Posted in Whathaveyou on August 4th, 2026 by JJ Koczan
“Open Sea” was recorded by Chris Fielding (ex-Conan, etc.) at Foel Studios at the same time Jessica Ball‘s post-MWWB solo-project set its debut album, Dark Light to tape — or, you know, to hard drive — but didn’t make the cut. Sometimes a thing needs to cook. The track would seem to have been the beneficiary of the time since that album came out in 2024, as Ball went back and reworked the vocals and now the song is public ahead of a London show this coming weekend at Camden’s famed Black Heart.
Those who followed Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard/MWWB on their journey will recognize the heft in “Open Sea,” and the focus on melody corresponding to that. According to the press release below, Ball is in-progress on a sophomore full-length for the project and rediscovering some of the joy in making a riff sound heavy on a planetary level. This is only good news, and with EYE‘s penchant for texture, it seems like there is plenty of room for prevailing philosophies to align.
If you didn’t hear the first EYE record, “Open Sea” — just six minutes long — feels like a good way to get introduced:
EYE, the band formed by Jessica Ball (Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard) return with a reworked heavy-psych bliss-out of a unreleased track and taster of new things to come from the Welsh heavy dark-wavers who gave us “Dark Light’, an acclaimed debut album in 2024 on New Heavy Sounds (Cwfen, Shooting Daggers, Death Pill).
An ethereal dark-folk intro of clean finger-picking and Carpenter synth lulls us into a sense of false calm before Ball unleashes one of her most crushing MWWB-esque fuzz riffs. By revisiting the track Ball has now delivered one of her most memorable melodies with a huge chorus recalling Mammoth Weed in full flow – Blackwater Holylight, Faetooth eat-your-heart-out.
A stand-alone track for the time being but Jessica explains where things are going…
“The release of ‘Open Sea’ was quite unexpected in a way! We had initially recorded it in Foel Studios with the intention of it being on our first album ‘Dark Light’. For whatever reason, it didn’t make it on the album. It’s a song I had written a very long time ago, and it’s funny how you can favour your new material over the old stuff. I also wasn’t keen on the vocal melody anymore.
Well we recently came across it again, and I decided to have a go at some new vocals with fresh ears as enough time had passed. I liked what I did, so we sent it to Chris Fielding to work his magic… What came back was a fierce track that we absolutely loved. So I’m glad it is seeing the light of day.
Since the release of Dark Light, we’ve been playing a few select shows and working on our live sound a lot more. I’ve also been writing and working towards our second album. This single (Open Sea) has inspired me to make next album a lot heavier, and bring back the riffs!”
EYE are also set to support label mates Crumbling Ghost, who launch their album with a show at London’s Black Heart on 7th August.
Posted in Reviews on November 17th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Happy Monday, and welcome to the Quarterly Review. Or welcome back, anyhow. I said last month that I might try to sneak another one of these weeks in before the end of November, and I’m honestly not prepared to say this’ll be it for the year. There’s a lot out there to keep up with, and this is the most efficient means I have for ‘keeping up,’ as best as I can do that anyhow. I don’t know, man. I’m just trying to get through the day.
This QR is 50 releases — I was slating them right up to yesterday, so some of it’s pretty fresh — and will go from today through Friday. It will be most, if not all, of what is posted this week. I hope you find something you enjoy. Let’s go.
Quarterly Review #1-10:
Beastwars, The Ship // The Sea
At nearly 15 years’ remove from their self-titled debut (review here), New Zealand’s Beastwars have been through ringers in life and music alike, but their sound on their sixth full-length, they’ve never sounded quite so refined. Understand, it’s Beastwars, so I still mean immersive and crushing riff-heavy rock, which the band have honed to a point of bordering on noise rock in pieces like “The Storm” or the later “You Know They’re Burning the Land.” “Rust” and “The Howling” maintain a sense of the epic with Matt Hyde‘s shouts alternately into and out from the abyss, but the band have grown in the six years since their last album of originals, 2019’s IV (review here), and for the blowout in “The Devil” and the weight of chug in “Guardian of Fire,” their impact feels all the more craterous for it.
