It’s all over now, I’ve got momentum on my side. This is day four of the Quarterly Review. The first three days have been nothing but a pleasure on my end, putting them together, and with just today and tomorrow left, I’m feeling pretty good about the entire endeavor. I’m not sure yet if this will be the end of the year as regards QRs, but if it is, it’s a good one to go out on.

And basically to make that determination, I need to look at next month’s schedule and see what’s coming when, when I’ll do things like the year-end poll and my own big end-of-year post. No idea on any of that yet, but I’ll get there. Getting this done in relatively smooth fashion is a help. Thanks for reading and I hope it’s been a good one for you as well.

Quarterly Review #31-40:

Psychedelic Source Records, The Initiation Outlaws

Set to release through Echodelick in the US and Weird Beard Records in the UK, in addition to Psychedelic Source Records‘ own distribution, The Initiation Outlaws brings eight pieces and a full 98-minute double-LP’s worth of cosmic improvised jamming, with a cast of regulars from the Hungarian collective — Bence Ambrus, Máté Varga, Róbert Kránitz, Krisztina Benus, Gergely Szabó — taking part in collaborative exploration with Go Kurosawa of Kikagaku Moyo, who goes from drums to bass to guitar as the release progresses, sliding right into the amorphous methodology of Psychedelic Source Records while distinguishing the heavier push in “Three Golds Reward II” or the snare work on “The King of Magic Colts and Wands I” earlier. Trance-inducing as ever, these captured moments are gorgeously fluid and immersive, active enough in parts like “The King of Magic Colts and Wands II” to defy mellowpsych-improv expectation, but abiding just the same. If you’re not there yet, it’s time to start thinking of Psychedelic Source among Europe’s finest purveyors of heavy psychedelia.

Psychedelic Source Records on Bandcamp

Echodelick Records store

Weird Beard Records store

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Bell Witch & Aerial Ruin, Stygian Bough Vol. II

The forlorn folkishness in the midsection of “Waves Become the Sky” bring to mind an extrapolation of emotive doom from the likes of Warning, but that’s understandable with Aerial Ruin and Bell Witch renewing their collaboration for Stygian Bough Vol. II, following on from a first volume (review here) in 2020. The album takes place over four extended tracks from the rolling density of the aforementioned opener through the minimalist-till-it-isn’t “King of the Wood” and the longform folk-death-doom of “From Dominion Let Them Bleed” and the melancholy triumph of heft wrought in 19-minute finale “The Told and the Leadened,” which dwells in spaces empty and full and remains conscious enough to end with tense noise and drumming. This is artistry on its own wavelength, working in its own time, and patient to a point of extremity. But they do it to offer comfort, make no mistake. There’s consolation in these songs, in addition to all the mourning.

Bell Witch website

Aerial Ruin website

Profound Lore Records website

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Giöbia, X-ÆON

Unrepentantly cosmic Italian outfit Giöbia are like a fresh coat of antimatter for space rock. The four-piece obviously hunkered down in their secret lab after 2023’s Acid Disorder (review here) and worked hard to refine their chemical compositions, such that “Voodoo Experience” nods grounded even as its synth and guitars surge beyond the thermosphere. The results show everywhere throughout X-ÆON in their outsider cohesion of classic and neo-space rocks, heavy psychedelia and oddball synthscaping, whether you’re doing the sensory thing with the dream-jam “1976” or embroiled in the four-part side B concept piece, “La Mort de la Terre,” which draws a cinematic curtain for life as we know it in “Dans la Nuit Éternelle,” a wordless epilogue that feels half a world removed from the stomp-and-verse of “The Death of the Crows,” but of course, that’s the whole idea.

Giöbia website

Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Bone Church, Deliverance

The included acoustic guitar, organ and FM-radio classic rock vibes in the eight-and-a-half-minute closing title-track aren’t a coincidence. They’re part of a stated intention the band had in taking on more of a traditional sound, coming down from some of the harder-hitting doom of 2020’s Acid Communion and working in more of a ’70s-inspired style. That manifests to varying degrees throughout, as leadoff “Electric Execution” feels like it’s working in the vein of “Neon Knights” or “Turn Up the Night” in Dio Sabbathian raucousness (I know that was 1980-81, don’t @ me), and while “Lucifer Rising” has a weighted march, it’s more Scorpions than Sleep, and “Goin’ to Texas” brings in the organ to emphasize the Southern geography of the album’s centerpiece. It’s a striking turn but they pull it off for sure. “Muchachos Muchachin'” has mid-’70s charm to spare, and “Bone Boys Ride Out” seems to bridge the more modern attack of Bone Church-prior with who they are today. Not every progression plays out like you think it will, and if this is the band Bone Church have wanted to be all along, they sound accordingly right to have made the redirect.

Bone Church on Bandcamp

Ripple Music website

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Js Donny, Death Folk

The ‘soft scream’ vocals give Js Donny‘s Death Folk an immediate sense of extremity, but it’s a quiet extremity. The French solo artist — who also plays bass in adventurous Marseilles sludgers Donna Candy — released an EP with a full lineup in 2023, but this six-song/33-minute offering is more intimate. Js Donny dwells in the quiet, creepy spaces the songs create, the vocal gurgle giving shades of otherworldliness and malevolence alike. It’s called Death Folk, but especially with the electrified/distorted wash that takes hold in “Not Like That” and again at the outset of closer “Black Heart” — a biting tone, like harsher blackgaze — I can’t help but wonder if Js Donny isn’t working in a kind of post-death-metallic framing. There are no drums, which is a fair trade for what’s gained in grim ambience, but even without, the album is clear in manifesting both sides of its title, and while Js Donny isn’t the only one laying claim to death-folk as a style, how it happens here sure feels like an act of genre creation.

Js Donny on Bandcamp

Bamboo Shoes on Bandcamp

29Speedway on Bandcamp

Chrüsimüsi Records on Bandcamp

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Nuclear Dudes, Skeletal Blasphemy

In some distant future, when the history is written of our idiotic, persistently awful time, no one will ever say, “and the right-thinking people of the day had no choice but to seek refuge in avant garde cybergrind,” and that’s why history is bullshit. Skeletal Blasphemy is the third album from Nuclear Dudes and second of 2025 behind September’s Truth Paste (review here) — keep ’em coming — and is the solo-project’s most vicious and realized offering to-date. Spearhead Jon Weisnewski (Sandrider, ex-Akimbo) brings powerviolent catharsis on “Victory Pants,” the title-track and assorted others, working in collaboration with guest drummer Coady Willis (High on Fire, Big Business, Melvins), and whether it’s the punker push in “Bad Body” or the slow, undulations of the closing “The Octopus” and the burgeoning thread of progressive melody throughout these songs, it’s exactly the sort of self-bludgeoning that being alive right now requires. Album of the year? Fuck you, fuck the year, and fuck capitalism.

Nuclear Dudes on Bandcamp

The Ghost is Clear Records website

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Kronstad 23, Sommermørket

With an instrumentalist foot in progressive, horn-inclusive jazz, heavy psychedelic fluidity and a resonant warmth of tone alongside a will to meander, Kronstad 23 feel tailor-made for El Paraiso Records, run by members of Denmark’s Causa Sui. Sommermørket is the Norwegian outfit’s debut album and without sounding consumed by its own ambition to do so, it organically nestles the band in a stylistic niche that allows for the explorations in “Caesar” and “Astralreiser,” the latter of which will seem barely there in its early going at low volumes, to exist along the daring-toward-dancey opener “Dølgsmål” and building a kind of dreamy tension between the guitar and drums on “Trosten,” with none of it feeling out of place. They’ll invariably get comparisons to Kanaan, but the foundation is different and the delivery gentler, with “Helgen” finding its way on drum rolls and key/guitar drift into a classic-prog horn section in a payoff that’s somewhat understated until you look back across the five and a half minutes and see how far you’ve come. I can’t wait to hear how they grow.

