https://www.high-endrolex.com/18

Ripplefest Texas 2024: Dates and First Bands Announced

Posted in Whathaveyou on September 25th, 2023 by JJ Koczan

This past weekend was Ripplefest Texas, and I gotta say, even having gone to a fest last friggin’ week, I was looking hard at that lineup and thinking to myself it’d be awfully nice to see a whole bunch of West Coast acts I don’t normally see. Maybe next year.

Wait, who’s thinking about next year when the festival is barely done? They are. Ripplefest Texas 2024 is bringing over Dozer and Mars Red Sky — oh I hope they tour together — and will have The Skull-offshoot Legions of Doom, Boston’s GozuThe Heavy Eyes, High Desert QueenBone ChurchBlue HeronDemons My Friends and, as you might guess looking at the packed lineup that was assembled for this year’s event, many more to come.

Honestly, you had me at either Dozer or Mars Red Sky, but the appeal here goes well beyond those, and in a US festival sphere reeling without a major summer event or two this year it’s gotten pretty used to having around, Ripplefest seems to be stepping in at least to give the heavy rock end of the underground somewhere to flourish. I’ll be interested to see in the next two or three years how it will continue to grow, but also just for next year. I’d imagine there’s a whole bunch of people who’ve already made their travel plans to get to Austin. Can’t say I really blame you.

More to come as we get closer to a year from now, obviously, but they’re throwing down. Pretty sure those earlybird tickets are gone:

ripplefest texas 2024 first poster

DATES AND FIRST BANDS ANNOUNCED FOR NEXT YEAR!

DOZER
LEGIONS OF DOOM
MARS RED SKY
GOZU
THE HEAVY EYES
HIGH DESERT QUEEN
BONE CHURCH
BLUE HERON
DEMONS MY FRIENDS

and many many more!

Only 100 Early bird tickets available so get yours now!
www.lickofmyspoon.com

https://www.facebook.com/theripplemusic/
https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/
http://www.ripple-music.com/

https://www.facebook.com/LOMSProductions
https://www.instagram.com/LOMSProductions/
http://www.lickofmyspoon.com/
https://linktr.ee/Lickofmyspoon

Dozer, “Rising” live at Desertfest Berlin 2023

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Full Album Premiere & Review: High Desert Queen & Blue Heron, Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake

Posted in audiObelisk, Reviews on May 22nd, 2023 by JJ Koczan

high desert queen blue heron turned to stone chapter 8 the wake

[Click play above to stream High Desert Queen and Blue Heron’s Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake split LP in full. Album is out Friday on Ripple Music and available to preorder here for the US, here for Europe, and here on Bandcamp.]

It’s a quick listen to be sure at just 28 minutes, but Turned to Stone Chapter 8: The Wake, which follows a lineage of Ripple Music splits that goes back eight years to the beginning of a series called The Second Coming of Heavy that focused on then-up-and-coming acts like Geezer and Borracho, Red Mesa, Kingnomad, and so on. That series boasted 10 releases and Turned to Stone began in earliest 2020 with Mr. Bison and Spacetrucker (review here) and has continued to roll out two or three split LPs per year since, the latest bringing together Albuquerque desert grunge sludgers Blue Heron and Austin, Texas, purveyors of plus-sized riffs and melody High Desert Queen.

The reason the lineage is relevant — yea, one split begat another split and that split begat another split, on into biblical perpetuity — is that Turned to Stone Chapter 8: The Wake reminds distinctly of the prior series’ specific intent to bolster newer bands; a mission that it directly inherited. Both High Desert Queen (side A) and Blue Heron (side B) present three songs that arrive subsequent to their debut full-lengths, Blue Heron having released Ephemeral (review here) a year ago this week through Seeing Red Records and Kozmik Artifactz and High Desert Queen having made a justified splash on Ripple (pun absolutely intended) with late 2021’s Secrets of the Black Moon (review here), the recording sessions of which birthed the three songs included here.

Cohesion between the two bands in terms of sound isn’t hard to come by. Both are straightforward in their arrangements, putting weighted fuzz out front in their mix and backing it with mostly mid-tempo grooves, more nod than shove, and both have frontmen involved behind-the-scenes in the heavy underground, whether it’s Blue Heron‘s Jadd Shickler serving as a label manager for Ripple as well as Magnetic Eye Records (also under the SPKR Media umbrella, along with labels like Prophecy Productions, Testimony Records and others) and Blues Funeral Recordings (responsible for the PostWax series and releases this year alone from Dozer and Acid King, among others) or High Desert Queen‘s Ryan Garney heading the booking concern Lick of My Spoon Productions, putting on RippleFest Texas and slating shows and tours for his own band and others.

