Posted in Features on April 29th, 2020 by JJ Koczan
The statistics of COVID-19 change with every news cycle, and with growing numbers, stay-at-home isolation and a near-universal disruption to society on a global scale, it is ever more important to consider the human aspect of this coronavirus. Amid the sad surrealism of living through social distancing, quarantines and bans on gatherings of groups of any size, creative professionals — artists, musicians, promoters, club owners, techs, producers, and more — are seeing an effect like nothing witnessed in the last century, and as humanity as a whole deals with this calamity, some perspective on who, what, where, when and how we’re all getting through is a needed reminder of why we’re doing so in the first place.
Thus, Days of Rona, in some attempt to help document the state of things as they are now, both so help can be asked for and given where needed, and so that when this is over it can be remembered.
Thanks to all who participate. To read all the Days of Rona coverage, click here. — JJ Koczan
Days of Rona: Rodger Mortis of Cursed Monk Records (Galway, Ireland)
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How are you dealing with this crisis as a label? Have you had to rework plans at all? How is everyone’s health so far?
We’re doing OK. We’ve stopped mailing orders for a few weeks as we are limiting going outside as much as possible. We have made our entire digital catalog free so hopefully this will help folks while away the hours of isolation. We’ve also started up a podcast (The Cursed Cast) which will highlight some of our favourite labels and the excellent acts they put out. So again, hopefully this will help people pass the time. Health-wise, we’re fine. We both came down with a cold the first week, which ramped up the paranoia as we’re both high risk. But thankfully it passed. We also had to postpone our wedding, but that’s small potatoes in the grand scheme of things.
What are the quarantine/isolation rules where you are?
We’re in lockdown at the moment, so you have to stay at home except to buy food, care for vulnerable people, do work deemed essential or briefly exercise within 2km (1.2 miles) of home. When you are out you have to adhere to social distancing. The state has deployed hundreds of extra police on the streets and passed laws to enforce the restrictions – violators can be arrested, fined €2,500 ($2715) and jailed for six months.
How have you seen the virus affecting the community around you and in music?
We live in a small town in the West of Ireland, the community seem to be taking this very seriously which is great. Ireland as a whole seems to be doing its best and giving the situation the gravity it deserves. Plus, comparatively to other countries, it’s not too bad here yet. The Government has taken the proper steps, you can get a test if you need to, and there’s plenty of food on the shelves. I think it’s much scarier for Amanda (Cursed Monk Records co-founder, Rodge’s Fiancee) as her whole family lives in the States.
Music-wise, I can see the community coming together and helping each other through. It’s a beautiful thing. Times are hard, but we will come out the other side.
What is the one thing you want people to know about your situation, either as a label, or personally, or anything?
I want people to take this very seriously. Wash your hands. Give people space if you absolutely have to go out. If you’re wearing protective gloves or homemade masks, please learn how to use them properly. But most of all, if you are not working on the front lines or in essential services, just stay at home. It’s easy. There’s endless entertainment online, in books, around the house, in your own head. Plus, the world is more connected than it has ever been. If you need to talk to someone, jump online or pick up the phone. There’s no excuse.
As for our situation as a label, I want people to know that we are not going anywhere, and we will strive to keep releasing dark musical esoterica from the underground.
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 14th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
‘Italian necro doom,’ huh? Yeah, I’ll check that out. Nocturnal Convocation aren’t quite what I’d expect though when it comes to actually listening. I was thinking standard fog-laced cultistry perhaps with a Paul Chain flourish, but actually hearing “Capitulum II,” it sure sounds a lot like black metal. Enough so that I went back and made sure I had clicked the right link. And looking at the art? Yeah, that kind of looks like it could be black metal. And the whole anonymous-band-unnamed-songs-releasing-on-the-darkest-night-of-the-year thing? Well, that could definitely be black metal too.
I think this one might just be black metal. At least in the one song, if not the full record. I don’t know what might be going on elsewhere with it as yet.
Where does the line draw between one style and another? What is to be gained by transgressing one genre for another? I’m nerdy for these questions, and I know not everyone is, but if you might be, it’s something to think about what you check out the song in the video below. Seems like the band might just be one guy, but whatever/whoever/however many, it’s pretty nasty stuff.
