Posted in Whathaveyou on February 12th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Three more names for Desertfest Berlin 2025 and by all the ‘more’ that’s featured on each day of the poster below, I’m guessing it’s not the last round of lineup additions to come before the festival takes place this May. Scott Hepple and the Sun Band are a mystery to me, but they’re booked now for London, Oslo and Berlin Desertfests, as well as Freak Valley and more, so good for them being all over the place. Hippie Death Cult just announced another European tour, and they too are making the Desertfest rounds in multiple cities, while The Mystery Lights so far as I know are Berlin-only but coming from New York to play, so good on them making the trip too.
You can see the full lineup below, with The Hellacopters, Dinosaur Jr. and Elder headlining and the likes of Slomosa, Dozer, Khan, My Sleeping Karma, Lowrider and Elephant Tree, Stinking Lizaveta and Darsombra, Temple Fang, Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol previously confirmed. If you haven’t caught wind of this one yet in 2025, the appeal pretty much speaks for itself.
Or at least the PR wire speaks for it:
DESERTFEST BERLIN adds HIPPIE DEATH CULT, THE MYSTERY LIGHTS and SCOTT HEPPLE & THE SUN BAND, who will join DINOSAUR JR., ELDER, THE HELLACOPTERS & many more outstanding live acts in 2025!
Desertfest Berlin has revealed three new names for its outstanding festival edition in 2025, and confirms Portland’s heavy doom and cosmic riff worship at its finest: HIPPIE DEATH CULT, New York’s raw and fuzzy garage-psych act THE MYSTERY LIGHTS and UK-based psychedelic vintage rockers SCOTT HEPPLE & THE SUN BAND!
This May will see Desertfest Berlin undoubtedly run its perhaps best and most eclectic line-up to date, welcoming iconic DINOSAUR JR., Swedish rock pioneers THE HELLACOPTERS, prog-and psych-rock masters ELDER (playing their groundbreaking “Lore” album in its entirety!), New Orleans sludge legends EYEHATEGOD, MY SLEEPING KARMA returning home, US doom metallers PALLBEARER, Norwegian “tundra rock” frontrunners SLOMOSA, DOZER, TEMPLE FANG, LOWRIDER and so many more incredible live acts the stoner, rock, doom, sludge, psych and metal scene has to offer.
Desertfest Berlin will take place between May 23 – 25, 2025 at Columbiahalle and Columbia Theater. While the Early-Bird tickets sold out in within hours, regular passes are available at:www.desertfest-tickets.de
Posted in audiObelisk on February 10th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
On Wednesday, Feb. 12, Berlin-based-but-multinationally-sourced four-piece Icarus Burns will release their self-titled debut album through their own label, Feather and Wax Records. It’s not the band’s first outing overall, as they had an initial three-song EP out in 2021 in a different configuration. The most notable difference is that the album has no vocals and the EP did, with Eva Bandke having contributed to the short release as standalone singer. Icarus Burns arrive at the declarations of this self-titled after having pared back to an instrumental outfit in 2024, reportedly changed tunings, and refined the focus of their songwriting. Accordingly, Icarus Burns feels fresh and benefits from the added crunch possible with two guitars in the lineup, as the underlying chug in the second half of “Die Werft” or the more metalized, double-kick-backed crescendo of side B opener “A Distant Light… in the Darkness” readily demonstrate. While it feels inherently like a more straightforward, stripped-down take, the album is by no means without flourish.
Much of that is heard in the interplay between Jens Gehrke and Tim Corden on guitar, but as opener “Minotaur” (which has a flash of creepy sampled speech that sounds homemade, as regards vocals), there’s rhythmic intricacy from bassist Axel Kalteiß and drummer Cristobal Cuadra Bravo (who’s come aboard since the EP) as well. In its midsection, “Minotaur” becomes a more brash, almost noise rocking crunch, even if it ends dreamy, and the prog-metal elements of “Die Werft,” indeed lower in tone than the band were a few years ago, grounds the exploratory-feeling leads. Each side ends with its longest track, because symmetry, with “Melancholia” (9:04) and album-capper “100 Days” (11:47) taking their time to reach further into the ether. Their doing is suitably otherworldly, to be sure, but the crux of Icarus Burns leans more toward prog than psych, so there’s a foot on the ground, however much a given part might seem to float, or, in the case of the soloing before the big-chugga breakdown ending in the finale, soar.
