First, a note about math. Copenhagen mellowpsych instrumentalists Papir were last heard from with 2022’s 7 (review here), which, intuitively, was put forth as their seventh album. Three years later, here come the seven songs and 75 minutes of IX. What happened to VIII? Did I miss an eighth Papir record? Now, before 7, in 2021, the trio released the 2LP collection Jams (review here), which very much was what it purported to be: jams.

But if they were going to count that instead of a numbered release, wouldn’t the bump have been before 7? So that would’ve been 8 or VIII or however they decided to write it? Or, alternatively, maybe there’s a lost Papir record. Maybe VIII exists on a hard drive somewhere. Maybe they skipped it out of some Danish superstition I don’t know. Maybe it got lost on the way to mastering and they’re so creative they decided to make a whole new record instead of just resending files.

I don’t know.

And does it matter when you’re dug into the pastoralist sprawl in “IX.IIII” (9:34), after Christoffer Brøchmann Christensen drums drop out (they come back, cymbals and light hits, don’t worry) when it’s just guitarist Nicklas Sørensen and bassist Christian Becher Clausen out there searching? No, to be sure, it doesn’t matter in the slightest. Papir could call their curiously-named eighth full-length anything else and it would still sound as sweet. The wash that’s created in opener “IX.I” (9:23) and the subtle, spacey movement in “IX.II” (10:33) that gives over later to more drift — name the record whatever, they remain. Papir have always been about exploration in a space, whether that’s a live setting, a studio, presumably a rehearsal room, etc. Their sound feels out the boundaries of the walls, bounces here and there, and coming through headphones, modern psychedelia holds few delights as comforting as having that beamed directly into your head. There’s sooth and surf in “IX.III” (10:06), and it comes through gorgeously with the organic tones, effects flourish, and patient delivery that have become staple elements of Papir‘s approach over the last 15 years.

A nuanced conversation between the guitar and bass in “IX.III” as the second half plays out sounds more structured than improvised, but IX wouldn’t be the first instance of Papir toying with the lines between making it up on the spot and composing. I’m not sure if it’s lap steel or an effect, but “IX.III” gives itself over to sentimentality in its later reaches, giving over to “IX.IIII” as the jazzier centerpiece with additional percussion, shakers and such, for extra motor-conveyance, some genuine Earthless-style solo shred in the first half and the aforementioned blissery in the second. That lead is abut as energetic as Papir get on the album, though 21-minute finale “IX.IIIIIII” (hey, I don’t name ’em, I just make run-on sentences about ’em) has its bursts as well as one might expect. One doesn’t generally think of Papir as trying to be heavy for heaviness’ sake, as they’ve never needed that to bring a sense of presence to their material, but their dynamic has grown broader, and especially on an offering that has so much palpable space, so much room in the sound, to hear them fill it in such a manner is thrilling, even just for a time.

Actually, I’ll say especially just for a time, because the truth is that Papir wouldn’t be half as immersive or comforting as they are if they were just unipolar in going all-in. They’ve learned in their years to follow where their whims take them, and the result is a vast and expansive sound, brought into emphasis as “IX.IIIII” (5:20) takes hold following the residual echo of the song before, fading in with a welcoming swirl of, I don’t know, magic? Did I just beat a dungeon boss? Maybe. Sørensen‘s guitar dares a strum and some notes, and every single one of them sends out ripples as on water through the background of shimmering, sun-reflecting drone. “IX.IIIII” is the shortest inclusion on IX, and fair enough to call it an interlude, but the later low frequency — could be bass, could be cello or keys — stands out all the more for the focused backdrop, and the song ends fluidly to move into the penultimate “IX.IIIIII” (8:47).

