Posted in Whathaveyou on October 9th, 2026 by JJ Koczan
Arkansas post-sludge institution Rwake are off and running on their way to this weekend’s Emissions From the Monolith fest in Ohio, where they’ll join the likes of Torche and Rebreather and screw it I don’t want to say any more since I’m so bummed not to be there to see the return of that festival 19 years later. In any case, you probably recall the accreting black hole that was the band’s also-a-return 2025 album The Return of Magick (review here), consuming as it was. Next month, they’ll release a stage-captured version given the title Built From Stardust – ‘The Return of Magick’ Live in Little Rock, AR, and yes, that’s a long name, but I think if you cut it at Built From Stardust everyone will still know what you’re talking about.
As they make ready to issue this second official live outing, the band will be on tour in the UK alongside Eyehategod, playing Damnation Festival and more in what’s sure to be an existential victory lap for them. Those dates and more info on the live record follow below, as hoisted from social media:
RWAKE return with a special live album!
“Built From Stardust – ‘The Return of Magik’ live in Little Rock, AR” is out November 13, 2026 on LP/Streaming.
“Built From Stardust – ‘The Return of Magik’ live in Little Rock, AR” captures the band bringing their critically acclaimed new album to life. Recorded in their hometown the day after the original album’s (The Return of Magik) release date, “Built From Stardust…” is every bit as crushing and evocative as the full length; the live album flows through the band’s future-classic material with heightened emotional weight.
Tracklisting: 1. You Swore We’d Always Be Together (Live) 2. The Return of Magik (Live) 3. With Stardust Flowers (Live) 4. Distant Constellations and the Psychedelic Incarceration (Live) 5. In After Reverse (Live) 6. Φ (Live)
Today, RWAKE shares the first offering from “Built From Stardust” with the appropriately titled track “With Stardust Flowers”
RWAKE begin their US Midwest run with Deadbird TOMORROW! RWAKE additionally make their long-awaited return to UK this November with Eyehategod!
“Built From Stardust – ‘The Return of Magik’ live in Little Rock, AR Recorded live at The Rev Room, March 15, 2026 Recording, Mixing, Mastering by Austin Sublett & RWAKE Artwork by Loni Gillum of Minverva’s Menagerie and RWAKE
RWAKE LIVE: Oct 08 Madison, TN @ The ‘58 at Eastside Bowl (w/ Deadbird) Oct 09 Indianapolis, IN @ Black Circle (w/ Deadbird) Oct 10 Youngstown, OH @ Emissions From The Monolith 10 Oct 11 Newport, KY @ The Southgate House (w/ Deadbird)
UK & Ireland Tour w/ EYEHATEGOD Nov 07 Manchester, UK @ Damnation Festival Nov 08 Southampton, UK @ The 1865 Nov 09 London, UK @ The Scala Nov 11 Bristol, UK @ Strange Brew Nov 12 Leeds, UK @ Brudenell Social Club Nov 13 Nottingham, UK @ Rescue Rooms Nov 15 Glasgow, UK @ Core Festival (Vic Bar)
July 22-25, 2027 @ Fire In The Mountain @ Red Eagle Campground, Montana
Posted in Reviews on August 14th, 2026 by JJ Koczan
Well, I have just about a full week’s worth of news to catch up on, so we must be coming down to the end of the Quarterly Review. “Planets align. A king is born. Dodge Swinger.” Etc.
It’s been real, though. Again, I didn’t go one day without putting something in my notes for end-of-year list time, and that includes today as well. If you’ve come along for the ride on these 50 release, thank you. I hope you’ve found something new to listen to, or at least had your opinions of what you’ve already heard confirmed, which always feels good on some level. I will say it’s been a pleasure to dig into this stuff, and I don’t know who slates these things — that’s a joke, I do; there’s nobody else here; sometimes I feel like I need to say that even after 17 years because I’m both insecure and irrelevant — but they did alright on this one because at no point in this process was I like, “omg what is mah life,” and it’s always a relief to not get there.
Bottom line, as always, thanks for reading. I’ll be back with another of these in October, probably.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol, The Disappearing Man
Word on the street — by that I mean their Linktree — is that Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol release their new single “Ca$h Grab” Aug. 18. That’s also the title-track of their next full-length, reportedly, but the low-string charmer Austin trio have been eeking out singles since Spring, and the resultant three-songer, The Disappearing Man, is a welcome keep-momentum interim outing for those who’ve been chasing the dragon of 2024’s Big Dumb Riffs (review here) and need something new for their reels-addled attention spans. All three tracks — “The Disappearing Man,” “Bough Down” and “Peaches” — are two minutes long but each gives a different look between the sneer of “Peaches,” the post-grunge heavy rock of “Bough Down” and the harder-hitting pummeling fuckery of the title cut. Is it a holdover? Yeah, probably. Will it even exist when the album comes out and likely features the same tracks? I don’t know. But it’s here now and the songs rule, so maybe get it while it’s there to get got and worry about the rest later, hmm?