They may be relatively new to the modus outwardly, but the recording makes a few purposeful statements about who they are and what their intentions are going forward. That is to say, Icarus Burns tells the listener a lot about the band in terms of sound and what they’re exploring. They’ve set themselves on a path of instrumentalism, and already one can hear these tracks feeling their way toward aural progression or creative growth. The more aggressive punch of “A Distant Light… in the Darkness” is an easy example, but the subsequent “Tränen der Sonne” gives Kalteiß the foreground of the mix on bass while as the guitars offer more languid atmospherics — the title, translated as “‘tears of the sun,’ fits well — and thereby lends the record a less insistent cast. I wouldn’t say it’s languid with the thud-fervency of Bravo‘s tom work, but it’s purposefully less metal than Icarus Burns want to be elsewhere and in itself that speaks to a dynamic taking shape in their sound that one hopes will develop over the next however many years and outings from these beginnings.
That said, Icarus Burns are hardly tentative here. Sure, they’re perhaps feeling their way into being a different band than they set out to be five years ago, but there’s something to be said for that process of discovery itself and for a band who can realize they’re not making the music they want to make, adjust their trajectory and (hopefully) end up in a place they feel is more honest to what they want to express as a group. I can’t speak to where Icarus Burns might go from here — they might get a singer for all I know — but the timing on their first record shouldn’t be ignored. That is, they’ve been a band for half a decade, became instrumental in 2024 and turned around Icarus Burns less than a year thereafter. However long ago they were starting to be written, there’s urgency in these songs precisely because it’s new to everybody. They won’t have that advantage next time out, of inner/outer novelty, but for a foursome of such obvious and clearly directed creative will, something tells me they’ll be just fine without.
The album streams in its entirety below. Again, it’s out Wednesday.
When the riffs hit, they burn. When the melodies soar, they sear. This is Icarus Burns.
Consisting of individuals from Germany, UK, Chile, the band is a rich blend of cultural and musical influences which combine to deliver an exciting and visceral live experience at their shows.
While the band has a wholly unique sound, Icarus Burns will appeal to fans across genres – reference bands include: Elder, Rotor, Karsk, Rezn, Monkey3, Mr Bison, Kosmodome, My Sleeping Karma, Robot God..
With their S/T debut album due to drop in early 2025, this next phase of the band promises to be their most exciting; with live gigs across various stages across Germany and Europe in the works – this will be the year IB take it to the next level.
Recorded at Wave Studios, Berlin Engineered, mixed, mastered by Florian Schack (Wave Studios) Produced by Florian Schack & Icarus Burns All songs written by Icarus Burns
Icarus Burns is: Tim Corden – Guitar Jens Gehrke – Guitar Axel Kalteiß – Bass Cristobal Cuadra Bravo – Drums
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 24th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
The vague sense of longing hinted toward in the title, the exhaled ‘just want’ in “I Just Want to Be a Sound,” is mirrored in a kind of pop urgency in the song’s chorus. This is the first track Kadavar have put out from their upcoming album of the same name, and in addition to answering how the inclusion of Jascha Kreft on second guitar might have shifted their dynamic — the guitar reaches farther out, giving breadth to the hooky, again pop-ish, longing and the vocal melody that carries it — it’s the first clue as to what Kadavar‘s next LP might have on offer sound-wise. In its range and atmosphere, you could almost call “I Just Want to Be a Sound” psychedelic, but there’s no mistaking the outreach in its production or the underlying structure, even if the bass still brings a bit of heft to its transitions.
Kadavar have been working to build hype leading to releasing this single, and fair enough. They’re a band who thrive on taking chances, and they’re taking a big one here, as it’s almost certain some of their listenership won’t be able to follow them on this path. Knowing that as they surely do, it’s all the more admirable that Kadavar have never capitulated to it. Surely they could be out there smiling through vintage longhair fashion shoots and a thousand differently-named remakes of “Doomsday Machine” and still have an audience. I feel like not knowing what you’re getting, their willingness to ride the edge and push the limits of expectation — is “I Just Want to Be a Sound” heavy? should it want to be? why? — can make it more satisfying, and I know better than to think one single represents the entire album from which it comes, even if it is the leadoff title-track.
Links and audio and such follow. If you’ve got thoughts, I’d love to hear them in the comments. And remember, Kadavar announced that Fall 2025 tour just a couple days ago as well:
KADAVAR – “I JUST WANT TO BE A SOUND”
I JUST WANT TO BE A SOUND out now & available on all platforms.