The fourth-wall-breaking, multi-tiered ‘scene’ contributions of Shickler and Garney give another dimension to Turned to Stone Chapter 8: The Wake — emblematic of the DIY manner in which heavy rock and roll has become what it is today; a worldwide subcultural phenomenon most people know nothing about — but none of it would matter as regards this split LP if the songs weren’t there. I’ll confess there was part of me hoping the High Desert Queen tracks — the mega-hooky “Black Moon,” the shorter, floating-but-not-an-interlude “Drift Into the Sun” and the telltale stoner boogie “Roll the Dice” — would be newer recordings, but one takes what one can get, and having “Black Moon” as a late-arriving semi-title-track from that album is welcome, the song fading in on feedback before its forward roll begins in earnest, a somewhat foreboding groove that turns out to be thick enough for everyone to ride opening up in the verse before the layered melody of the chorus.

high desert queen blue heron

Like the album from which they (didn’t) come, “Black Moon” and “Roll the Dice” — the lyrics in the latter seem to be the band asking themselves ‘should we go for it?,’ which is laughable with the hindsight of the two years they’ve spent mostly on tour in the US and Europe, where they’re touring even as this split is released — aren’t trying to play coy in their appeal. They make a space and fill it. “Roll the Dice” has an edge of metal in its post-solo finish, but never crosses over to outright aggression, and is much more a standout single in its impression than a leftover. “Black Moon,” with an even stronger hook at the outset, functions similarly, while “Drift Into the Sun” connects the two to create a sense of fluidity between them, strengthening and broadening the whole as a mini-EP on one side. Don’t be surprised when they show up as bonus tracks on the 10th anniversary reissue of Secrets of the Black Moon eight years from now.

Answering back with “Able Baker” (a Richard Scarry reference?), “Day of the Comet” and “Superposition,” Blue Heron run a thread between first-record-era Queens of the Stone Age in tone and oldschool sludge rock burl as guitarist Mike Chavez (who, like Shickler, was also in Spiritu), bassist Steve Schmidlapp and drummer Ricardo Sanchez smoothly establish themselves on side B. Immersion and atmosphere are prevalent as “Able Baker” runs through its five minutes, with a tonal-highlight of a solo in its second half answering the leads in its first, and melody met with due rhythmic force. “Day of the Comet” is deceptive in feeling looser but maintaining the strong grip on structure, and like High Desert Queen before them, Blue Heron cap with the speedier nod of “Superposition,” a righteous showcase that transposes Facelift-era Alice in Chains onto a foundation of modern heavy.

High Desert Queen and Blue Heron offer further complement to each other in the depth and apparent reach of their mix. Both bands sound big without being overblown or sacrificing craft to studio-born largesse. For committed heavy rockers or those who’ve followed along with the series, Turned to Stone Chapter 8: The Wake is a no-brainer. The kind of release you can pick up and see where it takes you. To those who are unfamiliar or have seen the names around but have yet to check out the songs, the sampler-style encapsulation of what they do is likewise convenient and actually-good. While they’re coming off their respective debuts, as noted, Blue Heron and High Desert Queen share a knowledge of what they want to accomplish in songwriting and performance, and that sense of control makes it that much easier as a listener to roll along to where the riffs are leading.

That destination might be the desert, if we want to talk about aesthetic, but the direction is forward, as both clearly have more to say than has been said here or on their respective first LPs. Ultimately stronger for its relative brevity, Turned to Stone Chapter 8: The Wake leaves the audience wanting more from one band and then the other, engaging with new takes on classic methods with a realized intent toward quality and fullness of sound. The only way to lose is by missing it.

Quotes from the bands, PR wire info, preorder and social links, etc., follow in blue:

High Desert Queen Blue Heron Turned to Stone Chapter 8 The Wake vinyl

Ryan Garney on Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake:

“It’s an honor to share a split with Blue Heron. From the first time we saw this band play live we were immediately happy to do anything with these musical juggernauts. Incredible musicians and even better people. It’s also great to be able resurrect three songs from the dead. These 3 tracks didn’t make our debut record and we are happy they get to see the light of day in conjunction with three powerful songs from Blue Heron.”

