They’ve released a single today, and a butt-load of merch, but I can’t find the song streaming as I write this, so I’ll update when it shows up [EDIT: It’s there now.]. The track is “A Million Beers” and I found a live version of it to put at the bottom of the post from Stöner‘s stint alongside Clutch on that band’s holiday tour in December. “A Million Beers” starts at about six and a half minutes into that video and is a good match for “Stand Down” from the first album in terms of pace, with Nick Oliveri backing Brant Bjork‘s lead vocals. Keep it simple, keep it straightforward, keep it going. I admire this band’s ability so far to not take itself too seriously.

To wit, the pepperoni pizza album art of their new record, Totally…. Tells you a lot about what you’re getting here, I think, and I don’t know how you’d see that and say anything other than “right on” in response. It’s been a long time since I last tasted Californian pizza, but it looks about right.

I know people were divided on last year’s Stoners Rule (review here), and I get that. High expectations as Oliveri and Bjork collaborate on a new project along with drummer Ryan Güt, and they purposefully stripped down their sound to its barest elements. It should be interesting to see responses to this second album, especially without a live record like earlier 2021’s Live in the Mojave Desert Vol. 4 (review here) giving an early introduction of their new songs.

Info and preorder link from the PR wire; many tour dates included and probably more to come as the band was also just confirmed for Ripplefest Texas in July:

STÖNER – totally… – sophomore album of the desert rock super band

Today we are stoked to start the presale of the STONER sophomore new album TOTALLY…!!!
The release will see the light May 6th on Heavy Psych Sounds !!!

ALBUM PRESALE: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/shop.htm#HPS230
USA PRESALE: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/shop-usa.htm#HPS230
NEW MERCH: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/merch.htm#stoner

RELEASED IN
25 ULTRA LTD TEST PRESS VINYL
100 ULTRA LTD SIDE A/SIDE B WHITE-BLACK-PINK VINYL
150 ULTRA LTD HALF/HALF SPLATTER TRANSPARENT YELLOW-TRANSPARENT ORANGE-RED SPLATTER VINYL
150 ULTRA LTD 3 COLOR STRIPED VINYL
250 ULTRA LTD COLOR IN COLOR SPLATTER VINYL
LTD ORANGE VINYL
BLACK VINYL
DIGIPAK
DIGITAL

RELEASE DATE: MAY 6th

TRACKLIST
Party March
A Million Beers
Strawberry Creek (Dirty Feet)
Spacedude & The Burn
Stöner Theme
Turn It Around Now
Driving Miss Lazy
Great American Sage

This is Epic! Half of the original members of Kyuss: the Lord of Coolness Brant Bjork himself, and the mighty Rex Everything AKA Nick Oliveri former of Queens of The Stone Age are ready to deliver you the album of the year 2022 !!!

The Dukes of the Desert are back with an incredible sophomore album: STÖNER – totally … is the perfect mix of Desert Swing, Stoner Rock, Desert Rock, and Low Punk all at once!

8 brand new tracks which will blow your mind, recorded by Yosef Sunborn who followed Brant in the last decade for his solo recordings. Mellow guitars, funky stoner rhythms, blousy atmospheres, typical Nick’s punky sounds.. the album flies away in one single listen and makes you want to play it again immediately. Cover art is Hilarious, as this band wants to be. Nothing too serious, they wanna play and have fun, that’s the recipe the Dukes are bringing us after 30 years of experience !!

Produced, recorded and mixed by Yoseph Sanborn and Stöner. Released by Heavy Psych Sounds Records. Guest appearances on guitar by Greg Hetson (Circle Jerks) and Mario Lalli (Yawning Man).
Grab a slice, crank it, and catch the band on tour in ’22 in the US, Canada, UK and Europe.