Produced by @maxrieger Thanks to @cloudshillmusic @chris_vosshagen
Album Tracklist: 1. I Just Want To Be A Sound 2. Hysteria 3. Regeneration 4. Let Me Be A Shadow 5. Sunday Mornings 6. Scar On My Guitar 7. Strange Thoughts 8. Truth 9. Star 10. Until The End
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 22nd, 2025 by JJ Koczan
This coming Friday, Berlin generational heavy rock forerunners Kadavar are going to put up the first single from their upcoming album, which is titled “I Just Want to Be a Sound.” Fair enough. I don’t know if that’s also the name of the LP or not, I’ve not heard any of it except the snippets in social media stories, and beyond the fact of its existence, a bunch of pre-save links and the cover art, I’ve got nothing for info on the tune or the record from which it comes. I don’t even know if the song’s on the album, come to think of it. Can we ever know anything? Is this chair even real?
Give me a couple seconds to re-sort my reality and I’ll get back to you on the track, hopefully Friday. In the meantime, Kadavar will take next-gen heavy rock’s best-to-date hope, Slomosa, on tour for the bulk of October. I’m a little curious why it’s the Fall tour being announced now, and what Kadavar‘s summer plans might be, but I assume we’ll get there when the album is actually announced in some real, here’s-actual-information kind of way. I have no guarantee that such press release-fodder is impending; I’m just trying to keep up. I couldn’t even find a text list of these dates, and because it’s 2025, I had a handful of places to look. Looks like a good tour, and you’ll note Australia’s Orb joining Kadavar and Slomosa for it.
As per socials:
KADAVAR – “I JUST WANT TO BE A SOUND” EUROPEAN TOUR 2025
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 7th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
I don’t know how it was for you, but Berlin’s Kadavar pretty much broke my internet yesterday with the photo and relatively brief post below confirming the completion of their next full-length. It wasn’t quite like they surprise-dropped the album itself, the title of which has not yet been revealed, but clearly there’s excitement and anticipation as they start the promotional cycle and the process of putting the thing out, and reasonably so.
The last studio LP from Kadavar was 2020’s The Isolation Tapes (review here), released in 2020, but even when the world stopped, the band never really did. During the plague, they released two live albums recorded in their own studio and a collaboration with Elder (review here), and as soon as touring reopened, Kadavar were back out. I’ve been lucky enough to see them a couple times at Euro fests in the last two years — in 2024 at Freak Valley (review here) and Bear Stone (review here), and in 2023 at SonicBlast (review here) — and though like many I’ve taken the band for granted over the last 15 or so years, the fact remains that a big part of why I’m so much looking forward to the next Kadavar record is I have no idea what it will sound like.
Part of that comes from the fact that Lupus, Tiger and Dragon (keeping it casual there with the nicknames, I am) brought in guitarist/synthesist Jascha Kreft (Odd Couple) to expand from a trio to a four-piece for the first time, but mostly it’s just from Kadavar themselves. If you look at the course of their evolution over now-going-on-seven records, plus what they bring live, it’s a genuine scope that emerges, and as they’ve shown no signs in hindering their own creative growth, one hopes they continue to push into the unknown. The mere prospect of their doing so, floated while reminding people to sign up for their newsletter, was enough to flood the ol’ timeline. Glad to know I’m not the only one looking forward here.
From socials:
Friends, after 2 years of work, our new album is finally finished. Our first single will be out soon, and we’re super excited! As always, everything will be different, yet it’s still unmistakably Kadavar. Sign up for our newsletter (www.kadavar.com/newsletter) now so you don’t miss any updates. xx
If you’re the type who’s sensitive to flashing lights — I get a headache; I’m not mocking anyone, I promise you — you might want to forego the full six minutes of Aptera‘s video for the new single “Hellbender” below in favor of the audio stream down by the bottom of the post. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that the strobe effects and bright-dark contrasts of “Hellbender” aren’t suitable to the song’s atmosphere, born largely out of darkthrash and black metal, but with an edge of psychedelia showing through in its middle.
Like Aptera‘s 2022 album, You Can’t Bury What Still Burns (review here), it is uncompromising metal born out of a honed songwriting process. It calls to mind early thrash at its root — when the tape hiss of the end product seemed to be a part of the recording itself — but takes a progressive view of genre, finding angles of attack as each part unfolds.
I do not know if “Hellbender” is a harbinger of a new Aptera album or what, but the band was on tour in Europe this past Fall still behind the 2022 release, so it seems likely that if/whenever a follow-up arrives, it too will be well supported. As in, you’ll hear about it. Some songs are made to be hammered into the listener’s consciousness.
On that merry note, enjoy the video:
Aptera, “Hellbender” official video
Music by Aptera Video by Tekla Valy
Recording by Alexander Meurer, Stella Sesto Mix & Master by Marcus Ferreira at @nomastersvoice1899No Master’s Voice Studio Photos: Javier S. Sañudo
“The song Hellbender takes inspiration from the eponymous movie by Toby Poser (2021), where the Hellbenders are an all-female, matriarchal clan of supernatural beings: “a cross between a witch, a demon, and an apex predator.” Their magic is rooted in fear, particularly the fear of death, which a Hellbender absorbs when she eats a living thing.
