[Click play above to stream ‘Suicidal Castle’ from The Crooked Whispers’ Funeral Blues LP. Album is out April 7 on Ripple Music. Preorders available here (US), here (EU) and here on Bandcamp.]

It is not so terribly long into The Crooked Whispers‘ second album, Funeral Blues — as opposed to Mark Lanegan‘s Blues Funeral; different vibe — before vocalist Anthony Gaglia delivers the lead-in line near the end of the opener streaming above: “Welcome to the suicide castle,” and that’s one of a few lyrics spread throughout from which the general point of view of the record might be extrapolated. See also: “You can’t escape from funeral blues,” in “Funeral Blues,” “Once you’ve seen both sides of life you’ll beg for death,” in “When Nothing is Left,” and, “Your god’s full of shit,” in the penultimate “Pleasant Death.” Especially as gurgled in the harsh, throaty sludge-scream delivery that populates most of the eight-song/41-minute procession, these lines tell you much about the bitter misanthropy at root in where The Crooked Whispers are coming from as they follow-up their widely-lauded 2020 debut, Satanic Melodies (review here).

As one might expect, there have been some changes in the band since 2020. The multinational four-piece, with bassist/backing vocalist/keyboardist Ignacio de Tommaso and drummer Nicolás Taranto based in Argentina and Gaglia (also of LáGoon) in Portland, Oregon, bid farewell to their San Francisco contingent with the departure of guitarist Chad Davis after 2021’s Dead Moon Night EP (review here), having signed to Ripple Music at the behest of Rob “Blasko” Nicholson (bassist for Ozzy Osbourne, Drown, Rob Zombie, etc.) and brought in guitarist/keyboardist Federico Ramos (ex-Dragonauta, Avernal) for late 2022’s split with Fulanno, Last Call From Hell! (review here).

They continue forward on this second long-player with de Tommaso helming production — which in this case includes putting together remotely-recorded parts as well as the usual working a board — and mixing and mastering alongside Marcelo Suraniti for a sound that’s full and weighted enough to give a sense of depth but still raw in a way that speaks to the sludge lurching beneath the cultish doom lurch of much of the material.

“Suicidal Castle” gives a whole-album intro for its first minute and a half or so (it’s actually 1:23, but who’s counting?) with a reinterpretation of the bridge to Nirvana‘s “In Bloom” that shifts into the first decisive roll for its verse, Gaglia‘s throaty rasp possessing character and bite in kind. It’s not a metal scream, but harsh just the same and rife with fuckall that bleeds into the generally grim atmosphere of what follows as “Stay in Hell” picks up from the quick fade of the leadoff and starts its own march, a cleaner incantation overtop working to establish the range in which much of Funeral Blues will dwell as it wood-handle-knife-carves its niche between crust-sludge, traditional doom, heavy cult rock, and so on, luring the listener further along a bleak course into the aforementioned title-track, which layers backing vocals in its middle third in another, more subtle, shift in approach as the structure likewise turns more linear.

Side A’s four songs are slightly shorter when taken as an entirety than side B’s, but the feeling of being pulled deeper into some shapeless hateful murk is palpable as the six-minute “When Nothing is Left” stands tall to announce its arrival at what is so far the lowest point The Crooked Whispers have gone. Its riff is the master of the dense fog in which the audience lands and resides, the looming peril of being stabbed never too far off as they revel in the extremity at their foundation even as they translate it into a deceptively accessible doomer nod. Side B, meanwhile, is even more down to the business of duggery as “Deathmaker” slams at the start and is quickly into its verse, which is harsh enough to make you want to read up on vocal cord nodules, even as cleaner lines are layered in again; stoned, dead, ugh. Just ugh. Righteously ugh.

Less of a march than its counterpart in “Suicidal Castle,” “Deathmaker” is duly bloodthirsty and malignant, and as the slower “Crippled Shadow” follows — a nadir as regards tempo — the overarchingly wretched spirit is at perhaps its most visceral. If Gaglia was going on about weed, you’d say it sounded like Bongzilla, but The Crooked Whispers are in darker thematic places, exclusively, and the held-out guitar of “Crippled Shadow” at the end of the verse lines past the three-minute mark is no less destructive than the lyrics.

There’s a big crash a minute later, and something of a kick for pace, but by this time, the band have made their intentions clear. Side A dug the whole, side B is where you’re buried alive, and if you want to think of that lurching riff at the finish of “Crippled Shadow” and the noisy cap they give the song as them tossing dirt down by the shovelful, that’s probably fair. It grooves, make no mistake. You can follow a course of riffs from front to back if you want and try and go that way, but these guys aren’t in the habit of making it easy, and many who pit their tolerance for extreme doom and sludge against Funeral Blues will find themselves bested long before the nihilism and churning violence of “Pleasant Death” arrives to put out any remaining vestiges of light.

Not there were any.

That makes the sweep-in guitar and this-is-gonna-be-the-riff-and-we’re-gonna-ride-it broadcasting of intention at the outset of closer and longest track “Bed of Bones” something of a victory lap on the band’s part, but it’s hard to begrudge them the win when what they’ve won at is so willfully disgusting. Murder fantasies persist through a crawler verse, and there’s either a sample or a spoken part as it plods into the midsection, setting up the next verse with a “hail Satan” that really says it all. They move into the last slog with more extreme vocals and a duly horrific organ-laced march that ends on a long fade, as though the one thing they forgot to tell you when they got underway was that the ‘funeral’ in Funeral Blues was going to be yours. Also they’re playing in your blood. That’s probably going to stain.

The Crooked Whispers have a sound that is well and truly fucked. And rather than dig into the genre-standard VHS-era Hammer Films grain, they skip the bullshit and go all-out in their grueling assault, full in tone and threat alike. I’m not saying they’re about to for-real-life wear your face like a mask, etc., but their sound certainly hones in on a fascination with death and Satanic malevolence, and if you think you can get down with that, there might just be a bit of catharsis in Funeral Blues. But if and when you start hearing voices, you might want to consider taking a break. Funeral Blues is multi-level brutality, actively working toward “not for everyone” as a central goal. To be sure, they get there.

The Crooked Whispers, Funeral Blues (2023)

The Crooked Whispers on Facebook

The Crooked Whispers on Instagram

The Crooked Whispers on Bandcamp

Ripple Music on Facebook

Ripple Music on Instagram

Ripple Music on Bandcamp

Ripple Music website

This week, Argentinian duo Les Nadie re-release their debut full-length, Destierro y Siembra (review here), through a veritable swath of labels: Echodelick Records in the US, Spinda Records in Spain, Psychedelic Salad Records in Australia, and Dirty Filthy Records in the UK. The level of support that’s rallied behind the first outing from the Córdoba-based two-piece of guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Juan Conde and drummer Rodri Deladerova should tell you something about the album even before you hit play on this bonus-track-inclusive reissue/first-physical-release streaming below.