STÖNER – WEST NORTH WEST TOUR 2022:
02.23 Costa Mesa CA The Wayfarer*
02.24 Santa Cruz CA Urbani’s Cellar*
02.25 Albany CA The Ivy Room*
02.26 Eugene OR The Big Dirty Live*
02.27 Portland OR Star Theater*
03.01 Seattle WA El Corazon*
03.02 Vancouver BC Rickshaw*
03.03 TBC BC*
03.04 Edmonton AB Starlite Room*
03.05 Calgary AB Palomino*
03.06 Missoula MT Badlander
03.08 Boise ID Neurolux
03.09 Salt Lake City UT Aces High
03.10 Las Vegas NV Soulbelly BBQ
03.11 Tempe AZ Pub Rock
03.12 Oceanside CA Pour House

STÖNER – APRIL & MAY 2022 UK & IRELAND TOUR :
Fri 22 Apr : Monroes Live, Galway, Ire
Sat 23 Apr : Dolan’s Warehouse, Limerick, Ire
Sun 24 Apr : Cyprus Avenue, Cork, Ire
Mon 25 Apr : Limelight 2, Belfast, UK
Tue 26 Apr : Opium, Dublin, Ire
Thu 28 Apr : The Garage, Glasgow, UK
Fri 29 Apr : The Warehouse, Leeds, UK
Mon 02 May : Academy 3, Manchester, UK
Tue 03 May : The Mill, Birmingham, UK
Wed 04 May : Thekla, Bristol, UK

STÖNER + support SLOMOSA Europe 2022
06.05.22 – TBA
07.05.22 – TBA
08.05.22 – Aachen / Musikbunker Aachen
09.05.22 – Hamburg / Knust Hamburg
10.05.22 – Luxemburg / Kulturfabrik Esch-sur-Alzette
11.05.22 – Belfort / La Poudrière – Belfort
12.05.22 – Paris / Nouveau Casino
13.05.22 – Toulouse / Connexion Live
14.05.22 – TBA
15.05.22 – Barcelona / Wolf Barcelona
17.05.22 – Duedingen / Bad Bonn
18.05.22 – Winterthur / Gaswerk
19.05.22 – Wien / ARENA WIEN
20.05.22 – Graz / p.p.c.
21.05.22 – Salzburg / Rockhouse Salzburg
22.05.22 – Aschaffenburg / Colos-Saal Aschaffenburg
23.05.22 – Munich / Feierwerk
24.05.22 – Erlangen / Kulturzentrum E-Werk
25.05.22 – Dortmund / Musiktheater Piano
26.05.22 – Marburg / Kulturzentrum KFZ Marburg
27.05.22 – Dresden / Beatpol
29.05.22 – Berlin / Desertfest Berlin

STÖNER is:
Brant Bjork – Guitars/Vocals
Nick Oliveri – Bass
Ryan Güt – Drums

https://www.stonerband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/StonerBandOfficial/
https://www.instagram.com/stoner.band/
heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com
www.heavypsychsounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/HEAVYPSYCHSOUNDS/
https://www.facebook.com/Soundofliberation/
https://www.instagram.com/soundofliberation/
https://www.soundofliberation.com/

Stöner, “A Million Beers”

Stöner, “Stand Down/A Million Beers” live in Baltimore, MD, Dec. 27, 2021

Stöner, Stoners Rule (2021)

So give me a second while I try to get a handle on all of Stöner‘s upcoming tour dates. First is the holiday run with Clutch. Assuming that happens, it starts next week.

The following lists of shows though have all been announced at various points — the UK/Ireland tour first, then the Clutch dates, then EU plus various fests, now West Coast — so it’s been hard to keep it all straight. I’ve compiled the full list from various other news posts in order to get a more complete picture of what the band’s intentions for 2022 are going to be. My question amid all of this is whether or not Brant Bjork, Nick Oliveri and Ryan Güt will also as previously stated be releasing a second album sometime next year to follow-up on 2021’s Stoners Rule (review here). Would love to tell you, but I just don’t know.

What I do know, however, is that the poster for the portion of the newly-unveiled West Coast stint that involves Yawning Man — dubbed the ‘Interstellar Taco’ tour — is amazing and I’m glad it exists. That art is by Brian Walsby working off an idea from Yawning Man‘s Gary Arce and Mario Lalli. Fucking a.