The rock is by no means gone from Tidal Wave‘s sound on Volume Tree, but a shift has taken place as well since 2023’s The Lord Knows (review here) such that the first half of the new record seems to draw more from classic heavy metal than desert rock. On “The Orb,” “Hangman,” “Earth” and “Temple of Humanity,” that finds the Swedish foursome more in league with Dio-era Sabbath or Johan Langquist-fronted Candlemass, which is a compliment to vocalist Alexander “Sunkan” Sundqvist. The back half of the album, with “Sideburns,” “Shapeshifter,” “Manuscript 512” and “Skitliv,” complicates the narrative in the yachty experiment of the closer and the penultimate cut drawing the two sides together, but “Sideburns” and “Shapeshifter” have desert-style push, and the latter reminds particularly of late-1900s outfits like The Awesome Machine in its crunch and buzz. Either way they go, the songs hit their marks, so mark it a win for the complexity.
With six songs likewise furious and welcome, Richmond, Virginia’s Thunderchief are only right to name their latest EP after ways they might possibly kill you. The charred heavy thrash-doom of from the two-piece of guitarist/screamer Rik Surly and drum-pummeler Erik Larson does not shy away from the caustic, and whether it’s a roll like “Entrance of the Devil” or the gallop-over-your-head “Chintzy,” or the concluding noisefest in “Slurpee,” to which nine of the EP’s 23 minutes are dedicated, their penchant for aural slaughter shows itself in Surly‘s unflinching rasp, in Larson‘s corresponding pounding — looking at you, “Malaise” — and in the disaffected shove of “Lie Nation,” the band packing a full album’s worth of aggression into the abbreviated runtime. This is Thunderchief‘s wheelhouse, and hardly their first excursion into listener-abuse, but as impressive as the raw sustained ferocity is — not that the world doesn’t provide constant reasons to stay angry — it’s the fact that the material holds together and bears the weight they put to it that makes their approach so lethal. That’s on full and punishing display here.
A multinational collaboration between Peruvian psychheads Chino Burga and Pepe Abad (both veterans of La Ira de Dios) and Scott “Dr. Space” Heller (Øresund Space Collective and adjacent projects), Umma resonate psychedelic meditation across their four-song debut, Kosmovisionen, with layers of intersecting guitar drones, percussion, and synth. “Monts” sets the stage for the unfolding free/freak jazz of “Procesio,” and while “Aeparatio” feels grounded by comparison, its float of guitar remains transcendant ahead of the finale “Ogon,” which is a dream of experimentalist tone and cymbal wash. I don’t know how much of a band Umma are going to be, sending files back and forth between Peru and Portugal, but they tap into something spiritual here in just 35 minutes, and Kosmovisionen sounds more like the beginning of a broader exploration rather than a one-off collab. They create so much space, it’d be a shame if they didn’t grow and flesh out their arrangements accordingly.
Intended as a 7″ complement to the DHU Records vinyl pressing of Rifle‘s 2025 album, Beyond Paranoia, this two-songer plays out for 11 minutes across “Incarnation” and “Twisted Death,” vibing like rote jams with mellow vocals overtop like Endless Boogie or something like that, with an unpredictable edge and underlying tension. Apparently there were lineup issues? I’m not sure on the story, but the resultant vibe is off-kilter in a fascinating way — it’s not necessarily holding back the songs, I mean — and the low-key chaos they capture in the recordings, with mad swirls of guitar behind the mostly-whisper vocals, builds on what the album was doing in pieces like “Beyond Paranoia” and “Gipsy Spell” while feeling less tethered to a classic-heavy/vintage songwriting methodology. That may be indicative of a future direction, or these may just be leftovers from the album sessions, I don’t know, but it’s weird and dug in and sounds like it doesn’t care in the slightest how you classify it.
This year has brought new productivity from Boston experimentalists Brass Hearse, who’ve released three singles in 2026 in addition to this 17-track/51-minute ambient film soundtrack; their first new offerings in six years. The penultimate “Destroyer of the Breach” runs nearly nine minutes, but most of Can’t Get No — titled after the movie — is made up of shorter pieces one to three minutes long, with drones and guitar, keys and various washes of tone, some cogent progressions, some purposefully not, evoking a feeling of loneliness and foreboding. Presumably the title is a Rolling Stones reference — “Drifting Through the Void” might build on the song in question as well, though I might be imagining it — and I haven’t seen the movie, but from what I read it’s shorter than the soundtrack, so yes, that would be emblematic of the new creative delve on the part of the Boston band. On its own, the album makes for a meditative, atmospheric listen but don’t take that to mean Brass Hearse lack dynamic or are doing the same thing all the time. They just happen to be really effective in conjuring a world.