Offered first by the band in 2022, it’s still a manageable 37 minutes with “Mal Viaje” (2:20) and “Hellkhan” (4:45) tacked onto the back end, and between the opening dense strums and swagger of “Grito el Indio” and the atmospheric guitar of “Venenauta” that used to close after the airy finish to the chugging “Del Pombero,” I’ll just say outright that you should consider yourself invited to hear it. If I’d had time to mail out cards, I might have. This will have to suffice.

I’ve promised myself I won’t re-review the album, and I won’t. Cut my hand open and swore a blood oath. But it doesn’t feel out of line to say that, for a record to be self-released by a band only to have four labels collaborate to pick it up and put it out less than a year later is pretty significant. The catchy melody in “Zhonda,” the way Codne and Deladerova weave in and out of riffy density and the playful desert weird of the airier guitar work. It’s the kind of record that has so much blended into it, it’s become something new, atmospherically.

And about those bonus tracks, “Mal Viaje” unfolds with a far back vocal over classically fuzzy guitar, less grunge than some of the proceedings, a stoner riff so groovy it feels like Fu Manchu wrote it circa 1995, but a drone runs throughout the entire song (it’s not long, but still) and gives it a personality of its own, while “Hellkhan” is more Kyuss in purpose and the tension in its rhythm. It also has its swirling element — effects, I think — and circles around an instrumental procession as that plays out, until just before 2:30 it drops out to a bridge to build back to full tonality (and drone) and they finish it cold.

Fair enough. Neither of the bonus tracks is knock-your-socks-off difference-maker must-own by itself — and that’s a lot to ask of studio leftovers or demos or whatever they are — but this is the first physical pressing for the album, and invariably this is the version of Destierro y Siembra most listeners will know because of that and the additional support behind the release. And neither do the bonus tracks take anything away from the original edition of the record, which is still under 40 minutes long and has what was the quiet atmospheric finish bolstered by the manner in which the mellow guitar stretch of original closer “Venenauta” meets with Deladerova‘s kick at the start of “Mal Viaje,” reinvigorating toward the next hypnotic close and that much more dynamic for how that procession plays out.

In addition to not reviewing, I’m not going to get into hyperbole about the album’s importance or the up-and-coming generation of heavy rockers in Argentina of which Les Nadie (not to be confused with Los Naides) would seem to be part — releases this year from Black Sky Giant and Moodoom and the continued success of an act like IAH, as well as a horde of other instrumentalists haunting Bandcamp also argue in favor — but suffice it to say there’s something happening there right now as there is in many other places and as the 2020s come into focus after their tumultuous and traumatic beginning, the shape that the next few years in heavy will take is being sculpted now, maybe also in Destierro y Siembra.

Not going to speak in absolutes — it’s an unpredictable world set in a universe of infinite possibilities — but part of enjoying Destierro y Siembra is wondering what Les Nadie might do from here, how they might flesh out their sound or deep-dive into the rawness that a duo configuration can provide, or both, or neither. Whatever comes, their debut is a special record and I’m glad to host it here and glad to have the excuse to listen again.

I hope you dig it:

Producido por Manu Collado en @fusisestudio (Córdoba , Argentina)

Grabación y mezcla a cargo de Manu Collado en @fusisestudio ,(Córdoba, Argentina) y Xavi Esterri Comes en @nomadstudio.es (Lleida, Catalunya) entre los meses de Marzo de 2021 y Julio de 2022.

Drum doc. Maxi Mansur

Mastering por Timone Brutti en Abdijan Studios , Lavaur, France.

Les Nadie son:
Juan Conde (guitar, voices)
Rodri Deladerova (drums)

Les Nadie on Instagram

Les Nadie on Facebook

Les Nadie on Bandcamp

Spinda Records on Facebook

Spinda Records on Instagram

Spinda Records on Bandcamp

Spinda Records website

Echodelick Records on Facebook

Echodelick Records on Instagram

Echodelick Records on Bandcamp

Echodelick Records website

Psychedelic Salad Records on Facebook

Psychedelic Salad Records on Instagram

Psychedelic Salad Records on Twitter

Psychedelic Salad Records store

Dirty Filthy Records on Facebook

Dirty Filthy Records on Instagram

Dirty Filthy Records store

I was not 24 hours removed from recommending this band to a friend who had just put me onto Black Sky Giant‘s new album as a candidate for the current best outfit in Argentinian heavy. A few years back, I might’ve said Certainly there are other candidates, but Les Nadie‘s Destierro y Siembra (review here) hit a nerve like few debuts do and particularly coming from a duo had a real sense of live chemistry without giving up production value. Just killer stuff. The kind of thing that maybe at least four labels would want to get behind for a proper release.

Well wouldn’t you know, that’s exactly what’s happened. Spinda Records sent the announcement below, but Psychedelic Salad in Australia, Echodelick in the States, and Dirty Filthy in the UK will also be giving a push. Psychedelic Salad and Echodelick are no strangers to collaborating (the same may be true of Dirty Filthy, I honestly don’t know) and you might recall Spinda‘s last roster-add was Bismut (info here), which was in collaboration with Lay Bare in the Netherlands. Shit is awesome, is all I’m saying. More collaboration. I don’t know what that does for the logistics of distribution, let alone anyone who works for a distributor outside the given network of ones involved in a given release, but it feels like a cool idea as a way to mitigate shipping costs to different regions while, again, everybody gets another voice behind promotion. Everybody wins.

In this case, Les Nadie do too. Their debut album will have four homes instead of just one, and there you go. Also, I think it’s hilarious that the glut of links in between the announcement text and the Bandcamp embed takes up more space than either that text or the player. You have to get your laughs where you can.

From Spinda via the PR wire:

Spinda Records – Argentinian psych-shoegaze band Les Nadie joins the family!

As many of you, we usually discover new music thanks to different magazines, websites and podcasts… Well, back in July 2022 we were reading a review of the debut album of an Argentinian band whilst we were listening to their songs, and we simply loved it. Immediately after, we contacted them with a proposition: to reissue that album on physical format, as it was available only on digital.

That band was the power duo Les Nadie, originally formed in 2018 by two young lads that, inspired by their predecessors such as Los Natas or Los Antiguos and the vast emptiness of the desert and the northern winds of their region, started mixing heavy riffs with other passages much calmer and reverberated, getting sometimes even very close to shoegaze and psych rock.