Jadd Shickler on Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake:

“Split releases work best when there’s a reason for them to exist. It’s easy to slap two bands on a record to fill up the album sides, but when there’s something to connect them, that’s when a split makes sense. Blue Heron and High Desert Queen are both from the Southwest, we’ve both got a shared love of massive desert rock and, whether we intend it or not, a lot of grunge influences. We also dig them as people and as musicians. We welcomed them for their first out-of-state show at our 7-inch release gig in 2021, and they hosted us at Ripplefest Texas last year. We respect the hell out of their ambition, their musicality, and their dedication to huge riffs, so it’s a real pleasure to share this record with them. As for the songs, we put a bit of pressure on ourselves. Our debut album came out just a year ago, and we wanted to follow that with a batch of new tunes that are compact and fairly straightforward, but still show our love for starting a song in one place and ending up somewhere radically different.”

HIGH DESERT QUEEN / BLUE HERON
“Turned To Stone Chapter 8: The Wake”
Out May 26th on Ripple Music
US preorder – https://ripplemusic.bigcartel.com/products

European preorder – https://en.ripple.spkr.media/

Bandcamp – https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/album/turned-to-stone-chapter-8-the-wake

Pairing up two highly esteemed bands of the Southwest underground scene, “Turned To Stone Chapter 8” is a gigantic masterclass of heavy rock, with six tracks that will take you on a riff-fueled journey with no further ado! Between HIGH DESERT QUEEN’s versatile and massive-sounding heavy and BLUE HERON’s raucous and desert-shaped songcraft, it is no understatement to say that we are in presence of true forces of nature, an alliance between two up-and-coming greats of the US stoner and desert rock scene.

“Turned To Stone Chapter 8” will be available on May 26th in various vinyl formats as well as digitally, with preorders available now on Ripple Music. The artwork was created by award-winning comic and poster artist Johnny Dombrowski.

TRACKLIST:
1. High Desert Queen – Black Moon
2. High Desert Queen – Drift Into The Sun
3. High Desert Queen – Roll The Dice
4. Blue Heron – Able Baker
5. Blue Heron – Day Of The Comet
6. Blue Heron – Superposition

High Desert Queen:
Morgan Miller – Bass
Phil Hook – Drums
Ryan Garney – Vocals
Rusty Miller – Guitar

Blue Heron:
Mike Chavez – Guitar
Ricardo Sanchez – Drums
Steve Schmidlapp – Bass
Jadd Shickler – Vocals

High Desert Queen on Facebook

High Desert Queen on Instagram

High Desert Queen on Bandcamp

Blue Heron on Instagram

Blue Heron on Facebook

Blue Heron on Bandcamp

Ripple Music on Facebook

Ripple Music on Instagram

Ripple Music on Bandcamp

Ripple Music website

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High Desert Queen & Blue Heron Announce Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake

Posted in Whathaveyou on March 21st, 2023 by JJ Koczan

If you’re unfamiliar — and if you are, that’s fine; I’m not trying to be out here keeping a gate or some bullshit — Ripple Music‘s Turned to Stone split series began after the success of the Cali label’s The Second Coming of Heavy 10-parter and has featured more than a few killers in its time, usually working on a loose theme either curated by Ripple itself or some underground denizen close to their heart. This time around, the two bands are Austin rockers High Desert Queen — about whom I’ve ended up writing pretty much daily for one reason or another the last couple weeks — and Albuquerque’s Blue Heron, who are fronted by Jadd Shickler of Magnetic Eye Records and Blues Funeral Recordings (he also co-founded MeteorCity and the All That is Heavy store before the century turned).

Both bands are awesome, so you’ll pardon if I treat this one as a total no-brainer. May 26 release. Preorders up. Fine. Blue Heron get first-single honors, and you can hear their “Able Baker” (is that you, Richard Scarry?) at the bottom of this post as a herald of more to come. I’ve done a few premieres for the last editions of Turned to Stone, and this press release just came in, so I haven’t made a request yet, but I think that might be where I head after I finish up here, which as it turns out, I just did.

From the PR wire:

High Desert Queen Blue Heron Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake

US stoner rock units HIGH DESERT QUEEN and BLUE HERON to release ‘Turned To Stone Chapter 8’ split album on Ripple Music this May!

HIGH DESERT QUEEN / BLUE HERON
“Turned To Stone Chapter 8: The Wake”
Out May 26th on Ripple Music
US preorder – https://ripplemusic.bigcartel.com/products

European preorder – https://en.ripple.spkr.media/

Bandcamp – https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/album/turned-to-stone-chapter-8-the-wake

Ripple Music announces the release of “Turned To Stone Chapter 8: The Wake”, the new split record featuring Southwestern heavy and stoner rock merchants HIGH DESERT QUEEN and BLUE HERON, to be issued on May 26th, 2023. Listen to Blue Heron’s debut single “Able Baker” now!