Dig:
Cursed Monk Records are thrilled to announce that we will be releasing Nocturnal Convocation’s debut album “Mors Omnia Solvit.”
This mysterious Italian Necro Doom band has entered a pact with one another to not disclose their photos, nor information about their members, nor even information about the lyrics of their songs. Their ritualistic necro doom speaks for itself.
Mors Omnia Solvit will be released on CD and DD during the Winter Solstice, December 21st, when night is at its longest.
You can check out a video for “Capitulum II” which is the first track to be released from the album, here.
Today is Tuesday, I’m pretty sure, and hey, that’s nifty. I thought yesterday kicked off the Summer 2019 Quarterly Review really well, and any time I get through one of these without my head caving in on itself, I feel like that’s a victory, so yeah. Now we wade even deeper into what will ultimately be a 60-review plunge, with another 10 offerings of various stripes and takes on heavy. Some higher profile stuff in here, which is fine, I guess, but most of it is pretty recent, so if there’s something you haven’t heard yet, I hope you find something you dig, as always.
Quarterly Review #11-20:
Salem’s Bend, Supercluster
This is the sound of a band who’ve figured it out. Salem’s Bend have taken retroist boogie and modern tonalism, production and melody and turned it into something of their own. Supercluster (on Ripple) follows the Los Angeles trio of guitarist/vocalist Bobby Parker, bassist/vocalist Kevin Schofield and drummer Zach Huling‘s 2016 self-titled debut (review here), and with an uptick in the complexity of songwriting overall and particularly in the arrangements of dual-vocals, it is a marked step forward palpable as much in the hook of “Ride the Night” — and if you’re gonna call a song that, you better bring it — as the heavy crash ending “Heavenly Manna” and the languid, lucidly dreaming groove in “Infinite Horizon,” which appears ahead of the acoustic hidden track “Beltaine Chant.” That won’t be the last time these guys unplug, but whether it’s the raw Zeppelin vibe of “Show Me the Witch” or the crunching low-end nod of “Thinking Evil” or the leadoff thrust in “Spaceduster,” the message is clear that Salem’s Bend have arrived.
The latest in Motorpsycho‘s nigh-on-impossible-to-chart and ever-growing discography is The Crucible, issued through Stickman Records, and taking some of the heavy rock push of 2017’s The Tower (review here) and stretching out to more willfully progressive execution across three increasingly extended tracks. Running from shortest to longest, the album begins with “Psychotzar” (8:44) which resolves itself in maddening turns after fleshing through an energetic beginning, and rounds out side A with the 11-minute “Lux Aeterna,” with vocal harmonies and mellotron building into a graceful swell of volume before a headspinner solo and jam take hold, break to near-silence and finish in a burst of directly earliest-King Crimson majesty. This all before the 20:51, side B-consuming title-track crashes in with immediate tension and plays back and forth at releasing that through a course that is rife with melody and an emphasis on the mastery of Motorpsycho over their sound and direction. Onto the list of the year’s best records it goes.
Hypnotic and immersive heavy post-rock and metal becomes the genre tag well enough, but what New York’s Sigils do on their markedly impressive self-recorded, self-released debut album, You Built the Altar, You Lit the Leaves, is more soulful and emotive than “post-” anything generally conveys. With four tracks/38 minutes best taken as a whole, single listening experience, the band offer resonant depths of tone and vocal echoes centered around airy but still weighted guitar and consuming rhythms brought to bear with the patience of an organic Jesu. The ultimate triumph is in the melody and payoff of 13-plus-minute closer “The Wicked, the Cloaked,” which seems to manifest the haunting sensibility that “Samhain” and “Ritual” advocate on side A, but neither will I discount the chug of the prior “Faceless” or the underlying churn in those two leadoff tracks. Especially as a first album, You Built the Altar, You Lit the Leaves casts a sonic identity for itself that is striking and sees the band already beginning to push themselves forward. One hopes they continue to do so.