Les Nadie joins now Spinda Records in order to finally reissue on physical format that debut album that they self-released last year. And we’ll do it in collaboration with our friends at Psychedelic Salad Records (Australia), Dirty Filthy Records (UK) and Echodelick Records (US). ‘Destierro y Siembra‘ is the name of this awesome album, and it will be out (including some surprises) this Spring!

https://www.facebook.com/lesnadie

https://www.facebook.com/SpindaRecords
https://www.instagram.com/spindarecords
https://spindarecords.bandcamp.com/
https://www.spindarecords.com/

https://www.facebook.com/ERECORDSATL
https://www.instagram.com/echodelickrecords/
https://echodelickrecords.bandcamp.com/
https://www.echodelickrecords.com/

https://www.facebook.com/psychsalad/
https://www.instagram.com/psychsalad/
https://twitter.com/psychsalad
https://psychedelic-salad.com/shop/

https://www.facebook.com/dirtyfilthyrecords/
https://www.instagram.com/dirtyfilthyrecords/
https://dirtyfilthyrecords.bigcartel.com/

Les Nadie, Destierro y Siembra (2022)

Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains is the third full-length offering from the multinational collaboration Olson, Van Cleef, Williams, issued on quite-limited CD and (unlimited, duh) DL through The Eagle Stone Collective and Electric Relics Audio Artifacts. With T.G. Olson (also Across Tundras, etc.) based presently in Iowa, Ivonne Van Cleef (who seems to travel) in Argentina and Caleb R.K. Williams in France, they remain committed to the instrumental approach of their prior two outings in 2021’s Unleash the Hoof’s Revenge and 2020’s As Gold Turned to Black Powder (discussed here), and present a richly evocative and varied soundscape across 10 new tracks and 45 minutes.

Somewhat curiously, they have not said much of anything about an intended narrative for the new collection of improvised and semi-improv works, recorded and assembled remotely, and mixed cohesively enough that if you weren’t told you’d never know they weren’t in the same studio, so you’ll pardon me if I fill in with at least a potential interpretation.

Beginning with the duly foreboding drones and open-landscape wash of “Hoofbeats,” which features The Ivonne Van Cleef Orquesta — there may or may not actually be an orquesta, but definitely some string sounds to going along with the voluminously strummed guitar and various other melodic, ambient effects and whatnot — Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains would seem to tell the story of the slaughter of American bison undertaken in the late 1800s as a means of furthering the genocide of the Native American populations that hunted the animals for food and other uses.

This is a documented policy part of the greater movement of White colonizers (or settlers, depending on which books you read) moving into the Great Plains in the middle of the United States, taking the land and isolating and working to destroy the culture and population of the people who lived there. It is, in fact, essential US history; the actual manifestation not-quite-as-glossed-over-as-it-used-to-be-but-still-plenty-glossed-over in discussions of ‘manifest destiny.’ Olson, Van Cleef, Williams portray these ideas in broad-reaching dark pastoralism, resonant hums and swells like that of “Bison Bones” and “The Fury of the Slaughter,” the former of which boasts the second of two guest appearances — Julián Pinto on percussion — and the latter which brings the electric guitar forward on a bed of consuming noise.

Songs like “Hides and Blood” — which begins in silence after “The Fury of the Slaughter” rings out its last regretted wisps to end the first three tracks’ initial salvo — move with intention. There are drums or at least beats being kept at times, but nothing is so certain with these players, each of whom has a history in experimentalism as well as folk musics of varying stripes. The twang in “Hides and Blood” and the penultimate “Ride the Ashes” — admittedly more buried in that later cut — will be recognizable from Olson‘s work elsewhere, but like the project’s moniker informs, it’s really just a part of the greater unfolding of this material, which isn’t so much cinematic as placemaking in itself.

Acoustic guitar and ancient hiss accompany the rolling rhythm of “Tragedy of the Commons,” in which the beating-on-a-thing timekeeping drops out as the track pushes toward its third minute, a last line of drone guitar holding sway until, well, it isn’t, and “Spiritual Eyes” picks up to begin again, even shorter at 2:38. Furthering the thesis as regards subject matter — and whether the theme was decided on before the music, during the recording, or after is ultimately meaningless; provided it’s true, it simply is — is the fact that “Spiritual Eyes,” which sets itself to a line of electric guitar and maybe far-back effects-laced harmonica (not sure, honestly), gives over to “A Prayer for the Buffalo,” an obvious focal point and the longest single inclusion at 6:12.

No, Olson, Van Cleef, Williams are not the first outfit to explore this big-sky aural territory, and those gravitated toward the atmospheres of Neil Young‘s Dead Man soundtrack or Hex-era Earth should think of Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains less as a derivation from those works and others like them and more like an expansion of those ideas into something new. “A Prayer for the Buffalo” is gorgeously patient and a sorrowful, engrossing wash, set to a simple drum beat that punctuates its willful, multifaceted slog, again departing well in advance of the finish, which brings together string sounds and guitar effects as though you’ve just crossed over a hill and now can truly see the land stretch before you.

Like much of what surrounds, it ends on a long fade before “Genocide” fades in with a decidedly more grim rumble in its distortion. What might be a drum machine underscores, but a sinister hum pervades, low guitar tone and high lead notes playing out until it simply ends in noise, leaving the aforementioned “Ride the Ashes” as the next stage in the tale, a kind of aftermath that might be represented in the cover art. Death, put to sinister purpose, is everywhere. But there’s a righteousness in the strum as well, since after all, these people were sure they were doing their god’s will and thereby prospering. At least some of them did. Others, no doubt, just wanted the fucking land.

Keeping with the spirit of the history being more embodied than retold here, closer “Wild Breath Decay” runs two minutes and is more layers than I can count but still largely impressionistic, building to a swell but ending with just a strum, almost clumsy, of acoustic guitar, and a stretch of silence, which is an element used often throughout Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains either as intended respite for the listener — separating one piece from another can give an audience time to digest what they just heard — or further the sense of mourning that is so contextually pervasive.

In any case, Olson, Van Cleef, Williams appear to have arrived at this point directly as a consequence of the explorations throughout the two full-lengths that preceded, and their ability to turn material — either thought out and crafted, constructed, or added to off the cuff by one player and then the next; I honestly don’t know but I’d love to find out more about the process, especially for this record — into a viable-enough portrayal of its apparent theme that they don’t need to actually tell you about it, should say something about the level of impression in the listening experience. Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains will not resonate for all who take it on, but it is particularly bold in its memorialization, especially for a record without lyrics, and emblematic of these players’ ability to harness clear intention from abstract sound. It is beautiful, sad, encompassing.