Tucked away in the northeast of Sweden, the Umeå-based three-piece Svindel strike an immediately classic impression on their Ripple-issued debut album, Drömfeber, channeling boogie rock’s sense of motion and, in the title-track and elsewhere, calling to mind psychedelic reach without actually veering too far from the underlying structures of their material. Somebody’s playing organ on opener “Jupiterbarn,” and I’d swear I hear keyboards elsewhere too, but none among guitarist/vocalist Jan Lindblad, bassist Daniel Forsberg and drummer/backing vocalist Johannes Braf is credited with the contribution, so maybe I’m the one in a fever dream. In any case, as “Tunga Ögon” hints toward blues and “Ta Mig Tillbaka Till Världen Nu” embarks in the direction of pastoralia, the stylistic book hardly seems closed in terms of how Svindel might progress, but the fact that they are able to cover this swath without sacrificing cohesive songwriting makes their debut impressive even for someone like me who speaks not a lick of Swedish.
The abrasive sludge excoriation of Dirtmother Live makes a fitting companion-piece for the Fayetteville, Arkansas, local-legend/cryptid outfit’s 19-years-later 2025 self-titled debut (review here), presenting five songs across a rasping, willfully confrontational half-hour set captured from the board at the American Legion Hall in their hometown in true punker fashion, and let’s say probably mixed thereafter. In this material — most of which comes from the record; “Reversal” seems to be “Reverse Cowgirl” under a different name and “Cult of Suzie Everett” does not appear on the studio LP — the nodding fuzz and the impact-density of their low end comes though in full-punch glory, stage banter is preserved, and “Trucker” is even nastier in its bite than it already was, which should be read as a high compliment to the achievement. If you don’t come out of this wanting to start a sludge band, consult a physician.
Italy’s Hijss return after 2024’s Stuck on Common Ground (review here) with a self-titled eight-song/39-minute LP that’s an even deeper dive into krautisms and cosmic heavy rock, volatile in “Vicious Cycle” and “Parasite,” daring to soothe before they walk into the wash of “S.W.A.N.” and getting full-on electro-dance-mode in the penultimate “Fatal Attraction” before the moody distortion swell of “Outro” rounds out. Opener and longest track (immediate points) “Drain of Thoughts” establishes precedent in the motorik-roll-turned-heavy-shove progression, but the ultimate product of the album is that Hijss have gotten weirder and more individualized in the last two years, they’re ready to tour with labelmates Giöbia like yesterday, and the experimentalism in bringing together acoustics and synthesized textures of “Underwater” and the throb/fuzz banger “Dopamine” present a fresher take than I’ve yet seen the band credited for honing.
Deley Sound System is the techno alter-ego of Budapesti psychedelic improvisationalist Deley, and if you’re feeling particularly adventurous, their earlier-2026 live recording Unsync 001 captures them bringing their spontaneity-fueled creative process to a style of music that, considering it’s programmed, is often classified as more staid. Psychedelia persists across genre here as the band weave together samples and different layers to carve an affect that’s all the more immersive and hypnotic not in spite of the steady beat that might underpin a track like “Sun 001” or the 18-minute “BBM 001” but rather because of it. The dub techno and synthesizer aspects, playing off influences from jams and generally more guitar-led (or -inclusive at all, for that matter) fare, are fascinating academically, but it’s satisfying as well to hear a band so willing to step beyond their comfort zone and a crucial reminder that the boundaries of creativity are far more imaginary than the sitar sounds on “Sun 002” and that the most dangerous thing to any status quo is a mind brave enough to look beyond it as these minds do here.
Posted in Whathaveyou on July 3rd, 2026 by JJ Koczan
Maybe you saw Pallbearer earlier in 2026 on the Eastern Seaboard leg of this tour celebrating the Little Rock, Arkansas, doomers’ debut album, 2014’s Foundations of Burden, originally released by Profound Lore before the band signed to Nuclear Blast. Well, it’s time for the Western half of the US (plus a dip into Canada) to get in on the action. In August and September, the tour will pick up and cover a no-less-substantial swath of burgs, of course playing the on-its-way-to-being-a-classic LP in its entirety for the never-say-never ‘last’ time.
Pallbearer‘s most recent album, Mind Burns Alive (review here), came out in 2024, and I have to wonder if they won’t be getting to work on a follow-up, but even if so, they’re never too far from their next tour. The dates for this one, in the meantime, are below, courtesy of the PR wire:
Pallbearer announce Aug + Sep tour dates in celebration of ‘Foundations of Burden’
Following this year’s extensive series of tour dates and festival appearances celebrating their landmark progressive doom album Foundations of Burden, Pallbearer are bringing their North American campaign to its culmination with a fresh set of dates performing the record in its entirety. This new, lengthy run includes shows in Texas, California, Pacific Northwest, the midwest and more, and tickets for the new shows will go on sale this Wednesday, July 1 at 10am local time here.