“IX.IIIIII” almost can’t help but feel more active, what with drums and bass and all. Clausen reminds that there’s serenity to be found in the low end too, and while the guitar floats overhead in a kind of following-along meander, and the drums provide emphasis and punctuation to the procession as it unfolds, it’s the bass at the center of the track and it’s one more dynamic turn ahead of the extended closer “IX.IIIIIII” to come, which invariably would do well in capturing much of the album’s scope considering unless it was going to make some kind of dramatic shift, which, I mean, it’s a universe of infinite possibility, but Papir do an awful lot of work to establish the atmosphere on IX, and they’re veterans at this point enough to know whether something is going to fit. Bigger though it is, “IX.IIIIIII” still very much fits here.

Admittedly, I’m writing from the perspective of someone for whom Papir are a known quantity, though surely if it’s your first encounter with the band — not gatekeeping or criticizing; they’ve been around for a minute but nobody expects you to hear everything; yes I’m half talking to myself there — they’ll come across as no less welcoming. The difference between IX and some of what they’ve done in the past is that the exploration in this material feels like it already knows where it is and it is where it wants to be. That is to say, in their maturity, Papir aren’t necessarily concerning themselves overmuch with where their flights take them, the point is going, and the way they go is by enacting the chemistry one can hear rampant throughout IX. If there’s escapism to hear, as there often is in something so evocative and pastoral, for the band the escape seems to be in the process of playing and creating itself, rather than something specifically evoked by the music.

This means their command is absolute — it’s not a leap at this point to say, wherever VIII went, that Papir are masters at what they do, and that’s not an opinion I form lightly — and while they obviously delight in sometimes just hitting record and seeing where they end up in a jam, going hard or not, that too is a conscious decision made on the part of the band, whose passion and revelry, even at the most subdued stretches, is carried across with vibrant resonance.

Papir, IX (2025)

Papir on Bandcamp

Papir on Instagram

Papir on Facebook

Stickman Records website

Stickman Records on Bandcamp

Stickman Records on Facebook

Day two. Normally this is time for hubristic gibberish about how easy the QR will be, the overconfidence of one whose trees rarely appear as forests. But we persist anyhow, and today looks pretty good from where I’m sitting now, so despite the ‘Day 2 on a Monday’ weirdness, which I’m pretty sure makes no one other than myself even raise an eyebrow, things are rolling and one hopes will continue to be fluid. I wouldn’t say Day 1 came together easily, since it took me like two and a half days to get done, but neither was out unpleasant. Hoping for more of the same here, plus efficiency.

Quarterly Review #11-20:

Queens of the Stone Age, Alive in the Catacombs

Something of an identity crisis in Queens of the Stone Age perhaps that sees the long-running highest commercial export of desert rock shift from the cloying pop of their last two albums to a comparatively stripped down live recording in — you guessed it — catacombs, where apparently the acoustics are pretty sweet. Anybody remember when Tenacious D went into ‘the cave’ on the Tribute EP? No? Didn’t think so. Frontman Josh Homme, who carries the minimal arrangements on vocals largely with ease, and his ever-ace band filmed the whole thing; it’s all sepia, all very artsy, and they do “Kalopsia” and dip back 20 years to finish with “I Never Came” after “Suture Up Your Future,” which is the second inclusion by then from 2007’s Era Vulgaris. All told it’s five songs and 27 minutes, and whether you hear it as a cringe hyperindulgence of unaware self-parody or as an expression of human artistry in organic form surrounded by memento mori probably depends on how deep you run with the band. But they’re not hurting anybody either way.

Queens of the Stone Age website

Matador Records website

—

Breath, Brahman

Between recording and then remixing/remastering their 2021 debut Primeval Transmissions (review here) and signing to Argonauta Records, Portland meditative duo Breath, comprised of Ian Caton and Steven O’Kelly, expanded the lineup with Lauren Hatch on keys and their second album, Brahman, brings Rob Wrong (Witch Mountain) into the fold on guitar as well as helming the recording. The sense across the eight songs/42 minutes is still of exploring the reaches of consciousness, very post-Om in the foundational basslines and dry vocals, but having Wrong rip out a solo in each break of “Awen” sure doesn’t hurt, and hearing the full band come together around the culmination of “Hy-Brasil,” keys, guitar, bass, drums all-in tonally, is emblematic of their expanding horizons. As for those, “Sages” pushes toward its own vision of psych rock in conversation with the opener, and “Cedars of Lebanon” demonstrates malleability and balance that one hopes portend more to come as the band continues to grow and gel.