Olson, Van Cleef, Williams, Bleached Skeletons Strewn About the Plains (2022)

Electric Relics Audio Artifacts on Bandcamp

Ivonne Van Cleef on Instagram

Ivonne Van Cleef on Facebook

Ivonne Van Cleef on Bandcamp

The Eagle Stone Collective on Instagram

The Eagle Stone Collective on Facebook

The Eagle Stone Collective on Bandcamp

Ever prolific and experimental, Sergio Chotsourian — aka Sergio Ch., as I know you know — will digitally release his latest solo album, The Red Rooster, on Oct. 14 through Spotify, Bandcamp, etc. That’s next week, which I also know you know. Vinyl is set to follow for the nine-tracker early next year in continued collaboration with Interstellar Smoke Records, and of course Chotsourian‘s own South American Sludge imprint has a hand in putting it out as well.

As, frankly, it should. You’ll note Chotsourian — who earlier this year surprised with an unexpected fourth Ararat album, Volumen 4 (review here), and whose pedigree includes not only that band and his solo work, but also Brno, Soldati and, once upon a time, South American desert rock trailblazers Los Natas — plays all the instruments on the song “El Manantial” that’s streaming below ahead of the new record’s release, and recorded it. Self-sufficiency is nothing new for him, either in terms of aesthetic or the practicalities of writing, performing and producing music.

“El Manantial” has a pretty bass-heavy sound that puts it in my mind in alliance with Ararat‘s general feel. I don’t think it’s a song that band has done, but it’s tempting to add a “yet” to that, since Chotsourian has certainly bled material over from one project to another, sometimes resulting in a completely different listening experience. I have said “why do I recognize this?” many times through the years. Generally, there’s a reason.

I’ve paid respect to Chotsourian‘s general ouevre over the last, I don’t know, 20 years now?, and no regrets, but I’ll note that especially as he’s opened new avenues for expression in solo work and collaborations, including those with his own family, his breadth as an artist has likewise flourished. One more thing I know you know: the same cannot be said of everybody who was once signed to Man’s Ruin. As an artist, he is unto himself.

So here’s a bit about the track and, of course, the track, which is why we’re here in the first place:

ADELANTO DEL NUEVO DISCO DE SERGIO CH. – “THE RED ROOSTER”
GRABADO, MEZCLADO Y MASTERIZADO EN DEATH STUDIOS POR SERGIO CH.
ARTWORK POR SERGIO CH.
PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH.

SERGIO CH. – GUITARRA, KEYS, BASS & VOCALS

https://sasrecords.bandcamp.com/album/the-red-rooster
https://www.instagram.com/sergioch_ig/

INTERSTELLAR SMOKE RECORDS
SOUTH AMERICAN SLUDGE RECORDS

https://facebook.com/1588780263/
https://www.instagram.com/sergioch_ig/
http://www.sergioch.com/

http://www.southamericansludge.com/
https://sasrecords.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/SASRECORDSARGENTINA

https://www.facebook.com/Interstellar-Smoke-Records-101687381255396/
https://interstellarsmokerecords.bigcartel.com/

Sergio Ch., “El Manantial”

Destierro y Siembra is not only the debut full-length from Córdoba, Argentina, duo Les Nadie, but the band’s first release of any kind as well. Comprised of guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Juan Codne and drummer Rodri Deladerova, the seven-song offering is low on hype and big on creativity, culling together a half-hour’s worth of material that brings a striking amount of character to largely familiar elements. Right at the outset, with the manner in which the post-Melvins roll-and-crash of lead cut “Gritó el Indio” gives way to layered ethereal howls (presumably representing the titular gritó, or cry) as it moves into its middle third, guitar effects placed overtop to add to the weirdness, turning back to the main riff soon enough before picking up the speed and shifting to a modified ending, Les Nadie signal their intention toward inventive structures and an unwillingness to play by traditional verse/chorus rules that only becomes a source of strength as the rest of the release unfolds.

Only the centerpiece “Helledén” (5:38) is longer than “Gritó el Indio” (5:35), and not by much, but quickly Les Nadie‘s work becomes as much about atmosphere, if not more, as about the riffs being played or the weight of the opener’s nod. “Zhonda” follows and begins with a more urgent pace and harder hitting drums from Deladerova, Codne‘s guitar turning from the crunch to an almost-noodling-but-not-quite succession of notes in what becomes the first real verse on Destierro y Siembra, all the more effective in the clarity of its delivery with that shimmer behind it and the fact that the band have gone about seven minutes into the offering without saying a word, despite the voice-as-instrument work on the first song. The lyrics, which translate to either a request for or a story about a wind from the south coming to bring rebirth — “Viento/Del sur viento/Baja a mi encuentro/Y resurrección” — are delivered twice through before the crunch resumes, sounding all the more grunge for the held note at the finish of the second time. The duo cycle through again before building into an early payoff of groove that gets accompanied by some howls not dissimilar from those in “Gritó el Indio,” but modified in purpose, now representing the wind itself as the song comes to its sudden end and “Siembra / Destierro,” which is as close to a title-track as Destierro y Siembra gets.

The ambience and feeling of open space in the recording, reverb on the guitar, continues in “Siembra / Destierro,” offset by a more solidified, fuzzier fluidity. Again, layering is a factor in the presentation, and as Destierro y Siembra was tracked between March 2020 and July 2021 (sounds about right) at studios in Córdoba and Catalonia, working with Manu Collado and the Lleida-based Xavi Esterri in the northern part of Spain, the fluidity of that jam comes across as well-honed, Codne‘s guitar swaying through the early procession — “Siembra,” presumably — before extending the method to the vocals of the following “Destierro,” which in their drawling, bottom-mouth layers recall the darker moments of Alice in Chains‘ Dirt over suitably heavy crashes and thuds. Thus the song ends, a final strum filling the silence before the airier, bouncing guitar figure of “Helledén” starts. After the first minute, the aforementioned centerpiece arrives at a lighthearted movement of guitar that becomes a recurring theme, balanced against jazzy jabs with vocals overtop. It is a willful contradiction of purpose that shouldn’t work but which the duo pull off readily, resolving in sweet, early Mars Red Sky rawness and melody, the guitar meandering to the end with just a flourish of cymbal wash.

As with “Zhonda” after “Gritó el Indio,” “Babas D’Allah” follows “Helledén” with a more straight-up riff, announcing itself via dense distortion before desert-hued noodling takes hold. With no more conflict than in “Helledén,” “Babas D’Allah” basks in its point and counterpoint, each change between them highlighting the differences and the unlikely flow that results as Les Nadie shift between the one and the other, the god-slobber’s 1994-ish Fu Manchu-style heavier riff seeming to find a complement in the intro to the penultimate “Del Pombero,” which starts out organic and weighted in a nod that comes through like a response to “Gritó el Indio” and that likewise builds out some of the Mars Red Sky melodicism as it breaks from the march for its verse before resuming the procession once more, a change that’s nowhere near as stark as some of those that come before it but that nonetheless finds the guitar resting to give space to the vocals, and solo lines and rhythm tracks working in layers as Codne and Deladerova summarize a good portion of what’s worked well in Destierro y Siembra — doing whatever they want, when they want to do it. Exploratory as the album may feel, there’s no questioning the confidence in Les Nadie to pull it off. And really, that and the creativity behind it in the first place is what it takes.