Kronstad 23 on Instagram

El Paraiso Records website

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Rolls the River, Love of Driving

“Love of Driving” is the debut single from newcomer New Jersey-based krautrock-minded two-piece Rolls the River. The band brings together Dan Kirwan of Pyre Fyre on bass, guitar and vocals, and Victor Marinelli on guitar, synth, drums and vocals for a sub-five-minute cosmic reachout, obviously schooled in where it’s coming from — that is to say, one doesn’t krautrock by accident; it is a form to adopt and refine — but still feeling like an initial exploration of both style and composition. Fading in on an initial keyboardy drone, the guitar and drums come in together and the neospace shuffle is mellow as layers are added, guitar, keys, but the sense of movement brought to “Love of Driving” is enough to explain the title, whatever you might think of the Garden State’s highway system. Rather than get caught up in jughandles, though, Rolls the River harness tonal presence and linear development and still find room to include voice as part of the atmosphere. Formative, and an encouraging start.

Rolls the River on Bandcamp

Rolls the River on Instagram

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Psychonaut, World Maker

Belgium’s Psychonaut may yet teach progressive metal a lesson or two. The post-metal three-piece reach what sure feels in “Endless Currents” like a new level of expression and craft, and while at 11 songs and 60 minutes, World Maker isn’t a minor undertaking — one could easily argue making a world takes time — the utter consumption achieved in “All in Time,” which I won’t spoil any further, the blissful wash of “…Everything Else is Just the Weather” are not to be missed, and worth whatever minor investment of attention span might be required. Exciting as the intermittent metallic surges are, “Endless Erosion” caps in a quiet place, and the atmospherics across the first two and a half minutes of “Origins,” just as one example, help to bring a feeling of place (of ‘world’) to the procession. It is a vivid place Psychonaut have made, and there are listeners for whom the melodies of World Maker will be transcendental.

Psychonaut on Bandcamp

Pelagic Records website

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Cabfighter, The Sea Between Stars

Following an apparent 2024 EP called Anachronist that is below because this debut album isn’t streaming yet that I can find, The Sea Between Stars — a suitably romantic framing of what you might otherwise call ‘the void’ — brings a progressive take to classic-style doom rock. The Oregonian five-piece roll out a genuine feeling of dynamic across the album’s 10 tracks, from the proto-metal shove of “Knightrider” at the outset to the later rush and wail of “Sky Sized Heart,” to the doom-epic ballad reach of “Bridge of Irreconcilable Sorrow” to the acoustic turn in the last movement of “The Words We Don’t Speak” and variable but unifyingly soulful vocal arrangements throughout, up to the minimal voice-and-piano closer “Ghost Notes” or the duet in the crescendo of “Still Breathing.” Ambition set in balance with organic production and songwriting. I don’t know when The Sea Between Stars is coming out, if it’s now-ish, early 2026 or what, but if you want to take this as an early heads up, do.

Cabfighter on Bandcamp

Cabfighter on Instagram

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Admittedly, my experience with Dirt Pile is pretty limited. The New London, Connecticut, sans-bass three-piece and I crossed paths in August at Wallingford’s Cherry Street Station, where they opened a night that also featured Thunderchief and When the Deadbolt Breaks (review here). Apparently they also know Clamfight. That in itself has been enough for me, historically speaking.

But I did listen to the band’s earlier-2025 six-song EP, Sonic Sewer, both before and after that show — if you’d like to do the same, it’s at the bottom of this post — and found their blend of chugging hardcore aggression and disaffected sludge riffery engaging. And by that I mean vocalist Matthew Hamblin marched back and forth in front of the stage in a way that was both rad and adrenaline-fueled and that kind of also made me think I might get punched standing there. I didn’t, it’s worth pointing out, but you never know, I might’ve gotten away with one there.

Raw Milk, which is set to issue digitally in October and physically on Nov. 8. To-date, Sonic Sewer, which came out in March, is their most substantive offering, and with the promise of five new songs — no word on if there are more and they’re older or what — the band would seem to have their interest in keeping the threads going on crush and mosh alike. Their hometown release show is Nov. 8 at 33 Golden, and they have other local dates booked you can see on their socials, which incidentally is where this (relatively minimal) release announcement comes.

Have at it:

Oh, hey. We’re going to release some new music. This record is called “Raw Milk” and it’s got five new songs on it. Digital release in October. Physical in November. Just thought we’d mention it.

Release show:
Nov 8 33 Golden New London, CT

Dirt Pile:
Matthew Hamblin – Vocals
Dean Beauchamp – Drums
Jeff – Guitar

https://linktr.ee/dirtpile
https://dirtpilect.bandcamp.com/
https://instagram.com/dirtpile_ct
https://www.facebook.com/DIRTPILECT/

Dirt Pile, Sonic Sewer (2025)

I couldn’t tell you off-hand when the last time I was at Cherry Street Station might’ve been, but I do remember the first time. There’s been at least one more night at Wallingford, Connecticut’s train-station-turned-rock-bar — which has on their website a rule against both cover bands and cover songs by otherwise original artists; dedication to the cause — but it’s in the ether.

The Connecticut connection for me is my wife’s family. I live in New Jersey, and on an average night, Wallingford would be about two and a half hours from my house — almost as long as it would take to get to Brooklyn — so a little out of the realm of possibility when one considers a drive back after. But my wife’s mombis about 40 minutes from there on the shoreline, so we were in the area visiting, brought my own mother up and everything, and as the living room dug into the evening on return from getting post-dinner ice cream — I’d stayed home with the dogs because The Pecan didn’t want me to go; mostly because I suck, I believe — I absconded. Felt a bit like something I’d have done 20 years ago. Mostly because it is.

Three bands on the night. Earplugs in. I wore sandals and cutoff pajamas because I “forgot” sneakers and a pair of pants. It was okay though, the evening was pretty casual. Place is amazing. A local institution and a vibe besides. You can’t go wrong. It’s the kind of joint where, if you live in the town and you like metal, you just go. I don’t get here much, living in another state, but hell’s bells I’m glad it exists.

It went like this:

Dirt Pile

Based in New London, which once upon a time hosted a SHoD, sans-bass trio Dirt Pile basked in the deathsludge of the downtrodden. Earlier this year, the band — vocalist Matthew Hamblin, guitarist Jeff (you know Jeff; he doesn’t need a last name) and drummer Dean Beauchamp — released the six-tracker Sonic Sewer, and if you’re looking for kind self-talk, look elsewhere. I’m not sure if it was intended to be an EP for a full-length, but if it’s an album, it’s their first one, and either way, it’s beastly. I’d checked it out ahead of hitting the show because I don’t know anxiety? and found its rawness of tone and throat given vivid realization live. Hamblin got his steps in hardcore pacing back and forth in front of the stage — there was room up there, but screw it — and while they unquestionably have an aggro sound, if you look at the lyrics, most not all of the ire on Sonic Sewer is inwardly directed. Knowing that lessened the impression of chestbeating, and with riffs drawn as much from noise rock as sludge, tight songs delivered raw, and a general air of despondency about them, they came on, hit it hard and split. It’s not an overly complex formula, but it works. I bought both the CDs they had.

