Caught Between Worlds turned 20 this year. A decade prior to its 2004 release through At a Loss Recordings, Philadelphia instrumentalists Stinking Lizaveta were putting together their first demos, so if we’re talking anniversaries, the band being 30 years old certainly warrants note. Their first album, the Steve Albini-produced Hopelessness and Shame, was came out in 1996. This was their fourth, following behind 2001’s III, which came out via Tolotta Records (run by Joe Lally of Fugazi), and the first of three that the lineup of guitarist Yanni Papadopoulos, bassist Alexi Papadopoulos and drummer Cheshire Agusta would do for At a Loss, which in a catalog of nine full-lengths and various splits and 7″s is a long as they’ve stayed with anybody. Hazards of this level of restlessness, perhaps.

And as for that level? Call it “characteristic,” though the persona of the band is something that’s evolved into itself over time as well. From a punkier, rawer foundation, Stinking Lizaveta have evolved a studio ideal of performance as a moral ethic. True to the very tail end of the CD era, it runs 61 minutes long and features 16 tracks, most under four minutes each. It shifts from place to place and its slowdowns don’t so much feel like they’re there to let the listener catch up as to throw down a gauntlet of instrumentalism. Stinking Lizaveta even two decades ago were no less clear in their purposes than the paragons of sans-vocals heavy riffing, Karma to Burn, but the Philly trio’s structures are quirkier, the turns brazenly angular, the stops and starts willfully unpredictable. The tense chugging and crashes of “I Denounce the Government” — at least as relevant in 2024 as 2004 — unfold with their own language of squeals in Yanni‘s guitar, answering the twisted depths conjured by Alexi‘s bass at the finish of “Beyond the Shadows” with a more animalian howl than the riffer title-track provided in the wistful melody of its shred and ensuing doomly march.

Parts are fast, parts are slow, ideas take shape in and around building cycles of riffs and are soon vaporized by impulsive-but-not-random redirects. “Out of Breath” seeming to hit a wall before pivoting to a creep before it’s halfway though, “Over the Edge” proffering a jammier, open and melancholic jazz fluidity, less manic than the crux of the record from which it comes but essential to it just the same, “Staying Here” getting its own acoustic intro before unfurling a Southern-style nostalgic sentiment, gradually flowing into improv-sounding meander but managing not to lose the plot by the finish, and so on. The focus throughout is less on atmosphere than one might expect having heard their more recent output — last year’s Anthems and Phantoms (review here) was born of the same roots as Caught Between Worlds, but the band have never stopped evolving or exploring — but the trade for that is a markedly live feel in the sound resulting from Ben Danaher and Joe Smiley‘s recording and mix, and Caught Between Worlds conveys its vitality in a way that, if it wasn’t all tracked with everyone in the same room playing at the same time, having that musical conversation and shaping the dynamic as it happened, is perhaps doubly impressive for sounding so much like it.

Granted this wasn’t a new band at the time — four records in 10 years isn’t nothing, however much they’ve done since — but in both their connections to punk in the drums, to jazz in the bass and to classic heavy rock via the guitar, the deep individualism of their writing style, and the verve with which even the urbane, largely mellow “Someone’s Downstairs” seems to soundtrack an invisible cartoon of someone walking tiptoe carrying a lamp with their shadow projected on the wall behind them — did it just move on its own? — is palpable and defining. Parts are fast, parts are slow, as noted, but Stinking Lizaveta remain unflinchingly themselves. It is a combination of elements that works simply because it does, and in the frenetic elbow-thrower “Stop Laughing” and the chunkier-style groove of “Last Wish” — still a live staple — and the greater tonal threat issued by “Side Naked,” which is even more striking for the human voice captured in its sample, the chemistry is plain to hear. It’s not about showing off, or maybe it is just a little, but each piece of Caught Between Worlds brings something to the complex picture of the whole.

That’s going to be most heard by those who put something into it. That is to say, Stinking Lizaveta have never been light on challenge when it comes to listening, and Caught Between Worlds — which front-to-back does what it says in presenting the band as drawing strength from existing in the spaces betwixt one style and another — is no exception, either in runtime or the various shifts in sound, tempo and mood put forth. They bring it back to ground near the finish for “Day of Dust” after “Someone’s Downstairs,” “Staying Here” (plus its intro) and the prior “Prayer for the Living” push into various oddball niches, and “Man Day” provides an insistent finish that feels well placed in providing a convincing closing argument. The more you put into it attention-wise, the more you’re going to get out of it, but as dug in as the band are throughout, it’s accordingly an easier dive for the listener to make at the outset, and once you’re in it, you might as well forget whatever else you had on for the day as you’ll be too busy trying to convince your head to stop spinning to get anything else done. This might make it distracting if you’re not committed to giving their songs the attention due, but if you can get on board, Stinking Lizaveta are good for the soul in a way few acts could ever hope to be and many don’t care enough to try to become. I promise you this is restorative music.