Pallbearer comment: “We can’t overstate how great it’s been to revisit this record and share the experience of it with so many people over the past year. It’s always been a hugely impactful record for us, and letting it live and breathe over the course of the year has been such a joyful opportunity. We plan for these shows to be the final North American tour dates for the album so if you’ve been hoping for an chance to dwell within Foundations’ sonics, don’t miss out! We are also completely thrilled to have two captivating and masterful bands in Slowhole and Ordh along for these dates!”
Pallbearer, Foundations of Burden tour: Aug 20 Shreveport, LA — Bear’s * Aug 21 Houston, TX — Black Magic Social Club * Aug 22 McAllen, TX — The Gremlin * Aug 23 Austin, TX — Brushy Street Commons * Aug 25 Dallas, TX — AM/FM * Aug 27 Arenas Valley, NM — Whiskey Creek Zócalo * Aug 28 Tucson, AZ — Soundquest Festival Sep 01 San Diego, CA — The Casbah ^ Sep 02 Santa Ana, CA — Constellation Room ^ Sep 03 Los Angeles, CA — Echoplex ^ Sep 05 San Francisco, CA — Great American Music Hall ^ Sep 06 San Jose, CA — The Ritz ^ Sep 08 Eugene, OR — John Henry’s ^ Sep 09 Portland, OR — Polaris ^ Sep 11 Bellingham, WA — The Shakedown ^ Sep 12 Vancouver, BC — The American ^ Sep 13 Seattle, WA — Substation ^ Sep 14 Spokane, WA — Brightside ^ Sep 15 Boise, ID — Shrine Social Club ^ Sep 16 Salt Lake City, UT — Urban Lounge ^ Sep 18 Denver, CO — Marquis ^ Sep 19 Omaha, NE — Slowdown ^ Sep 21 St. Paul, MN — Turf Club ^ Sep 22 Chicago, IL — Empty Bottle ^ Sep 23 Muskegon, MI — Rake Beer Project ^ Sep 24 Cincinnati, OH — Woodward Theater ^ Sep 25 Lexington, KY — The Burl ^ * with Slowhole ^ with Ordh
Pallbearer’s Foundations of Burden (2025 Redux) is a lovingly reconstituted rendering of their milestone 2014 album. “During the writing and preparation for ‘Foundations,’ everything was ephemeral and we were practically feral,” recalls bassist/vocalist Joseph D. Rowland. “We had no real practice space, we barely had a single working computer between the four of us. Our demos of the record consisted of something barely discernible from white noise. Nevertheless, we knew we were working towards building a set of songs we were deeply enthusiastic about. Once in the thick of recording, the feeling went from dream to dreamlike very quickly, as we found ourselves in what felt like an endless churn of repetition. We slept at the studio on whatever soft surfaces we could find, waking each day to discover that some of the previous day’s work had been corrupted overnight. This resulted in some parts of the album being recorded many times over. The guitars in particular mutated into something Sisyphean.”
Rowland continues, “Since the time that we finally committed the original version of ‘Foundations’ to print, we knew it would be a sonic space we would eventually revisit. Its form did not unfold according to the original version as the numerous file corruptions, delays, and exhausted studio budget compounded into a final feverish push to finish the mix. We were relieved to get those massive and difficult mixes turned into finished songs just in time, but not without a nagging thought; we had to sacrifice much of the nuance we had spent so much time crafting.”
After many discussions and plans were charted during the decade following the 2014 release, Pallbearer seized the opportunity to revisit the record from the ground up. Over the course of 2025, the band laboriously reconstructed the album from the original sessions, as well as recording new versions of the colossal rhythm guitars that define the sonic identity of the record as well as the band.
“In the time since then, we have played most of the songs from ‘Foundations’ more times than we can count, and they remain some of our favorites,” Rowland continues. “The songs have grown with us. And while we hold a deep love and attachment to what we created in 2014, we also gained a fuller understanding of how we would want to re-present them if we had a chance. After years of discussion, listening and learning, we found ourselves in the position to fulfill that vision.”
Foundations of Burden (2025 Redux) features new mixes and mastering, plus new artwork featuring a painting by Benjamin Vierling. The six-song, 55-minute collection is produced by Pallbearer, mixed by Mario Quintero (Spotlights), and mastered by Adam Gonsalves, as well as original engineering by Billy Anderson in 2014.