About joining forces with High Desert Queen, Blue Heron frontman Jadd Shickler says: “We dig High Desert Queen as musicians and as people. We invited them to Albuquerque to play the release party for our first single, which I think was their first-ever out-of-town gig. They returned the favor by having us play with them at Ripplefest Texas last summer, and I think all of us in Blue Heron are pretty impressed by their go-getter attitude. Along with all that, several of us are actual friends outside of band stuff, so it just felt like a natural pairing that Todd at Ripple was on board with. We’re stoked that it worked out, and with luck, we’ll be playing some shows with them to promote the record later this year!”

Pairing up two highly esteemed bands of the Southwest underground scene, “Turned To Stone Chapter 8” is a gigantic masterclass of heavy rock, with six tracks that will take you on a riff-fueled journey with no further ado! Between HIGH DESERT QUEEN’s versatile and massive-sounding heavy and BLUE HERON’s raucous and desert-shaped songcraft, it is no understatement to say that we are in presence of true forces of nature, an alliance between two up-and-coming greats of the US stoner and desert rock scene.

“Turned To Stone Chapter 8” will be available on May 26th in various vinyl formats as well as digitally, with preorders available now on Ripple Music. The artwork was created by award-winning comic and poster artist Johnny Dombrowski.

TRACKLIST:
1. High Desert Queen – Black Moon
2. High Desert Queen – Drift Into The Sun
3. High Desert Queen – Roll The Dice
4. Blue Heron – Able Baker
5. Blue Heron – Day Of The Comet
6. Blue Heron – Superposition

https://www.facebook.com/highdesertqueen/
http://www.instagram.com/highdesertqueen
http://highdesertqueen.bandcamp.com/

https://www.instagram.com/blueheronabq/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/5iNywSwnYX4eMwaQISEpzG
https://www.facebook.com/blueheronabq

https://www.facebook.com/theripplemusic/
https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/
http://www.ripple-music.com/

High Desert Queen & Blue Heron, Turned to Stone Ch. 8: The Wake (2023)

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The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal Playlist: Episode 85

Posted in Radio on May 27th, 2022 by JJ Koczan

the obelisk show banner

Yeah, there are some longer songs here. Truth be told, I wanted that. I wanted the show to have a flow from one track to the next. A lot of it is a pretty dug-in, trippier vibe. There’s some light and dark, and when you get to Wild Rocket and YOB that’s a kind of blasting point that I acknowledge in the subsequent voice track too, but I get two hours every other week to do this thing and I had a specific idea for how I wanted to use it this time.

Does that matter? I don’t know. I just want you to listen to Moura and Okkoto because those records has been laying waste to my soul of late. Lili Refrain I was put onto last weekend or somewhere thereabouts and I wanted to check out more, so there you go, and I feel punk rock guilt for missing Blackwater Holylight and BleakHeart when they came through — to be fair, I had/kinda-still-have the plague — and I thought that I’d probably be the only person on Gimme to play something like Magick Brother & Mystic Sister, so after having closed out last week with that on the site, the temptating to include it was too much to resist. Everything else was built off that.

I did my best to make a good show. If you listen, I hope you enjoy it.

Thanks if you listen, thanks if you’re reading. Thanks in general.

The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 05.27.22

Moura Lúa vermella Axexan, Espreitan
Okkoto Where the Meadows Dream Beside the Sea Climb the Antlers & Reach the Stars
Magick Brother & Mystic Sister Utopia Magick Brother & Mystic Sister
Kungens Män Vaska lyckokaka Kungens Ljud & Bild
Blue Heron The Buck Ephemeral
VT
Blackwater Holylight Who the Hell Silence/Motion
BleakHeart The Dead Moon Dream Griever
Lili Refrain Ichor Mana
Wild Rocket Formless Abyss Formless Abyss
Mt. Echo Flummox Electric Empire
YOB Nothing to Win Clearing the Path to Ascend
VT
Wo Fat The Oracle The Singularity

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is June 10 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

Gimme Metal website

The Obelisk on Facebook

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Review & Full Album Premiere: Blue Heron, Ephemeral

Posted in audiObelisk, Reviews on May 25th, 2022 by JJ Koczan

Blue Heron Ephemeral Cover Art by Mirkow Gastow

[Click play above to stream Blue Heron’s Ephemeral in full. Album is out Friday on Kozmik Artifactz and Seeing Red Records.]