Thunderchief

Ah, the touring band. Thunderchief are splitting their Fall run up over the next couple months, and this was the fourth show of a tour that goes to Sept. 5. They’ve got copies of 2023’s Dekk Meg… at the merch. The duo is comprised of guitarist/vocalist/hotsauceist Rik Surly and drummer Erik Larson (also Avail, ATP, Sun Years, about a dozen others before you get to the one-offs), and the tour they’re doing is called ‘DIY or Die Trying,’ by which they mean they booked it themselves. Furious, they were. Half-thrash, sludge in the slow parts, and nasty to spare. They were a good follow-up for Dirt Pile, who stood in front of the stage and rocked out, reasonably so. Surly’s scream is vicious and from a place in his throat where it’s sustainable. He can do that for a month on the road. And Larson is among the best drummers I’ve ever seen, in a heavy context or any other. Digs in, almost like a guitarist (he’s one of those too) where you get the sense of how the player and the instrument commune, the latter an extension of the former. As Surly played through a full guitar stack and the standard roll-up Ampeg 8×10 bass cabinet, Larson made his snare regret everything it had ever done, and I was really, really glad to have been there to see and hear all of it.

When the Deadbolt Breaks

A long, long time ago, Aaron Lewis of When the Deadbolt Breaks, myself, and the drummer of the band I was in at the time did a project together over a weekend, and our bands had played together before and this was about 20 years ago now, so yeah, I was happy to see them for the first time in however long. Lewis, vocalist/noisemaker Amber and low-key monster bassist Steve played to a drum machine and celebrating this year’s noise-drenched horrorfest In the Glow of the Vatican Fire (review here) — incidentally, “noise-drenched horrorfest” is my new answer to “how’s it going?” — their brand of darkness was familiar in its consumption. I don’t know the last time I saw them and I don’t want to look — 2019 if I had to guess — but whether they’re crooning and minimalist and atmospheric or raging grind riffs, their element of threat is their own. I’m probably guilty of taking for granted a band whose output has been steadily drifting into an aural black hole for the last 15 years, but if I call them a good time, understand that comes with an undercurrent of malevolence and a psychedelia that is all in shades of black. I wondered if, in the longer term, but having a live drummer might let Lewis and company experiment with different sounds and styles of rhythm. I swear got dancey twice. Maybe, maybe not, but the fact that they’re the kind of band who 20 years on might try something new is not to be ignored. They’ve always gone deep. They did this time too, and they remain loud as all fucking get out. A pleasure to be swallowed whole by that distortion.

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A train went by the venue just before I pulled out of the parking lot. No stop at Cherry St. Hard not to be glad this venue exists — I’ll also note Wallingford is the home of Redscroll Records, which is also a boon to the planet — and that I was able to make it out.  Thanks to my family for the understanding and support. There are some more pics after the jump if you’re up for it. Thanks for reading.

Read more »

Connecticut-based heavy rock and rollers Bone Church will issue their second long-player, Deliverance, through Ripple Music on Oct. 24. The dudely five-piece are streaming lead single “Bone Boys Ride Out” now, which emphasizes punch and push as one might hope for its three and a half minutes, conveying energy as well as craft. The band are veterans of Ripplefest Texas (twice over, I think?) and have already been confirmed to appear at Planet Desert Rock Weekend VI next January in Las Vegas, so it seems fair to expect more live announcements to come, if not before the Southwest trip in the New Year, then likely around that.

The PR wire brought info and the song that heavy enough I needed to restart my laptop to hear it. It’s not every riff goes around busting technology. Have at it:

BONE CHURCH: new album and single announced on Ripple Music

New Haven, Connecticut’s hard blues rockers BONE CHURCH share a raucous first single taken from their sophomore album “Deliverance”, to be released on October 24th through Californian label Ripple Music.

Feel the grit and fire of new single Bone Boys Ride Out

Their forthcoming sophomore album “Deliverance” is Bone Church’s boldest step yet into the heart of classic and hard rock: an album built on big hooks, anthemic songcraft, and the kind of radio-ready swagger that would’ve ruled the airwaves in 1977. Written primarily in 2019 and 2020, this record trades their debut’s doom-laden expectations for soaring, blues-soaked riffs and sing-along choruses. “You’ll still hear the Sabbath influence, but you’ll also hear ZZ Top, the Allman Brothers, Santana, and Lynyrd Skynyrd, to name a few. These songs are meant to be sung along to,” says lead guitarist Dan Sefcik.

Lyrically, Bone Church remains steeped in their signature themes—apocalyptic visions, Luciferian power struggles, and the eternal battle between light and dark—but this time, they balance the weight with raucous tales of life on the road and the pure, uncomplicated joy of rock ‘n’ roll. “We’ve juxtaposed those heavy themes with lighthearted fun as well. We didn’t want this record to be all doom and gloom. Overall, we think it’s our best work yet,” he adds.

“Deliverance” is a thunderous exorcism, a Molotov cocktail hurled at the gates of genre. Bone Church never bowed to the rules, and now? They’re torching the rulebook entirely. Crank it. Howl along. This is their reckoning and it’s coming this fall on Ripple Music!

BONE CHURCH “Deliverance
Out October 24th via Ripple Music (LP/CD/digital): https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/album/deliverance

BONE CHURCH is
Jack Rune – Vocals
Dan Sefcik – Lead Guitar
Pat Good – Bass
Nick Firine – Guitar
Rob Sickinger – Drums

https://bonechurch1.bandcamp.com/
https://www.instagram.com/bone_church/
https://www.facebook.com/bonexchurch/

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

Bone Church, Deliverance (2025)

Alright, y’all. This is where it ends. The Quarterly Review has been an absolute blast, an easy, fun, good time to have, but inevitably it must come to close and that’s where we’re at. Last day. Last 10 releases. Thanks if you’ve kept up. I’ll be back I think in September with another one of these, probably longer.

Hope you’ve found something killer this week. I did.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Katatonia, Nightmares as Extensions of the Waking State

Nightmares as Extensions of the Waking State is the first long-player in the 34-year history of Katatonia — upwards of their 13th album, depending on what you count — to not feature guitarist Anders Nyström. That leaves frontman Jonas Renkse as the remaining founder of the band, with two new guitarists in Nico Elgstrand and Sebastian Svalland, bassist Niklas Sandin and drummer Daniel Moilanen, steering one of heavy music’s most identifiable sounds in new ways. “Wind of No Change” is duly subversive, and “Departure Trails” basks in texture in a way Katatonia have periodically throughout the last 20 years, but the Opethian severity of they keys in “The Light Which I Bleed” and the declarative chug at the end of opener “Thrice” speak to the band’s awareness of the need to occasionally be very, very heavy, even as “Efter Solen” shifts into dark, emotive electronics ahead of the sweeping finale “In the Event Of…” Renkse has never wanted for expression as a singer. If he’s to be the driving force behind Katatonia, fair enough for how that manifests here.