Posted in Whathaveyou on December 2nd, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Granted I’m not cool enough to call it Mutants Fest, but if I was, I’d surely say something like, “Gosh, I sure am looking forward to seeing who’s playing Mutants Fest next year,” or something like that. Mutants of the Monster — us poor plebes stuck with all those extra syllables as compared to those in the know — will take place from June 4-6 next year in its ceremonial home of Little Rock, Arkansas. Put together at the behest of CT, best known as the frontman of Rwake, the fest not only regularly features that band — a draw in itself; did you hear the album they put out this year? — but a well-curated selection drawn from across the underground spectrum of genres.
The beginnings of the 2026 lineup bear that out as well. From the extremist sludge of Chained to the Bottom of the Ocean to the dirt-coated atmospheric heavy wrought by Deadbird to metalcore pioneers Coalesce, who’ll also be undertaking a European tour next Spring. It’s three bands confirmed — I think; there was a fourth but it’s not in the social post below so I’m leaving them out to play it safe — but each one of them bringing something different to the bill. Expect that theme to continue as Mutants of the Monster continues to flesh out the lineup from here. I’ve heard a few of the names CT is working to get, and you can take my word that it’s going to be a party.
They had tickets up for sale over this past weekend for Black Friday and such. I assume it’ll sell out but I’m paranoid like that about everything, so take it as you will. The website and social links will have more info, and when I see the next round of names out I’ll do my best to keep up too.
From social media:
We are completely over the moon to welcome Coalesce, CTTBOTO, and Deadbird to 2026 Mutants. Black Friday Early Access over at the Last Chance Records home site.
Posted in Whathaveyou on April 25th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Just over a month’s remove from the March release of their first record in 14 years, The Return of Magik (review here), Little Rock, Arkansas, atmospheric post-doomers Rwake have lined up a few live dates this June to support the album. No, it isn’t the most extensive list of shows I’ve ever put up, but between frontman CT‘s Mutants of the Monster Fest (which some day I will try to attend, because it seems cool and it’s a good place to see Rwake) and sharing the stage with Acid Bath, among others, clearly the idea is more quality than quantity.
Shows are in Arkansas, Alabama, Florida and Georgia. Saint Vitus Bar doesn’t exist anymore, so I don’t know how you get this band to New York ever again, but if it happened I’d do my damnedest to be there. The point though is that if you’re in their path, don’t take it for granted and see the band while you can.
It was 14 years between releases, and yeah, they’ve done local/regional shows all along — it’s not like they ever broke up, I mean — and the press release says there are more shows TBA, but I haven’t seen any signs that these four dates will be backed by a six-week coast-to-coast US run followed by five more weeks in Europe, plus South America, plus Japan and Australia. So if this is where the magik is gonna be, it’s a place to put yourself if you can. That’s all I’m saying.
From the PR wire:
RWAKE Confirms Special Live Dates This June; The Return Of Magik Full-Length Out Now On Relapse Records
RWAKE will take to the stage this June on four special shows including a performance at this year’s edition of Mutants Of The Monster Fest on their home turf of Little Rock, Arkansas as well as a show supporting Acid Bath and Weedeater in St. Petersburg, Florida. More dates will be announced in the weeks to come.
RWAKE Live:
6/06/2025 Mutants Of The Monster Fest – Little Rock, AR 6/26/2025 Saturn – Birmingham, AL w/ Hexxus, Hiraeth 6/28/2025 Jannus Live – St. Petersburg, FL w/ Acid Bath, Weedeater 6/29/2025 The Earl – Atlanta, GA w/ Canopy, Insomniac
RWAKE released their long-awaited new full-length, The Return Of Magik, last month on Relapse Records.
RWAKE: C.T. – vocals, words, theme Reid – bass guitars, distortion John – guitars, lap + pedal steel, 12-string bass Austin – guitars Brittany – energy peddler, keys and a microphone Jeff – drums, acoustic guitar, 12-string bass
* “…Psychedelic Incarceration” written and spoken by Jim “Dandy” Mangrum, February 17th, 2024 in Black Oak, Arkansas.
Posted in Reviews on March 12th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
[NOTE: In this interest of full disclosure, I wrote the promotional bio for this album (posted here) and was compensated for it by Relapse Records. This did not factor into my decision to do this review — you can see in the links below it’s not my first time writing about the band — and I’m pretty sure the reason I was asked to do the bio in the first place was because I’m a fan, which, yes, I am. But I took a journalism class one time, so I feel a need to mention this kind of thing when it applies. Thanks for reading.]
One could not accuse Rwake of failing to see the beauty in horror. The Little Rock, Arkansas-based post-metallic conjurors are closing in on the 30th anniversary of the band next year, and perhaps the looming onset of another decade was a factor in their making The Return of Magik, their sixth album and first since 2011’s Rest (review here), but the passage of time is an important part of the procession, coinciding with the dynamic changes in space throughout.