Following 2015’s Poisoned Altars (review here), subsequent years of touring and a jump from Relapse to eOne Metal, Lord Dying‘s Mysterium Tremendum is enough of a stylistic melting pot that the best thing to do is call it progressive and just let it roll. Comprised of 11 tracks themed around death and the afterlife, the record takes the Portland, Oregon, outfit’s prior death-doom ways and expands them to incorporate an array of styles and melodies, like a vocoder-less Cynic or even Atheist, but more focused on the songs themselves. It’s being widely hailed as one of 2019’s best metal releases, and honestly I can’t speak to that because who the hell knows what “metal” even means, but it sees Lord Dying pull off a major sonic leap and if this is the direction they’re headed from now on, then I guess “metal” is going to be whatever the hell they want. So there. Expect to see a lot of Lord Dying t-shirts around in the years to come.
The core of Sunn O)))‘s sound — that is, the drone-riffed tonality of Greg Anderson and Stephen O’Malley, has proven amorphous enough over the last two decades to either be orchestral, minimalist, impossibly bleak, or now, something brighter. The Steve Albini-recorded Life Metal is one of two purported Sunn O))) releases slated for this year, and it follows behind 2015’s Kannon (review here) in manifesting their project in a new way. It is 68 minutes long, comprised of four tracks — the first, “Between Sleipnir’s Breaths,” is notable for the inclusion of vocals from Hildur Guðnadóttir; the rest is instrumental — and while one wonders how much is the power of suggestion amid their colorful artwork and titular presentation, “life” as opposed to death metal, etc., their resonance throughout “Aurora” (19:07) and “Novae” (25:24) strips away much of the flourish that has engulfed Sunn O))) in their post-maturity years and reminds of the power at their center. They chose the right producer.
With a handful of tracks of dirt-coated Sabbathian doom rock, Crimson Heat make their debut with a self-titled demo/EP in no small part defined by its lack of pretense. I’d buy the tape at the show. You’d buy the tape at the show. The download is free. Clearly this is a band figuring out what they want to do and trying to catch a few ears, but the sound is right on. Notable as well for the participation of Sam Marsh of Sinister Haze, tracks like “At My Door” blend Tee Pee Records-style skate vibes with darker traditionalist crunch, and the subsequent acoustic interlude “Firewood” indeed adds a bit of burning-stove smell to the procession ahead of doomed shuffler finale “Deep Red.” They might be new, but from the nod of “Premonition” and the double-layered guitar of “Fortune Teller,” they very clearly know where they’re coming from. What they do with that from here will tell the tale, but for now, selling the tape at the show isn’t nothing. Guess they better get on pressing some up.
The boogie runs strong in Molior Superum‘s first album in seven years, As Time Slowly Passes By… (on H42 Records), the title of which might just hint at the distance between their two full-lengths. Their debut was Into the Sun (discussed here) in 2012, and they answered that with 2014’s Electric Escapism (review here), but for a band who sound so energized on cuts like “Att Födas Rostig” and “Through Valleys of Wonder,” the time differential from one record to the next is curious. Still, no question the Swedish four-piece make the most of the 36 minutes they present on their sophomore offering, realizing classic vibes and fuzz tones through modern production that recalls the likes of Graveyard, Jeremy Irons and the Ratgang Malibus and even, on “Into the Grey,” Demon Head‘s doomier fare, with an overarching bluesy sensibility that remains exciting even in moments like the hypnotic midsection build of centerpiece “Divinity Blues.” Even the closing soft-guitar title-track has movement. They sound hungry in a way that suggests maybe it won’t be another seven years before a third LP arrives.
Just because Philly is leading the Eastern Seaboard in terms of psychedelic charge, that doesn’t mean there isn’t room for the guttersludge extremity of a unit like Moros. The destructive three-piece’s first full-length, Weapon (on Hidden Deity Records), is vicious in its bite and downright nasty in its groove, abrasive from the static intro “(Vortexwound)” onward through “We Don’t Deserve Death” and “Devil Worshipper,” which recalls slower Napalm Death in its riff but is met with a harsh scream as well as shouts. The brutality continues through “Wizard of Loneliness” and into the outright pummel of “Death Nebula,” such that the locked-in nodder groove in the second half of “Every Day is Worse Than the Last” feels almost like a lifeboat, though there’s little salvation on offer in the closing title-track, which fades out on a noisy note in much the same way it faded in. Filthy, mean and heavy. The crust is real and it is thick.