Breath Linktr.ee

Argonauta Records website

—

Johan Langquist The Castle, Johan Langquist The Castle

Kind of an awkward moniker grammatically for the solo-band fronted by original/once-again/maybe-erstwhile Candlemass vocalist Johan Langquist. Is it possessive? Is he The Castle? I don’t quite understand, but from the operatic complement of Emelie Lindquist‘s backing vocals on opener “Eye of Death” through the litany of compiled singles Johan Langquist The Castle dropped over the course of 2024, there’s no mistaking the classic nature of the doom. “Castle of My Dreams” flows keyboardier on balance, while “Where Are the Heroes” gives riffers shelter in its chug, while “Raw Energy” and “Revolution” toy with the balance between the two sides, with “Freedom” as a classic-metal epic and “Bird of Sadness” as the comedown epilogue. Langquist, absent decades between fronting the first Candlemass LP in 1986 and rejoining the band circa 2011, would seem to be making up for lost time, and the ideas he’s exploring here warrant the investigation. I’m curious where this leads, which I think I’m supposed to be, so right on.

Johan Langquist The Castle on Instagram

I Hate Records website

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Maliciouz, Tortoise

From Joshua Tree, California, Maliciouz is the solo-outfit of Michael Muckow, who handles guitar, bass and drums for the molasses-thick instrumentalist proceedings. Tortoise arrives beating you over the head with its tone and metaphor alike; eight songs and 58 minutes of lumbering density wrought with dug-in purpose, harnessing heaviness-of-place as riffs and often melancholic drone metal crash. It’s an art project, but without pretense of being anything other than it is, and Muckow — who makes a point of noting his age (67) in the press material — composes for flow and immersion as each slow march gives way to the next, culminating in the semi-acoustic “The End,” which is no less on-the-nose than calling the album Tortoise to start with. No grand reflections, no sweeping statement. Tortoise lets the riffs do the talking and they say plenty about the grit and expanse Muckow is trying to conjure. Be careful out there. He makes it easy to get lost.

Maliciouz on Bandcamp

Maliciouz on Instagram

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Steve Von Till, Alone in a World of Wounds

The former co-guitarist/vocalist of Neurosis has come a long way since his guy-and-guitar beginnings as a solo artist, and Alone in a World of Wounds reaps the textural fruit of Steve Von Till‘s willful artistic progression in a piece like the leadoff “The Corpse Road” or “Distance,” which caps side A fluidly with the only use of drums on the record, reminiscent of The Keening‘s awareness of sonic weight and atmospheric sidestep. The cello, synth and field recordings build out what would be minimalist arrangements without them and remain early-morning quiet, the piano on the spoken-word-topped “The Dawning of the Day (Insomnia)” and flirtations with lushness on “Horizons Undone” softly shaping the album’s world with the electronics of “Old Bent Pine” ahead of the guitar-based “River of No Return,” which closes with what feels like an updated take on Von Till‘s earlier woodsfolk craft, reminding that ‘heavy’ is just as much existential as it is aural.

Steve Von Till website

Neurot Recordings store

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Mrs Frighthouse, Solitude Over Control

Solitude Over Control is as much a confrontation as an album, and that’s very clearly the intention behind Glasgow’s Mrs Frighthouse for their Lay Bare-issued debut LP, Solitude Over Control. Its 11 songs foster a bleak gamut of industrial sounds, portraying dark and inflicted sexual violence as part of the band’s expression. Slaying rapists, then, and fair enough. Intertwining layers of vocals and experimentalist pieces like “Seagulls (Part 1)” give an avant-garde air to the crush of “DIY Exorcism” and the lurching, abrasive finish of “White Plaster Roses,” soprano vocals and electronic noise externalizing the unsettled in a way that can only really be thought of as ‘extreme’ in a musical sense. “My body has never been mine,” confess the lyrics of “Our Culture Without Autonomy” with horror-style keyboard behind them; there’s a show being put on here, but it’s visceral just the same, and the later “My Body is a Crime Scene” turns the accusation direct: “My body is a crime scene/He did this to me/My body is a crime scene/You did this to me” in a moment that lands powerfully unless you’re a fucking sociopath.