The video was directed and shot by Finnish visual artist Tekla Valy in the woods near Berlin, partially at night during the so-called “hour of the wolf,” as referenced in the lyrics. This is the hour between night and dawn, when most people die, sleep is deepest, and nightmares feel most real. It is the hour when the sleepless are tormented by their worst anguish and when ghosts and demons are at their most powerful. It is also the hour when most babies are born.”
APTERA is Michela Albizzati – guitar, vocals Celia Paul – bass, vocals Renata Helm – guitar Sara Neidorf – drums
Posted in Reviews on December 13th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
It’s been almost too easy, this week. Like, I was running a little later yesterday than I had the day before and I’m pretty sure it was only a big deal because — well, I was busy and distracted, to be fair — but mostly because the rest of the week to compare it against has been so gosh darn smooth. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. This is the last day. The music’s awesome. Barring actual disaster, like a car accident between now and then or some such, I’ll finish this one with minimal loss of breath.
Set against the last two Quarterly Reviews, one of which went 10 days, the other one 11, this five-dayer has been mellow and fun. As always, good music helps with that, and as has been the case since Monday, there’s plenty of it here. Not one day has gone by that I didn’t add something from the batch of 50 releases to my year-end list, which, again, barring disaster, should be out next week.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
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Cosmic Fall, Back Where the Fire Flows
After setting a high standard of prolific releases across 2017 and 2018 to much celebration and social media ballyhooing, Berlin jammers Cosmic Fall issued their single “Lackland” (review here) in mid-2019, and Back Where the Fire Flows is their first offering since. The apparently-reinvigorated lineup of the band includes bassist Klaus Friedrich and drummer Daniel Sax alongside new guitarist Leonardo Caprioli, and if there was any concern they might’ve lost the floating resonance that typified their earlier material, 13-minute opener and longest track (immediate points) “Lucid Skies Above Mars” allays it fluidly. The more straightforwardly riffed “Magma Rising” (4:31) and the tense shuffler “Under the Influence of Gravity” (4:38) follow that leadoff, with a blowout and feedback finish for the latter that eases the shift back into spacious-jammy mode for “Chant of the Lizards” (12:26) — perhaps titled in honor of the likeness the central guitar figure carries to The Doors — with “Drive the Kraut” (10:34) closing with the plotted sensibility of Earthless by building to a fervent head and crashing out quick as they might, and one hopes will, on stage. A welcome return and hopefully a preface to more.
It doesn’t seem inappropriate to think of Weather Systems as a successor to Anathema, which until they broke up in 2020 was multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Daniel Cavanagh‘s main outlet of 30 years’ standing. Teamed here with Anathema drummer/producer Daniel Cardoso and producer Tony Doogan, who helmed Anathema‘s 2017 album, The Optimist (review here), Cavanagh is for sure in conversation with his former outfit. There are nuances like the glitchy synth in “Ocean Without a Shore” or the post-punk urgency in the rush of highlight cut “Ghost in the Machine,” and for those who felt the Anathema story was incomplete, “Are You There? Pt. 2” and “Untouchable Pt. 3” are direct sequels to songs from that band, so the messaging of Weather Systems picking up where Anathema left of is clear, and Cavanagh unsurprisingly sounds at home in such a context. Performing most of the instruments himself and welcoming a few guests on vocals, he leads the project to a place where listening can feel like an act of emotional labor, but with songs that undeniably sooth and offer space for comfort, which is their stated intention. Curious to hear how Weather Systems develops.
Assembled by bassist Ron Holzner and his The Skull bandmate, guitarist Lothar Keller, Legions of Doom are something of a doom metal supergroup with Henry Vasquez (Saint Vitus, Blood of the Sun) on drums, Scott Little (Leadfoot) on guitar alongside Keller, and vocalists Scott Reagers (Saint Vitus) and Karl Agell (Leadfoot, Lie Heavy, C.O.C.‘s Blind LP) sharing frontman duties. Perhaps the best compliment one can give The Skull 3 — which sources its material in part from the final The Skull session prior to the death of vocalist Eric Wagner — is that it lives up to the pedigree of those who made it. No great shocker the music is in the style of The Skull since that’s the point. The question is how the band build on songs like “All Good Things” and “Between Darkness and Dawn” and the ripping “Insectiside” (sic), but this initial look proves the concept and is ready and willing to school the listener across its eight tracks on how classic doom got to be that way.