I was enticed to dig further into Glitter Wizard‘s Opera Villains (on Heavy Psych Sounds) by the recent video for opener “A Spell So Evil” (posted here), and it’s not a choice I regret. The San Fran-based weirdo collective are putting on a show, no doubt, but the quality of their songwriting on “The Toxic Lady” and the punkish underpinning of “Dead Man’s Wax,” etc., puts them in a classic rocking no man’s land in which they absolutely revel. The laser-strewn drama of “March of the Red Cloaks” and the organ- and flute-laced swing of “Hall of the Oyster King” embrace the grandiose in brazen fashion, and thereby make it that much easier for the listener to join them on this wavelength that is so thoroughly their own. Closer “Warm Blood” taps prog-of-old pomposity in its largesse while the earlier “Fear of the Dark” seems to do the same thing with just an acoustic guitar and some vocal harmonies. A record that knew exactly what it wanted to be and then became that thing. Awesome.
Ambient darkness is inflicted with only the cruelest of spirit throughout Gourd‘s Moldering Aberrations EP, the Irish two-piece alternating minimalist spaciousness with gurgling drone intensity, the extremity of which doesn’t so much come through in pummel or drive, but in the swell of volume and its contrast with the emptiness surrounding. Also the growls. Three tracks are offered up like monuments to pain, and through “Befoulment,” “Mycelium” and the title-track, they conjure a heft of atmosphere as much as one of low end, the claustrophobic feeling of their craft coming through even in the relatively peaceful opening of the last song. That peace, of course, isn’t so much moment of respite as it is precursor to the next plunge, and either way, Gourd work in grueling fashion over 23 minutes to dismantle consciousness and expectation with a grim, distortion-fueled chaos from which there seems to be no escape, until the rumble and noise leave “Moldering Aberrations” and there’s just residual hum and a cymbal crash left. Madness.
Posted in Whathaveyou on May 7th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
Once upon a time a couple years ago, I was brought to Dublin by the good care of Sid Daly, who had organized a festival of mostly-but-not-entirely-Irish bands called Emerald Haze. For me, it was a chance not only to go someplace I’d never been — airport aside — but to get an education in the thriving underground there. One of the stages was even named after this site. It was incredible, and I was fortunate to be asked. Long story short, Gourd opened the second night of the fest (review here) and they were devastating. There was plenty of heavy going around that weekend, and it took plenty of forms, but Gourd‘s ultra-malevolent atmospherics reminded me then and still remind me now of Khanate, and that is a comparison I’ll almost never make because it’s a standard to which almost nobody can live up to.
Cursed Monk Records — based in Galway — has the release on May 30 for Gourd‘s Moldering Aberrations, and you can stream the video for the title-track at the bottom of this post. Do that, but take a breath first.
From the PR wire:
GOURD – Moldering Aberrations EP
On the 30th of May Cursed Monk Records will be releasing GOURD’s new EP ‘Moldering Aberrations’ on Limited edition CD, and Digital (CMR013)
GOURD is an Irish two member band that started in the summer of 2014. The band is made up of Ray (Wreck of the Hesperus, Beneath the Sod) and Hick (On Pain of Death, Coscradh). Ray plays drums and creates noise as well as visuals and videos. Hick does vocals, plays guitar and builds extra walls of gritty, cacophonous noise. GOURD attempts to write filthy, twisted songs with extras layers of rotten madness and wonky weirdness to make the music a deeply unsettling experience.
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 8th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
Belgian instrumentalist post-metal trio Oldd Wvrms will release their new album, Codex Tenebris, this month through Cursed Monk Records and Fear of Gun, with the former handling the CD and the latter the tape version. The band are currently streaming a video for the opening track, “Ténèbres” that’s 10 minutes of cerebral atmospheric plunder set to manipulated silent film footage. I’m going to go ahead and assume that not all five tracks on the record are 10 minutes long, but even if they are, Oldd Wvrms would seem to have the stylistic reach — and creative spelling! — to accommodate fickle attention spans. I don’t know the exact release date, because there are all kinds of things I don’t know and that’s just one of them, but I have no reason to think anyone’s lying when they say end of this month. Would be kind of a silly thing to lie about.