Katatonia website

Napalm Records website

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Black Moon Circle, A Million Leagues Beyond: Moskus Sessions Vol. I

Trondheim, Norway’s Black Moon Circle recorded the four-song set of A Million Leagues Beyond: Moskus Sessions Vol. 1 at the hometown venue of Moskus, a small bar that, to hear them tell it, mostly hosts jazz. Fair enough for cosmic heavy psychedelic grunge rock to join the fray, I should think. It was late in 2023, so earlier that year’s Leave the Ghost Behind (review here) full-length features readily, with “Snake Oil” following the opener “Drifting Across the Plains” — which is jazzy enough, certainly — ahead of the chunkier-riffed “Serpent” and a 20-minute take on “Psychedelic Spacelord (Lighter Than Air),” which has become a signature piece for the three-piece, suitably expansive. If you know Black Moon Circle‘s studio albums, you know they do as much as they can live. Honestly, A Million Leagues Beyond: Moskus Sessions Vol. I isn’t all that different, but it’s definitely a performance worth enjoying.

Black Moon Circle on Bandcamp

Crispin Glover Records website

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Bloodhorse, A Malign Star

Kudos if you had ‘new Bloodhorse‘ on your 2025 Stoner Rock Bingo card or caught it when they launched an Instagram page last year. I certainly didn’t. The Massachusetts aughts-type prog-leaning riffmakers were last heard from with their 2009 debut album, Horizoner (review here), and the six-song/28-minute A Malign Star serves as a vital return, if not one brimming with good vibes as “The Somnambulist” dream-crushes its four-minute course, the band not so much dwelling in atmospheres like the relatively careening “Shallowness,” but getting into a song, making their point, and getting out. This works to their advantage in opener “Saboteur” and the chuggier title-track that follows, but even six-minute closer “Illumination” retains a sense of immediacy amid the dirty fuzz and comparatively laid back roll. This band was once the shape of sludge to come. 16 years later, the future has taken a different course and everybody’s a little more middle-aged, but Bloodhorse still kind of feel like they’re waiting for the world to catch up.

Bloodhorse on Instagram

Iodine Recordings website

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Aawks, On Through the Sky Maze

Should you find yourself thinking you didn’t remember Canadian riffers Aawks — also stylized all-caps: AAWKS — having quite such a nasty streak, you’re not alone. Their 2022 debut, Heavy on the Cosmic (review here), had a take that seems like fuzzy dream-pop in comparison to “Celestial Magick” and the screamy sludge that populates On Through the Sky Maze, their second LP. The nine-song 48-minute full-length is the first to feature bassist/vocalist Ryan “Grime Pup” Mailman alongside guitarist/vocalist Kris Dzierzbicki, guitarist Roberto Paraíso, and drummer Randylin Babic, and songs like “Lost Dwellers” or the mellow-spacier “Drifting Upward,” with no harsh vocals, seem to hit more directly, in addition to arriving in a different context with the “blegh”s of “Wandering Supergiants” and “Caerdoia,” and so on. In the end, Mailman‘s rasp becomes one more tool in Aawks‘ songwriting shed, and the band have more breadth and are less predictable for it. Call that a win, even before you get to the record being good.

Aawks website

Black Throne Productions website

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Moon Destroys, She Walks by Moonlight

The shimmering, floating guitar in “Echoes (The Empress)” tells part of the story in the deep-running The Cure influence, and the somewhat moody vocals of Charlie Suárez echo that emotional foundation, which is coupled in that song and throughout Moon Destroys‘ debut album, She Walks by Moonlight, with a willful progressivism in the songwriting, attention to detail in the arrangements, melodies, even the mix. Comprised of Suárez, guitarist Juan Montoya (ex-Torche), bassist Arnold Nese and drummer/producer Evan Diprima (Royal Thunder), the band are able to set a wash in place that’s not deceptively heavy in “The Nearness of June” (an earlier demo track) because it’s beating you over the head with tone, but still has more to offer than just its own heft. “Only” sounds like heavied-up proto-emo, while the roll of “Set Them Free” is massive in terms of both its riff and its big feelings. If you’re willing to let it grow on you, She Walks by Moonlight can be a space to occupy.

Moon Destroys website

Limited Fanfare website

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Astral Magic, In Space We Trust

In Space We Trust is one of four-so-far full-lengths that Santtu Laakso — multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, composer and producer — has out between Astral Magic and related collaborations and projects. It’s not a pace of releasing one can keep up with, but if you need a check-in from the generation ship that is Astral Magic, chances are Laakso is out there on some voyage or other between classic space rock and clearheaded prog, spanning galaxies. The eight-song/42-minute In Space We Trust pairs him with lead guitarist Jonathan Segel (Øresund Space Collective, etc.), and one should not be surprised at the cosmic nature of the resulting music. The pair get into some sci-fi atmospherics in “Ancient Pilots” and “Alien Emperor,” but the synth and guitar are leading the way across the galaxy and the vibe across the board is more Voyager and less Nostromo, so yes, smooth solar-sailing the whole way through.

Astral Magic on Bandcamp

Astral Magic on Facebook

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Lammping x Bloodshot Bill, Never Never

IMG

The dreamy guitar, semi-rapped vocal, and dub backbeat give the opening title-track of Never Never a decidedly ’90s cast, but it’s not the summary of what Toronto’s Lammping have to offer in their collaboration with weirdo-rockabilly solo artist Bloodshot Bill, bringing together their urbane, grounded psych and studiocraft, samples, etc., with the singer/guitarist’s low, sometimes bluesy delivery across seven songs totaling 15 minutes, peppering the vibe-on-vibes of “Never Never,” “One and Own” and “Won’t Back Down” — the longest inclusion at 3:23 — with ramble and flow alike, with experimental jawns like “Coconut,” “0 and 1” or “Anything is Possible” and the closer “Nitey Nite,” all under two minutes long and each going their own way with the casual cool one has come to expect from Lammping, quietly staking out their own wavelength while still sounding like something from a half-remembered soundtrack to a radder version of your life. This is one of four releases Lammping will reportedly have over the next year or so. Way on board for whatever’s coming next.

Lammping on Instagram

We Are Busy Bodies on Bandcamp

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Fuzz Sagrado, Strange Daze

After the disbanding of Samsara Blues Experiment in 2021, guitarist/vocalist Christian Peters — who had already by then moved from Germany to Brazil — unveiled Fuzz Sagrado with EPs in July and October of that year. Fuzz Sagrado‘s 2021 self-titled (review here) and Vida Pura EPs are included on Strange Daze, a new compilation of tracks unified through a remaster by John McBain, showcasing the early outreach of keyboard and guitar that served as the foundation for the project. As Peters readies a live band for an eventual return to the stage, Strange Daze demonstrates how multifaceted the growth has been in terms of songwriting and still feels exploratory in hindsight as it did when the material was first released. Also included is the jammy “Arapongas,” which wasn’t on either EP but was recorded around the same time. Something of a curio or a fan-piece, but I ain’t arguing.

Fuzz Sagrado website

Electric Magic Records website

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When the Deadbolt Breaks, In the Glow of the Vatican Fire

A couple different modes on When the Deadbolt Breaks‘ In the Glow of the Vatican Fire, which is the long-running Connecticut malevolent doomers’ umpteenth album, running 63 minutes and eight songs. Some of those are longer pieces, like opener “The Scythe Will Come” (12:24), “The Chaos of Water” (14:02), “The Deep Well” (10:42) and “Red Sparrow” (10:57), but interspersed with these are a succession of shorter tracks, and the breakdown between them isn’t just that the short songs are fast and the long songs are slow. Certainly the ripping early portions (and the later, more minimalist spaciousness) of “The Chaos of Water” argue against this, and the dynamic turns out to be correspondingly complex to suit the abiding murk of mood, as founding guitarist/vocalist Aaron Lewis and co-singer Cherilynne provide foreboding croon to suit the lo-fi, creeping, distorted terrors of the music surrounding. This is When the Deadbolt Breaks absolutely in their element; bleak, churn-chaotic, expressive, immersive. They’re able to put you where they want you whether you want to go or not.