Shows:

STÖNER with Clutch:
Dec. 27 – Baltimore, MD – Rams Head
Dec. 28 – Sayreville, NJ – Starland Ballroom
Dec. 29 – Cleveland, OH – Agoura Theatre
Dec. 30 – Detroit, MI – Filmore Theatre
Dec. 31 – Cincinnati, OH – The Icon
Jan. 2 – Washington DC – The 9:30 Club

STÖNER – WEST NORTH WEST TOUR 2022:
02.23 Costa Mesa CA The Wayfarer*
02.24 Santa Cruz CA Urbani’s Cellar*
02.25 Albany CA The Ivy Room*
02.26 Eugene OR The Big Dirty Live*
02.27 Portland OR Star Theater*
03.01 Seattle WA El Corazon*
03.02 Vancouver BC Rickshaw*
03.03 TBC BC*
03.04 Edmonton AB Starlite Room*
03.05 Calgary AB Palomino*
03.06 Missoula MT Badlander
03.08 Boise ID Neurolux
03.09 Salt Lake City UT Aces High
03.10 Las Vegas NV Soulbelly BBQ
03.11 Tempe AZ Pub Rock
03.12 Oceanside CA Pour House

STÖNER – APRIL & MAY 2022 UK & IRELAND TOUR :
Fri 22 Apr : Monroes Live, Galway, Ire
Sat 23 Apr : Dolan’s Warehouse, Limerick, Ire
Sun 24 Apr : Cyprus Avenue, Cork, Ire
Mon 25 Apr : Limelight 2, Belfast, UK
Tue 26 Apr : Opium, Dublin, Ire
Thu 28 Apr : The Garage, Glasgow, UK
Fri 29 Apr : The Warehouse, Leeds, UK
Mon 02 May : Academy 3, Manchester, UK
Tue 03 May : The Mill, Birmingham, UK
Wed 04 May : Thekla, Bristol, UK

STÖNER + support SLOMOSA Europe 2022
06.05.22 – TBA
07.05.22 – TBA
08.05.22 – Aachen / Musikbunker Aachen
09.05.22 – Hamburg / Knust Hamburg
10.05.22 – Luxemburg / Kulturfabrik Esch-sur-Alzette
11.05.22 – Belfort / La Poudrière – Belfort
12.05.22 – Paris / Nouveau Casino
13.05.22 – Toulouse / Connexion Live
14.05.22 – TBA
15.05.22 – Barcelona / Wolf Barcelona
17.05.22 – Duedingen / Bad Bonn
18.05.22 – Winterthur / Gaswerk
19.05.22 – Wien / ARENA WIEN
20.05.22 – Graz / p.p.c.
21.05.22 – Salzburg / Rockhouse Salzburg
22.05.22 – Aschaffenburg / Colos-Saal Aschaffenburg
23.05.22 – Munich / Feierwerk
24.05.22 – Erlangen / Kulturzentrum E-Werk
25.05.22 – Dortmund / Musiktheater Piano
26.05.22 – Marburg / Kulturzentrum KFZ Marburg
27.05.22 – Dresden / Beatpol
29.05.22 – Berlin / Desertfest Berlin

STÖNER is:
Brant Bjork – Guitars/Vocals
Nick Oliveri – Bass
Ryan Güt – Drums

https://www.stonerband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/StonerBandOfficial/
https://www.instagram.com/stoner.band/
heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com
www.heavypsychsounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/HEAVYPSYCHSOUNDS/
https://www.facebook.com/Soundofliberation/
https://www.instagram.com/soundofliberation/
https://www.soundofliberation.com/

Stöner, Stoners Rule (2021)

Those who keep an eye on such things will have noted a few canceled dates on the US tour that desert trio Stöner were doing until last week with Clutch and King Buffalo, owing to someone in Clutch‘s crew coming down with Covid-19. Obviously best wishes for recovery there. The three-piece of Brant Bjork, Nick Oliveri and Ryan Güt are slated to be back out with Clutch this winter on the Maryland stalwarts’ holiday tour — King Buffalo also taking part — and in answer to Stöner‘s having been confirmed for Desertfest Berlin 2022 next May (they’ll be in London as well) the band now have unveiled a full slate of European tour dates, bringing with them Norwegian upstarts Slomosa.