So, having been up, down, fast, slow, hither, yon, the desert, the beach, the garden, the boogie van and the monster truck, they end subtle and quiet with the guitar epilogue “Venenauta,” which is some reference to poison I can’t quite place translation-wise but that underscores how much of what makes Destierro y Siembra such an engaging listen across its relatively brief span comes down to the atmosphere in the material itself. There’s pastoralism, or at least a drive toward escape in the songs, but Les Nadie are neither cloying in their use of structure — not beating you over the head with a hook — nor so psychedelic as to be tripped out to the exclusion of conscious craft. Their efforts here stand as testament to the undervalued status of South American heavy rock in the broader, worldwide underground, but more crucially and more immediately, they announce Les Nadie as a band and Codne as a songwriter looking to break from the norm of sand-worship, riff-worship, worship-worship, etc., while remaining steadfast in their use of the tenets of genre. These two sides, like the banishment and sowing in the album’s title, feel disparate, but in Les Nadie‘s capable hands are the stuff of a richness that speaks to present immersion and future possibility all at once.

Les Nadie, Destierro y Siembra (2022)

Les Nadie on Instagram

Les Nadie on Facebook

Les Nadie on Bandcamp

Last day. Maybe I’m supposed to have some grand reflection as we hit 100 of 100 records for the Quarterly Review, but I’ll spare you. I’ve put a few records from the bunch on year-end lists, enjoyed a lot of music, wondered why a few people got in touch with me in the first place, and generally plotzed through to the best of my ability. Thanks as always to The Patient Mrs., through whom all things are possible, for facilitation.

And thank you for reading. I hope you’ve managed to find something killer in all this, but if not, there’s still today to go, so you’ve got time.

Next QR is probably early October, and you know what? I’ve already got records lined up for it. How insane is that?

Quarterly Review #91-100:

Jo Quail, The Cartographer

To list the personnel involved in Jo Quail‘s Roadburn-commissioned five-movement work The Cartographer would consume the rest of this review, so I won’t, but the London electric cellist is at the center of an orchestral experiment the stated purpose of which is to find the place where classical and heavy musics meet. Percussion thuds, there’s piano and electric violin and a whole bunch of trombones, and whatever that is making the depth-charge thud underneath “Movement 2,” some voices and narration at the start by Alice Krige, who once played the Borg Queen among many other roles. Though Quail composed The Cartographer for Roadburn — originally in 2020 — the recording isn’t captured on that stage, but is a studio LP, which lets each headphone-worthy nuance and tiny flash of this or that shine through. So is it heavy? Not really in any traditional sense, but of course that’s the point. Is SunnO))) heavy? Sure. It’s less about conforming to given notions of genre characteristics than bringing new ideas to them and saying this-can-be-that in the way that innovative art does, but heavy? Why the hell not? Think of it as mind-expansion, only classy.

Jo Quail on Facebook

By Norse Music website

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Experiencia Tibetana, Vol. II

An aptly named second full-length from Buenos Aires trio Experiencia Tibetana greatly solidifies the band’s approach, which of course itself is utterly fluid. Having brought in Gaston Saccoia on drums, vocals and other percussion alongside guitarist/vocalist Walter Fernandez and bassist Leandro Moreno Vila since their recorded-in-2014-released-in-2020 debut, Vol. I (review here), the band take the methodology of meditative exploration from that album and pare it down to four wholly expansive processions, resonant in their patience and earthy psychedelic ritualizing. Each side of the 48-minute LP is comprised of a shorter track and a longer, and they’re arranged for maximum immersion as one climbs a presumably Tibetan mountain, going up and coming back down with the longest material in the middle, the 16-minute pair “Ciudad de latahes” and “(Desde el) Limbo” running in hypnotic succession with minimalism, noise wash, chanting, percussive cacophony, dead space, bass fuzz, spoken word and nearly anything else they want at their disposal. With “El delito espiritual I” (8:18) and the maybe-eBow(?) ghost howls of “El delito espiritual II” (7:19) on either side, Vol. II charts a way forward for the trio as they move into unknown aural reaches.

Experiencia Tibetana on Facebook

Experiencia Tibetana on Bandcamp

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People of the Black Circle, People of the Black Circle

Not quite like anything else, Athenian conjurors People of the Black Circle plunge deep into horror/fantasy atmospheres, referencing H.P. Lovecraft and Robert Howard within the five tracks of their nonetheless concise 34-minute/five-track self-titled debut. Weighted in tone and mood, almost garage-doom in its production, the synth-backing of “Cimmeria” unfolds after the outward crunch of leadoff “Alchemy of Sorrow” — like Euro doom dramaturge transposed onto a bed of ’80s synths with Om-style bass — and from centerpiece “The Ghoul and the Seraph (Ghoul’s Song II)” through the bookending choral figures and either sampled or synthesized horns over the resolute chug of “Nyarlathotep” and more straight-ahead slow-motion push of closer “Ghosts in Agartha,” which swirls out a highlight solo after a wailing verse lets go and seems to drift away after its payoff for the album as an entirety. While in concept, People of the Black Circle‘s aesthetic isn’t necessarily anything new, there’s no denying the boundaries of dungeon synth and horror/garage doom are being transcended here, and that mixture feels like it’s being given a fresh perspective in these songs, even if the thematic is familiar. A mix of new and old, then? Maybe, but the new wins out decisively. In the parlance of our times, “following.”

People of the Black Circle on Facebook

Red Truth Productions on Bandcamp

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Black Capricorn, Cult of Blood

It always seems to be a full moon when Black Capricorn are playing, regardless of actual cloud cover or phase. The Sardinian trio of guitarist/vocalist Fabrizio Monni (also production; also in Ascia), bassist Virginia Pras and drummer Rachela Piras offer an awaited follow-up to their 2019 Solstice EP (discussed here). Though it’s their fifth full-length overall, it’s the second with this lineup of the band (first through Majestic Mountain), and it comes packed with references like the doomly “Worshipping the Bizarre Reverend” and “Snake of the Wizard” as distorted, cultish and willfully strange vibes persist across its 44-minute span. Doom. Even the out-there centerpiece kinda-interlude “Godsnake Djamballah” and the feedback-laced lurch-march of the nine-minute “Witch of Endor” have a cauldron-psych vibe coinciding with the largely riff-driven material, though, and it’s the differences between the songs that ultimately bring them together, closer “Uddadhaddar” going full-on ritualist with percussion and drone and chanting vocals as if to underscore the point. It’s been five years since they released Omega (review here), their most recent LP, and Cult of Blood wholly justifies the wait.