I already mentioned it, but the band’s latest LP, Anthems and Phantoms, is hardly a distant memory. I was lucky enough to catch them over the summer in Germany at Freak Valley (review here), and to absolutely no surprise, they were stellar. If you can see them, do. If not, they’ve got nine records for your plunge. Do it up.

Good luck, and as always, I hope you enjoy this one. Thanks for reading.

—

I was back and forth on whether to close out the week — it’s after noon now, which is later in the day than I’d prefer to be doing so, for sure — but I won’t regret it. In like an hour and a half I’m going to leave the comfort of my home and drive to I-don’t-know-where in Brooklyn to the TV Eye venue, try to find a place to park for however many hours and sit in my car rather than wait to drive in. I’m doing this because traffic and because it’s that much easier to get out of the house before school pickup, which is a little after 3. Traffic’s going to suck either way; going in or coming out of New York, that’s just a condition of life, but yeah. It’s Mars Red Sky and Howling Giant, and I swore up and down I was going, and I want to go, so I am.

The intervening time I’ll spend at least part of putting together the back end of the Quarterly Review I’ll be doing next week. Sneaking one in before year-end list time, and absolutely part of that is me trying to keep up with releases before I close out the year around here. It’s just one week — 50 releases, as opposed to 110, which we did, I don’t know, like four weeks ago, maybe? — but there’s some good stuff in there from the whole year, in addition to new releases. Things like Gnome, Fuzz Sagrado, Hermano, Thou, Sergeant Thunderhoof, Cortez (which I wrote the bio for but haven’t reviewed yet) Cosmic Fall and Coltaine — I don’t want to let these slip before 2025 hits and I start yet another year of listening at a deficit. Not that music has an expiration date, not that any of it matters in the first place, blah blah you get the point.

But doing the QR next week will help me finalize the shape of my own year-end list, and I’d feel awfully triumphant if I could get that out the week before the Xmas holiday — when I’ll almost certainly have a ton of other crap going on — rather than the week of. There was one year it was Xmas Eve it went up, which is ridiculous. I’ll do my best, but while I’m working on that it means I’ll be doing fewer reviews, so yeah, having just banged out 50 and needing to get caught up on news anyway — there was so much this week; anyone remember when the music industry shut down in December? — should put me in good position to start wrapping my head around what I think are the best releases of the year. I also feel like I need a special section to mention that I haven’t heard either the Opeth or the Blood Incantation records, but I can plot all that out as I get closer.

So that’s the plan for the rest of the month. Quarterly Review, list as soon as I can and whatever news and reviews I can fill in around it. There are less premieres, which is fine. That frees me up to chase down stuff on my own rather than follow what comes in for PR pitches, and that’s not a hardship when there’s a lot to do. If I get through it in a timely manner — I never know how much I have to say until I start saying it with these things, and sometimes it’s a lot — and have the week of New Year’s open, I’ll see where I’m at and what I want to do writing-wise with that time. I’ll do as much as I can, when I can. If you see me in my car this afternoon in Brooklyn typing out a 180-word review of the new Space Shepherds outing, perhaps you’ll have some semblance of the truth of that.

Whatever you’re up to this weekend — 16 are also in town but I can’t commit to driving to the city twice given how much I both hate it, it takes time away from duties at home, and I have a fair amount of travel set for the end of next month; Morris County, North Jersey needs a 200-cap venue on the underground circuit so god damn bad; anyone want to open one with me? — I hope you have a great and safe time. Have fun, maybe relax a bit, and enjoy the break if you get one. I’ll have the review of tonight up either over the weekend or on Monday, depending on when I have time to sort photos. Ugh, photos.

Okay, here I go.

FRM.

The Obelisk Collective on Facebook

The Obelisk Radio

The Obelisk merch

A band who don’t get enough credit. Rwake released the cumbersome-but-righteously-titled If You Walk Before You Crawl, You Crawl Before You Die in 2004 through At a Loss Recordings. Based in Little Rock, Arkansas, the six-piece outfit — six of ’em! — traveled to Chicago in March of that year to record for six days with Sanford Parker, who also mixed (John Brearley is credited with engineering as well; Alan Douches mastered), and what they went home with remains these 18 years later both monstrous and unlike nearly anything else that was coming out at the time. With discernable influences from the likes of Neurosis and Buzzov*en, two singers in Christopher “CT” Terry and Brittany “B” Fugate (the latter also Moog), and a sound that both was and was not in league with the then-nascent movement of post-metal, they were able to bring together atmosphere and impact in a way that few acts of the style before or since have.