Mrs Frighthouse Linktr.ee

Lay Bare Recordings website

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Droid & I Am Low, Eroded Forms/Inertia

A joint release between Majestic Mountain and Copper Feast Records, Eroded Forms/Inertia presents as a double-EP split release between Melbourne, Australia, melodic heavy post-metallic rockers Droid, who dare toward aggression on “Reverence” and the sludgier shouts of “Ruin” after leading off with “Khaki” without giving away the plot such that the blastbeats of “Resonance” still hit as a surprise, and Sweden’s I Am Low, who answer the fullness of tone with careening on “Sweet M16” before the grunge melody of “Greed” makes that song a highlight, “Waves” flows with less emotional baggage and a subtle hook, and “Inertia” wraps as a landing point with duly vibrant crash. Grunge and a hairy kind of fuzz are shared between the bands, but each has their own purpose. I don’t know if it’s a release of convenience to make it a split, but it makes for an engaging showcase, and if you’ve never come across either of them, the best arguments for digging in are right there in the songs.

Droid Linktr.ee

I Am Low on Bandcamp

Copper Feast Records website

Majestic Mountain Records store

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Tar Pit, Scrying the Angel Gate

Portland five-piece doomly flamekeepers Tar Pit begin their second full-length (on Transylvanian) with the 10-minute three-parter “Dagon, Dark Lord Dwelling Beneath,” the longest inclusion (immediate points) at 10:15 and bookended with the title-cut at the record’s end. Between, from the more rocking aspects of “Coven Vespers” to the downtrodden roll of “Blessed King of Longing,” the five-piece remind of doom at the turn of the century, when ‘traditionalism’ in doom metal was something of a defiance against modernity instead of an aesthetic unto itself. More than 20 years, The Gates of Slumber, Reverend Bizarre, and what was then the Church of True Doom would seem to have evolved into Tar Pit‘s Eldritch Doom Syndicate, and that’s nothing to complain about as “Blue Light Cemetery” accounts for Candlemass and Cathedral after the dim-blues of “Jubilee” secures the band’s place in the heavy morose. If you were just getting into doom, this kind of thing might make you want to start a band, and yes, that’s a compliment.

Tar Pit website

Transylvanian Recordings on Bandcamp

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GRGL, Horror-Bloated Ouroboros

Dirt-coated riffing leads the way on GRGL‘s Horror-Bloated Ouroboros six-song EP, as Jake‘s guitar, Hal‘s bass and Nick‘s drumming in the first-names-only Salt Lake City trio align around a chug in the opening “Horror-Bloated Ouroboros (An Overview),” that, despite the dry-throated barks that top it, remains among the more accessible moments of the churning sludge-doom outfit’s 23-minute outing. To wit, “Born Again” and the even more gurgley (hey wait a minute!) “My Skeleton” takes roughly the same elemental formula and slows it the frick down, thereby becoming immediately more tortured. The overarching impression is unipolar — raw, heavy, miserable — and the vocals are part of that, but the dynamic between those first two songs is answered for in the uptick of pace that arrives with “My Pie Hole” and the angularity of the shorter instrumental “Absorption/Secretion,” while the plodding reprise “Born Again (Again)” closes so as to make sure everybody ultimately gets where they need to be, i.e., hammered into the ground. Eat dust shit sludge. Hard to get away from thinking of this as the true sound of our times. Maybe it’s the title.