Black Capricorn on Facebook

Majestic Mountain Records store

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SABOTØR, Skyggekæmper

The Danish title Skyggekæmper translates to English as “shadow fighter,” and if punk-informed heavy rocking Aarhus three-piece SABOTØR mean it in a political context, then fair enough. I speak no Danish, but their past work and titles here like “2040-Planen” — seemingly a reference to Denmark’s clean energy initiative — the stomping, funky “Ro På, Danmark!” (‘calm down, Denmark’) and even the suitably over-the-top “King Diamond” seem to have speaking about Danishness (Danedom?) as an active element. Speaking of “active,” the energy throughout the nine-song/49-minute span of the record is palpable, and while they’re thoroughly in the post-Truckfighters fuzz rock dominion tonally, the slowdowns of “Edderkoppemor” and the closing title-track hit the brakes at least here and there in their longer runtimes and expand on the thrust of the earlier “Oprør!” and “Arbejde Gør Fri,” the start-stop riffing of which seems as much call to dance as a call to action — though, again, I say that as someone without any actual idea if it’s the latter — making the entire listening experience richer on the whole while remaining accessible despite linguistic or any other barriers to entry that might be perceived. To put it another way, you don’t have to be up on current issues facing Denmark to enjoy the songs, and if they make you want to be afterward, so much the better.

SABOTØR on Facebook

SABOTØR on Bandcamp

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The Buzzards of Fuzz, The Buzzards of Fuzz

Vocalist/rhythm guitarist Van Bassman, lead guitarist/backing vocalist Benjamin J. Davidow and bassist/backing vocalist/percussionist Charles Wiles are The Buzzards of Fuzz. I’m not sure who that leaves as drummer on the Atlanta outfit’s self-titled Sept. 2021 debut LP — could be producer/engineer Kristofer Sampson, Paul Stephens and/or Nick Ogawa, who are all credited with “additional instrumentation” — and it could be nobody if they’re programmed, but one way or the other, The Buzzards of Fuzz sure sound like a complete band, from the trippin’-on-QOTSA vibe of “Tarantulove” and “Desert Drivin’ (No Radio)” (though actually it’s Kyuss alluded to in the lyrics of the latter) to the more languid psych pastoralia of “All in Your Head” and the spacious two minutes of “Burned My Tongue on the Sun,” the purposeful-feeling twist into Nirvana of “Mostly Harmless” and the nod to prior single “Lonely in Space” that is finale “Lonely in Space (Slight Return).” Sleek grooves, tight, hooky songwriting and at times a languid spirit that comes through no matter how fast they’re playing give The Buzzards of Fuzz, the album, a consistent mood across the 11 songs and 32 minutes that allows the delivery to play that much more of a role in making short pieces feel expansive.

The Buzzards of Fuzz on Facebook

The Buzzards of Fuzz on Bandcamp

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Temple of Void, Summoning the Slayer

Crawl into Temple of Void‘s deathly depths and you may find yourself duly consumed. Their style is less outright doom than it used to be, but the Detroit extremist five-piece nonetheless temper their bludgeoning with a resilient amount of groove, and even at their fastest in songs like “Hex, Curse & Conjuration” and some of the more plundering moments in “A Sequence of Rot” just prior, the weight behind their aural violence remains a major factor. The keys in “Deathtouch,” which follows down-you-go opener “Behind the Eye” and leads into “Engulfed” branches out the band’s sound with keyboards (or guitar-as-keyboards, anyway) and a wider breadth of atmosphere than they’ve enjoyed previously — “Engulfed” seems to touch on Type O Negative-style tonality as it chugs into its midsection — and the concluding “Dissolution” introduces a quieter, entirely-clean approach for just under three key-string-laced minutes that Temple of Void have legitimately never shown before. Seems doubtful they’ll take that as far as Opeth in putting out Damnation — though that’s just crazy enough to work — but it shows that as Temple of Void move toward the 10-year mark, their progression has not abated whatsoever. And they still kill, so no worries there.

Temple of Void on Facebook

Relapse Records website

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Anomalos Kosmos, Mornin Loopaz

Psych jazz, instrumental save for some found voice samples which, if you were listening on headphones out in the wild, say, might have you wondering if you’re missing the announcement for your train at the station. Based in Thessaloniki, Greece, Anomalos Kosmos brim with experimentalist urgency on the half-hour of Mornin Loopaz, the seven tracks of which are titled playing off the days of the week — “Meinday,” “Chooseday,” “Whensday,” etc. — but which embark each on their own explorations of the outer reaches of far out. The longest of the bunch is “Thirstday” at just over five minutes, and at 30 minutes one could hardly accuse them of overstaying their welcome. Instead, the shimmering tone, fluid tempos and unpredictable nature of their style make for a thrilling listen, “Thirstday” remaining vital even as it spaces out and “Friedday” picking up directly from there with a ready sense of relief. They spend the weekend krautrocking in “Shatterday” and managing to squeeze a drum solo in before the rushing Mediterranean-proggy end of “Sinday,” the crowd noise that follows leaving one wondering if there aren’t more subversive messages being delivered beneath the heady exterior. In any case, this is a band from a place where the sun shines brightly, and the music stands as proof. Get weird and enjoy.

Anomalos Kosmos on Facebook

Anomalos Kosmos on Bandcamp

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Cauchemar, Rosa Mystica

This third full-length from Quebec-based doom outfit Cauchemar brings the band past their 15th anniversary and makes a bed for itself in traditionalist metallurgy, running currents of NWOBHM running through opener “Jour de colère” and “Rouge sang” while “Danger de nuit” takes a more hard rock approach and the penultimate roller “Volcan” feels more thoroughly Sabbathian. With eight songs presumably arranged four per vinyl side, there’s a feeling of symmetry as “Le tombeau de l’aube” tempts Motörhead demons and answers back with wilful contradiction the late-’70s/early-’80s groove that comes late in “Notre-Dame-sous-Terre.” Closer “La sorcière” tolls its bells presumably for thee as the lead guitar looks toward Pentagram and vocalist Annick Giroux smoothly layers in harmony lines before the church organ carries the way out. Classic in its overarching intentions, the songs nonetheless belong to Cauchemar exclusively, and speak to the dead with a vibrancy that avoids the trappings of cultism while working to some of its strengths in atmosphere, sounding oldschool without being tired, retro or any more derivative than it wants to be. No argument here, it’s metal for rockers, doom for doomers, riffs for the converted or those willing to be. I haven’t looked to see if they have patches yet, but I’d buy one if they do.