That is to say, while “You Swore We’d Always Be Together” opens with a wistful stretch of acoustic guitar — drummer Jeff Morgan is credited with acoustics and 12-string bass, though John Judkins also plays guitar, lap and pedal steel and 12-string bass, and this record introduces Austin Sublett on lead guitar; Reid Raley plays bass, Brittany handles vocals and keys and Christopher “C.T.” Terry, also vocals, gives form to the preaches and cosmic declarations of “The Return of Magik,” “With Stardust Flowers,” and so on — the sense of breadth the band cast is met head-on by claustrophobically heavy riffing. Just because it’s been 14 years and one assumes a fair amount of life-living done in that time doesn’t mean Rwake are going to stop being Rwake.
The world they cast in The Return of Magik is their most vivid to-date — a place out in the woods on soft ground that you feel might just eat you on your next step because it might. The animal bones on the cover, especially cleaned and cared for as these have been, could hardly be more appropriate. It shows a reverence for the natural order and a reminder of the human place in it, and to coincide, they are more spiritual, ritualized in the delivery.
In his 2010 documentary, Slow Southern Steel (discussed here), Terry posits the advent of Southern heavy in part as a response to the cultural dominance of the southern baptist church, and Rwake have always been in conversation with that musical ideology, which one can hear in some of the guitar throughout the linear courses of “The Return of Magik” and “With Stardust Flowers” before Black Oak Arkansas‘ Jim “Dandy” Mangrum steps in for a spoken word guest spot in “Distant Constellations and the Psychedelic Incarceration,” the longest song at 13:56, reading a poem he wrote sort of as an existential assessment. It’s interesting how much of the spoken/semi-spoken vocals throughout feel like a sermon.
Mangrum‘s voice is manipulated with effects to give an otherworldly aspect, and that fits well alongside the rest of The Return of Magik, which from the mammoth lurch of “You Swore We’d Always Be Together” to the quiet space created at the finish by the sub-two-minute outro “Φ” (the Greek letter “Phi”), which follows the gnashing and consumptive churn and darkly progressive reality twist — plus a shimmering, scream-topped beautifully apocalyptic ending that’s more graceful than the black metal from which it might otherwise have derived — with some backmasking before it bursts into the crescendo.
Brittany, or sometimes just B., has a rasp of voice that is singular in underground heavy music, and like few harsh vocalists, she is able to both add to the atmosphere of the album’s five extended pieces while also providing some of its most vivid moments of extremity. “You Swore We’d Always Be Together” draws a lot of its impression from the lead guitar and acoustic thread, but especially in its first half, the title-track is monstrous in a genuinely nightmarish way, bleak and threatening and subliminal — of couse it ends gorgeous — and “With Stardust Flowers” plays back and forth off a similar level of crush.
This, in turn, flows like thick, seemingly bottomless, water into “Distant Constellations and the Psychedelic Incarceration,” with “In After Reverse” and “Φ” for culmination. A six-song/53-minute course is not inconsiderable in an age of fleeting attention spans and the instant/false gratification of technology’s numb-you-out-to-rob-you dopamine drip, but Rwake are a guiding presence through this ethereal mire they’ve swirled together — there’s talk of cauldrons I think in the title-track, and the image feels appropriate given both the dirt-mystique of those lyrics which are discernible in spoken parts and screams, etc. — and as much as aural threat persists, a sense of catharsis pours through even through the most outwardly caustic stretches.
Coupled with the willingness to veer into gorgeousness, whether that happens as the prog-metal twisting solo six minutes into “With Stardust Flowers” or the residual drone epilogue to “In After Reverse” or indeed many of the rawest and most intense stretches since that’s a kind of beauty too, Rwake circa 2025 present a mature take on some of what’s felt less controlled in their sound in the past, without letting go of the progressive songwriting ethic central to their richly individualized approach.
What that boils down to in terms of the listening experience is immersion with a pointed depth of mood and intermittent, well-used harshness among the tools employed, along with traditional Southern rock, psychedelic, prog metal, post-sludge, folk and an experimentalist foundation underpinning it all. Maybe even a little bit of New Age in there if you want to count some of the philosophy being thrown around in the lyrics.
One way or the other, The Return of Magik is a striking comeback for Rwake that, despite the 14 years it’s been since their last outing, will be recognizable to those who followed their course the better part of a generation ago while introducing new listeners to the fold, most of all by highlighting who Rwake are in its uncompromising, forward-thinking, distinctive craft. It’s a cohesive, engrossing, wholly realized work that’s an intangible meld of different players, ideas, styles, and times, so if you want to sum that up by calling it ‘magic’ — or ‘magik,’ as it were — then fair enough.