That pairing is significant. To my knowledge, it’s the most touring Slomosa have undertaken since the release last year of their self-titled debut (review here), and possibly overall as well. They signed with Sound of Liberation for booking at some point during this fucking pandemic, so their hitting the road this time most likely only prefaces more touring to come. If you haven’t checked them out yet, consider doing so, and consider their pairing with veteran players like those in Stöner a purposeful move to get them in front of a crowd looking to be won over.

I don’t know what the status of Stöner‘s intended second LP is yet, but Stoners Rule (review here) is still pretty new, so we’ll see. I know they were looking for a quick turnaround though.

Here’s dates from Sound of Liberation:

STÖNER – Europe 2022 with SLOMOSA

Friends,

are you ready for the most original desert tour to hit European roads in 2022?!

Brant Bjork and Nick Oliveri (THE Californian desert rock legends and founders of nothing less than KYUSS, MONDO GENERATOR, CHÉ, FU MANCHU, BLOODCOT and more between them), together with flow-master Ryan Gut, are ready to finally hit our European stages with their latest project Stöner! RAD!

Support comes from Norwegian’s hottest upcoming „tundra rock“ band Slomosa Without a doubt one of the brightest new stars in the stoner rock sky!

Sound of Liberation proudly presents:
STÖNER + support SLOMOSA Europe 2022

06.05.22 – TBA
07.05.22 – TBA
08.05.22 – Aachen / Musikbunker Aachen
09.05.22 – Hamburg / Knust Hamburg
10.05.22 – Luxemburg / Kulturfabrik Esch-sur-Alzette
11.05.22 – Belfort / La Poudrière – Belfort
12.05.22 – Paris / Nouveau Casino
13.05.22 – Toulouse / Connexion Live
14.05.22 – TBA
15.05.22 – Barcelona / Wolf Barcelona
17.05.22 – Duedingen / Bad Bonn
18.05.22 – Winterthur / Gaswerk
19.05.22 – Wien / ARENA WIEN
20.05.22 – Graz / p.p.c.
21.05.22 – Salzburg / Rockhouse Salzburg
22.05.22 – Aschaffenburg / Colos-Saal Aschaffenburg
23.05.22 – Munich / Feierwerk
24.05.22 – Erlangen / Kulturzentrum E-Werk
25.05.22 – Dortmund / Musiktheater Piano
26.05.22 – Marburg / Kulturzentrum KFZ Marburg
27.05.22 – Dresden / Beatpol
29.05.22 – Berlin / Desertfest Berlin

We can’t wait for Spring 2022 to come. Get your tickets and let’s make this one hell of a party!!

STÖNER is:
Brant Bjork – Guitars/Vocals
Nick Oliveri – Bass
Ryan Güt – Drums

https://www.stonerband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/StonerBandOfficial/
https://www.instagram.com/stoner.band/
heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com
www.heavypsychsounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/HEAVYPSYCHSOUNDS/
https://www.facebook.com/Soundofliberation/
https://www.instagram.com/soundofliberation/
https://www.soundofliberation.com/

Stöner, Stoners Rule (2021)

The stated objective of Stöner and the recording of Stoners Rule (on Heavy Psych Sounds), as guitarist/vocalist Brant Bjork explained here, has been to strip excess toward essentials. That is to say, Bjork and bassist/mostly-backing vocalist Nick Oliveri — who are joined in the endeavor by drummer Ryan Güt — aren’t so much looking to build on the legacy they’ve created in desert/heavy rock so much as to plunge down to its roots in what Bjork long ago coined “low desert punk.” It is not a coincidence that the first lyrics in album-opener “Rad Stays Rad” are lifted from the Ramones, and “hey ho, let’s go,” set to a thick, mid-tempo rollout, is emblematic of the purpose on display throughout the record that follows.