I won’t take away from the shorter bangers here, whether it’s the wah-on immediacy of “Listen Close” or “Weird Scenes” with its stick-click immediacy, but each half(-ish) of Lacertilia‘s third LP (first for Majestic Mountain), Transcend, ends with a more extended cut, with “Nothing Sacred” (10:34) and “The Sun is the Key” (7:13) rounding out their respective sides, and the band are right to take the time when they take it. Of course, it’s symptomatic of the broader variety brought to the Cardiff five-piece’s craft, and they make Transcend a showcase of their reach, be it into acoustic strum and emergent bluesier scorch on “Over and Out,” the twisting lead guitar progressivism of “Deviate From the Plan,” which meets the grandeur halfway, or the percussion-laced instrumentalist build of the semi-title-track “Transcending.” They end up offering something different with each of the 10 songs, and balance raucousness and expressive purpose as they go in malleable and distinctive style.
With their debut album, Turin three-piece Dune Aurora draw together disparate ideas from across the modern riffy pastiche such that garage-style sway and more traditonalist stoner chug combine with at-times-ethereal melody, desert push, psychedelia and, in the case of “Trapdoor,” a poppier take entirely. There’s cohesion in the songwriting to match the aesthetic ambition, though, and Dune Aurora don’t come off as haphazard so much as multifaceted. The reworked prior single “Fire” demonstrates a fuzzy drive waiting in the wings as part of their approach, but the nod in “Burning Waters” is more dug in, and “Sunless Queen” reveals a patience underlying their builds that might come out more on subsequent outings, but the shove of “Crocodile” and that Nirvana riff in “Dune Chameleon” are vital to Ice Age Desert too, and it’s still just a sampling of the elements Dune Aurora use to ensnare the listener. As much as they have going on, that they don’t come across as confused seems to give them all the more potential.
Ghost Pain is the debut two-songer from Almeria, Spain, post-metallic four-piece Khayrava, who present “Red Hot Sun” (7:04) and “Ghost Pain” (10:32) with a marked sense of texture as part of their intention. Both tracks crush, but both also offer a moment of departure from that, and the latter plays off the impact of the former with a keyboardier air and its later divergence into floating melody and crash before, just past the eight-minute mark, they torch the whole thing with a worthy and minutes-long crescendo. “Red Hot Sun” is huge, but its midsection gives over to a break of Tool-y groove met with heavy post-rock flourish from the guitar. That also, of course, comes back around to the pummel, but it’s in the getting there that Khayrava begin to reveal the character of the band, and with the depth of mix they bring to Ghost Pain and the clear intent toward nuance of style, I’ll be on the lookout for where they go from here.
“Who invented 9-5,” River Cult ask on “Fast Crash.” “They should be shot dead,” is the answer the lyrics give. Fair. The third long-player from the heretofore undervalued New York-based disgruntled fuzzbringers manages to make a mental health crisis swing like desert rock on “Smoke Break,” the sixth of the seven inclusions on the 38-minute offering, seeming to answer the crash-in, warm tone and lyrical fuckall of the opening title-track in the process. They’re not wrong, and if you’re gonna say the world sucks, at least “Feels Good to Scream” has a density of distortion to hold up to the message, vocals biting through like early-metal’s cultist inheritor, cavernous and obscure ahead of centerpiece “Mind the Teeth” start-stop chugging as the lore of ‘The Wolf’ is cast. The trio of guitarist/vocalist Sean Forlenza, bassist Anthony Mendolia and drummer Eli Pizzuto (ex-Naam) find a niche for themselves in downtrodden fuzz, ending with “New Song,” which even having been tracked at Brooklyn’s Studio G sounds fresh off the stage.
In the soaring vocals of Kate Prokop and the riffs behind them chugging away at the verses of “The Dead Follow” and the moodier surge into the layered hook of “Witch Hunt,” Omaha, Nebraska’s Beast Eagle answer their 2024 self-titled debut EP with five more songs of metal-rooted heavy groove, clear and fluid in “Sharp Tongue” but not without aggression underlying. The bass in “The Dead Follow” is mixed the way I feel bass should always be — forward — and that gives even the mellower stretch as they move into the ending a different sense of presence than it might otherwise have, but in the galloping verse and sprawling chorus of “The Demonstration” and the rush of “Send Me Down,” the latter of which, admittedly, is more of a rocker, speaking to a burgeoning dynamic in their sound, they retain a feeling of charge, and that defines Sorceress‘ 19-minute run as much as the taut chug in “Sharp Tongue.”