From the seven-minute opener “Dying Spiral Galaxies” — hell of a place to start — through the double-whammy titular finale of “If You Walk Before You Crawl” and “You Crawl Before You Die,” Rwake harnessed a creative scope that could either be the screamed poetry over acoustic guitar and distorted bass of “Sleep and Forget Forever” or the deceptively methodical onslaught of volume that was “Embedded,” and even listening to it now, you never quite know where the next turn is headed until it gets there. It is likewise gross and beautiful.

Comprised of Fugate, Terry (also of Iron Tongue), guitarists Kris “Gravy” Graves and Kiffin Rogers, bassist Reid Raley (who played with The Obsessed from circa 2013-2019) and drummer Jeff Morgan (also bass/vocals in the undervalued Deadbird), if Rwake‘s output wasn’t the product of multiple songwriters, it was at least informed by multiple personalities somewhere along the way. If You Walk Before You Crawl, You Crawl Before You Die was their third full-length, preceded by 1999’s Absence Due to Projection and 2002’s Hell is a Door to the Sun, and it took the avant sludginess of those offerings to a new level, remaining cohesive even at its most unhinged and noisiest — looking at you, “Woodson Lateral” — resulting in a powerful combination of control and chaos.

Concurrent to releases like Neurosis‘ The Eye of Every Storm, Isis‘ Panopticon, Cult of Luna‘s Salvation and Mouth of the Architect‘s Time and Withering, among others, it was a piece of an expanding aesthetic puzzle, yet it stood out even among peers and offered depth in a way that was organically its own. And while a lot of those bands used similar elements, be it synth, or effective layering of guitar, loud/quiet trades and malleable tempos, etc., Rwake tapped into a more vicious gnash when they wanted to — the first time I saw Fugate live was SXSW around the time of this release; she was hunched over at the front of the stage and I couldn’t even see her at first for the rest of the crowd in front of me, just heard that rasp, and when she stood up, a jolt of electricity went through the room; what a scream — and their songs seemed to take special delight in shirking the rules of microgenre even as those were still being defined.

Laced with samples throughout in a way that was very much emblematic of Southern sludge at the time — the album begins with some conservative or other worrying about the deleterious effects of rock and roll on the mind, ambient screams and acoustic guitar behind, before the requisite volume kick actually launches “Dying Spiral Galaxies” — If You Walk Before You Crawl, You Crawl Before You Die is still head-spinning in its complexity, and offers multiple paths to its audience. If you put it on and follow the guitar, you’ll get an offering of ace riffs front to back, peppered through with stretches of acoustic and more subdued fare, be it “Intro” ahead of “Sleep and Forget Forever” or “If You Walk Before You Crawl” itself.

Concentrate on the vocals and you’ll hear arrangements of marked reach in conveying emotion as well as raw ferocity, an abiding mournfulness that only feels more relevant now and a disaffection that seemed to be speaking to its own experience of the place it was from — lest we forget, CT produced the documentary Slow Southern Steel in 2010 — further evidenced by moments like the sample at the start and in the second half of “Woodson Lateral,” the warning of people living in the woods and on the road of the same name through Pulaski County, where Little Rock is located. Follow the bass and you’re consumed entirely. Follow the drums and it’s damn near jazz, at least intermittently.

There is, in other words, a lot to be heard if you’re willing to engage Rwake on their own wavelength, which given the extremity of purpose around which their work always was/has been based, not everyone can or is willing to do. Fair enough. An outlier position suits them well on If You Walk Before You Crawl, You Crawl Before You Die, with its closer “You Crawl Before You Die” nearly hitting the 10-minute mark and finding the band at their most dug-in as they make their way to the noise-drenched, mania-screaming, torn-apart-until-only-feedback-is-left finale; like they had a strategic reserve of scathe just waiting to be busted out at the right time.

Maybe part of why their work remains underrated is because they never quite fit in one niche or another, though they signed to Relapse for 2007’s Voices of Omens and 2011’s Rest (review here) — also a 2015 reissue of their 1998 demo Xenoglossalgia (The Last Stage of Awareness) — so they were certainly in good company despite all that pesky doing-their-own-thing that made them harder to categorize. That same ethic, along with the sense of punishment and downerism that so much of it conveys, is also why If You Walk Before You Crawl, You Crawl Before You Die holds up so well. If it was ahead of its time then, and maybe it was, it still kind of feels that way now. You’ll note the version above is from an 8-track tape edition from Texas-based Dead Media Tapes. And that feels about right,l. On its face and under the surface, it’s just pervasively, definitively weird. And weird is fucking awesome.