True, the blue heron is not a desert bird. They live in wetlands. One imagines that Albuquerque, New Mexico’s Blue Heron — who include the line, “without water we’ll drink the sand,” in the song “Futurola” which opens their debut album, Ephemeral — chose it because in some Native American traditions, to see a blue heron is a positive omen for a fishing trip, or a sign of growth and evolution more generally. One doubts the four-piece get much fishing done in Albuquerque, so perhaps it’s safe to assume their nod is to the latter.

Such would seem to be borne out across the 47 minutes and eight songs of Ephemeral, which sees issue through Seeing Red Records and Kozmik Artifactz and follows only a couple of compilation/tribute appearances and the band’s late-2021 two-songer Black Blood of the Earth / A Sunken Place (review here), the video that accompanied same accomplishing much in terms of establishing the band’s persona as they rocked a barroom venue with drummer Ricardo Sanchez turning in a full-body performance behind the kit. One very much gets the sense that he’s doing the same on the rest of the tracks here, and whether it’s the heavy-but-laid-back classic desert rock unfurling of “Futurola,” the lumbering-into-freakout-into-space-out-jam in the midsection of the subsequent 13-minute viber “Sayonara” or the later march of “The Buck” that sets out into the sandy wastes with a backpack made of highlight fuzz, rhythm is very much at the heart of Ephemeral.

Can’t groove without it, and it’s the groove that ties the scream-sludgy payoff of “Push the Sky” to the angular turns prior, the crunching, gruff rush early in “Black Blood of the Earth” to its willfully meandering, spoken-word-topped second half, like a post-grunge noise solution to the problem of ‘how do we get lost on purpose.’ That’s not to minimize the contributions of bassist Steve Schmidlapp, or guitarist Mike Chavez and vocalist Jadd Shickler, the latter two of whom also played together in Spiritu, whose self-titled debut was issued in 2002 and of whom Blue Heron might be considered a spiritual successor in terms of their general approach.

Shickler — who’s invariably more known for having also co-founded MeteorCity, today runs Blues Funeral Recordings and contributes to Ripple MusicMagnetic Eye Records, the PostWax vinyl subscription service (for which I do liner notes; full disclosure), and so on — and Chavez dig into older-school heavy/desert vibes throughout, and the ability and readiness to break out a more aggressive stance across Ephemeral is part of that, though at the same time, they offer the Chavez-solo drifting interlude “Infiniton Field” and the acoustic/pedal steel-laced Americana expanse of the penultimate two-minute instrumental “Where One Went Together,” and those are decidedly drawn from newer influences; a bit of Lord Buffalo to go with the underlying Dozer, at least in the case of “Where One Went Together.” It’s only fair to read this as Blue Heron‘s omen of evolving coming to fruition in the songs themselves, which is arguably the ideal for the band, particularly on their first full-length.

The broad scope they set is likewise realized among the shifts in tonality and meter, though certainly the heart of Ephemeral is in the fuzz of Chavez‘s guitar, which shoves the listener into the first verse of “Futurola” like Kyuss pushing over “Gardenia.” Pairing that song and the more purposefully vast “Sayonara” — which opens like “War Pigs” at the wrong (right) speed — as the record’s initial salvo has a lasting effect on the atmosphere of what follows, and even when “The Buck” leads into “Black Blood of the Earth,” which is the pairing of two tracks that are the most similar in their intention throughout, those two songs have distinctive resonances. Elsewhere, the shout-topped payoff of “Sayonara” gives way to the comparatively stripped down, backing vocal-inclusive melodic highlight “Push the Sky,” from which they set off into the “Infiniton Field” before the steady, righteously-stoner-rock drawn-out intro of “The Buck” establishes the beginning of a subtle and effective linear build unto its final rumble.

Blue Heron 2022 Band Photo 4 by JT Schmidlapp

That’s one from which the tense noise at the outset of “Black Blood of the Earth” looses its initial tom-fueled intensity, which seems to be maintained even through the more open-sounding midsection until at last the song lets go of your lungs and turns at about five minutes in to its heavy psych-style exploration, which caps with fingers sliding on strings as one imagines pedals are clicked off and gives over to the acoustic strums of “Where One Went Together” and, ultimately, to the finale “Salvage,” which answers the layering of “Push the Sky,” the head-down force of “Black Blood of the Earth” and reaffirms the threat that at any point Blue Heron can and just might bring forward their sludgier impulses, which they do as the track’s seems to break apart at the conclusion of the album before it turns around for one final clearheaded chorus.