The first offering from Netherlands mellow psych-folk two-piece Myriad’s Veil brims with sweet melody and a subtly expansive atmosphere, bringing together Utrecht singer-songwriter Ismena, who has several albums out as a solo artist, and guitarist Ivy van der Meer, also of Amsterdam cosmic rockers Temple Fang for a collection of eight songs running 44 minutes of patiently-crafted, thoughtfully melodic and graceful performance. Ismena is no stranger to melancholia and the layers of “When the Leaves Start Falling” with the backing line of classical guitar and Mellotron give a neo-Canterbury impression without losing their own expressive edge. Most pieces stand between five and six minutes each, which is enough time for atmospheres to blossom and flourish for a while, and though the arrangements vary, the songs are united around acoustic guitar and voice, and so the underpinning is traditional no matter where Pendant goes. The foundation is a strength rather than a hindrance, and Ismena and van der Meer greet listeners with serenity and a lush but organic character of sound.
Never short on attitude, “I Only Play 4 Money” — “If you take my picture/Your camera’s smashed/You write me fan mail/I don’t write back,” etc. — leads off Michael Rudolph Cummings‘ latest solo EP, the four-track Money with a fleshed out arrangement not unlike one might’ve found on 2022’s You Know How I Get (review here), released by Ripple Music. From there, the erstwhile Backwoods Payback frontman, Boozewa anti-frontman and grown-up punk/grunge troubadour embarks on the more stripped down, guy-and-guitar strums and contemplations of “Deny the World” and “Easier to Leave,” the latter with more than a hint of Americana, and “Denver,” which returns to the full band, classic-style lead guitar flourish, layered vocals and drums, and perhaps even more crucially, bass. It’s somewhere around 13 minutes of music, all told, but that’s more than enough time for Cummings to showcase mastery in multiple forms of his craft and the engaging nature of what’s gradually becoming his “solo sound.”
Basking in a heavygaze float with the lead guitar while the markedly-terrestrial riff chugs and echoes out below, Moon Destroy‘s “The Nearness of June” is three and a half minutes long and the first single the Atlanta outfit founded by guitarist Juan Montoya (MonstrO, ex-Torche, etc.) and drummer Evan Diprima (also bass and synth, ex-Royal Thunder) have had since guitarist/vocalist/synthesist Charlie Suárez joined the band. Set across a forward linear build that quickly gets intense behind Suárez‘s chanting intertwining vocal lines, delivered mellow with a low-in-mouth melody, it’s a tension that slams into a slowdown in the second half of the song but holds over into the solo and fadeout march of the second half as well as it builds back up, the three-piece giving a quick glimpse of what a debut full-length might hopefully bring in terms of aural largesse, depth of mix and atmospheric soundscaping. I have no idea when, where or how such a thing would or will arrive, but that album will be a thing to look forward to.
Billed as Coltaine‘s debut LP — the history of the band is a bit more complex if I recall — Forgotten Ways is nonetheless a point of arrival for the Karlsruhe, Germany, four-piece. It is genuinely post-metallic in the spirit of being over genre completely, and as Julia Frasch makes the first harsh/clean vocal switch late in opener “Mogila,” with drummer Amin Bouzeghaia, bassist Benedikt Berg and guitarist Moritz Berg building the procession behind the soar, the band use their longest/opening track (immediate points) to establish the world in which the songs that follow take place. The cinematic drone of “Himmelwärts” and echoing goth metal of “Dans un Nouveau Monde” follow, leading the way into the wind-and-vocal minimalism of “Cloud Forest” at the presumed end of side A only to renew the opener’s crush in the side B leadoff title-track. Also the centerpiece of the album, “Cloud Forest” has room to touch on German-language folk before resuming its Obituary-meets-Amenra roll, and does not get less expansive from that initial two minutes or so. As striking as the two longest pieces are, Forgotten Ways is bolstered by the guitar ambience of “Ableben,” which leads into the pair of “Grace” and “Tales of Southern Lands,” both of which move from quieter outsets into explosive heft, each with their own path, the latter in half the time, and the riff-and-thud-then-go 77 seconds of “Aren” caps because why the hell not at that point. With a Jan Oberg mix adding to the breadth, Coltaine‘s declared-first LP brims with scope and progressive purpose. It is among the best debuts I’ve heard in 2024, easily.