Having relocated from Denver to Asbury Park, New Jersey, The Munsens are no less vicious or crushing on their second album, Degradation in the Hyperreal. “Eternal Grasp” starts the procession as much death metal as it is sludge, which is an ethic that “Supreme Death” will bring to gorgeously extreme fruition a short time later, while pieces like the melancholic, minimalist instrumental “Vesper” and the blistering megasludger “Sacred Ivory” and the outro “I Avow” offset the onslaught of “The Knife,” “Scaling Ceausescu’s Balcony” and the lumber-into-double-kick of “Drauga,” vocals offering precious little comfort for the downward journey of the record’s 46 minutes. That “The Knife” finishes, specifically, ahead of “I Avow,” stands as testament to just how far The Munsens have pushed into extremity over the course of their decade-plus, but they are not entirely unforgiving either, despite having grown only more gnashing over the course of their decade-plus tenure.
They’re not thrash, but thrash is part of what Dayton, Ohio’s Rattlesnake Venom Trip get up to on their new four-song EP, Eclipse the Sun, with a sharp edge to the riffing on lead cut “Hollowed Eyes” that tells the tale. The second half of that track subsides some in terms of forward thrust, setting up the still-chugging-but-slower “Ablaze Set I,” with a more resonant hook, and “Brushstrokes/Eclipse the Sun,” which in its first half is as far as Rattlesnake Venom Trip go in divergence from the burl and push, but in its second answers for the metal and the nod both that it seems to have inherited from the opener. Punchy bass’ed reinforcement takes place over the five minutes of “Cold Winds Blow,” and the four-piece maintain a clear-eyed sense of identity through whatever turns the material makes, somewhere between heavy rock, Southern metal, thrash and stoner idolatry. You could sit and parse it, but the band make it pretty easy to trust where they’re headed as they go.
For their third long-player, The Craft of Pain (on Glory or Death), Brazil’s Pesta offer a take on doom born of traditional metal. They’re not aggro, or outwardly depressive, but “Masters of the Craft of Pain” and the swinging “Marked by Hate” find a route from Sabbath and the NWOBHM to doom just the same. A guest appearance from Scott “Wino” Weinrich (The Obsessed, etc.) on vocals for “Mirror Maze” is a departure, but not so radical as to be out of place, especially backed by the depth of groove in the subsequent rocker “In the Drive’s End.” On side B, the pair of “The Inquisitor Pt. I” and the initially-acoustic-based “The Inquisitor Pt. II” provide a more theatrical reach, but the acoustic-and-key-strings “Canto XXI” brings in Rodrigo Garcia (Diffuse Reality) for another curve before “Shadows of a Desire” returns to ground to finish out not so far from where “Marked by Hate” left off. At no point do Pesta feel like they’ve diverged from where they want to be.
The lyrics posted with the cumbersomely-titled “J.I.B.B.E.R.I.S.H. (John Inflates Balloons Because Every Remote Island Starts Hallucinating)” are wrong, and the level of psychedelic tricksterism and playfulness across Atom Lux‘s debut, Voidgaze Dopamine Salad is such that I’m not sure if that’s on purpose or not. Rest assured, different references to “I Am the Walrus” are being made. The self-recording solo-project of Roman multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Lucio Filizola is a garden of weirdo delights, with the keyboardy bounce of “Death by Small Talk” giving away none of the subversively easy garage swing of “Spaghettification Apocalypse” and “Stoned Monkey Heritage” bashing away like it’s an alternate-reality 1964, which by the way I’m no longer convinced it isn’t. It’s from gleeful oddities like “Dance Plague Delirium” that progressive rock first emerged in the comedown era. The same trajectory may or may not be in store for Atom Lux long term, but right now any kind of ‘comedown’ still feels a good ways off.