When the Deadbolt Breaks on Bandcamp

When the Deadbolt Breaks on Instagram

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A/lpaca, Laughter

It may have sat on the shelf for two years since recording finished in 2023, but don’t worry, it’s still from the future. Laughter is the second-on-Sulatron full-length from Italian experimentalists A/lpaca, and it sees them push deeper into electronic elements and ambiences, keeping some of the krautrock elements of their 2021’s Make it Better, but with songs that are shorter on average and that stand ready to convey a sense of quirk in the keyboard elements or the Devo verses of the title-track, which isn’t without its aspect of shove. Does it get weird? You bet your ass it does. “Bianca’s Videotape,” “Who’s in Love Daddy?,” the post-punk synthery meeting doomed fuzz on “Empty Chairs,” the list goes on. Actually, it’s just the tracklisting and it’s all pretty freaked out, so as long as you know going in that the band are working from their own standard of weirdoism, making the jump into the keyboardy gorge of “Kyrie” or the new wave-y “Don’t Talk” should be no problem. If you heard the last record, yeah, this is different. Seems like the next one will probably be different again too. Not everyone wants to do the same thing all the time.

A/lpaca on Bandcamp

Sulatron Records store

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This is day four of the Summer 2025 Quarterly Review, and though I might pay for it later, say right around late-September when I’m doing the Fall one, I think I’m going to keep it to five days. Mostly that’s about not pressing my luck. This has been an exceedingly easy QR to get through, a breeze compared to some — one downer day is all it takes and I feel like I never have my groove again, but that hasn’t happened here — and I’m content to take the win and move on, as opposed to pushing for an extra day or two next week.

So this is the penultimate day, and we’ll finish tomorrow. I hope you’ve enjoyed the Quarterly Review nearly as much as I have. Not one day has passed without me adding at least one release to my year-end list(s), which is a pretty killer thing to realize as I type it. Let’s see how today goes.

Quarterly Review #31-40:

Muto Tapes, Side Effects

One of apparently five singles that Mexico City’s Muto Tapes will release over the course of 2025 — year’s half-over, they’d better hurry up — “Side Effects” runs four riffy minutes of thickened, aggressive chug-metal, calling to mind Sepultura in its spit-out guttural vocals, but creating a denser mass of distortion and leaving in trade the thrashy, sometimes bloody, roots. Past the halfway point in the song, circa 2:30 into the total 4:05, the tempo drops and the guitar/drum duo bask in some of the minimal spaces their configuration lets them occupy, saving a fair round of shove for the finish after setting it up with due foreboding guitar creep. Not sure if Muto Tapes are building toward an EP or LP or what, or just releasing singles because not everything needs to be a package to sell, but they bring a blend of heft and intensity that immediately distinguishes them in the heavy underground, and they look to be developing their sound on their own terms. Guitarist/vocalist/bassist Jorge S. and drummer Roy B. have been meting out punishment in this manner since 2023, so we’re just beginning to see where it’s all headed.

Muto Tapes website

Muto Tapes on Bandcamp

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Turkey Vulture, Dead to Me

It hasn’t been that long since Turkey Vulture released their Oct. 2024 EP, On the List, or maybe I just blinked out for a few months. The Connecticut duo of Jessie May (guitar, bass, vocals) and Jim Clegg (drums, backing vocals) have long-enough since carved their niche in doom and punk rock, and “Dead to Me” and “Jill the Ripper (Heavy Take)” — the two of them running about four and a half minutes, combined — continues the thread. They don’t list the recording info, so I don’t know if these two songs were done at the same time as the EP or not, but “Jill the Ripper (Heavy Take),” as the title describes, is a louder and punkier take on the closing “Jill the Ripper” from that also-short release. “Dead to Me,” meanwhile, seems to be about not going to shows anymore, presumably because you have a kid, and the changing nature of friendships as a result of that. Turkey Vulture have a whole series of songs about these life-stages; just six years on from their debut, they’ve done a lot of growing.

Turkey Vulture on Bandcamp

Turkey Vulture on Instagram

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Polymerase, Mindspace

Philippines heavy psych wanderers Polymerase are back two years after their two-part Dreams and Realities I & II full-length cycle with the mood-altering 78 minutes of Mindspace, seemingly named for the two things on which the material has the greatest effect. Pairing extended, jammier pieces with, well, shorter, jammier pieces, songs like “Divine Reefer” (12:08) can touch on Sleep while “Space Child” (7:10) is anything but grounded in its repetitions and evident outbound plotted trajectory. There’s more to Mindspace than mellow-out stoner idolatry, though, as the bassy rumble underwriting the harsher shouts of “Interplanetary Echoes” (13:08) demonstrates, taking some of the sludgier moments paired with heavygaze in “Crows and Doves” (11:57) and using them to call out to the expanse of the band’s own making. Closer “Downward Spiral” (12:22) functions similarly at the conclusion, calling to mind modern practitioners like Rezn while feeling empowered through their individual processes. I don’t know how much is actually improv, but Mindspace is way open, and that’s how it should be.

Polymerase on Bandcamp

Polymerase on Instagram

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Troy the Band & Cower, Fade Into You

Something of a specialty item, perhaps. Fade Into You is a two-tracker split 12″ with London outfits Troy the Band and Cower taking its name from the Mazzy Star song, which both bands cover. Like, they do the same song. And much to their credit, they do it differently. Troy the Band, who early last year released their debut album, Cataclysm (review here), on Bonebag Records, take a heavygaze viewpoint on the 1993 single, fleshing out the moody atmosphere with echoing effects and hard-landing, immersive roll. Cower, whose second full-length, Celestial Devastation (review here), also came out last year, reimagine it as Nick Cave or latter-day Wovenhand, holding to the emotional crux of the original with ethereal drones and new age-y keyboard. A stopgap? Probably, but an interesting project just the same, and the song, of course, stands up to the manipulation.

Troy the Band on Bandcamp

Cower on Bandcamp

Troy the Band & Cower at ElasticStage

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Jaspe, Grietas

What would seem to be the debut offering from Tijuana-based post-metal four-piece Jaspe, Grietas runs just 23 minutes at three songs, but carries a full-length’s sense of breadth in doing so. Shades of Amenra persist in the quiet/spoken stretch of “Rios de Polvo II” (11:52), where the lumber that begins opener “Litorales” (9:46) crushes as might a modern Isis before departing into the inevitable stretch of pretty guitar, Russian Circles-esque, but with more plunge in the low frequencies, and the arriving guttural growl of vocals is genre-transgressive in a way that satisfies wholly. Separating the larger pieces is the two-minute droner “Rios de Polvo I,” obviously aligned to the second part that follows, which adds to both the tension and atmosphere of this resoundingly impressive post-doom showcase and highlights the potential that’s so prevalent in Jaspe‘s sound. I’ll take an album of this for sure. Just say when.