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

—

I was going to close out last week with this record, but was both out of my mind in pain from my knee — I tore my meniscus at the start of October and there have been good days and bad since — and short on time. If anyone noticed the lack of a Friday Full-Length, no one said anything, and I did extra shares on social media for Bandcamp Friday, so whatever. I remain convinced that I give the biggest crap about that kind of thing anyhow, so it’s on me. Fine. Sometimes you need a day of just six posts on the site. Ha.

I had arthroscopic surgery on the same knee — they marked it with a pen and everything; “YES” in purple letters so they knew to do the left — yesterday afternoon, and could immediately move better. I was given a piece of paper with stretches and exercises to do three times a day, which I did last night before bed with a due amount of discomfort. But the mental difference of productive, healing pain instead of just ongoing injury pain is huge, and this morning I could bend my knee when I sat down on the couch to begin writing, which feels like a novelty even tight as my knee is. It’s been weeks since I could do that. Painkillers don’t hurt either, as it were.

The timing is good, because in 10 days, The Pecan, The Patient Mrs. and I fly to Mexico for the wedding of a couple who are good friends of long standing, and one imagines that will require walking in addition to the air travel. I don’t know that I’ll be running laps by then, but sore as I am now, I feel better than I did. On the mend, as it were. I am fortunate that my wife as a professor at a public university is on a state health insurance plan, or I’d probably never be able to have it fixed. The economic realities of medicine in this country are horrifying and infuriating. Universal healthcare now. Shit, universal healthcare 40 years ago. Alas, everybody’s got their money to make. Don’t get me started.

But I’m lucky I’ll spend hopefully as much time as I can stand not standing (I seem to have lost my ability to sit still during the day) this weekend dedicated to actively healing, icing, doing those leglifts which I hope will become less excruciating, then I have a follow-up next Friday morning with the orthopedist — dude was all-swagger; Lita Ford’s “Kiss Me Deadly” was playing on the radio in the OR when they wheeled me in, followed immediately by TLC’s “Scrubs”; surgical equipment kept in a huge black Husky-brand tool chest; this is who you want operating on you — to get the stitches out and see if I’ll need physical therapy. I might. I can feel a shift in muscle mass in my legs as a result of walking funny for a month, and I’m a wuss generally, so I wouldn’t be surprised if even in what for me feels like diligence doing the stretches, I’m not pushing hard enough.

And while we’re talking about follow-ups, I have one on Monday with my neurologist (if you’re interested, more on this adventure here) that’s supposed to be more of a psychiatric thing, I think? I don’t know. Anyway, the doctor was nice and it’s a virtual appointment, so that’s easy enough. The Patient Mrs. will be at work, but I’ll see if I can’t loop her in through Zoom because the wretched truth is I’m not a reliable narrator of my own life. Is anybody? I’m interested to hear what she says, even if the entire process feels somewhat like an indulgence. I do miss swimming, which I haven’t done but once to try it since I hurt my knee.

Gimme show today, 5PM, free to stream on https://gimmemetal.com.

New River Flows Reverse stream on Monday, and Mythosphere, High Noon Kahuna, Captain Caravan/Kaiser and Candlemass are lined up for review after that, so it’s a full week. Expect fewer posts while I’m in Mexico — it’s also Thanksgiving week here in the States, so there’s less going on generally — but I’m sure something will come along that I feel compelled to write about. Never fails, even if I’m on “vacation,” as much as traveling with a five year old after knee surgery can ever actually be that.

In any case, I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Have fun, watch your head, hydrate, all that fun stuff. See you back here Monday for more shenanigans.

FRM.

The Obelisk Collective on Facebook

The Obelisk Radio

The Obelisk merch

With its 15th anniversary impending later this year, Minsk‘s debut album, Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive, still sounds like the end of the fucking world. Issued through At a Loss Recordings, the full-length built directly on a prior 2004 demo that made the band’s signing mandatory — had to happen — with two of the tracks from that independent offering re-recorded and positioned as part of the monstrous opening salvo of the LP proper. Those songs are “Waging War on the Forevers” (10:40) and “Narcotics and Dissecting Knives” (10:57), and together with the universe-consuming 14 minutes of “Holy Flower of the North Star,” they assured Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive‘s place in the then-burgeoning pantheon of post-metal’s most glorious moments.

As the mid-aughts found Neurosis and Isis exploring some of their most ambient material and bands like Mouth of the Architect, Rwake, Burst, Amenra and Rosetta started to establish the aesthetic tenets of the style, Minsk were almost singularly chaotic. Like no one before them, the Chicago-based outfit were able to harness the tempestuous rhythms of Neurosis‘ Through Silver in Blood and bring that kind of intensity to their own approach, pairing it with standout riffs and vocal lines as well as effective linear builds like that with subtly leads into “Holy Flower of the North Star” before letting go of the listener’s hand and tossing them over the edge into the churning fray. Though the record’s impact was not immediate, with the quiet opening sample at the start of “Waging War on the Forevers” before the thrust kicks in at 1:29, once Minsk unveiled their full tonal weight, there was no way to stop the ensuing crush, and who the hell would want to anyway?