Posted in Whathaveyou on September 12th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
One thing leads to the next, I suppose, as the same week Majestic Mountain Records offers up the latest from Northern Irish crushers Slomatics, so too do they announce the next British-Isles-based release they’ll stand behind in the form of Lacertilia‘s Transcend. Anytime we’re talking just about anything Welsh and heavy, my mind goes to ’90s riffkings Acrimony, from Swansea, but Cardiff’s Lacertilia have a modern sense of atmosphere to the album’s first single and closing track, “The Sun is the Key,” calling to mind latter-day Steak with the bit of vocal burl atop instrumental outreach. It’s always a bold move for a band to give away how it all ends, but the seven-and-a-half-minute track has atmosphere and push alike, a grabber of a hook and a heavy groove underscoring the whole thing. I’m curious to find out how they get there.
Oct. 24 is the release date, as the PR wire informs. You can check out the semi-kaleidoscopic video for “The Sun is the Key” at the bottom of this post, with all its sun-baked yellow light and flowing riffery. Apparently that’s how they spent the solstice. Could do far, far worse, from the look of it:
UK heavy psychedelic rockers LACERTILIA to release new album “Transcend” on Majestic Mountain Records this fall; first single “The Sun Is The Key” streaming!
Cardiff-based heavy psych torchbearers LACERTILIA return after five years with their anticipated third studio album “Transcend”, due out on October 24th through Swedish powerhouse Majestic Mountain Records. Stream their brand new single and video for “The Sun Is The Key” now!
Lacertilia stand out as a fearless blend of psychedelic soul and heavy riff warfare, rooted in their Welsh stoner rock identity but unafraid to draw from cosmic textures, primal energy, and punk-inspired vigour. A powerhouse live act, they have leveled stages from Desertfest London to Hellfest in France, converting audiences at every stop.
Their sonic evolution culminates in their forthcoming third album and Majestic Mountain Records debut “Transcend”, which sees the five-piece refining their explosive sound, merging the massive riffs and spacey explorations they are revered for with darker, more intricate textures of folk, prog and post-rock. The result is a heavier, more dynamic listen that charts a course through themes of profound personal growth and transformation, grappling with the nature of reality, existential dread, the breakdown of relationships, and the future of mankind.
Their new single “The Sun Is The Key” is a pagan space rock epic that soars with cosmic energy, connecting themes of higher consciousness, mysticism and ancient spiritual practices. Lacertilia worked with filmmaker Ren Faulkner to capture a ritual sunrise performance in the Welsh Mountains during Summer Solstice ’25.
New album “Transcend” Out October 24th on Majestic Mountain Records (LP/CD/digital)
TRACKLIST: 1. Archaic Oscillations 2. We Go Here 3. Listen Close 4. Over & Out 5. Nothing’s Sacred 6. Transcending 7. Deviate From The Plan 8. Weird Scenes 9. Cerulean Sky 10. The Sun Is The Key
Lacertilia is Matt Fry – Acoustic Guitar, Vocals Lucas Zalunski – Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar Michael Young-Temple – Electric Guitar, Djembe Ed Hughes – Bass Carl Richards – Drums
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 7th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Those familiar with the work of Jessica Ball from her time in MWWB, or Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard as they were more fully known before their last album, 2022’s The Harvest (review here), shouldn’t be too thrown off by the stylistic shift being made with EYE, taking that band’s synth and melodic foundation and extrapolating it to new ends in an exploration less tonally dense but able to reach that much further as a result. “In Your Night” is the first single from EYE‘s upcoming debut LP, Dark Light, and as you’ll hear on the player below, Ball leads her new outfit with patience through heavy post-rock ambience and lays out the melody on vocals before the band dig into more aural crush in the second half.
I haven’t heard the full record yet — it’s out April 26 on New Heavy Sounds, preorders, etc. — so I can’t speak to how much “In Your Night” represents the entirety. But if the intention was maybe to give listeners who know Ball from her prior outfit something to latch onto to ease the transit of fandom from one project to the next, I don’t hear anything in it that pulls me out of the experience, and I think probably those who caught on to what MWWB were doing at any point in their tenure should well be able to get on board here. Which probably makes the single a win for more than just actually being cool.
It was kind of a heavy chat, but Ball spoke in an interview here in 2022 about EYE and her intentions with the band coming out of MWWB. I look forward to hearing how Dark Light unfolds.