GRGL on Bandcamp

GRGL on Instagram

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Grusom, III

It’s a clear and classic style across Grusom‘s aptly-titled third album, III, which arrives some seven years after they were last heard from with 2018’s II (review here), the band who’ve become a low-key staple of the Kozmik Artifactz roster demonstrating in no uncertain terms what’s gotten them there. Vintage-heavy heads will find plenty to dig in the organ-laced flow of “Shadow Crawler,” “Hell Maker,” the later “Fatal Romance” and the more open finale “Mortal Desire,” and while “Le Voyage” has many of the same aspects at work, it shows the Danish six-piece as flexible enough in their approach to convey a range of emotions, ditto the wistful Graveyard-y “Memories” and the interlude “Euphoria,” making sure that among the places III might take a given listener, there’s nothing to remove them from the procession carried along by the band.

Grusom website

Kozmik Artifactz store

—

The fourth installment in a trilogy? When Edena Gardens came along, the instrumentalist jam-psych trio comprised of Causa Sui drummer Jakob Skøtt, Papir guitarist Nicklas Sørensen, and Martin Rude of the London Odense Ensemble — all acts within the sphere of Causa Sui‘s El Paraiso Records, which has of course released the albums — the word was that the project intended to release a trilogy of improv-based offerings, and that’s exactly what happened. Dispossessed, the fourth Edena Gardens full-length, was then not part of the original plan. This is the hazard of things working out when players get together to jam. All of a sudden, oops, it’s another record. That was reportedly the situation earlier this year when the band assembled at Jonas Munk‘s studio.

As with past studio outings — late 2023’s Dens (review here), earlier ’23’s Agar (review here) and 2022’s self-titled debut (review here), quietly half-renamed Eden retrospectively so that the three spell out the name of the band, as if to say, “these are who we are” — the methodology is still rooted in live performance. Edena Gardens did do a live record as well, Live Momentum (review here), during the 2023 that might turn out to be project’s busiest year, but it’s the live-in-studio aspect that typifies the work. Edena Gardens has never been about being loud, or being heavy, or riffs riffs riffs, or even an effects-laced wash of noise. None of that. The material across Dispossessed, with songs like “Cantor Dew,” “Heim” and the 10-minute dream-drifter-droner finale “Aftenstjerne,” is telling the story of its own creation as it happened.

Well, mostly. The eight songs and 47 minutes of Dispossessed — a more foreboding title perhaps for more foreboding times; note the gulls on the cover; are they migrating? fleeing? — were tracked live, including anything that wound up as overdubs, as Skøtt worked with what he had to tie the pieces together. I won’t call the process seamless, because it’s not that and it’s not intended to be, but as opener “Hiraeth” sees the three-piece align around crashes and then draw concentric instrumental circles between, the chemistry is what most comes through. It is comfort at its foundation — the awareness of the three players of each other in space and the seeming ease of the musical conversation between them — and nobody here was a stranger when the band started, let alone the development of the project over the three records prior, so that’s no surprise.

But they’re in their element in the meditative repetitions of “Hiraeth,” even if the initial crashes are somewhat jarring in their heft compared to what the band did on Eden-Agar-Dens, and improvisation remains the priority. Second cut “Fills the Well” bumbles charmingly through its five minutes with a pastoral post-grunge sway, lightly immersive, and sees Sørensen leading on guitar in a way that handily coincides with the growth narrative. They’re dug in, to be sure, but as they have up to this point, Edena Gardens leave room for the listener in the spaciousness of the material, and the guitar-driven evocations continue on “Cantor Dew,” sweet in tone and classic in its flow, and the A-side capper “Vanishing Point” provides due culmination in its sprawl of low frequencies and the cirrus wisps of guitar floating above them.