This movement of one into the next into the next is more than about run-on sentences. It’s the flow of Ephemeral as an entirety, and though as a 47-minute LP it’s pushing the limits of that format in terms of runtime, there is not a song in which the overarching fluidity of the whole work is sacrificed.

I am not impartial here, on multiple fronts. First, no one’s ever truly impartial about anything. Ever. Second, and in the interest of further full-disclosure, I’ve known Shickler for about 20 years now since his MeteorCity days, and we communicate on the regular for PostWax, other bands, and more besides. I consider him a friend and often a monumental pain in the ass (which is how you know I really mean that “friend” part). Accordingly, even if I didn’t dig Ephemeral, I probably wouldn’t say so. However, if I didn’t dig Ephemeral, I also wouldn’t be streaming it or reviewing it in this manner, or even telling you this. One way or the other, Ephemeral sets its goals clearly in its songs and meets them front to back.

In terms of my actual listening experience, there are parts where I can pick out nuances from acts Shickler has long associated with, be it the aforementioned Dozer, or Lowrider, or Unida, but even for a listener not coming into Blue Heron‘s debut with my personal context, its melding together of cross-generational sounds is not to be overlooked. The songs are considered and developed, but full of life, and they offer forward glimpses as well as potent nostalgia. As a record, Ephemeral is folkloric in that way, even if the title imagines things coming and going in the passage of time.

Blue Heron, “Black Blood of the Earth” official video

Blue Heron on Facebook

Blue Heron on Instagram

Blue Heron on Bandcamp

Kozmik Artifactz store

Kozmik Artifactz on Facebook

Seeing Red Records on Facebook

Seeing Red Records on Instagram

Seeing Red Records website

Seeing Red Records on Bandcamp

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Blue Heron Set May 27 Release for Ephemeral

Posted in Whathaveyou on April 21st, 2022 by JJ Koczan

Blue Heron 2022 Band Photo 2 by JT Schmidlapp

Whether or not you know Jadd Shickler personally — and he’s an outgoing guy, so you just might — the greater possibility is you know his work. One of the original founders of the MeteorCity label and the perennially-missed All That’s Heavy webstore, he’s currently involved to some degree or other in Blues Funeral, Magnetic Eye Records and Ripple Music, in addition to having conceived and launched the PostWax vinyl subscription series.

That this lifelong passion for heavy rock and roll should extend itself to performing should be no surprise whatsoever. Blue Heron will release their debut album, Ephemeral, on May 27 — the news actually came in a bit ago and slipped through the rather large cracks in my PR wire system these days — and they’ve got a video up for the new single “Futurola.” That, of course, is not to be confused with Futurama, which I hear is coming back, and the song and the album it heralds will follow-up on the initial two-songer (review here) that the Albuquerque-based four-piece put out late last year.

Older heads will recall Shickler (in the blue shirt above and presumably the designated driver of the photoshoot since he’s the only one without a drink) as well from his time in the underrated Spiritu, whose lone, Jack Endino-produced self-titled full-length was released in 2002. Twenty years after the fact — and keeping plenty busy in the meantime — to have Blue Heron arrive with their own album only emphasizes the point. I don’t use the word “lifer” often, but sometimes nothing else will do.

Looking forward to the album:

BLUE HERON EPHEMERAL

Desert Rockers BLUE HERON Prepare to Release First Full Album Ephemeral

New Mexico stoner metal outfit to issue new LP via Seeing Red Records and Kozmik Artifactz on May 27th, with first single “Futurola” now streaming

New Mexico desert rockers Blue Heron will release their first full-length album, Ephemeral, via Seeing Red Records (US) and Kozmik Artifactz (Germany) on May 27th, 2022. The album’s first single, “Futurola” is now streaming on digital services, along with an interpretive animated video.

Ephemeral is an 8-track, 47-minute exploration of heavy rock at its fullest. Excavating the far reaches and connected strata of stoner rock, sludge, doom, heavy psych and post-metal, Blue Heron transmute years of engagement with rock and metal’s profuse branches into a singular, sand-scorching epic. With lyrical threads ranging from mortality and failed civilizations to mythic fables and cinematic re-imaginations, Ephemeral is stylistically diverse, thematically ambitious and unassailably relentless in its raw, desert power.