From the PR wire:
EYE – THE NEW BAND FROM MWWB SINGER-SONGWRITER/MUSICIAN JESSICA BALL – UNVEILS HER EAGERLY ANTICIPATED DEBUT ALBUM ‘DARK LIGHT’ & FIRST SINGLE
EYE – the new band from Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard (MWWB) singer-songwriter/musician Jessica Ball – has announced the arrival of their eagerly awaited debut album, ‘Dark Light’ set for release on 26th April via New Heavy Sounds (Shooting Daggers, MWWB, Blacklab)
“These songs have been many years in the making… Some of these ideas were crafted before MWWB, this is something I’ve always wanted to do. Over the last couple of years, I’ve spent some time on finishing and crafting these ideas and pieces of music into songs. Some were snippets of lyrics from my early twenties which reflect on what seems like a different person. I think it’s quite poetic how it’s all come together now.
I was also encouraged after finding musicians who understood the vision and style I was trying to achieve, and of course my experience of being in MWWB. I’m a guitarist above all, and I loved reconnecting with guitar again. It feels like all my influences and favourite styles have come together in this album. Shoegaze, doom, folk, dream pop… It’s a real mix bag but as a whole, it represents many different stages of my life and tells a story.
The album ultimately is quite introspective yet lyrically loose enough to be open to interpretation – I’ve always been a fan of songs that seem to perfectly slot into the situation I’m experiencing and not too specific to one person’s experience… I think that comes across in this album.”
Jessica relocated from Wrexham to join her new partner, veteran Welsh musician Gid Goundrey (Gulp, Ghostlawns, Martin Carr), in Cardiff just as the pandemic era dawned. Confined to their small Grangetown flat, they quite naturally began making music together.
Having earned acclaim and a fervent fan following for her role in MWWB, Ball took the opportunity to compose songs that were all her own – nuanced, lyrical, and hypnotically distinctive.
Triggered in part by the existential dread looming outside as well as the sudden ill health of her dear friend, MWWB guitarist Paul “Dave” Davies, then fighting for life after a Covid-related stroke.
With Goundrey on drums (for the first time in his musical career) and joined by keyboardist Johnny TK, Eye experimented with sounds to match Ball’s melodic songs, traversing a diverse spectrum of dark folk, dreampop, IDM and psychedelic doom, to create sometimes heavy and foreboding drones, alongside spare but still richly textured sonics.
The result is their debut album ‘Dark Light’. An intensely atmospheric fusion of emotionally charged songcraft and inspired sonic energy. The clue is in the album’s paradoxical title. Chilling and even bleak melodies with arrangements daringly and deliberately stripped down and minimal. Revealing a kinship with sonic bed-fellows Mazzy Star, Chelsea Wolfe or even Portishead, which can be heard on first single ‘In Your Night’.
Jessica comments, “Our first release ‘In Your Night’ represents Eye musically, conceptually and lyrically and I’m proud for this to be the first song that everyone hears from us… Light and dark, night and day, quiet and loud is the running theme throughout this song and album as a whole. Whether you’re up close to a song, or listening to the album as a whole, these themes will be ever present throughout. We’re playing around with these two extremes sonically and what these represent emotionally and mentally. I feel that nothing takes you on a journey more effectively than a good build up, or something happening unexpectedly, much like real life. We are just the eye that witnesses it all.”
Songs like “The Other Sees”, “Respair”, “See Yourself” are chameleonic and commanding, wielding snaky, chiming guitar back to back with fuzzed out riffs. Vocal melodies may be sweet but melancholic, amidst tightly contrasted spatial dimensions, and Ball’s signature vocals are at the forefront, sometimes soaring but also with a heart of darkness. Of the two ‘heavier’ numbers “In Your Night,” slowly builds to a brooding fuzz-groove like a down-tuned Yo La Tengo until a huge space-doom riffs carries you home while with “See Yourself” the contrast from folk delicacy to tripped out sub-bass fuzz riffage is astounding.
So, whilst not strictly speaking ‘Doom’ or ‘Metal’ fans of Jessica’s previous work with MWWB will not be disappointed. Along with producer Chris Fielding (MWWB, Conan) EYE have produced something otherworldly, which is at times heavy and epic, yet still deeply intimate and dark. A striking debut.