Though the fact that he’d helmed Pelican‘s Australasia certainly didn’t hurt his cause, and also the fact that Buried at Sea‘s Migration remains one of the heaviest records ever released, period, Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive seemed to serve particular notice of Sanford Parker‘s accomplishment as a producer. His ability to harness low frequency resonance is writ large throughout the 65 minutes of Minsk‘s debut, and of course that he wound up playing bass in the band, taking over for Drew McDowell in the lineup alongside vocalist/percussionist/keyboardist Tim Mead, guitarist/vocalist Chris Bennett, guitarist Dustin Addis and drummer Tony Wyioming (aka Anthony Couri), was a bonus that only added to their sonic impact. The use of percussion and keys whether in stretches of maximum churn or atmospheric reach, was also a distinguishing factor for Minsk, and made their sound all the more inventive and distinct from their peers amid what was at the time a stylistic boom, and as much of their impression would be made across those first three tracks — the original At a Loss vinyl edition reordered the songs to fit neatly as a 2LP — the subsequent “Three Hours” (11:11), “Bloodletting and Forgetting” (8:26) and “Wisp of Tow” (9:28) pushed ever deeper into hypnotic sway and contrasting pummel.

“Three Hours” still feels especially raging once it builds the proper momentum, with intertwining lines of vocals reaching up from out of the grueling ether with a kind of desperation that seems as emotionally raw as the proceedings around it are sonically complex. By the time the track crosses its halfway point, with its swirling effects leading gradually to a chugging that is all the more vicious for the undercurrent of keys and the glorious opening that follows, Minsk are both nearly impossible to follow and impossible to turn away from. The sheer aural demand of Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive remains staggering. Not only is it the kind of record in which, almost 15 years later, one can still hear new aspects of the band’s approach — it’s the kind of record whose urgency time has done nothing to dull. Which is all the more impressive when one considers how much of it is given to quiet parts.

“Bloodletting and Forgetting,” which follows “Waging War on the Forevers” on the vinyl side A, is the penultimate cut on the CD, and positioned well behind “Three Hours” as something of a comedown with its extended quiet start working as the launch of a linear build that, sure enough, hits a raging crescendo, but still gives over to closer “Wisp of Tow” with a psychedelic fluidity that the guest saxophone spot from Bruce Lamont, then of Yakuza, only drives into the broader reaches of the “far out.” Of course, they finish with a payoff that borders on Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive‘s most extreme moments before returning to lucidity for a few final lines before cutting out, but by then the feeling of consumption is long since established, and Minsk‘s refusal to bask in their own accomplishment — leaving as they do largely without ceremony — highlights the prior intensity. Though it was the earlier demo that set the foundation on which the album would flourish, they left no question as to their forward-thinking intent or their strength of purpose.

I recall it wasn’t long before Relapse Records came knocking. The venerable Philly imprint snagged Minsk and issued 2007’s The Ritual Fires of Abandonment and 2009’s With Echoes in the Movement of Stone (review here), as well as a split with Unearthly Trance concurrent to the latter, before Minsk took part in Neurot Recordings‘ Hawkwind Triad (review here) with U.S. Christmas and Harvestman in 2010. Half a decade passed before they returned with The Crash and the Draw (review here), a fourth LP once again on Relapse, and a split with like-minded Swiss outfit Zatokrev, titled Bigod (review here), followed in 2018 to mark the occasion of a tour and the 15th anniversaries of both bands.

Their first demo, 2003’s Burning, was reissued on tape in 2018 by Three Moons Records — it seems to be sold out, which I know because I just went to the label’s webstore to try to buy it — and they’ve had a beer collaboration and periodic local shows since. What their plans might be going forward, I don’t know, but even if it’s another three years before they release another album, The Crash and the Draw certainly proved worth that wait, and whatever they do, they’ve never given a reason for their audience to anticipate anything but creative and structural progression. When and if there is a “next record,” I’d expect no less of it than to live up to that high standard.

Still, Out of a Center Which is Neither Dead Nor Alive was and is a landmark for them and for post-metal as a whole, and as always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.

—

I left the house this week. That was good. Took half a xanax to get me out the door, but we got there. And the show was good. And the people were good. I had fun and when I felt like a weirdo, I just took my little red laptop and started writing in the corner. Problem solved and it got the review done quicker. Can’t do that at every gig, but when I can it’s kind of nice to get the immediate impressions down rather than letting them filter through a night’s — or half a night’s, as it were — sleep.