Cauchemar on Facebook

Temple of Mystery Records website

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Seum, Blueberry Cash

If you ever wanted to hear Weedeater or Dopethrone hand you your ass with Sons of Otis-worthy tones, Seum‘s Blueberry Cash has your back. The no-guitar-all-bass-and-drums-and-screams Montreal three-piece are just as crusty and weedian as you like, and in “Blueberry Cash,” “John Flag” and the seven-minute “Hairy Muff,” they reinforce sludge extremity with all that extra low end as if to remind the universe where the idea of music being heavy in the first place comes from. Grooves are vital and deathly, produced with just enough clarity to come through laced with what feels like extra nastiness, and “John Flag”‘s blues verse opens into a chasm of a chorus, waiting with sharpened teeth. Rounding out, “Hairy Muff” is a take on a song by vocalist Gaspar‘s prior band, Lord Humungus, and it’s drawn out into a plodding homage to liberation, pubes and the ability of sludge to feel like it’s got its hands on either side of your face and is pressing them together as hard as it can. These guys are a treasure, I mean that, and I don’t care what genre you want to tag it as being or how brutal and skinpeeling they want to make it, something with this much fuckall will always be punk rock in my mind.

Seum on Facebook

Seum on Bandcamp

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Week two, day one. Day six. However you look at it, it’s 10 more records for the Summer 2022 Quarterly Review, and that’s all it needs to be. I sincerely hope you had a good weekend and you arrive ready to dig into new music, most of which you’ve probably already encountered — because you’re cool like that and I know it — but maybe some you haven’t. In any case, there’s good stuff today and plenty more to come this week, so bloody hell, let’s get to it.

Quarterly Review #51-60:

Celestial Season, Mysterium I

After confirming their return via 2020’s striking The Secret Teachings (review here), Netherlands-based death-doom innovators Celestial Season embark on an ambitious trilogy of full-lengths with Mysterium I, which starts with its longest song (immediate points) in the heavy-hitting single “Black Water Rising,” but is more willing to offer string-laced beauty in darkness in songs like “The Golden Light of Late Day,” which transitions fluidly into “Sundown Transcends Us.” That latter cut, third of seven total on the 40-minute LP, provides some small hint of the band’s more rock-minded days, but the affair is plenty grim on the whole, whatever slightly-more-uptempo riffy nod might’ve slipped through. “This Glorious Summer” hits the brakes for a morose slog, while “Endgame” casts it lot in more aggressive speed at first, dropping to strings for much of its second half before returning to the deathly chug. The pair “All That is Known” and “Mysterium” close in massive and lurching form, and not that there was any doubt about this group 30 years on from the band’s founding, but yeah, they still got it. No worries. The next two parts are reportedly due before the end of next year, and one looks forward to knowing where the rest of the story-in-sound goes from here. If it’s down, they’re already there.

Celestial Season on Facebook

Burning World Records website

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Noorvik, Hamartia

Post. Metal. Also post-metal. The third full-length from Koln-based instrumental four-piece Noorvik, Hamartia, glides smoothly between atmosphere and aggression, the band’s purposes revealed as much in their quiet moments as in those where the guitar comes forward and present a more furious face. In the subdued reaches of “Ambrosia” (10:00) or even opener “Tantalos” (6:55), the feeling is still tense, to where over the course of the record’s 68 minutes, you’re almost waiting for the kick to come, which it reliably does, but the form that takes varies in subtle ways and the bleeding of songs into each other like “Omonoia” into “Ambrosia” — which crushes by the time it’s done — the delving into proggy astro-jazz on “Aeon” and the reaching heights of “Atreides” (which TV tells me is a Dune reference) assure that there’s more than one path that gets Noorvik to where they’re going. At 15:42, “The Feast” is arguably the most bombastic and the most ambient both, but if that’s top and bottom, the spaces in between are no less coursing, and in their willingness to be metal while also being post-metal, Noorvik bring excitement to a style that’s made a trope of its hyper-cerebral nature. This has that and might also wreck your house, and if you don’t think that’s a big difference, ask your house.

Noorvik on Facebook

Tonzonen Records website

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Doctors of Space, Mind Surgery

Wait. What? You mean to tell me that right now there are some people in the world who aren’t about to dig on 78 minutes’ worth of improvised psychedelic synth and guitar drones? Like, real people? In the world? What kind of terrible planet is this? Obviously, for Doctors of Space — Scott “Dr. Space” Heller (Øresund Space Collective) on synth, Martin Weaver (Wicked Lady) on guitar — this planet is nowhere near cool enough, and while it’s fortunate for the cosmos at large that once shared, these sounds have launched into the broader reaches of the solar system where they’ll travel as waves to be interpreted by some future civilization perhaps millions of years from now that evolved on a big silly rock a long, long way from here and those people will finally be the audience Doctors of Space richly deserve. But on Earth? Beyond a few loyal weirdos, I don’t know. And no, Doctors of Space aren’t shooting for mass appeal so much as interstellar manifestation through sound, but they do break out the drum machine on 23-minute closer “Titular Parody” to add a sense of ground amid all that antigravity float. Nonetheless, Mind Surgery is far out even for far out. If you think you’re up to it, get your head in the right mode first, because they might just open that thing up by the time they’re done.

Doctors of Space on Facebook

Space Rock Productions website

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Astral Pigs, Our Golden Twilight

Pull Astral Pigs‘ second album, Our Golden Twilight, out of the context of the band’s penchant for vintage exploitation horror and porn and the record’s actually pretty cool. The title-track and slower-rolling “Brass Skies/Funeral March” top seven minutes in succession following instrumental opener “Irina Karlstein,” and spend that time in nod-inducement that goes from catchy-and-kinda-slow to definitely-slow-and-catchy before the long stretch of organ starts the at least semi-acoustic “The Sigil” and “Dragonflies” renews the density of lumbering fuzz, the English-language lyrics from the Argentina-based four-piece giving a duly ceremonious feel to the doomly drama unfolding, but long song or shorter, their vibe is right on and well in league with DHU Records‘ ongoing fascination with aural cultistry. The Hammond provided by bassist/producer Fabricio Pieroni isn’t to be ignored for what it brings to the songs, but even just on the strength of their guitar and bass tones and the mood they conjure throughout, Our Golden Twilight, though just 25 minutes long, unquestionably flows like a full-length record.

Astral Pigs on Facebook

DHU Records store

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Carson, The Wilful Pursuit of Ignorance

No question, Carson have learned their lessons well, and I’ll admit, it’s been a while since a basically straightforward, desert-derived heavy rock record hit me with such an impression of songwriting as does their second full-length, The Wilful Pursuit of Ignorance. Issued through Sixteentimes Music, the eight-track/36-minute outing from the Lucerne-via-New-Zealand-based unit plays off influences like Kyuss, Helmet (looking at you, title-track), Dozer, Unida, and so on, and honest to goodness, it’s refreshing to hear a band so ready and willing to just kick ass musically. Not saying that an album with a title like this doesn’t have anything deeper to say, just that Carson make their offering without even a smidgeon of pretense about where they’re coming from, and from opener “Dirty Dream Maker” onward, their melody, their groove, their transitions and sharper turns are right on. It’s classic heavy rock, done impeccably well, made modern. A work of genre that argues in favor of itself and the style as a whole. If you were introducing someone to riff-based heavy, Carson would do the trick just fine.