‘Dark Light’ is due to drop on 26th April 2024, and as with all New Heavy Sounds releases, will come in a deluxe limited vinyl edition. Green/Purple half and half effect vinyl, with full download included as well as limited edition CD and at all digital platforms.
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 29th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
I do sincerely wish that more signing announcements were inclusive of the purple heart emoji. It is the most doomed emoji. Jessica Ball, known for her work fronting Welsh cosmic megadoomers MWWB — né Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard — announced her then-solo-project Eye a while ago. Might have been during lockdown, even? I don’t think I’m the only one who’s been waiting for word of a release, though I won’t take away from MWWB having issued The Harvest (review here) in 2022 — also through New Heavy Sounds — as their maybe-final album and there being so much to dig into there.
So far as I can find, Eye — you might recall the classic-style prog band from Ohio; they were really cool, but this isn’t that and I’m pretty sure they’re broken up — don’t seem to have anything out yet, though I say that while admitting I haven’t scrolled back through Facebook because, well, doing that is fucking depressing (on any page) and there are only so many hours in a day, month, life. I thought mine might be better spent actually putting this post together. But in light of that, I thought about including the MWWB Bandcamp player for The Harvest, but somehow it didn’t seem appropriate in full knowledge that Eye are a different kind of band. And also, apparently, a band now.
But if you didn’t hear it when it came out, you should, and this too when the opportunity presents itself. For now, the signing announcement:
I’m so happy to announce that we’ve signed a record deal with London-based New Heavy Sounds ! (#128156#)(#128065#)️(#128156#)
Some of you may know, I have worked with them for years under Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard, and I’m beyond excited that they want to continue working with me on my next musical venture.
We will be announcing more exciting news soon. In the meantime if you’re in Cardiff, you can catch us this Saturday at Clwb Ifor Bach with Half Happy (#128156#)
Posted in Bootleg Theater on January 19th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
The seamlessness with which Lacertilia shift into and out of psychedelia on the otherwise hard-driving “At the Edge of Utopia” should tell you what you need to know about the band. The video for the track, premiering below, follows suit, bringing color and lights to the otherwise dark room — it kind of looks like shots of bassist Ed Hughes had to be edited in because the corner he’s in is so void of light — in which the Cardiff five-piece are performing the song. Stated intention is to give a feeling of the energy of Lacertilia‘s live show.
Well, I’ve never had the pleasure, but 2020’s Calling the Quarters only argues in their favor, with “At the Edge of Utopia” the longest track at 7:33 as their sound reminds of Orange Goblin and of course Acrimony on rockers like “Cloaks and Daggers” and “Inside the Circle” even as they move into and out of acoustics for “Furthur” and the interlude-type shorter pieces “Procession of Lost Souls” and “Feral,” the latter working in (kind of problematically) tribalist hand-percussion as well ahead of rolling doom rock closer “So Mote it Be.” They cover a lot of ground and kick a lot of ass in a manageable 37-minute stretch, and the vitality that surges at the front of “At the Edge of Utopia” is emblematic of what they can bring at their most ferocious.
Neither is the psych face that shows itself making its only appearance. Both “Cloak and Dagger” and “Labyrinth” before it preface “At the Edge of Utopia”‘s more subdued movement, though neither pushes quite as far. In contrast, “Inside the Circle” is all-go, a kind of manic hard-heavy that to my Garden Stater ears reminds of Solace. Yes, that is a compliment. “So Mote it Be,” in its final reaches, brings out a kind of spaciousness as well, and that seems to answer not just the opening salvo but “At the Edge of Utopia” as well. One can’t help but wonder too if the optimism of the longest cut’s title isn’t also meeting some resignation in the closer, but that might just be 2020’s utter hopelessness carrying over.
One way or the other, Lacertilia burn.