I’m talking about this show, if you’re wondering. Sorry, should’ve made that clear.

So hey, Gimme Radio has come through the round of specials they were doing I guess to finish out 2019 and they’re bringing back The Obelisk Show to its every-other-week scheduling. I’m stoked. It was kind of a bummer just to do it once a month, but I like the alternating weeks. Next show is Jan. 31 at 1pm Eastern. I hope you can tune in: http://gimmeradio.com.

That was good news to get this week. I got kind of hosed on two of the “premieres” over the last few days, so makes up for a bit.

We’re coming up on the start of The Patient Mrs.’ next semester, which I know will be an adjustment to schedule that, where The Pecan and I are concerned, takes about three weeks to really get in a groove with. He’s also starting daycare part-time, four-hours, for two days a week, before the end of the month, so that’s a further tweaking of routine. It’ll be good to get him some time with other kids though. He needs it. Spends too much time with my cynical ass.

He’s up now, running around the living room as I type. And his approaching me to read Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus — which I’ll pause to do — is probably my cue to wrap it up.

Next week there’s a premiere on Monday that I don’t think I can talk about yet, plus announcements on Tuesday that I know I can’t and a premiere of Grimoire Records’ next release. Wednesday I’m going to try to review the new Ripple split — new series, might as well at least start to try to keep up with it. Thursday’s open at the moment but something will come along or I’ll do another review, then Friday is a Lowrider track premiere and review, which, yeah, I wrote the liner notes for the Postwax version of Refractions, but fuck it, Lowrider’s first album in 20 years, you’d have to hit me with a bus to stop me from writing about it. I’ll do a full disclosure note before the review starts and then proceed with the hyperbolic praise accordingly.

Should be fun.

Today’s off to Connecticut, then back this afternoon. Tomorrow I have a press release to write for another announcement that’s also happening sometime early in the week, and then before I know it I’m neck deep in the week. That and cheesy taco dip are my big plans for the next couple days. Maybe a few minutes of reading during nap if such a thing can be finagled.

May yours be great and safe as ever. Have fun and be kind.

FRM: Forum, Radio, Merch at MiBK.

The Obelisk Forum

The Obelisk Radio

The Obelisk merch

Black Cobra, Bestial (2006)

Black Cobra are now, always were and likely will remain a live band for as long as they’re any kind of band at all. On paper, should it even work? Of all the branches of the Cavity family tree, Black Cobra might be the most unlikely, as one of that band’s guitarists, Jason Landrian, stepped into a frontman role by pairing up with Acid King bassist Rafael Martinez, who moved to drums. They were a two-piece before being a two-piece wasn’t something to comment on — that is, in their early going, they heard a lot of, “You’re so heavy… and just a duo!” — and their project from the outset with their 2004 self-titled debut EP seemed to be to bridge the gap between sludge/doom tonality and intensity born of thrash. Consider the pummeling “The Cry of Melora,” the centerpiece of 2006’s Bestial, their At a Loss Recordings-issued first full-length. From an angular introduction, it turns to outright extremity before locking in a massive, consuming nod complemented by the harsh bark that would become such a hallmark of Landrian‘s vocal approach. Largely amelodic, they took what High on Fire started doing a few years earlier and pushed it further, playing faster and harder and with more of a sense of impact to their material. And they toured the crap out of it. Especially in their early years, they were largely nomadic. Across Bestial, 2007’s righteous Feather and Stone, 2009’s Chronomega (review here), which found them picked up by Southern Lord well ahead of that label’s full dive into next-gen metalcore and working with Billy Anderson as producer, and 2011’s conceptual triumph Invernal (review here, which seemed to realize the promise of their harsh atmosphere by pairing it with a historical narrative of Arctic exploration, they always seemed to showcase something different while remaining tied to the core elements of their sound, but if and when they grew, it was due to their live work, and the stage was where Landrian and Martinez always seemed most at home.