Jaspe on Bandcamp

Jaspe on Instagram

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Yung Druid, Wooden Lungs

Two songs, 20 minutes. Yung Druid, in continued collaboration with Totem Cat Records, offer Wooden Lungs, comprised of the 11-minute “Wooden Lung” and the nine-minute “Space Cowboy.” Both songs owe some debt in swagger to Led Zeppelin, but “Wooden Lung,” in the vocal arrangement and steady nod, reminds more of Iota‘s 2024 return, Pentasomnia, in its fluid progression and grunge-style harmonies. Not a complaint. Also not complaining about the uptick in fuzz for “Space Cowboy,” which still manages to move despite the primordial pool of tone in which it seems to soak. A riff for riffers, that one. Originally based in London around the time of their 2019 self-titled debut (discussed here), the band have moved between the Spain, Australia and New Zealand. It can be difficult for a band who were all together in the rehearsal space to transition to working remotely, but if Wooden Lungs is their proof of concept, they can make a go of it.

Yung Druid on Bandcamp

Totem Cat Records store

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The Crystal Teardrop, …Is Forming

Issued through Rise Above Records imprint Popclaw (see also Bobbie Dazzle and Scott Hepple and the Sun Band), The Crystal Teardrop‘s debut long-player, …Is Forming, sounds remarkably ‘formed,’ if you want to think of it in those terms, as regards aesthetic. Taking a heaping dose of influence from ’60s garage and daring toward Beatlesism on the sweetly bouncing “Borrowed Time” or the Help-toned “Two Hearts,” the band present a retroist face but hold back from IYKYK-style gatekeeping via pop songwriting and the sweep of the later “Turn You Down,” which is a ruffled-hair rush ahead of the similarly shoving “Stealing Suggestions” and the perhaps inevitable psychedelic delve of the closing pair “Nine Times Nine.” and “…Is Forming,” the latter of which has enough backward guitar to meet whatever your quota might be before it unfurls darker instrumental heavy proto-prog like it’s something the band just invented. Rise Above is ready for the garage rock revolution, ready to foster a new generation of artists, but as ever, the question is whether or not the world at large can keep up. …Is Forming argues fervently in favor of trying.

The Crystal Teardrop links

Rise Above Records website

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Doom Lab, Desert Caravan Doom

The adventures of Alaska’s Leo Scheben and his Doom Lab continue, declaring a genre in Desert Caravan Doom and then immediately setting about defying its parameters with an encompassing, continually on-its-own-wavelength craft, increasingly clear production, and varied intent across the 12-song/43-minute long-player, with creeps like raw East Coast hardcore in “What’s Your Angle?” before the jazzy puns take further hold in “Feeling Minor and Diminished,” pieces like “Fives” and “Desert Hailstorm” tapping into some Stinking Lizaveta-type intensity while the sweetly alt-rocking “At Dusk” and the “Gimmie One Drop (Dub)” and “Desert Caravan Improvisation” — with a new live drummer, reportedly — add to the fabric of Doom Lab‘s ongoing explorations in style and expression. Desert Caravan Doom isn’t as dark, on average, as some of Doom Lab‘s output, and that comparative lightness of mood lets it swing all the more, but Scheben‘s never just been/done one thing, and Desert Caravan Doom holds to this dynamic as well.

Doom Lab on Bandcamp

Doom Lab on YouTube

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Liquid Pennies, Fore

The synth and keyboard elements play a significant role throughout Liquid Pennies‘ Fore, as “Tapered Scape” and “Ready Tide” demonstrate early on, never mind the 11-minute “Echolalia,” which also has plenty of time for its heavy breakout in the middle third and doomier-until-it-thrashes ending. “Sight Skewer” finds the adventurous Floridian unit evoking nostalgia with fuzz and melody, the drum machine patterning working in contrast to the heavier tones, but feeling by that point very much part of the thing. Presumed side B starter “Elliptic Triptych” brings a bit more functional aggression to the mix, while the three-minute droner “Further Ennui” gives transition to the terrestrial acoustic strum in the pastiche of “The Bone,” which grows broader while remaining melodically intricate, and the closing title-track runs the atmospherics backwards for, well, backwards atmospherics. There’s some influence from All Them Witches at work, but four albums in, Liquid Pennies are onto something special in sound, and one hopes the pursuit continues.

Liquid Pennies links

Threat Collection Records website

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Mordbear, Mordbear

A fascinating debut three-song EP from Portland, Oregon’s Mordbear, released by Dipterid Records as a single-sided 12″ vinyl, comic book included. If that seems elaborate for what’s basically a demo, there’s the rub. “Like the Dead,” “A Mirror with a Sea of Flames” and “The Alchemist” are resoundingly cohesive and sure of their construction. The style is modern stoner with nascent hints of prog leaking through — again, modern — and in the seven minutes of “The Alchemist,” the scope feels broader as they methodically unfurl their riffing. Meanwhile, “Like the Dead” leads off with atmospheric semi-desert heavy, catchy and nodding and slow, and “A Mirror with a Sea of Flames” has more of a rhythmic tumble. When Mordbear lock into a bigger groove in the middle cut, there’s some hint of Monolord to their sound, but ‘their sound’ is hardly a settled issue, so the exploration is welcome even as they seem to have so much nailed down in terms of style.

Mordbear on Bandcamp

Dipterid Records on Bandcamp

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So this is it for the second of two Quarterly Review weeks around here, bringing the total to 100 releases covered since last Monday, with 10 more still to come next Monday.

110 releases, mostly (not all) from about April through November.

That’s insane. More, I’m not in any way prepared to call it or any other Quarterly Review comprehensive. It’s nowhere near everything that’s come out or is coming out. It’s a fraction at best. There’s just so much.

I’m not going to attach a value judgment to that. It’s not good, it’s not bad; it simply is. My processes remain largely unchanged, and whether it’s a net positive that the underground is either sparse and fractured or flooded with bands to such a point that Gen-X reunions underwhelm in the face of so much good, new music being made, I’ll be here regardless. And even if there were a fifth as many bands out there as there are right now, no doubt I still couldn’t keep up.

See you Monday.

Quarterly Review #91-100:

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Elder, Live at BBC Maida Vale Studios

While it’s by no means Elder‘s first captured-live release, as they’ve put out festival sets from Roadburn and Sonic Whip in years past, Live at BBC Maida Vale Studios answers any what’s-all-this-about questions with the sound of the performances themselves. It’s a single LP, somewhere about 40 minutes long, and in Elder terms that translates to three songs — “Merged in Dreams/Ne Plus Ultra” (15:33), “Lore” (13:54) and “Thousand Hands” (9:21) — so by no means is it expansive, or comprehensive in representing this era of Elder‘s presence on stage or scope in songwriting. Why put it out instead of some recorded tour night or a compilation of songs from different shows? Same answer as before: the sound of the performances. For sure Live at BBC Maida Vale Studios is a fan-piece, but it is live, and Elder sound fantastic — and it’s probably a pretty decent memory for the band to celebrate — so you’re not at all going to hear me argue.

Elder on Facebook

Stickman Records website

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Kandodo, theendisinpsych

Simon Price, now formerly of UK heavy psych forebears The Heads, returns with the first Kandodo outing since 2019’s K3 (review here) and a reoriented focus on intimacy rather than operating in a full-band style. That is to say, the five-track/44-minute release sounds like the solo album it is. That, however, doesn’t stop “Fuzzyoceans” from casting an expanse in its just-under-11 minutes, with a central rhythmic bounce around which layers of synth and guitar conjure a wash of experimentalist flourish. Lo-fi beatmaking starts in “Chamba7,” the opener, and sounds higher budget as “Theendisinpsych Pt. 1” borders on psych techno — “Theendisinpsych Pt. 2” follows immediately and moves from sustained keyboard notes and a sampled David Bowie radio interview to an evocative, shimmering drone; it isn’t arhythmic, but it doens’t have a ‘beat’ per se — and becomes part of the avant garde soundscape (the lightning part) in closer “Freefalling,” which unfolds in stages of variable volume and hum with some howling leads snuck in near the end. It’s a deep dive and at times a challenging listen. So yes, exactly what one would hope.