Find out for yourself in the video below, and enjoy:
Lacertilia, “At the Edge of Utopia” official video premiere
Lacertilia on “At the Edge of Utopia”:
‘At The Edge Of Utopia’ is the third and final single from Lacertilia’s 2020 album ‘Calling The Quarters’. Recorded at Foel Studios in the depths of Mid Wales, the track captures the energy of five primitive humans hurtling towards Nirvana on a ship called planet Earth. The band continue to explore themes of personal growth and change as they traverse the perils of existence in search of a promised land. The video was recorded and edited by Mei Lewis (Mission Photographic) to convey the three distinct sections of the track whilst showcasing the intensity of the band’s live performance.
[Click play above to stream the self-titled debut from Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember. It’s out Sept. 6 on Cardinal Fuzz.]
Sweet psychedelic salvation like that on offer throughout Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember‘s self-titled debut is rare. It’s rare, period. Never mind rare for a first album. Or rare for a first album as a 2LP. Rare. Picture yourself in a boat on a river, except the boat is a dragon and the river is lava and you’re not so much you as some kind of mix between Dennis Hopper and Gimli from Lord of the Rings. The Cardiff-based six-piece — listed as Luke, Gaz, Grant, Ropey, Tim, and Owen, and that’s fine — have some semblance of consciousness at work throughout the fully-blazed 66-minute offering, but it is the stuff of expanded minds. The low-end fuzz of “Walk with the King” and motorik thrust accompanying, the mood-setting drift in LP1 intro “Strange Flotsam on the Rising Tide” and the manner in which each platter’s second side — that’s B and D for those playing along at home — is consumed by a massive sprawl, be it the just-under-17-minute glory of “Great Vibrating Seasons” or the multi-movement build into cacophony that precedes the quiet finish of “Sun God Grave Goods,” the 14:31 capper for Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember as a whole.
These cuts represent a pinnacle — and one from which “Walk with the King” (12:38) and post-intro opener “Sub-Sonic Dreamer” (9:31) aren’t far off, by the way — but anywhere the band goes, freakitude follows like some kind of mushroom-added cultist, be it the blowout of “Sub-Sonic Dreamer,” the relatively straightforward “Surely They Know?” with its maddening and catchy hook, or the we’re-just-gonna-take-four-and-a-half-minutes-and-commune-with-the-universe drone of the penultimate “From the One Comes the Many,” which is missing only a warning that too much listening will expose the lizard people. All of these come together to make a killer set of charge-up, melt-down and burn-baby-burn, the band easing and oozing their way through subdued float and full-on warp drive push with an ease that belies it being their debut and every bit earns the yellow and black starkness of the cover that adorns it.
And just in case the point hasn’t been made, it’s gorgeous. Gorgeous and raw and expansive, sun-baked in gazing style but never trying to be anywhere or anything it’s not. Cohesion doesn’t just happen in the moments of solidified verses, either. One can hear it in the age-of-Aquarius chants of “Strange Flotsam on the Rising Tide” and subsequent post-TheHeads blower guitar in the early going and latter reaches of “Sub-Sonic Dreamer,” the interplay of harmonica and dreamy jazz guitar in the midsection of “Sun God Grave Goods” and the various washes of synth between them. To be sure, Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember are functioning with a third-eye-open creative sensibility, but it’s worth emphasizing that these tracks aren’t just jams and that there’s a plan at work. “Sub-Sonic Dreamer” and “Surely They Know?” emphasize this with priority on side A, but even the when-Hawkwind-met-Floyd triumphalism of “Great Vibrating Seasons” works with motion in mind beyond barebones exploration.
Nothing against that, you understand, but the direction Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember bring to the proceedings make them feel all the more like kosmiche gatekeepers, holding open fuzz-covered doors of perception so that all might pass through into the ocean of effects beyond. Vocals in harmony or at least melodic unison are no less of an instrument than anything else that beeps, boops, beats or strums, and the feeling of fullness in the mix does nothing to undercut the spaciousness of the entirety in which that fullness resides. The volume dynamic in “Great Vibrating Seasons” alone is worth the price both of your soul and international shipping, never mind the manner in which the song rips itself apart at the end to let an acoustic guitar and residual effects subtlety take the helm for the inevitable fadeout. You gotta be kidding me with this stuff. Who the hell are these guys and why the hell haven’t they put out a second record yet? Yeah, I know the first one isn’t out, but no way you can listen to “Walk with the King” or “From the One Comes the Many” and make the argument that linear time matters.