Stöner, with an umlaut? That’s something you’d name a band in high school. And yeah, you might write even scribble Stoners Rule on the front of your notebook while note paying attention in whatever class it might be. But that’s the idea behind the band. Yes, their pedigree involves Kyuss/Vista Chino, Fu Manchu, Queens of the Stone Age, Mondo Generator, Ché, Ten East, The Dwarves, Desert Sessions, solo work from both, and on and on and on (we could do this all day). Stöner is an effort to distill all of that work they’ve done down to its simplest, most straightforward form.

Is that possible? Can you go back without actually going back? I don’t know, but Stoners Rule turns a willfully simple methodology into a strength throughout its seven tracks and 42 minutes. There is no question that some of what the trio are up to is a nostalgia trip for Bjork and Oliveri, and from the already-noted Ramones lyric in “Rad Stays Rad” and general perspective there to the Oliveri-fronted punk of “Evel Never Dies” — about daredevil Evel Knievel, which is about right in demographic terms — and in “The Older Kids,” to the these-are-lessons-we’ve-learned point of view in “Own Yer Blues,” “Nothin'” and “Stand Down,” even unto “Tribe/Fly Girl,” the 13-minute concluding jam that includes lines about finding their sound and finding their tribe, there’s a lot happening in past-tense throughout the songs. “Go ask the older kids” is something a parent says to a child.

“All your shit/It ain’t shit” in “Stand Down” comes across with the assurance of experience. “You take nothin’,” is both sound advice and testimony of ethic on the part of the lyrics. With the ever-fluid, laudably understated, not-doing-too-much-but-doing-it-right adaptable swing drumming of Güt, who also plays in Bjork‘s solo band, behind them, even at their most playful, Stöner are walking a delicate balance between looking back and embarking on something fresh, which is the project itself, while actively trying to remain unconcerned about any of it and just jam out and write songs and have a good time.

However simple they might seem and however straightforward the resultant material is — with “The Older Kids” nodding toward the ultra-seminal structures of riff that typified Kyuss as if to prove the theorem of “rad staying rad” before anyone could even have time to question it — these are not minor stylistic ambitions. And just because something is straightforward doesn’t mean it’s dumbed down or lazy, which the material on Stoners Rule isn’t. Rather, clever turns of phrase abound, even unto the idea of “taking things vs. taking nothing” in “Nothin'” — a song that’s two and a half minutes long and nonetheless serves as the centerpiece here.

Some compositions are easier to read more as Bjork‘s or Oliveri‘s at least in the main — “Evel Never Dies” has an inimitable mania that feels very Oliverian, and “Stand Down”‘s wah-soaked “Ain’t no funk if it don’t smell like a skunk” comes across as more Bjork, but the contributions of the one to the other aren’t to be understated. These are songwriters who’ve worked together on and off for over 30 years. Ultimately, a track like “Own Yer Blues” feels most like it emerged naturally out of a bluesy fuzz jam to become the slow-rolling hooky piece it is, and all three members of the band do well sharing space in the song. It’s by not pretending to be more than it is that Stoners Rule most flourishes.

It seems inevitable, though, that Stoners Rule would come up against high expectations, particularly given the personnel involved and the fanfare that surrounded the band’s debut as part of the ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’ streaming series. On a basic listening level, Stoners Rule doesn’t come across as that much different from the resultant live album from that stream, Live in the Mojave Desert Vol. 4 (review here), and it’s not supposed to. If anything, it’s to the band’s credit that it does, since the purpose behind what they’re doing is to make it sound like a live show might — the music in a raw, natural state, being itself raw and natural in its makeup — so while I’ve come across some ambivalence toward the record and it’s arguable the studio release has perhaps had some of its potential impact lessened by the live album showing up first, it seems likely that over time the balance will even out and Stöner‘s studio offering will stand on its own as the initial statement of intent that it is.