Kandodo on Facebook

Kandodo on Bandcamp

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High Reeper, Renewed by Death

When High Reeper‘s third LP, Renewed by Death, was announced back in July, it was notable how much the album’s narrative seemed to position them as a metal band rather than heavy/doom rock, which even though 2019’s Higher Reeper (review here) had its harder-hitting moments, is kind of how I’d come to think of them. The eight songs of Renewed by Death aren’t hyper-aggressive — though you wouldn’t call “Torn from Within” ‘chill’ by any means — but they feel sharper in their composition than the last record, and if High Reeper want to say that “Lamentations of the Pale” and “Jaws of Darkness” are their take on doom metal, I’d only emphasize how much that take feels like High Reeper‘s own in being cognizant of the traditional metal and doom aspects of their sound and making them groove as fervently as they do. The Eastern Seaboard is lucky to have them.

High Reeper on Facebook

Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Kanaan & Ævestaden, Langt, Langt Vekk

A low-key highlight of 2024, the collaboration between Norwegian neofolkers Ævestaden and heavy progressive instrumentalists Kanaan — titled Langt, Langt Vekk and comprising nine songs of varied intent, arrangement and origin — resounds with creative depth. It’s in Norwegian, and plays a lot off of traditional folk instrumentation and vocal styles — not to mention the songs themselves, which are also traditionals — but as the two sides come together even just on a three-minute instrumental piece like “Fiskaren,” there’s an organic forested space rock to be found, and whether it’s the somehow-catchy “Farvel” or “Habbor og Signe,” the cosmic-leaning “Vallåt efter C.G. Färje” or the wistful progeadelia that resolves in “Vardtjenn,” the reverence for the material is palpable, and also the reverence for the process itself, for each of these two entities contributing to something grander than either might be able or inclined to conjure on their own. That the collection worked out to be gorgeous, both worldly and otherworldly, and to cast such a breadth while remaining cohesive in mood is a credit to all involved. It could’ve been an absolute mess. It very much is not.

Kanaan on Instagram

Ævestaden on Instagram

Jansen Records website

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MC MYASNOI, Slugs are Legal Now

Slugs are Legal Now contains two live sets from experimental doomers MC MYASNOI, one from Harpa and one from R6013, both venues in the band’s hometown of Reykjavík, Iceland. The setlists are identical at six-per, but the performances are varied in a way that becomes part of the personality of the whole, which is immersive in its droning stretches, sometimes harsher in the noise being made particularly on the rougher R6013 songs, but still able to be heavy in a piece like “Step on Ur Neck” in a way that feels conversant with the likes of Ufomammut or Boris, and neither the moody post-darkjazz of “Nytrogen” nor the drums-and-rumble-do-a-minute-or-two-of-free-psych “lea%rdi%rdx2%rcx” a short time later (watch out for your speakers with that one), do anything to dissuade that impression. “Terror Serpentine” finishes both halves of Slugs are Legal Now with 11 minutes of grim sprawl, and in the culmination, that it’s the keyboard that’s shredding instead of one or the other of the guitars feels suitable to the weirdo nuance MC MYASNOI seem to come by so naturally and pair with a progressive will to grow by screwing with convention. Not going to be for everybody, but those ready to take a risk might find the reward waiting.

MC MYASNOI on Instagram

MC MYASNOI on Bandcamp

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Turkey Vulture, On the List

Back after two years with further affirmation of their comfort with the EP format, Connecticut two-piece Turkey Vulture run a condensed gamut in the six songs and 12 minutes of On the List, with the duo of vocalist/guitarist/bassist Jessie May and drummer/backing vocalist Jim Clegg giving specifically Misfits-y early punk impressions on “Fiends Like Us,” which “Untitled” takes more of a garage angle on in following before they metal-up for “Dollhouse” and the 48-second grind-punker “Adults Destroy,” which leads to thrashing in “Harvest Moon” offset by doomly swing, and the closing “Jill the Ripper,” going out on a note that toys with goth Americana in the vein of The Bad Seeds and boasts banjo, guitar, percussion and, crucially, accordion from Steve Rodgers in a multifaceted guest spot. The accordion makes it. Turkey Vulture‘s output is generally pretty raw and that’s true with On the List as well, but there’s character in them coinciding with the flow from one aspect of their sound to the next between the songs, and the EP ends up conveying a lot about what works in the band for something that’s 12 minutes long.

Turkey Vulture on Facebook

Turkey Vulture on Bandcamp

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Ghost:Whale, Dive:Two

Doubly-bassed Brussels longform doom explorers Ghost:Whale certainly don’t get any less consciousness melting on the second disc of Dive:Two, which manifests its plunge across three extended pieces each given the title “Dub:Whale” and assigned a Roman numeral, but by then the five songs of the album’s first 67 minutes (as opposed to the 57 of the concluding trilogy) have already passed in the hypnotic, cosmic-doom push of “Under Pressure” and the synth-laced chug nod in the second half of “Les Danses des Sorcieres” that seems to come to a head in the speedier “Ultimas Palabras.” The shortest inclusion at nine minutes and by its finish spending some time cruising around a Truckfightersian desert, “Ultimas Palabras” gives over to “Godzilla” and “Eye of the Storm,” a kind of second LP within the first CD, led into by the synth of “Godzilla” — not a cover — and arriving at the farthest reach in the electronics-infused expanses of “Eye of the Storm,” for which the drums mostly sit out and the noise spends 21 minutes venturing into the unknown. Ghost:Whale are not fucking around. And obviously the “Dub:Whale” tracks are a divergence in intention, harnessing the power of repetition in a different way, but either it’s a logical extension or my brain has just gone numb from the low-end. Fine in any case, honestly.

Ghost:Whale on Facebook

Forbidden Place Records store

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Sheepfucker and Kraut, Bring Your Sheep

Do I really need to tell you these guys are up to some shenanigans? They called the band Sheepfucker and Kraut, for crying out loud. Heavy rock chicanery ensues over eight tracks rife with willful misbehavior, culminating with “Broner” after turning the album’s progression into a kind of playground running between heavy rock, classic and psychedelic instrumentalism, metal and jams. It’s not a little, and I guess a namedrop for Mr. Bungle is somewhat obligatory, but the Bulgarian outfit make themselves welcome in the swath of ground they cover, punkish in their glee on top of everything else in “Bobanei” and the pop-adjacent “Look at Me,” which would seem to have some satire behind its chorus but is a standout hook just the same. They’re not all nonsense, or at least not at the expense of their songwriting in “Rich Man” and “Jolly Roger,” or “Did You Know” mirroring “Look at Me” in the penultimate spot on side B, but if people having fun while making music is a problem for you, I mean, really, you might want to have a good long think on what that’s all about. Yeah, it’s over-the-top. That’s the idea.