Info and narrative came down the PR wire like so:
Oldd Wvrms’s new offering – Codex Tenebris
“Fear is the price for imagination”: these words can describe the descent into the depths of this overwhelming instrumental landscape, drawing his inspiration from all things obscure…
Feel the serpent crawl upon your flesh and embrace the haunting emptiness within.
ØW is a triple entity, officiating in an occult register, blending Sludge/Doom/Black and Post-Metal, including drones for an hypnotic and intoxicating result.
Working live with « A Thousand Lost Civilizations » for video projections and lightshow. Video for the first song “Ténèbres” out now.
To be released through Cursed Monk Records for the CD version and Fear of Gun for the cassette edition around end of January…
Album tracklist : Ténèbres A l’or, aux ombres et aux abîmes Misère & Corde La vallée des tombes Fléau est son âme
Oldd Wvrms is: Cho : Drums Oli : Bass Ben : Guitar
[Click play above to stream the premiere of ‘The Horrendous Abyss’ from Shallow Grave’s Threshold Between Worlds. Album is out Oct. 31 on Sludgelord Records, Cursed Monk Records, Black Voodoo Records and Minor Label.]
All that happens in the first 30 seconds of Shallow Grave‘s second album, Threshold Between Worlds, is a fade-in of an introductory riff, and yet even that seems crushing. The Auckland four-piece made 55-minute their self-titled debut (review here) in 2013 via Astral Projection, and while they’ve trimmed the runtime down to an LP-ready 38 minutes for four songs, the sense of impact remains a major concern. Mostly, I’d think, for seismologists. It is not long after that fade-in that Shallow Grave begin the 10-minute “The Horrendous Abyss” in earnest, with a buzzsaw tone worthy of namedrops like Beast in the Field and Swarm of the Lotus from guitarists Tim Leth (also vocals) and Mike Rothwell, furious low end distortion from bassist Brent Bidlake and an almost noise-rocking rhythm from drummer James Bakker, who succeeds in pushing deeper into “The Horrendous Abyss” while cutting through the mire with a snare that seems to hit with no less of a thud than the toms.
Largesse is the order of business, and business is lethal, but in “The Horrendous Abyss” and onward through “Garden of Blood” (9:41) and side B’s “Master of Cruel” (13:11) and “Threshold Between Worlds” (5:31), the band craft an atmosphere of chaotic churn, marked by vicious noise and, for all the madness unfolding, a feeling that the worst violence is still being held back. To wit, “The Horrendous Abyss,” in its eighth minute, pulls back to minimalist guitar notes, but even these are backed with windy drones, giving all the more a feeling of being alone somewhere in the wild. Presumably, we’ve arrived at the titular locale. That’s actually how the track ends, fading out to let the faster start of “Garden of Blood” come on to stomp itself between the line of sludge and brutalist noise. An angularity of rhythm emerges, and Leth‘s largely indecipherable vocals call to mind Tomas Lindberg in their rasp, but the primary impression thanks to a consistency of tone is still one of lumber, and Shallow Grave take due time to revel in it.
And who would argue? The foreboding is palpable early in “Garden of Blood,” as it was throughout “The Horrendous Abyss,” and before it hits the 2:30 mark, “Garden of Blood” slows its pace to a crawl and lurches-out for the next minute, growing an increasing wash of noise as its march leads toward an inevitable decay, drums cutting out just prior to four minutes in and the volume receding to let an airy guitar take hold momentarily before a momentum of riff picks up — exactly the source of the two band-comparisons above, neither of which one is inclined to make lightly — and shoves forward through the next several minutes, once again increasing in wash before the vocals return, caked in echo and even less human/humane for that. It may not be a horrendous abyss, as the first song was, but neither is it a relaxing beach-day getaway.