They don’t make you wait much longer than the four-count into opener “Soil the Dove” before Dirtmother tell you what they’re all about. And even that count-in has feedback behind it. Based in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and counting their origins back to 2006, the four-piece reformed in 2023 after I don’t know how long of a break, and make their self-released debut with the eight songs and 44 minutes of Dirtmother. The tracks are raw to the point of being raw as a point, and across the span, the band — vocalist Tim Stockburger, guitarist Anthony Harvell, bassist Todd Bohannon (ex-Deadbird, Deadeyejack), and drummer Jay Hollingshead (ex-Wrought) — capture the groove and despondent aggression of classic Southern sludge.
Riffs are followed, nods are nodded, screams are screamed, and that explosion as “Soil the Dove” picks up that count is a scouring, lumbering, nasty-ass take on the style, meaner at high volumes but intentionally caustic regardless. I don’t know how long these songs have been around — for a band with 19 years of history releasing their first album, the possibility for vintage riffs grows — but Dirtmother show up with the clear purpose of laying waste and “Plinko” starts with a “shit! fuck!” sample before setting out on its own roll, backing the opener with mid-tempo low-end push as aural torque behind Stockburger growls and higher-register throatrippers, only intermittently intelligable, but in little danger of not making their statement regardless. “Close your eyes…” is repeated in the chorus of “Plinko,” but Dirtmother are less about hooks or accessibility than about pummel, and their energies are thusly directed in songwriting.
Once upon a time, about 20-25 years ago, scores of bands like this wandered the earth. I was in one. The hillsides were painted with them, all pissed off and crashing around about who knows what. Dirtmother‘s Dirtmother doesn’t really feel anachronistic — such as it is, the production is way more 2020s than 2000s, but after a certain point, raw is raw — as longest cut “Goodnight Mommy” (7:53) draws down the pace to emphasize the doomly pulls and rearing-back before the next crushing measure, but it’s a take on sludge that I can only think of as ‘classic’ in my mind, odd as that seems. The way everything stops to let the guitar establish a riff after two minutes into “Goodnight Mommy” and for how the scream starts before they crash back in on that same groove; or the way “None Would Name It” pushes even further into grueling tempo and filthy revelry, a bit of swing arriving for contrast coinciding with a ’00s janga-janga shuffle — the stuff of stoner rock when it was still embarrassed to be called that.
“None Would Name It” feels especially dark in tone, but it moves fluidly even if the band sound like they have knives for teeth. There aren’t going to be a ton of surprises for those who’ve had experience with Southern sludge, but neither should that be taken to mean Dirtmother are aping Eyehategod or anyone else in the sphere. If you look at Dirtmother as a first record from a band who got going in 2023, it’s a fascinating and righteous representation of the style.
The fact that they started in the aughts, and that they highlight that longevity — something that one generally expects from black metal bands, who somehow all formed in 1991 — even with the implication of a break of some years between eras, changes the context. I didn’t see Dirtmother in Arkansas circa 2006, or 2007, or ever, so I can’t speak to how they sounded then vs. how they sound now — I found a clip on YouTube from 2008; way blown out, but consistent in methodology — but as they start the second half of the record with “Bad Ideas All Around,” with Stockburger seeming to open wide and swallow the whole song in the first minute, only to have the riff persist thereafter, it’s a strange thing to feel nostalgic about. Obviously, different listeners will bring themselves to it in their own way.
Growing deathly in its grows, “Bad Ideas All Around” comes to a halt around a sample and feedback at around the halfway point — the use of samples serving as another tie to original-era sludge; think Buzzov*en, Rwake, etc. — and crawls to its finish from there. Nothing on side B hits the seven-minute mark like “Goodnight Mommy,” but there’s little letup just the same. “Beware of God” is likewise harsh and Sabbathian, another sample after the first verse and a slowdown into a lower-growling middle eventually gives back to swing, but keeps the barebones feel of its most methodical crush.
I don’t know what the lyrics are and I’m not sure I want to, but “Reverse Cowgirl” follows suit in its first verse, opening to a chorus that cycles through around crashes and a twist of riff, Stockburger as scathing as he’s yet been on vocals. There’s a slowdown, a speed-up, and even some cleaner shouts in the last minute, so “Reverse Cowgirl” isn’t without its dynamic — it’s the shortest cut at 4:05 — and it ends with push and the repeated line, “Baby, you’ve got no reason to stop..” giving over to a sample at the start of closer “Trucker,” someone in a Southern accent talking about hitting something or someone; it’s pretty vague.
The capper is no less an assault than one would hope. No, Dirtmother haven’t been hiding some too-clever-by-half divergence up their collective sleeve, and they’re not about to take away from the album-as-monolith impression they’ve given throughout while still highlighting different pieces of individual tracks. “Trucker” is a rolling stoner riff, blues-via-Sabbath-via-Southern-Baptist-trauma, and it finishes Dirtmother‘s Dirtmother with six and a half minutes of reaffirmed assault.