Zagreb-based veteran heavy rockers Stonebride — the four-piece of vocalist/guitarist Siniša Krneta, bassist/vocalist Matija Ljevar, guitarist Tješimir Mendaš and drummer Stjepan Kolobarić — give a strong argument for maturity of songwriting from the outset of Smiles Revolutionary, their fourth long-player. The ease with which they let the melody carry “In Presence,” knowing that the song doesn’t need to be as heavy as possible at all times since it still has presence, or the way the organ laces into the mix in the instrumental rush that brings the subsequent “Turn Back” to a finish before the early-QOTSA/bangin’-on-stuff crunch of “Closing Distance” tops old desert tones with harmonies worthy of Alice in Chains leading, inexorably, to a massive, lumbering nod of a payoff — they’re not written to be anything other than what they are, and in part because of that they stand testament to the long-standing progression of Stonebride. “Shine Hard” starts with a mosh riff given its due in crash early and late with a less-shove-minded jam between, part noise rock, answered by the progressive start-stop build of “March on the Heart” and closer “Time and Tide,” which dares a little funk in its outreach and leaves off with a nodding crescendo and smooth comedown, having come in and ultimately going out on a swell of vocals. Not particularly long, but substantial.
Toad Venom will acknowledge their new mini-album, Jag Har Inga Problen Osv…, was mixed and mastered by Kalle Lilja of Welfare Sounds studio and label, but beyond that, the Swedish weirdo joy psych rock transcendentalists offer no clue as to who’s actually involved in the band. By the time they get down to “Dogs!” doing a reverse-POV of The Stooges‘ “I Wanna Be Your Dog” in classic soul style, they’ve already celebrated in the rushing bliss and Beatles-y Mellotron break of opener “Jag har verkligen inga problem (så det måste vara du),” taken “One Day You Will Be Perfect” from manic boogie to sunny Californian psych/folk rock, underscoring its chorus with a riff that could easily otherwise be black metal, dwelled in the organ and keyboard dramaturge amid the rolling “Mon Amour” — the keys win the day in the end and are classy about it afterward, but it’s guitar that ends it — and found a post-punk gothy shuffle for “Time Lapse,” poppish but not without the threat of bite. So yes, half an album, as they state it, but quite a half if you’re going by scope and aesthetic. I don’t know how much of a ‘band’ Toad Venom set out to be, but they’ve hit on a sound that draws from sources as familiar as 1960s psychedelia and manages to create a fresh approach from it. To me, that speaks of their being onto something special in these songs. Can’t help but wonder what’s in store for the second half.
Following up on the organ-and-fuzz molten flow of “Radio Radiation” with the more emotive, Rolling Stones-y-until-it-gets-heavy storytelling of “Antihero,” Berlin’s Sacred Buzz carve out their own niche in weighted garage rock, taking in elements of psychedelia without ever pushing entirely over into something shroomy sounding — to wit, the proto-punk tension of quirky delivery of “Revolution” — staying grounded in structure and honoring dirt-coated traditionalism with dynamic performances, “No Wings” coming off sleazy in its groove without actually being sleaze, “Make it Go Wrong” revealing a proggy shimmer that turns careening and twists to a finish led by the keys and guitar, and “Rebel Machine” blowing it out at the end because, yeah, I mean, duh. Radio Radiation is Sacred Buzz‘s first EP (it’s more if you get the bonus track), and it seems to effortlessly buck the expectations of genre without sounding like it’s trying to push those same limits. Maybe attitude and the punk-born casual cool that overrides it all has something to do with that impression — a swagger that’s earned by the time they’re done, to be sure — but the songs are right there to back that up. The short format suits them, and they make it flow like an album. A strong initial showing.
Posted in Reviews on December 11th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Wow. This is a pretty good day. I mean, I knew that coming into it — I’m the one slating the reviews — but looking up there at the names in the header, that’s a pretty killer assemblage. Maybe I’m making it easy for myself and loading up the QR with stuff I like and want to write about. Fine. Sometimes I need to remind myself that’s the point of this project in the first place.
Hope you’re having an awesome week. I am.
Quarterly Review #21-30
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Thou, Umbilical
Even knowing that the creation of a sense of overwhelm is on purpose and is part of the artistry of what Thou do, Thou are overwhelming. The stated purpose behind Umbilical is an embrace of their collective inner hardcore kid. Fine. Slow down hardcore and you pretty much get sludge metal one way or the other and Thou‘s take on it is undeniably vicious and has a character that is its own. Songs like “I Feel Nothing When You Cry” and “The Promise” envision dark futures from a bleak present, and the poetry from which the lyrics get their shape is as despondent and cynical as one could ever ask, waiting to be dug into and interpreted by the listener. Let’s be honest. I have always had a hard time buying into the hype on Thou. I’ve seen them live and enjoyed it and you can’t hear them on record and say they aren’t good at what they do, but their kind of extremity isn’t what I’m reaching for most days when I’m trying to not be in the exact hopeless mindset the band are aiming for. Umbilical isn’t the record to change my mind and it doesn’t need to be. It’s precisely what it’s going for. Caustic.