Instead, it is an apex of pummel that reveals the second movement in “Garden of Blood” for the linear build it’s been all along, cleverly concealed by the surrounding onslaught. The last two minutes of “Garden of Blood” are given to a noisy, mechanical-seeming drone that fades out to conclude side A and prepare the ground for “Master of Cruel,” which in effect is the closing argument Shallow Grave will make here. A swell of low distortion provides a bed for the drums to come forward in the mix — bit of a role reversal there, since it’s been the drums anchoring the proceedings all along throughout “The Horrendous Abyss” and “Garden of Blood” — before an impressive and extended scream from Leth brings with it a surge of guitar.
By the time they’re past three minutes deep, the drums are gone entirely, and is the guitar, as they recede completely to a drone as the foundation for a line of standalone guitar soon enough met with cymbal wash. Just when you might think you have them figured out and that they’re starting another forward build in the vein of the preceding cut, instead of making their way through with deceptive patience, they thrust ahead all at once into a huge-sounding plod, brutally delivered before evening out to a steady hi-hat-punctuated roll. They are not yet, it’s worth noting, at the midpoint of “Master of Cruel,” the title of which would seem to betray its ambitions.
That steadying transition leads to a push-pull nod that will consume much of the second half of the track, as the vocals show up amid a proceeding decrease in tempo and increase in noise. By the time they’re 11 minutes deep, the direction is set and telegraphed to the listener: once more into the morass. Undulations of harsh frequencies mark the noisy finish, less about feedback directly than one might think, but still working on another long fade into a drone that shifts directly into the shorter closing title-track, which executes a tonal deathblow in a midsection surrounded on either side by noise. The effectiveness of those elements isn’t to be understated. Drones in the transitions, long fades, etc. — these are the things that help craft the atmosphere that winds up playing such a significant role in the effect of Threshold Between Worlds on the listener.
I won’t take away from the force of their delivery or the intensity of their heaviest moments — how could I? — but it’s the ambient factors that let Shallow Grave‘s sophomore release become more than just a very heavy sludge record and really begin to find its own personality in terms of style. And that personality may be psychopathic, but that still counts. With a half-decade between their debut and Threshold Between Worlds, it doesn’t seem fair to anticipate a follow-up anytime soon from Shallow Grave, but when/if it does happen that they put out a third release, one might expect them to continue to toy with this balance, as it seems so crucial to their purposes overall. At the same time, to think at all of Threshold Between Worlds, it feels less safe making predictions of any sort for what might come. Other than darkness, which most certainly is lurking on the horizon for all.
Posted in Whathaveyou on August 10th, 2018 by JJ Koczan
Late last year, San Antonio doom rockers Burn Ritualsigned to Cursed Monk Records on the heels of their successful debut EP, Like Suffering. That two-songer, released on limited tapes (gone) and CDs (gone and back), showcased a weighted tonality and flourish of classic Sabbathian melody, and the two songs currently streaming from their upcoming full-length, Blood of the Raven, would seem to follow suit. Play your cards right — i.e., look at the bottom of this post — and you can hear “The Mirror” and the album’s title-track now, and they’re both a clarion to the converted, calling to worship. Preorders are up for the album now through Cursed Monk ahead of the official release date, which is Oct. 1.
The PR wire put it like this:
Cursed Monk Records are thrilled to announce that pre-orders are now open for Burn Ritual’s highly anticipated debut album Blood of the Raven
Blood of the Raven will be released October 1st on CD and Digital Download via the Cursed Monk Records Bandcamp. Each preorder comes with the immediate download of the first two tracks from the album, plus a free woven Burn Ritual patch for the first number of orders, although patches are limited. Preorders can be made directly from our Bandcamp.
Based out of San Antonio, TX, Burn Ritual brew their own brand of heavy riffs, bluesy hazy vocals, and massive hypnotic fuzzed out tones. The band combine their love for traditional doom and stoner rock bands with modern elements making it a unique but familiar journey for the listener. Originally the brainchild of vocalist/guitarist Jake Lewis, who performed and recorded on most of the band’s positively received debut EP Like Suffering. The one man project soon paved way for the necessity for a full band of musicians to bring the songs to the stage the way they were meant to be heard. Now a full four piece band, Burn Ritual has shared the stage with bands such as The Lucid Furs, Black Pussy, and Goya.