Part of its doing so, again over the longer haul, is what/if anything Stöner do to follow it up. Tour dates have been booked domestically and abroad, and it could well be that the band will continue forward and bring another collection of songs to bear after Stoners Rule, rather than Bjork and Güt going back to their band and Oliveri returning to any number of his several ongoing projects, and build on their accomplishments here. As it is, they do well by actively trying not to live up to the standard their pedigree would dictate, and that level of fuckall is all the more enjoyable as a listening experience because of the perspective of their songwriting and performances. I’m not sure what some listeners might’ve thought was coming, but it’s a band called Stöner. Maybe if they wanted it to be prog, they’d have called it that.

Stöner, Stoners Rule (2021)

Stöner on Facebook

Stöner on Instagram

Stöner website

Heavy Psych Sounds on Facebook

Heavy Psych Sounds on Instagram

Heavy Psych Sounds website

Heavy Psych Sounds on Bandcamp

Stöner recently announced tour dates for UK and Ireland next Spring, and that honestly had me thinking their first album wouldn’t come out until around then, but hey, I’ll take it. The new trio with Brant Bjork, Nick Oliveri and Ryan Güt were a high point among high points in the ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’ stream series (review here), and the resultant live album, Live in the Mojave Desert Vol. 4 (review here), is out this Friday, also in part through Heavy Psych Sounds.

Accordingly, it’s not really a surprise that the three-piece would sign to the label for a debut studio outing as well — both Bjork and Oliveri are on the label too, it should be noted — and if you saw the interview with Brant Bjork back in March (video below), he said that indeed Heavy Psych Sounds would be on board for the record they made in the studio last Fall while also preparing for the performance that would become the stream. See how it all ties together? Isn’t that nice?

The grooves certainly are. Nice to know more are coming sooner than I thought.

Preorders start May 6 — next week already — and there will be a song out then too. Here’s the info with the short bio I wrote for the band:

Heavy Psych Sounds Records&Booking is really proud to present a NEW BAND signing: *** STÖNER ***

– brand new band feat. desert legends Brant Bjork and Nick Oliveri –

We’re incredibly stoked and honored to announce that the California super-band. STÖNER is now a new member of the HPS family!!

!! Heavy Psych Sounds will release the band’s debut album this summer !!

The release was recorded at The Rad Cabin, Joshua Tree, CA on October 12, 2020 by Yosef Sanborn.

DEBUT ALBUM PRESALE + FIRST TRACK PREMIERE START: MAY 6th

Rad stays rad. A few ideas are timeless. Stöner is Brant Bjork (guitar/vocals), Nick Oliveri (bass/vocals) and Ryan Güt (drums), and from flowing jams to all-out punker blasts, they know what they’re doing. It ain’t anybody’s first time at the dance, and you don’t call your band Stöner if you’ve never heard the word before. Stöner, however straight-ahead their moniker, encompass varied styles and the songwriting of Bjork and Oliveri – both founders of Kyuss, also Mondo Generator, Ché, Fu Manchu, Bloodcot, and more between them. Atop the classic-style swing and flow from Güt (also of Bjork’s solo band), Stöner keep it casual and wear the name as only those who helped create the sound could.

STÖNER – APRIL & MAY 2022 UK & IRELAND TOUR :
Fri 22 Apr : Monroes Live, Galway, Ire
Sat 23 Apr : Dolan’s Warehouse, Limerick, Ire
Sun 24 Apr : Cyprus Avenue, Cork, Ire
Mon 25 Apr : Limelight 2, Belfast, UK
Tue 26 Apr : Opium, Dublin, Ire
Thu 28 Apr : The Garage, Glasgow, UK
Fri 29 Apr : The Warehouse, Leeds, UK
Mon 02 May : Academy 3, Manchester, UK
Tue 03 May : The Mill, Birmingham, UK
Wed 04 May : Thekla, Bristol, UK

STÖNER is:
Brant Bjork – Guitars/Vocals
Nick Oliveri – Bass
Ryan Güt – Drums

https://www.stonerband.com/
https://www.facebook.com/StonerBandOfficial/
https://www.instagram.com/stoner.band/
heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com
www.heavypsychsounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/HEAVYPSYCHSOUNDS/
https://www.facebook.com/Soundofliberation/
https://www.instagram.com/soundofliberation/
https://www.soundofliberation.com/
https://www.facebook.com/RouteOneBooking/
https://www.instagram.com/routeonebooking
https://www.routeonebooking.co.uk/