They get a little Goatsnakey in the second half, and that’s certainly welcome and suited to Hollingshead‘s drumming, but hit into the inevitable slowdown and there make their final stand. There’s the expected amount of fanfare to cap — i.e. not very much at all; a sample gives over to residual echo as the amps drop to hum and cut to silence — and Dirtmother exit the proceedings with no more pretense than they came in. A band who showed up, wrecked the place, got out. I’d say they don’t make ’em like that anymore, but apparently they do. Sludge on.
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 28th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Don’t get so lost in the 12 minutes of Rwake‘s new single that you don’t realize the act of world-creation happening around you atmospherically, because The Return of Magik — which is the Little Rock, Arkansas, outfit’s first long-player since 2011’s Rest (review here) dwells in the sinister spirituality one can hear manifest in the title-track. The interweaving of vocalists CT and Brittany remains singularly vicious, and the former’s semi-spoken litany in the midsection of “The Return of Magik” is righteously weird and correspondingly from the heart. Rwake have never been about catchy hooks or fodder for light-listening. “The Return of Magik” asks you to immerse accordingly.
I was fortunate enough in December to do some bio writing for the album. Some of that appears below — “Years have now…,” the part about Austin Sublett and the paragraph after — which is neat if you happen to be me, but the real crux here is the song itself, which lays out a scope and vibe that really is Rwake‘s own, however one might align them to post-sludge or another niche of the like. Extreme swamp doom mysticism? Eventually, you keep paring down elements, and Rwake are just Rwake.
The PR wire gives it back thusly:
RWAKE To Release First New Album In Over 13 Years, The Return Of Magik, On March 14th Via Relapse Records; New Video/Single Now Playing + Preorders Available
After thirteen years of silence, an unsettling sound that is strangely familiar yet somehow even more haunted re-emerges from the Arkansas depths. There is no mistake as to what this is. RWAKE has released a new transmission. The Return Of Magik, set for release on March 14th via Relapse Records, has arrived.
Years have now fed into an album that reaches into a swirling, cosmic unknown – RWAKE has grown, and the perspective of the material has shifted accordingly. Overwhelming at its peak and haunting during moments of respite, The Return Of Magik is undeniably RWAKE. Every movement feels like an emotionally engrossing journey. Arrangements carefully and thoughtfully built in layers over a period of years lend mystique and a feeling of building toward a cathartic release. There is no box into which the material might fit other than one with the band’s name on it.
Today, the band shares the official video for the album’s title track.
The Return Of Magik will be released on CD, LP, and digital formats. Find preorders at Relapse.com HERE.
The Return Of Magik Track Listing: 1. You Swore We’d Always Be Together 2. The Return Of Magik 3. With Stardust Flowers 4. Distant Constellations And The Psychedelic Incarceration 5. In After Reverse 6. Φ
Additionally, RWAKE has announced their first shows of 2025 around the release of The Return Of Magik including a hometown release show on March 15th.
RWAKE Live: 3/14/2025 Eastside Bowl – Nashville, TN 3/15/2025 Rev Room – Little Rock, AR * Record Release Show 4/11/2025 Bear’s – Shreveport, LA 4/12/2025 Siberia – New Orleans, LA
Recorded in early 2024 at East End Sounds in Hensley, Arkansas, The Return Of Magik introduces RWAKE’s new lead guitarist Austin Sublett with a barrage of shredded solos suited to the angular, progressive metal riffing of the album’s most jaw-clenching moments, while presenting a through-line of molten, immersive ambience. The opener “You Swore We’d Always Be Together” – already a fixture of live sets – and the expansive sprawl of “Distant Constellations And The Psychedelic Incarceration” move with cruelty and grace alike. Foreboding, syncopated riffs sway against Moog-driven space and guttural bellows. The Return Of Magik’s songs stand alone as individualized post-metallic blends of genres.
RWAKE remains dually fronted; Chris Terry’s powerful vocals lay against Brittany Fugate’s visceral screams. Jeff Morgan returns to the drum kit, in addition to acoustic guitar and 12-string bass. Bassist/noisemaker Reid Raley, Sublett, and fellow guitarist John Judkins set an instrumental backdrop that is vast and engrossing in itself – quiet, contemplative passages often explode into gut-wrenching, doomed out distortions. The Return Of Magik, which features artwork by Loni Gillum of Minerva’s Menagerie and RWAKE, burns brighter and beyond the ferocity of the band’s already storied catalog.
Although the Magik may be bleak, the manner in which RWAKE revels in it can only be called a celebration.
RWAKE: C.T. – vocals, words, theme Reid – bass guitars, distortion John – guitars, lap + pedal steel, 12-string bass Austin – guitars Brittany – energy peddler, keys and a microphone Jeff – drums, acoustic guitar, 12-string bass
* “…Psychedelic Incarceration” written and spoken by Jim “Dandy” Mangrum, February 17th, 2024 in Black Oak, Arkansas.