Tell a friend, space-children. Tell two friends. Make new friends and tell them too. Tell your cousin Chuck. There’s beauty in the universe and coffee in that nebula and neither will go un-harvested in the meditations and rush of Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember‘s Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember, and while the rest of the world such as it is debates who’s-who’s cool enough to be neo-this or that, you’ll know that the more important thing is that feeling of your existential being leaking out of your eyeballs in rainbow teardrops of joy as “Walk with the King” pushes over the line between oblivi-off and oblivi-on, propelled from one to the other by a snare that pops like neurons firing, flourish of keys and bass, bass, bass that holds filthy sway while at least seven or eight guitars shred themselves and whatever else happens in an engrossing swell that’s even kind enough to arrive with its own comedown leading into “From the One Comes the Many” and “Sun Gods Grave Goods,” which even with a side flip between them feel no less born for each other.
This is where it’s at. Make no mistake. I’m not saying it’s a one-band revolution, because it’s not trying to be, but for a band to come around on an initial release with such utter and unflinching mastery of these uncontrollable-seeming sounds is not something to be taken lightly. It’s to be taken heavily because it is thusly administered, with patience for patients and intensity when it needs it most to create that feeling of hitting escape velocity, these sweeping builds that every bit demand not just the second platter but the listener attention throughout it. I don’t know much about this band’s circumstances, if they’ll tour, if they’ll put out five records a year or never do anything else, but they’re beginning to dig into something special here. What I said at the outset was true. It’s rare. And if Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember in any way pay off the promise that this debut shows, then all who encounter them can only consider themselves lucky. Double LP? Shit. Make the next one a triple.
Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember, “Surely They Know?” official video
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 8th, 2018 by JJ Koczan
Welsh heavy grunge riffers Ironbird have released their second album, Persian Blade, as a six-years-later follow-up to their 2012 debut, Songs of Spite and Ire (get it?), and they’re streaming the record in full now. It’s easy enough to read a narrative progression into the tracks, and all the more so when one factors in the artwork by bassist Gob and the series of videos they’ve unfurled in support of the tracks. You can see one for the title-cut below, and it’s pretty pro-shop Flash animation in such a way as to make me think Gob is probably a pro of some sort in the graphic arts. It’s like Samurai Jack in the desert, which of course is cool by me, along with the ’90s viibes of the songs themselves.
Here’s the release announcement, followed by the album stream and that clip. Dig it:
‘PERSIAN BLADE’THE NEW ALBUM FROM IRONBIRD OUT FRIDAY 2ND NOVEMBER 2018
Cardiff, Wales premier stoner metal band, Ironbird return with their long awaited second album, ‘Persian Blade’ on 2nd November 2018 through False Lord Recordings. Recorded, mixed and produced by the bands guitarist Van and mastered by renowned engineer Pete Maher (Nine Inch Nails, Pixies, Jack White, Rolling Stones), ‘Persian Blade’ builds on the bands successful debut album (2012’s ‘Songs of Spite and Ire’) by displaying a more intricate and dynamic songwriting approach while also adding more colour and texture to the heavy vibes.
Steeped in sounds synonymous with 90’s stoner and grunge bands such as Kyuss, Fu Manchu, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains, while also being influenced by classic rock melded to progressive metal, ‘Persian Blade’ delivers thunderous tales of assassins, curses and false messiahs reflecting uncertain times. Formed in 2010 through the desire to create something unique in the genre, Ironbird were immediately thrown to the forefront of the burgeoning South Wales stoner rock scene and quickly built up a cult following on the local circuit. Their eclectic blend of hard rock and heavy metal was perfectly captured on their debut album, 2012’s ‘Songs of Spite and Ire’, which spawned the singles ‘Black Sunrise’ and ‘Assassins of the High Crag’. Gigs supporting the likes of Karma to Burn, Sigiriya and Bloody Hammers soon followed.
1 White Stork 2 The Healer 3 Persian Blade 4 Last Siren 5 Cradle of Time 6 From the Slave to the Grave 7 Circle of Sin 8 The Hunt Goes On
Ironbird are: Eli – vocals Van – guitars Ad – drums Gob – bass