Stoner, Interview with Brant Bjork, March 16, 2021

Stöner, “Own Yer Blues” from ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’

Stöner, the new band from Brant Bjork, Nick Oliveri and Ryan Gut, are just about a week out from making their debut with Live in the Mojave Desert Vol. 4 (review here) on Heavy Psych Sounds. If you watched the stream (review here) from whence the audio for that live record was taken, then you already know that’s a thing to be stoked about. Further stoke-age arrives via Sound of Liberation, the European booking concern/now-also record label, which has announced it will handle EU tour routing for the trio.

In conjunction with Route One Booking — which was founded by Orange Goblin frontman Ben Ward last year after his many years working in management, booking, etc. — tour dates have been announced for the UK and Ireland in Spring 2022, and there’s even a spot left open for them to hit up Desertfest London, though that announcement won’t officially come until that fest makes its own first lineup reveal on April 30.

And while we’re here, let’s just figure that by the time Stöner go abroad, they’ll have a studio album out as well, since Brant Bjork confirmed in his recent interview here that the band will be working with Heavy Psych Sounds on a studio release sometime soon.

Tickets for the UK/Ireland shows go on sale this Friday, links below:

STÖNER JOINS SOL ROSTER

Hey friends!

We’re happy to announce that we’ll take care of EU bookings for STÖNER! Brace yourself for finest original desert rock coming your way!

Stöner is the brand new band of desert rock legends Brant Bjork (Fu Manchu, Kyuss, Ché and solo), Nick Oliveri (Kyuss, Queens of The Stone Age, The Dwarves, Mondo Generator) and Ryan Gut (Brant Bjork solo).

While we are taking care of the EU mainland bookings, our friends at Route One Booking are ready to announce the UK & Ireland part of this tour.

STÖNER – APRIL & MAY 2022 UK & IRELAND TOUR :
Fri 22 Apr : Monroes Live, Galway, Ire
Sat 23 Apr : Dolan’s Warehouse, Limerick, Ire
Sun 24 Apr : Cyprus Avenue, Cork, Ire
Mon 25 Apr : Limelight 2, Belfast, UK
Tue 26 Apr : Opium, Dublin, Ire
Thu 28 Apr : The Garage, Glasgow, UK
Fri 29 Apr : The Warehouse, Leeds, UK
Mon 02 May : Academy 3, Manchester, UK
Tue 03 May : The Mill, Birmingham, UK
Wed 04 May : Thekla, Bristol, UK

Tickets on sale 9am Friday 23rd of April from Ticketmaster.ie

www.tegmjr-eire.ie

Can’t wait to bring STÖNER your way!

‘Live in the Mojave Desert Vol. 4’ preorder: https://heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com/album/st-ner-live-in-the-mojave-desert-volume-4

https://www.stonerband.com/
https://www.instagram.com/stoner.band/
heavypsychsoundsrecords.bandcamp.com
www.heavypsychsounds.com
https://www.facebook.com/HEAVYPSYCHSOUNDS/
https://www.facebook.com/Soundofliberation/
https://www.instagram.com/soundofliberation/
https://www.soundofliberation.com/
https://www.facebook.com/RouteOneBooking/
https://www.instagram.com/routeonebooking
https://www.routeonebooking.co.uk/

Stoner, Interview with Brant Bjork, March 16, 2021

Stöner, “Own Yer Blues” from ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’

Tomorrow, Friday, is Brant Bjork‘s birthday. Happy birthday, Brant. On Saturday, his new trio with drummer Ryan Gut (pronounced like “good” in German), who also plays in Bjork‘s solo band, and bassist/vocalist Nick Oliveri, will be unveiled. The band is called Stoner, the event is the last of five in the ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’ series of streams which has brought an exceptional level of production to the medium of bands-can’t-play-shows-so-here’s-this, creating something truly special in an indisputably difficult time.