Ephemeral arrives May 27th, 2022 on limited edition vinyl from Seeing Red Records in North America and Kozmik Artifactz in Europe and on all digital services.

Preorders are available now via the labels and the Blue Heron Bandcamp.

Blue Heron will perform at Ripplefest Texas this July alongside scene heavyweights including Crowbar, Big Business, The Sword, Heavy Temple, Howling Giant and Eagles of Death Metal.

Blue Heron is:
Mike Chavez – Guitar
Ricardo Sanchez – Drums
Steve Schmidlapp – Bass
Jadd Shickler – Vocals

Ephemeral was recorded at Third Eye Studios by David McRae, except:
“Infiniton Field” recorded by Mike Chavez
“Where One Went Together” recorded at Tru-Art Media by Jose Martinez

Mastered by J.T. Schmidlapp
Produced by Blue Heron, David McRae and Lee Sillery
Art and layout by Mirkow Gastow

https://www.instagram.com/blueheronabq/
https://open.spotify.com/artist/5iNywSwnYX4eMwaQISEpzG
https://www.facebook.com/blueheronabq

http://shop.bilocationrecords.com/
https://www.facebook.com/kozmikartifactz

https://www.facebook.com/seeingredrecords/
https://www.instagram.com/seeing_red_records/
http://www.seeingredrecords.com/
https://seeingredrecords.bandcamp.com/

Blue Heron, “Futurola” video

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RippleFest Texas 2022 Lineup Finalized

Posted in Whathaveyou on March 22nd, 2022 by JJ Koczan

Back for its second year and with a fourth day in tow, Ripplefest Texas 2022 confirms its full lineup, a total beast of legends and newcomers. Really, I don’t even know what to say here except that if you’re lucky enough to go, it’s probably the kind of thing you’re going to remember for a long gosh-darn time, and it’s the kind of lineup that serves as lording-over fodder on the part of those who were there to those who weren’t. Well, at least it would if the heavy underground weren’t too cool to each other for that kind of gatekeeping nonsense. In any case, this looks like a massive undertaking to put on, and the roster of assembled acts gets a hearty ‘fucking a’ from my corner of the universe.

Tickets for all four days will run you $150, but I feel like the festival earns that on both quality and quantity of product.

Here’s the announcement, info and links:

ripplefest texas 2022 final poster

RIPPLE FEST TEXAS – The Far Out Lounge – July 21-24

4-day passes available now!

RippleFest Texas 2022 is back and the lineup is as big and hot as Texas itself! 4 days of blistering hot music at Austin’s premier music venue The Far Out Lounge. There will be everything from crushing heavy riffs, to acoustic and banjo picking, to improvisation jam sessions and puppet shows! So many legends and great music that this will be a 4 day weekend you will not want to miss!

TICKETS:
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/thefaroutloungestage/639551

FULL LINEUP:
Eagles of Death Metal, The Sword, Crowbar, Mothership, Big Business, The Obsessed, Stöner, Spirit Adrift, The Heavy Eyes, Sasquatch, REZN, Fatso Jetson, Heavy Temple, J.D. Pinkus, Lord Buffalo, Lo-Pan, Wino, El Perro, Void Vator, Hippie Death Cult, Howling Giant, Doctor Smoke, Nick Oliveri, High Desert Queen, Destroyer of Light, Ape Machine, High Priestess, Dryheat, Rubber Snake Charmers, Sun Crow, Holy Death Trio, Bone Church, Horseburner, Spirit Mother, Thunder Horse, Mother Iron Horse, The Age of Truth, Salem’s Bend, Las Cruces, All Souls, Kind, Fostermother, The Absurd, Godeye, Ole English, Mr. Plow, Snake Mountain Revival, Blue Heron, Grail, Formula 400, Rickshaw Billie’s Burger Patrol, Eagle Claw, Bridge Farmers.

The Far Out Lounge is located at 8504 South Congress. Winner of Best New Venue at the Austin Music Awards 2020.

http://www.thefaroutaustin.com/

https://www.facebook.com/ripplefesttexas
https://www.facebook.com/LOMSProductions/
https://www.facebook.com/theripplemusic/
https://www.instagram.com/ripplemusic/
https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/
http://www.ripple-music.com/

Lo-Pan, Live at the Grog Shop, Cleveland, Ohio, Feb 18, 2022

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Blue Heron Premiere “Black Blood of the Earth” Video

Posted in Bootleg Theater on October 14th, 2021 by JJ Koczan

blue heron

Though one may have seen their name around in the sphere of Magnetic Eye Records ‘Redux’ offerings for Pink Floyd or AC/DC, Albuquerque, New Mexico’s Blue Heron will make their standalone debut with the two-songer 7″, Black Blood of the Earth / A Sunken Place, on Dec. 3. And while it could be tempting to think of those comp appearances and even the coming single as a soft opening, doing so hardly accounts for the sonic heft present in the material itself. There are a few lessons to take away from the four-piece’s video for “Black Blood of the Earth,” premiering below.