The fourth full-length from Boston’s Cortez sets a tone with opener “Gimme Danger (On My Stereo)” (premiered here) for straight-ahead, tightly-composed, uptempo heavy rock, and sure enough that would put Thieves and Charlatans — recorded by Benny Grotto at Mad Oak Studios — in line with Cortez‘s work to-date. What unfolds from the seven-minute “Leaders of Nobody” onward is a statement of expanded boundaries in what Cortez‘s sound can encompass. The organ-laced jamitude of “Levels” or the doom rock largesse of “Liminal Spaces” that doesn’t clash with the prior swing of “Stove Up” mostly because the band know how to write songs; across eight songs and 51 minutes, the five-piece of vocalist Matt Harrington, guitarists Scott O’Dowd and Alasdair Swan, bassist Jay Furlo and sitting-in drummer Alexei Rodriguez (plus a couple other guests from Boston’s heavy underground) reaffirm their level of craft, unite disparate material through performance and present a more varied and progressive take than they’ve ever had. They’re past 25 years at this point and still growing in sound. They may be underrated forever, but that’s a special band.
Writing a catchy song is not easy. Writing a song so catchy it’s still catchy even though you don’t speak the language is the provenance of the likes of Uffe Lorenzen. The founding frontman of in-the-ether-for-now Copenhagen heavy/garage psych pioneers Baby Woodrose digs into more straightforward fare on the second full-length from his new trio Lydsyn, putting a long-established Stooges influence to good use in “Hejremanden” after establishing at the outset that “Musik Er Nummer 1” (‘music is number one’) and before the subsequent slowdown into harmony blues with “UFO.” “Nørrebro” has what would seem to be intentional cool-neighborhood strut, and those seeking more of a garage-type energy might find it in “Du Vil Have Mere” or “Opråb” earlier on, and closer “Den Døde By” has a scorch that feels loyal to Baby Woodrose‘s style of psych, but whatever ties there are to Lorenzen‘s contributions over the last 20-plus years, Lydsyn stand out for the resultant quality of songwriting and for having their own dynamic building on Lorenzen‘s solo work and post-Baby Woodrose arc.
The popular wisdom has had it for a few years now that retroism is out. Hearing Baltimorean power trio Magick Potion vibe their way into swaying ’70s-style heavy blues on “Empress,” smoothly avoiding the trap of sounding like Graveyard and spacing out more over the dramatic first two minutes of “Wizard” and the proto-doomly rhythmic jabs that follow. Guitarist/vocalist/organist Dresden Boulden, bassist/vocalist Triston Grove and drummer Jason Geezus Kendall capture a sound that’s as fresh as it is familiar, and while there’s no question that the aesthetic behind the big-swing “Never Change” and the drawling, sunshine-stoned “Pagan” is rooted in the ’68-’74 “comedown era” — as their label, RidingEasy Records has put it in the past — classic heavy rock has become a genre unto itself over the last 25-plus years, and Magick Potion present a strong, next-generation take on the style that’s brash without being willfully ridiculous and that has the chops to back up its sonic callouts. The potential for growth is significant, as it would be with any band starting out with as much chemistry as they have, but don’t take that as a backhanded way of saying the self-titled is somehow lacking. To be sure, they nail it.
Oase is the second full-length from Berlin’s Weite behind 2023’s Assemblage (review here), also on Stickman, and it’s their first with keyboardist Fabien deMenou in the lineup with bassist Ingwer Boysen (Delving), guitarists Michael Risberg (Delving, Elder) and Ben Lubin (Lawns), and drummer Nick DiSalvo (Delving, Elder), and it unfurls across as pointedly atmospheric 53 minutes, honed from classic progressive rock but by the time they get to “(einschlafphase)” expanded into a cosmic, almost new age drone. Longer pieces like “Roter Traum” (10:55), “Eigengrau” (12:41) or even the opening “Versteinert” (9:36) offer impact as well as mood, maybe even a little boogie, “Woodbury Hollow” is more pastoral but no less affecting. The same goes for “Time Will Paint Another Picture,” which seems to emphasize modernity in the clarity of its production even amid vintage influences. Capping with the journey-to-freakout “The Slow Wave,” Oase pushes the scope of Weite‘s sound farther out while hitting harder than their first record, adding to the arrangements, and embracing new ideas. Unless you have a moral aversion to prog for some reason, there’s no angle from which this one doesn’t make itself a must-hear.