I’ve been fortunate enough to interview Bjork on several occasions, and there’s always a lot of ground to cover. As he says in the video, he and Oliveri go back to before Katzenjammer — pre-Kyuss — to playing Ramones covers in his mom’s living room as kids in Palm Desert. That Oliveri would go on to be desert rock’s most notorious figure through his work with Mondo Generator, the Dwarves, Queens of the Stone Age, etc., and Bjork an Ambassador of Groove with a pivotal catalog of albums under his own name has not stopped the two paths from converging periodically. Kyuss Lives!/Vista Chino was one such instance, at least for a while. This is another.

Stoner — also stylized with an umlaut: Stöner — are something of a mystery as of this post. How much to Bjork and Oliveri share vocal duties? How much is punk, how much is rock, how much do they jam? Where do they go from here? The mission, as Bjork describes, is “no-brainer”; to strip everything away, forget audiences (because there aren’t any right now, though tour plans are being made for 2022) and everything else and just have fun going back to the basics, back to that living-room mentality. To hear him talk about it, it sounds like a good time. They hit the studio last Fall and will likely release that session through Heavy Psych Sounds — to which both Bjork and Oliveri are signed — sometime in the coming months.

So ‘Live in the Mojave Desert’ is kind of a welcome party for the new band. For Bjork, it is not unalloyed, however, due to an ongoing business dispute with now-former manager and mastermind of the stream series Ryan Jones. It’s a pickle, and something playing out as we speak.

You’ll notice a hard cut in the clip, and trust me, the original video was considerably longer as Bjork went into some detail about what’s going on. Why isn’t that here? Well, there’s part of me that feels like a fucking coward because it isn’t, but the fact of the matter is this thing might wind up in court and I don’t want to have anything said here come back around. The cut is about 18 minutes in, and there’s about 18 minutes cut, so yeah, a significant part of the conversation is gone. I feel shitty about that. Fact is, I couldn’t run the video unedited without comment from the other side, and looking at the totality of the situation, I’m not sure I’d be helping anyone or doing anything but stirring drama. It would not make anything better.

Actually the edit’s pretty clean, but you might notice the mood of the conversation has somewhat shifted and that nixed part is why. Maybe you wouldn’t have seen it at all otherwise. Whatever. I’m gonna take a xanax and go read some Star Trek.

Oh, and if you’re a fan of Bjork‘s solo stuff — his 2020 self-titled (review here) was a highlight of a tumultuous Spring — he says he’ll continue that in addition to working with Stoner, even if the focus is on the new band for this year and the ensuing album cycle. Good to know.

Enjoy:

Stoner, Interview with Brant Bjork, March 16, 2021

Stoner‘s Live in the Mojave Desert live album is slated to release in April in the US through Live in the Mojave Desert and in Europe through Heavy Psych Sounds.

Stoner, Live in the Mojave Desert teaser

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Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Live in the Mojave Desert website

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Back to normal, such as it is, for The Obelisk Show. I did two songs in two hours last time and though it seemed to go over decently well in the chat, it was less welcomed by the station itself. Fair. I’ll readily admit that two hours of psychedelic improv is not going to be everybody’s cup of tea, even in a setting that supports extreme fare as a central ethic. I’m lucky they decided to air it. I’m lucky they let me do another episode.

In here you’ll find some more rocky stuff like Greenleaf and Formula 400. I’ve yet to really dig into the new Domkraft, so I wanted to give that a roll, and then the show gets into some heavier industrial stuff. Godflesh were talked about here last week, and Trace Amount, but some Sanford Parker and Author & Punisher too. I’ve had an itch lately that stuff has helped scratch. After that and Yawning Sons is my little homage to the Live in the Mojave Desert stream series. Mountain Tamer are on that this weekend and it’s well worth your time to search out. Of course, Earthless started that series so they’ll end the show here. Only fitting.

Thanks for listening and/or reading.

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

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 03.05.21

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is March 19 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

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