Sheepfucker and Kraut on Facebook

Threechords Records on Instagram

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LungBurner, Natura Duale

In some ways, LungBurner‘s second LP of 2024, Natura Duale, reminds of earliest Yatra in bringing together vicious sludge metal and a breadth of atmosphere, but the Atlanta outfit have more of a post-metallic bent as the solo of “Barren” nonetheless dares to soar, and opener/longest track (immediate points) “Requiem” establishes the first of the album’s nods in a build of standalone guitar in the spirit of YOB, and in combination with a churn that wouldn’t feel out of place on Neurot and a crush in centerpiece “(Prey) Job” that opens to a classic stoner metal swagger in its verse, the righteousness here takes many forms, most of them dark, grueling and heavy — this definitely applies to the Celtic Frosting put on the proceedings by the finale “Astral Projection” — but not without a corresponding reach or purpose. LungBurner are served by the complexity of character, and Natura Duale grows more vivid as it goes.

LungBurner on Facebook

Electric Desert Records on Bandcamp

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Bog Wizard, Journey Through the Dying Lands

With their material steeped in fantasy and horror/sci-fi lore, a goodly portion of it being of their own making, Michigan’s Bog Wizard continue to find the thread between tabletop gaming and sometimes monolithic sludge. The bulk of Journey Through the Dying Lands, which is their second release in a row done in collaboration with a game company, is dedicated to opener “I, Mycelium,” which stretches across 19:50 and unfolds in stages that don’t bother to choose between being brutal or fluid, the band winding up coming across as dug-in as one might expect Bog Wizard to be in the endeavor. There are two more studio tracks, in “Dodz Bringare,” which is black metal until it slams into the doom wall, and “Hagfish Dinner,” on which they depart for two minutes of harmonized chant-like vocals over resonant acoustic guitar. They’re not done yet as Ben Lombard (guitar/vocals), bassist Colby Lowman and drummer/vocalist Harlen Linke offer a glimpse at some live-on-stage banter before tearing into the thrasher “Stuck in the Muck” and backing it with another live track, this one a take on “Barbaria” from 2021’s Miasmic Purple Smoke (review here) that by the time it builds to its galloping finish has already long since demanded every bit of volume you can give it.

Bog Wizard on Facebook

Bog Wizard on Bandcamp

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Four years ago, long-running Connecticut fuzz lurchers Curse the Son offered Excruciation (review here) as their fourth full-length, and pushed depressive and stylistic boundaries in expansive and melodic ways. It was the darkest Curse the Son had ever been. The band as they were at the time doesn’t exist anymore, so maybe it’s not such a surprise that Delirium, their fifth album, follows a different course. They remain led, as always, by guitarist/vocalist Ron Vanacore, but Curse the Son aren’t strangers to trading out players or a rhythm section, which is what’s happened here.

With bassist Dan Weeden and drummer Brian Harris — who since recording has already been replaced by the teenaged Logan Vanacore, son to Ron — the band’s personality as channeled through the material comes off as more doom than stoner, with opener “The Suffering is Ours,” “Deliberate Cruelty” and “In Dismal Space” answering for the atmosphere of the prior release while locking into more straight-ahead grooves that feel stripped down in terms of arrangement. There isn’t a ton of layering (but some), and while “In Dismal Space” has a vocal reach, its core shuffle is well within Vanacore‘s purview.

The instrumental portion of the album, whether that’s the sans-vocals “Riff Forest” picking up directly from the back end of the Witchfinder General cover “R.I.P.” (premiered here) in a way that feels like it was born out of an organic jam inspired by the song prior, or the druggy effects interlude “Brain Paint” ahead of the title-track, or “May Cause Drowsiness” directly after and penultimate to the finale “Liste of the Dead,” helps assure there’s enough variety of intention represented, but this too comes in a context that speaks to the core idea of what Curse the Son do in terms of tonal worship Sabbathian stoner-doom and an exploration of themes around mental health. There’s been a global pandemic since the last time Curse the Son put out an LP, so yes, the mood on Delirium remains reliably downer.

The plague is accounted for in “Deliberate Cruelty” after the initial plod of “The Suffering is Ours.” A thickened chug boogie and harmonized lead-guitar flourish gives over to the chorus, “This is our/Extermination song/When breathing/Is terminal for everyone.” That’s a story that’s been told many times at this point, but in phrasing and sound alike, Curse the Son make their version resonate in groove and experience. Most of all, the impression Delirium gives — somewhat contradicting the title — is one of clarity on the part of the band. Of course, the medication-induced fog that would seem to be coming through in “Brain Paint” and the more swirling, languid 52 seconds of “May Cause Drowsiness” are intended to capture a certain kind of stupor, and fair enough.

But as Curse the Son forego what felt like some of the more relatively experimental aspects of the last album and find their way into the kind of doomly traditionalism of “Liste of the Dead” — like slower The Obsessed with Vanacore‘s voice layered in ’90s-Ozzy style for the chorus — and the morose slogging in the bookending leadoff, etc., it’s easy to read purpose into the shape that Delirium takes. Could be Curse the Son willfully pushing themselves in a different direction at Vanacore‘s behest — he’s the only one to play on both records, after all — or it could simply be an extension of the shift in character resulting from the corresponding change in personnel, I honestly don’t know, but as the listener engages with the shove and crashdown of “In Dismal Space,” the dropout of guitar and bass in its verse lines, the album’s sound doesn’t seem like happenstance in the slightest.

Perhaps leaning into the doom portion of the balance of stoner-doom was inevitable for a band who’ve never been shy about wearing their discontent on their collective sleeve, and perhaps part of what makes Delirium feel so self-aware is the aforementioned Witchfinder General cover. This speaks pointedly to older influences — the song originally appeared on the NWOBHM-era doom rockers’ 1982 album, Death Penalty — and accordingly to an older audience, and the inclusion of “Riff Forest” right after not only accounts for how Curse the Son are making that obscure-classic their own, but how they’ve incorporated that influence into their own writing in this particular case. Underlying it all is Black Sabbath, of course, but Curse the Son‘s songwriting seems throughout the album to only benefit from the focused take that birthed it.

To wit, the hook of “Delirium” itself with its clever turn around the month of July being a wonderful time to start living and a terrible time to die represents a cleverness that’s been in Vanacore‘s craft since the also-medicated days of 2011’s Klonopain (review here). The difference on Delirium, then, is one of maturity in expressing and framing ideas; that is, the focus itself is the sign of growth in the band’s root approach, and as cognizant as they may or may not be of direction and how much flash they wanted to bring to the production this time out, the underlying development of what they do remains natural. There’s a drift factor as Delirium moves from its opening salvo into the interludes woven across the second half of the tracklisting — “In Dismal Space” makes for a winning centerpiece coming out of “Riff Forest,” and “Brain Paint” takes off from there — but that outward portrayal of a loss of clarity shouldn’t be taken as actual confusion about what Curse the Son are trying to accomplish. Delirium isn’t so much a step backward as it is a realignment around a different idea of what they do.

In a way, it’s a shame that the timing on Logan Vanacore‘s joining the band didn’t work to have him play on these tracks. It’s surely an exciting moment to have Curse the Son bridge a generational divide, and, well, they don’t put out a record every year. All the same, the material on Delirium feels quintessential in what it captures of Curse the Son‘s persona, and considering the manner in which these songs align with and diverge from what they’ve done before, that they are so much the band’s own highlights the solid foundation on which they’re constructed. For established fans or newcomers, they could hardly make it easier to get on board.

Curse the Son, Delirium (2024)

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