Big on tone and melody in a way that feels inspired by the modern sphere of heavy — thinking that Hum record, Elephant Tree, Magnetic Eye-type stuff — Florida’s Orbiter set forth across vast reaches in Distorted Folklore, a song like “Lightning Miles” growing more expansive even as it follows a stoner-bouncing drum pattern. Layering is a big factor, but it doesn’t feel like trickery or the band trying to sound like anything or anyone in particular so much as they’re trying to serve their songs — Jonathan Nunez (ex-Torche, etc.) produced; plenty of room in the mix for however big Orbiter want to get — as they shift from the rush that typified stretches of their 2019 debut, Southern Failures, to a generally more lumbering approach. The slowdown suits them here, though fast or slow, the procession of their work is as much about breadth as impact. Whatever direction they take as they move into their second decade, that foundation is crucial.
As regards genre: “dark arts?” Taking into account the 44 minutes of Vlimmer‘s fourth LP, which is post-industrial as much as it’s post-punk, with plenty of goth, some metal, some doom, some dance music, and so on factored in, there’s not a lot else that might encompass the divergent intentions of “Endpuzzle” or “Überrennen” as the Berlin solo-project of Alexander Donat harnesses ethereal urbanity in the brooding-till-it-bursts “Sinkopf” or the manic pulses under the vocal longing of closer “Fadenverlust.” To Donat‘s credit, from the depth of the setup given by longest/opening track (immediate points) “2025” to the goth-coated keyboard throb in “Mondläufer,” Bodenhex never goes anywhere it isn’t meant to go, and unto the finest details of its mix and arrangements, Vlimmer‘s work exudes expressive purpose. It is a record that has been hammered out over a period of time to be what it is, and that has lost none of the immediacy that likely birthed it in that process.
Indianapolis four-piece Moon Goons cut an immediately individual impression on their third album, Lady of Many Faces. The album, which often presents itself as a chaotic mash of ideas, is in fact not that thing. The band is well in control, just able and/or wanting to do more with their sound than most. They are also mindfully, pointedly weird. If you ever believed space rock could have been invented in an alternate reality 1990s and run through filters of lysergism and Devin Townsend-style progressive metal, you might take the time now to book the tattoo of the cover of Lady of Many Faces you’re about to want. Shenanigans abound in the eight songs, if I haven’t made that clear, and even the nod of “Doom Tomb Giant” feels like a freakout given the treatment put on by Moon Goons, but the thing about the album is that as frenetic as the four-piece of lead vocalist/guitarist Corey Standifer, keyboardist/vocalist Brooke Rice, bassist Devin Kearns and drummer Jacob Kozlowski get on their way to the doped epic finisher title-track, the danger of it coming apart is a well constructed, skillfully executed illusion. And what a show it is.
Although it opens up with some element of foreboding by transposing the progression of AC/DC‘s “Hells Bells” onto its own purposes in heavy Canadiana rock, and it gets a bit shouty/sludgy in the lyrical crescendo of “What a Dummy,” which seems to be about getting pulled over on a DUI, or the later “The Castle of White Lake,” much of Familiars‘ Easy Does It lives up to its name. Far from inactive, the band are never in any particular rush, and while a piece like “Golden Season,” with its singer-songwriter vocal, acoustic guitar and backing string sounds, carries a sense of melancholy — certainly more than the mellow groover swing and highlight bass lumber of “Gustin Grove,” say — the band never lay it on so thick as to disrupt their own momentum more than they want to. Working as a five-piece with pedal steel, piano and other keys alongside the core guitar, bass and drums, Easy Does It finds a balance of accessibility and deeper-engaging fare combined with twists of the unexpected.
Progressive stoner psych rockers The Fërtility Cült unveil their fifth album, A Song of Anger, awash in otherworldly soul music vibes, sax and fuzz and roll in conjunction with carefully arranged harmonies and melodic and rhythmic turns. There’s a lot of heavy prog around — I don’t even know how many times I’ve used the word today and frankly I’m scared to check — and admittedly part of that is how open that designation can feel, but The Fërtility Cült seem to take an especially fervent delight in their slow, molten, flowing chicanery on “The Duel” and elsewhere, and the abiding sense is that part of it is a joke, but part of everything is a joke and also the universe is out there and we should go are you ready? A Song of Anger is billed as a prequel, and perhaps “The Curse of the Atreides” gives some thematic hint as well, but whether you’ve been with them all along or this is the first you’ve heard, the 12-minute closing title-track is its own world. If you think you’re ready — and good on you for that — the dive is waiting for your immersion.