The Black Sabbathian foursome has really cemented their sound with Blood of the Raven. And what they have delivered is an album full of monster hooks and gargantuan riffs drenched in a fuzzy psychedelic haze. A must have for every fan of the genre.
Let the burn ritual commence.
Burn Ritual is: Jake Lewis – vocals, lead guitar, keys Brent Standifer- drums Richard Perez – guitar Chris Trezona – bass
Posted in Bootleg Theater on October 23rd, 2017 by JJ Koczan
Irish sludge nasties Weed Priest issue their four-song full-length, Consummate Darkness, on Halloween via Cursed Monk Records. There is a moment toward the chug-mad ending of album opener “Witch’s Curse” that, somehow fittingly to the title, conveys a sense of the genuinely unhinged. I don’t know if the idea was that, as his own guitar and that of Sean “The Tormentor” Sullivan and the bass of Ragas Iscariot devolve into crackling amp noise, the vocals of Adam Diavol — points all around on the names, guys; lest we forget Micheál Dúlachán on drums — shift from the lower-register extreme growing to a higher-pitched cackle. Is this the witch in “Witch’s Curse” speaking directly to the listener? I don’t know, but it sounds utterly fucked, and I’m pretty sure that’s the point. Point taken.
Weed Priest issued their thick-rolling self-titled debut long-player (review here) in 2013 and brought with their volume worship a sense of grim-hued ritualizing. Consummate Darkness feels more about rawer scathe. Set up across two vinyl sides on which a shorter track leads into a longer one — “Witch’s Curse” (8:04) into “Vampyr” (10:33) on side A; “SkyDaddy” (6:36) into “The Mass” (14:29) on side B — the record isn’t without a sense of structure, but as the horror sample leads to the plodding, post-Electric Wizard launch of “Vampyr,” Weed Priest find themselves engaging a grittier form of extremity, less outwardly crushing and more about the overarching filth conjured through the riffs and the rhythmic nod, the theme taking shape really in “Vampyr” and finding catchier foothold in the speedier “SkyDaddy” before “The Mass” brings about a last push into rumbling oblivion, grueling and mirroring the viciousness of “Witch’s Curse” early while finding spaciousness later in its extended solo section.
Brutal? Why yes it fucking is. That would seem to be the point. One can hear a dynamic shift between the more “rock”-based songcraft of “SkyDaddy” and “The Mass,” certainly, but Weed Priest are far less about showing off their range than they are about bludgeoning their audience with it, and that suits them. “The Mass” ends Consummate Darkness on a long-fading drum march and the funereal vibe is noteworthy; a dirge undertaken with a relished sense of dismemberment, flayed skin and any number of other medieval cruelties having been brought to bear through volume and tempo-be-damned sonic terror.
Today I have the pleasure of hosting the video premiere for “Vampyr” from Consummate Darkness, which can be preordered now via the links below. Please find it on the player here, followed by more info from the PR wire, and if you think your personal constitution is up to it, enjoy.
Here we go:
Weed Priest, “Vampyr” official video premiere
Weed Priest’s second much anticipated full length album “Consummate Darkness” is coming out on Samhain (31th of October) 2017 as vinyl, cd and digital via Cursed Monk Records.
“Lo and behold! From the depths of the smoke filled dungeons, from the tops of the mountains of madness, the priest is coming back with the new opus. Four hymns depicting the unholy ceremonies of union with darkness, four sermons of crawling doom, four spits into the face of conformity and meekness.”
Adam (guitar, vocals), Ragas (bass) and Adrian (drums) were brought together by the love of classic Black Sabbath sound, seventies psychedelic rock, doom/sludge metal and their interest in occultism in 2009. In 2011 Weed Priest released a well received demo CD. A grandiose debut self-titled full length album came out in 2013 and is now sold out. It was followed by “Worship” EP (2014). In 2014 the drum throne was taken over by Michael. Second guitar player Sean also joined. Two split releases followed: split single with Northern Irish doom brothers Astralnaut (February 2015) and split EP with Italian doomsters Black Capricorn (September 2016).
WEED PRIEST: Adam Diavol – lead guitar/vox Ragas Iscariot – bass San “Balor” Sullivan – guitar Micheál Dúlachán – drums