To wit, first and foremost, let us all be reminded of what a difference a truly great drummer can bring to a lineup. These guys aren’t newcomers by any stretch — you can see vocalist Jadd Shickler (also of Blues Funeral Recordings/ex-MeteorCity, etc.) andblue heron black blood of the earth guitarist Mike Chavez‘s connection to Spiritu in the info below — and it’s pretty clear they’re not doing anything by accident. That includes filming their first video live on stage. As introductions go, their presence for a hometown getdown at The Launch Pad is no less engaging than the song itself, which is elbows and knees early, brash in its groove, before tripping out later with a whispered spoken vocal on top. As the camera flashes between ShicklerChavez, bassist Steve Schmidlapp (who wins at t-shirts with Mad Season, as one invariably would) and drummer Ricardo Sanchez, just watch the whole-body-all-in technique of the latter. Dude has the kind of energy in his play that even in a clip like this you can see infects a whole room in the best way possible. Showy? Yeah, but neither is he missing a beat.

And if you can dig that — and yeah, you can — you’re gonna be able to get on board with the rest of the surroundings, which rolls out heavy at first and digs into a well-yes-that-will-do-nicely nod to underscore the solo section before the jam really takes off. If that last movement informs as to anything, it’s that the atmosphere with which “Black Blood of the Earth” caps was there all along. Go back and start the song over and you’ll hear it, or at least take a second to process how not-at-all out of place that jam is and you’ll understand. Either way, that’s classic heavy rock and roll songcraft at work, and with their debut full-length, Ephemeral, apparently already done, it only makes that record something more to look forward to.

That’s my spiel. Thanks for reading.

Enjoy the clip below:

Blue Heron, “Black Blood of the Earth” video premiere

Blue Heron on “Black Blood of the Earth”:

Every new band has that song that comes together and it finally feels like you’re not searching for your sound anymore, and this was that song for us. It morphed and changed a bunch of times and runs the spectrum of what we do, from sludge on steroids to spacey melodies to a sick goddamn breakdown that we don’t ever get tired of. As a way to announce ourselves to the world, it’s pretty perfect, a massive, balls-out mini-epic straight from the New Mexico desert.

Preorder: https://blueheronabq.bandcamp.com/

“Black Blood of the Earth” written by Blue Heron
Taken from the “Black Blood of the Earth / A Sunken Place” 7-inch

Available at: https://blueheronabq.bandcamp.com/

Video edited by J.T. Schmidlapp for BassRezin Studios (@bassrezin)

Filmed by Mike Gerdes and J.T. Schmidlapp at The Launch Pad, Albuquerque, NM, June 11, 2021.

Formed in 2018, Blue Heron is a heavy rock band from Albuquerque, New Mexico, and our firsthand relationship with the desert is inextricable from who we are and how we sound. Surrounded by endless horizons that spark a compulsion to fill the vastness with massive volume, we saturate our piece of desert with rolling, thunderous riffs, drums that pummel and swing, deep, thrumming tones and vocals that rip and roar.

Blue Heron’s guitarist and singer were founding members of Spiritu, possibly Albuquerque’s first desert-style rock band, who burned briefly yet brightly with a Jack Endino-produced debut LP, a European tour with Clutch, Spiritual Beggars and Dozer, and a compilation slot next to Entombed and Mastodon.

On December 10th, Blue Heron will self-release our Black Blood of the Earth / A Sunken Place single on 7-inch vinyl and digital formats. We also have a track on Magnetic Eye’s forthcoming Best of AC/DC [Redux] (Dec 3rd), alongside the likes of Supersuckers, Domkraft and Witchskull.

Blue Heron has completed work on our debut album, Ephemeral, and is currently in search of a label.

Blue Heron are:
Jadd Shickler- Vocals
Mike Chavez- Guitar
Steve Schmidlapp- Bass
Ricardo Sanchez- Drums

Blue Heron on Facebook

Blue Heron on Instagram

Blue Heron on Bandcamp

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