a ton of importance or emphasis on something and to think that something has to be perfect or has to happen in a certain way or within a certain timeframe. It all might be called off at any moment. Just do what you can; appreciate the present more.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
I hope it just continuously leads to new places you can’t anticipate or know until you’re there. It’s exciting to me that this really doesn’t have a destination, just further journey, travel, discovery. New ways of articulating. It also fosters connections with new people and places, and also more pathways within.
How do you define success?
I’m still figuring that one out. For sure it involves making work that feels true to me. Releasing that work and having that work recognized and enjoyed (and yes, paid for) by others is also still important to me, though I aim for that to be less of a priority. Of course, it’s not about quantity; it’s about the quality of the interaction. My general experience is that a show in front of 50 really tuned-in people is way more fulfilling than a super distant-feeling one in front of 2,000. Sharing your life with people who are good to you and who understand you, and vice versa, is also a big part of success. A mindset of abundance, generosity, freedom, ease, and exchange.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
I wish I hadn’t seen my mother in so much pain in her final year of life. I am still haunted by some images I will not recount here. It’s a relief to know that she isn’t suffering anymore, but I miss her every minute of every day.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
I’d like to collaborate on creating the soundtrack to a film. I’d like to start by doing some live scoring for some silent horror films, which I’m beginning to do with a new project I’ve started playing with in Berlin, Pausa a Pausa. I’m excited to explore combining my love of music with my love of cinema. I’d also like to eventually write a sort of memoir, a collection of short stories or essays.
Other than that, also looking forward to recording and releasing more work with my projects Mellowdeath, Choral Hearse, and Aptera.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
It needs to keep pushing us to new places, presenting us with new images that test our imaginations, lead us to question systems of power, push us to feel uncomfortable sometimes but with an intentionally devised frame to make that discomfort productive, and to create affective environments in which we can reflect and experience things in personal ways.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
I’m looking forward to visiting my grandmother for her 95th birthday this September. I’m excited to attend Fantasia Film Fest in Montreal next summer, which I’m currently sad to be missing. I’m stoked for the next edition of the feminist horror film fest I co-organize each February, Final Girls Berlin Film Fest, which is just a lovely community of artists and film nerds. Lots of little things too — I’m excited to meet an old friend for dinner later.
With the release tomorrow of their new single She’s Still a Goth, Lydenburg, South Africa, four-piece-with-new-press-shots-soon Ruff Majik also announce the coming of their next album, Elektrik Ram, due from Mongrel Records in April 2023, which may feel and sound like the distant future when people live on Mars and there’s no war on Earth and someone still being a goth would be like a big surprise I guess, but, you know, isn’t actually that far away. Far enough that I haven’t asked to hear the record yet though, not least since I don’t know whether or not it’s done.
I know this song rocks. Among the rampage of admirable qualities in Ruff Majik‘s music, whether it’s the frenetic guitar strum and intertwining leads of Johni Holiday or the depth of vocal arrangement that’s somewhere between Axl Rose and Josh Homme, the shove of groove, etc., the willingness to have actual-fun is a standout, and “She’s Still a Goth” — why on earth wouldn’t she be? — is a blast in that very spirit. Written in homage to Holiday‘s wife, Anni Buchner, who’s been doing art for the band for years now as Ale & Cake Illustration — she helmed the Pulp comic they had out last year as well, and that also was actual-fun — it is nonetheless a reminder that, no matter who you are, where or how you live, gender, orientation, anything, at some point, everybody has had a crush on a goth girl. It’s a part of life in modern times.
Ruff Majik would probably need to slow down a bit to play toward actual goth music, but I’ve known goths into Misfits and Ministry and so on, so maybe there’s a place for them to play at ‘grim’ for a while — at least for the sub-three-minute run of this track — and if the rules are bent, so be it. One more reason to look forward to Elektrik Ram, which will serve as the follow-up to 2020’s The Devil’s Cattle (review here), an absolute fucking destroyer of a rock album that the band of course didn’t get to give nearly the support touring that it deserved because, well, you were there.
Ooh, I wonder if they’ll have a pandemic song on the record. Those are lyrics I want to see.
Onto the list of 2023’s most anticipated it goes, and I’m just kind of assuming they’ll head back up to Europe to tour, but I haven’t actually seen dates or anything yet. April release means Spring festival season is in play, though, so it’ll be worth keeping an eye out.
Enjoy the video. Yes, it’s got a bat:
Ruff Majik, “She’s Still a Goth” video premiere
South African stoner rock cult Ruff Majik releases their first new music since the critically acclaimed 2020 album The Devil’s Cattle. Frontman and chief songwriter, Johni Holiday splatters latest single She’s Still A Goth with 80’s tinged goth saturated rock and roll synth-wave. Biting down on a dirty riff and even filthier backbeat the song includes a doom infused breakdown and highly flammable swagger throughout. The track is the first single from their highly anticipated upcoming album Elektrik Ram, which drops in April 2023.
Johni and his wife’s (Anni Buchner of Ale & Cake Illustration) fascination with b-grade horror and gothic imagery has always been influential in the lyrical themes and overall image of the band. When Anni fell in love once more with 80’s tinged gothic synthwave during the pandemic, it inspired him to write a tune in ode to her – featuring references to classic gothic imagery whilst still fitting neatly into the realm of Tarantino-esque desert rock.
It’s just a love song. Nothing more, nothing less. Packaged neatly in a ghoulish package…” – Johni Holiday
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 27th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
It’ll be just about two years on Nov. 11 when Trondheim trio Dune Sea release Orbital Distortion as the follow-up to 2020’s Moons of Uranus (review here) and only over three since their 2019 self-titled debut (review here), but maturity seems to be coming quickly to the Norwegian outfit as they present “Hubro” as the new single from the impending release. All Good Clean Records is once more behind the offering, and a surely as ‘c’ is for ‘cowabunga,’ the track streaming below is a heavy cosmic rocker that, even just at five minutes, has reach well beyond where the airplanes go.
I got hit up to do a premiere for this record, and space is tight between now and the 11th, but I’m gonna see if I can’t make something happen in that regard anyway. A lot of the younger-bands heavy rock attention these days is on Slomosa and Kanaan, who’ve been out touring hard and earning it to be sure, but Dune Sea do something a little more about texture and atmosphere, and show that if you’re looking at the up and coming generation of outfits — that is, no grey beards in the press photos — there’s no shortage of aural diversity emerging between different bands.
Also, Trondheim. I damn near got on a train from Oslo earlier this month on a whim just to see the place where so much right on music comes from. Alas, my tourist card remains unpunched in this regard.
From the PR wire:
Dune Sea – Norwegian Psych/Stoner-Rockers Share New Song “Hubro”
Norwegian psych/stoner rockers Dune Sea have recently shared a new song off their third album “Orbital Distortion”, which is set for release on November 11th via All Good Clean Records.
Titled “Hubro”, this song is the first taster of what’s to expect from “Orbital Distortion” and sees the Norwegian trio delving further into space rock, taking off for a grand musical journey into outer space.
Since their self-titled debut album in 2019, Dune Sea have establish themselves as a solid part of the Norwegian psych-scene. Their psych-space rock universe has expanded for every release and with their upcoming 3rd album “Orbital Distortion” it seems like they have left the Earth for good cruising though the cosmos.