Bestial was a launch point for that, and like Black Cobra on tour, the album takes only momentary breathers. With the exception of the two-minute intro and shorter outro of its longest cut in the six-minute “Broken on the Wheel,” which goes on to emit a plod unmatched anywhere else in the component 11-tracks/36-minutes — conjuring a rumbling bomb tone not unlike that of another former Cavity guitarist, Steve Brooks (of Floor and Torche), in the process — and maybe a tense moment here or there elsewhere, Bestial is about the sharpness of its turns, the weight of its tone and the onslaught brought to bear rhythmically. Riffs hit like they should draw assault charges, from the opening “One Nine” and into “Thrown from Great Heights” and “El Equis,” there’s no letup. All told, it’s about an eight-minute salvo, but the effect it has remains overwhelming 12 years after the fact. “Beneath” dives into an opening quiet stretch like it’s tossing the listener a life preserver only to yank it away again with the lung-squeezing riff and crash that takes hold en route directly into album highlight “Omniscient,” an air-tight execution that winds its way into a slowdown as it heads toward its midsection but loses none of its ferocity in the process. By this point, Martinez and Landrian have already cast their lot in terms of style and made their violent, aggressive intentions plain to hear. Their putting together quieter introductions and slamming into all-out directed chaos is a subtle but essential component, as though they need to remind listeners that quiet exists, but Bestial has its title for a reason: the album is defined by its animalistic raging, a kind of natural brutality brought to life in “El Doce de Octubre,” the foreboding quiet and chugging largesse of “Sombra de Bestia” — which accomplishes more in its two and a half minutes than bands do in their entire careers in terms of creating an ambience while still remaining outwardly monstrous-sounding — and the return to searing thrash with closer “Kay-Dur-Twenty” that seems to call back to the beginning of the record in a way that nonetheless emphasizes how far Black Cobra have actually come from that initial beastliness.

It’s hard to think of Black Cobra as underrated, but as a studio band they might be. Since so much of their focus has always been on playing live, there’s been an almost begrudging aspect to some of their studio work — as though they didn’t want to stop touring to actually record new material — but their albums have always managed to bring some new aspect to their sound, and that was true even as 2016’s Imperium Simulacra (review here) worked itself around the theme of human interaction with technology, which, like Invernal, was a subject befitting the band’s sound, this time for its precise, inhuman attack, rather than the frozen nature of its atmosphere. They’ve slowed down in terms of touring somewhat, though still hit the road significantly to support Imperium Simulacra, and continue to reside in a place between genres with a sense of willfulness in doing so. They’ve never wanted to be exclusively a sludge band, or a thrash band, or a hardcore band or a doom band. Their sound draws from all of those and more besides, but it’s in melting down these different and sometimes opposing sides and reshaping them to their purposes that is where Black Cobra manage to land so hard. And maybe being between genres as they are has contributed to that under-valuing of their recorded work. One way or the other, they’ve never been a comfortable band, and Bestial still offers no quarter to this day. It is a refusal to compromise their approach that has gone on to become one of their signature elements, and though as noted they’ve pulled back somewhat on touring and Martinez has rejoined Acid King once again on bass, it’s the studio work that is left to document who they are and were at various points, and whatever comes next from them, it’s a safe bet they’ll remain steadfast in that identity, wherever else they might take it.

As always, I hope you enjoy.

—

I’m sitting up trying not to fall asleep as I type. I’ve got one eye open and one eye closed like I’m trying to compromise with myself and let the right side of my body go back to bed — it’s not yet 5AM — while the left side stays up and finishes this thing off. I wouldn’t say it’s working, but I kind of knew that going in. Not exactly my first time at this dance.

But no, there will be no dancing.

Yesterday in the States was Thanksgiving. If you celebrated, I hope you enjoyed. Like New Year’s, it’s traditionally a take-stock holiday. Yeah, there’s the feast and the turkey, but there’s also the “what are you thankful for,” and so on. There are a lot of people and things in my life for which I should be grateful, that are better than I deserve. It is not always easy to keep that in mind, especially when you’re as much of a narcissistic shit as I am prone to being.

In two weeks I begin a two-week Quarterly Review. The countdown is on. I think it’s too weeks. Whenever December starts, that’s it. Two full weeks of 10 records a day. It filled up easily. Next week though is a bunch of reviews I want to get in before the year starts to wind down and we get into lists and all that. Greenleaf is in there, Belzebong, Green Dragon, Horehound. There are a couple premieres slated otherwise, but yeah, that’s what’s up. You’ll pardon me if I don’t do proper notes. Right now, holding shift and hitting enter seems really, really hard.

But next Friday the Year-End Poll goes up. Sneaking it in a day early this year. Don’t tell anyone. Or wait, better: Tell everybody.

We’ve been in NJ since Tuesday and have to go back to Massachusetts on Sunday because The Patient Mrs. has some fucking awful work thing that, tragically, doesn’t involve sitting on the couch and eating leftovers while watching Deep Space Nine. I’d say her loss, but I think we all really know it’s mine.

Alright. I’m gonna put the first post of the day up and try to catch some sleep before The Pecan wakes up upstairs. Have a great and safe weekend, and if you’re traveling, stay off I-95. Ha.

Thanks for reading. Forum, radio, merch.

The Obelisk Forum

The Obelisk Radio

The Obelisk shirts & hoodies

Portland-by-way-of-Rhode Island abrasion specialists The Body commence a run of West Coast ritualizing this weekend. Fresh off the release of their Master, We Perish EP on At a Loss and a round of East Coast and Midwestern dates in support of it, The Body‘s next album will be released on Thrill Jockey, who’ve apparently decided they like it extreme. Fair enough.