Carson on Facebook

Sixteentimes Music website

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Isaurian, Deep Sleep Metaphysics

Comprised of vocalist Hoanna Aragão, guitarist/vocalist Jorge Rabelo (also keys, co-production, etc.), guitarist Guilerme Tanner, bassist Renata Marim and drummer Roberto Tavares, Brazil’s Isaurian adapt post-rock patience and atmospheric guitar methods to a melody-fueled heavy purpose. Production value is an asset working in their favor on their second full-length, Deep Sleep Metaphysics, and seems to be a consistent factor throughout their work since Matt Bayles and Rhys Fulber produced their first two EPs in 2017. Here it’s Muriel Curi (Labirinto) and Chris Common (Pelican, many others), who bring a decided sense of space that’s measurable from the locale difference in Aragão‘s and Rabelo‘s vocal levels from opener “Árida” onward. Their intensions vary throughout — “For Hypnos” has “everybody smokes pot”-esque gang chants near its finish, “The Dream to End All Dreams” is a piano-inclusive guitar-flourish instrumental, “Autumn Eyes” is duly mellow and brooding, “Hearts and Roads” delivers culmination in a brighter melodic wash ahead of a bonus Curi remix of the opener — but it’s the melodic nuance and the clarity of sound that pull the songs together and distinguish the band. They’ve been tagged as “heavygaze” and various other ‘-gaze’ whathaveyou, and they borrow from that, but their drive toward fidelity of sound makes them something else entirely. They should tour Europe asap.

Isaurian on Instagram

Isaurian on Bandcamp

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Kadavermarch, Into Oblivion

Hints of Kadavermarch‘s metallic origins — members having served in Helhorse, Illdisposed, as well as the Danish hip-hop group Tudsegammelt, and others — sneak into their songs both in the more upfront manner of harsher backing vocals on “The Eschaton” and the subsequent “Abyss,” and in some of the double-guitar work throughout, though their first album, Into Oblivion, sets their loyalties firmly in heavy rock. Uncle Acid may be an influence in terms of vocal melody, but the riffs throughout cuts like “Satanic” and “Reefer Madness” and the galloping “Flowering Death” are bigger and feel drawn in part from acts like The Sword and Baroness, delivered with a sharp edge. It’s a fascinating blend, and the recording on Into Oblivion lets it shine with a palpable band-in-the-room sensibility and stage-style energy, while still allowing enough breadth for a build like that in the finale “Beyond the End” to pay off the record as a whole. Capable craft, a sound on its way to being their own, a turquoise vinyl pressing, and a pedigree to boot — there’s nothing more I would ask of Into Oblivion. It feels like an opening salvo for a longer-term progression and I hope it is precisely that.

Kadavermarch on Facebook

Target Group on Bandcamp

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Büzêm, Here

The violence implied in the title “Regurgitated Ambition Consuming Itself” takes the form of a harsh wall of noise drone that, once it starts, continues to unfurl for the just-under-eight-minute duration of the first of two pieces on Büzêm‘s more simply named Here EP. The Portland, Maine, solo art project of bassist/anythingelse-ist Finn has issued a range of exploratory outings, mostly EPs and experiments put to tape, and that modus very much suits the avant vibe throughout Here, which is markedly less caustic in the more rumbling “In an Attempt to Become the Creator” — presumably about Jackson Roykirk — the 10 minutes of which are more clearly the work of a standalone bass guitar, but play out with a sense of the human presence behind, as perhaps was the intention. Here‘s stated purpose is meditative if disaffected, Finn turning mindfulness into an already-in-progress armageddon display, and fair enough, but the found recording at the end, or captured footsteps, whatever it is, relate intentions beyond the use of a single instrument. Not ever going to be universally accessible, nonetheless pushing the kind of boundaries of what’s-a-song that need to be pushed.

Büzêm on Facebook

BÜZÊM on Bandcamp

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Electric Mountain, Valley Giant

Can’t mess with this kind of heavy rock and roll. The fuzz runs thick, the groove is loose (not sloppy), and the action is go from start to finish. Electric Mountain‘s second LP, Valley Giant digs on classic desert-style heavy vibes, with “Vulgar Planet” riffing on Kyuss and Fu Manchu only after “Desert Ride” has dug headfirst into Nebula via Black Rainbows and cuts like “Outlanders” and the hell-yes-wah-bass of big-nodder “Morning Grace” have set the stage for stoner and rock, by, for and about being what it is. Picking highlights, it might be “A Fistful of Grass” for the angular twists of fuzz in the chorus, but “Vulgar Planet” and the penultimate acoustic cut “At Last Everything” both make a solid case ahead of the eight-plus-minute instrumental closing jam “A Thousand Miles High.” The band’s 2017 self-titled debut (also on Electric Valley Records) was a gem as well, and if they can get some forward momentum going on their side after Valley Giant, playing shows, etc., they’d be well placed at the head of the increasingly crowded Mexico City underground.

Electric Mountain on Facebook

Electric Valley Records website

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Hush, The Pornography of Ruin

Also stylized all-caps with punctuation — perhaps a voice commanding: HUSH. — Hudson, New York, five-piece Hush conjure seven songs and 56 minutes of alternately sprawling and oppressive atmospheric sludge on their third full-length, The Pornography of Ruin, and if you take that to mean the quiet parts are spaced and the heavy parts are crushing, well, that’s true too, but not exclusively the case. Amid lyrical poetry, melodic ranging, slamming rhythms — “There Can Be No Forgiveness Without the Shedding of Blood” walks by and waves, its hand bloody — and harsh shouts and screams, Hush shove, pull, bite and chew the consciousness of their listener, with the 12-minute “By This You Are Truly Known” pulling centerpiece duty with mostly whispers and ambience in a spread-out midsection, bookended by more slow-churning pummel. Followed by the shorter “And the Love of Possession is a Disease with Them,” the keyboard-as-strings “The Sound of Kindness in the Voice” and the likewise raging-till-it-isn’t-then-when-it-is-again closer “At Night We Dreamed of Those We Were Stolen From,” the consumption is complete, and The Pornography of Ruin challenges its audience with the weight of its implications and tones alike. And for whatever it’s worth, I saw these guys in Brooklyn a few years back and they fucking destroyed. They’ve expanded the sound a bit since then, but this record is a solid reminder of that force.

Hush on Instagram

Hush on Bandcamp

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