Here’s the news:

THE BODY: West Coast Live Excursion Begins This Weekend

Hot off of their recent tour through the Central and Northeast US regions following their recently-released Master, We Perish EP, nomadic duo THE BODY is set to embark on their newest auditory warfare excursion this weekend.

This Sunday, June 30th, THE BODY will join Los Crudos, Iron Lung, Talk Is Poison and more at This Is Not a Step Fest in Berkeley, California. Just a few days later, THE BODY will converge with Subservient Fuck for a counter-clockwise slice of touring, beginning in Arcata, California, crossing North to Portland and Seattle and then south through Western Cali with stops in Oakland, La Puente, Los Angeles, Riverside, San Diego and Sacramento confirmed.

THE BODY Live:
6/30/2013 924 Gilman – Berkeley, CA @ This Is Not a Step Fest
7/01/2013 Mex n’ Wow – Arcata, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/02/203 The Laughing Horse Book And Film Collective – Portland, OR w/ Subservient Fuck
7/03/2013 Black Lodge – Seattle, WA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/04/2013 1234 Go Records – Oakland, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/05/2013 Bridgetown – La Puente, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/06/2013 East 7th – Los Angeles, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/07/2013 Blood Orange – Riverside, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/08/2013 Che Café – San Diego, CA w/ Subservient Fuck
7/09/2013 The Press Club – Sacramento, CA

Preaching three anti-life messages, Master We Perish takes the distinctive, matchless attack of earthmoving cult THE BODY to its most corrosive and ominous yet; blackened bursts of noise-drenched, doom fueled by hypnotic, tribal rhythms and penetrating vocal torture. Recorded at Providence, Rhode Island-based Machines With Magnets (Battles, Daughters, Lightning Bolt, Chinese Stars). THE BODY also recruited Leslie Weitz (Otesanek), Chrissy Wolpert (Assembly Of Light Choir) and Reba Mitchell (Whore Paint) for vocal contributions throughout the torrid endeavor adding an array of eerie dynamics to the songs.

Master, We Perish is out now on 12” EP, CD, cassette and digital download via At A Loss Recordings.

http://www.thebody.bigcartel.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/the-body/334047229514
http://www.atalossrecordings.com
https://www.facebook.com/atalossrecordings

Just when you thought you might get through April without buying yet another record, here come Portland-by-way-of-Providence malevolent doomers The Body with a new EP. The duo-plus will deliver their latest work, Master, We Perish, through the venerable At a Loss Recordings on April 30 — which is sure to be a dark day for humanity and a good day for the doomed.

The PR wire has the grim and gory details:

THE BODY: New Scourge From Apocalyptic Duo Set For Release Via At A Loss

In an ongoing pilgrimage towards the apocalypse and perpetual hatred for humankind, earthmoving doom duo THE BODY will dispense their latest scourge upon the masses in the coming weeks.

The newest wave of abhorrence from the nomadic family, Master, We Perish shows THE BODY’s nihilistic audio terror ever-forward with three new tunes sure to cause birds to fall from the sky and traumatize nonbelievers, once again recorded at Providence, Rhode Island-based Machines With Magnets (Battles, Daughters, Lightning Bolt, Chinese Stars). Blackened bursts of noise-drenched, low-fi doom are fueled by percussionist Lee Buford’s hypnotic, tribal rhythms via thunderous macaroni drums, the melee infiltrated by guitarist/vocalist Chip King’s penetrating vocal screech. The clan also recruited Leslie Weitz (Otesanek), Chrissy Wolpert (Assembly Of Light Choir) and Reba Mitchell (Whore Paint) for vocal contributions throughout the torrid endeavor adding an array of eerie dynamics to the songs. Saddened confessions of mental anguish are ended with a pump of a shotgun, a sludgy foreshadowing of the coming explosion of tortured screams. Feedback and noise erupt into the slow crush and the bellowing of an end to beliefs and an end to these truths…

With mangled-human cover art by Manifester, Master, We Perish is to be released as a 12” EP, CDEP, cassette and digital download on April 30th. The new hymns are to be disbursed once again by At A Loss Recordings, the group who also claimed responsibility for previous attacks from THE BODY including last year’s reissue of the band’s self-titled LP, their collaborative release with Braveyoung, and most notoriously, their revered and feared 2010-released All The Waters Of The Earth Turns To Blood. Preorders of all formats are available here.

Stay tuned to your trusted media sources for further updates as transmissions from THE BODY and their latest endtime message are broadcasted in the coming weeks.

Master, We Perish Track Listing:
1. The Ebb And Flow Of Tides In A Sea Of Ash
2. The Blessed Lay Down And Writhe In Agony
3. Worship