A steady building rumble across “Vanishing Point” gives it extra weight-in-sound, but the abiding feel is still peaceful if not serene or calm. Audio therapy. A salve. “Vanishing Point” reaches up and lets go right around six minutes in, and with Rude‘s bassline urging subtle movement, the song’s final section resonates internal more than external. The bass underscores side B opener “Light in August” as well, picking up from the fluidity of the drum progression early and carrying the second half of the track to its finish and into the also-four-minute “Heim,” which in combination with “Light in August” is about as straightforward as Edena Gardens have ever been. “Heim” follows a linear trajectory and is slow in the tempo but welcoming and unpretentious in its drawing the listener deeper, which makes it well placed ahead of “Dispossessed” and “Aftenstjerne,” which perhaps represent the ‘going’ and the ‘gone’ implied by the album’s title.

Dispossession of what, whether material, existential, emotional, I don’t know, but if you want to dare to look around the world right now you’ll see a lot of all of it, so it’s a relevant notion regardless of the specific purpose behind it. The song, “Dispossessed,” has more reach than “Heim” or “Light in August.” It’s consistent enough in mood not to be out of place, but the steady roll of drums and just an edge of urgency mark a shift to the ending section of the record. After the three-minute mark, the course they’re following becomes more lush, and brighter in the guitar, and as it moves through a sort of inadvertent payoff, they’re the heaviest they’ve been since “Hiraeth,” which makes for a fitting bookend to the first seven tracks, and lets “Aftenstjerne” stand more on its own, which it does anyway, starting from silence, waking up, and finding its own path across Dispossessed‘s longest runtime.

That’s not to say the shift into it is disjointed. Once you’re in it, there’s nothing throughout Dispossessed that’s likely to pull you from its ambience, and “Aftenstjerne” isn’t out of place in being the most ready example of that. Rather, it encapsulates the procession before it and reshapes the movement to its own course. That is, soft psychedelic guitar, backmasking, drones, drums far off in the distance and a gradual change to a more solid form as the instruments come forward across the span are all part of Edena Gardens‘ pastiche before the closer, but if you ever find yourself in need of a handy summary for the appeal of this project, “Aftenstjerne” awaits. By extension, I guess it all does. They’re not keeping it secret, in any case.

Unexpected but not unwelcome, Dispossessed brings further complexity and growth to the story of Edena Gardens. And if you want to know what might’ve motivated the three-piece to come together again and make another album, listen to the songs. Creation is the reason, beauty is the result. Art making your life better if you let it. Most of all, Dispossessed puts light to the fact that there’s no reason Rude, Sørensen and Skøtt had to cut short the communion they’d discovered, and there’s no reason Edena Gardens can’t continue into years-to-come perpetuity. It’s not like they’re going to run out of infinity to explore.

Edena Gardens, “Fills the Well”

Edena Gardens on Instagram

Edena Gardens on Facebook

El Paraiso Records website

El Paraiso Records on Instagram

El Paraiso Records on Facebook

Danish groovemovers Bogwife announce their third full-length, From Ashes, will be released Nov. 7 through Majestic Mountain Records. The follow-up to 2021’s A Passage Divine (review here) introduces itself to listeners with “Shivering,” a five-minute jaunt through a warm, riffly aural pudding that just happens to be premiering on the player below.

Really, it’s right there. You could just push play.

This is somebody’s album announcement, so one is automatically hesitant to go slathering it with opinions — it’s not what I think about the thing; it’s that the thing exists; and not to mention I haven’t heard the whole record yet — but if you make your way through “Shivering,” you might find yourself around minute four wondering just how you got there. What happens is the lyrics finish early and the first half of the song is brought neatly to a finish, and from there Bogwife go on a multi-stage instrumental excursion that’s too grounded to really call psych in the drippy, ‘now’ sense, but for sure manifests the immersive feel you’ll see the PR wire note in the blue text below.

But first, the song. If you do get lost in “Shivering” and find yourself snapped back to reality by the clarion of the track’s later solo-fueled crescendo — not overblown; classy and balanced, like preceding — which gives hints of heavyprog without dropping the underlying Sabbath-circa-’74 bounce, don’t worry too much about it. The good news is you can go back to the start and listen again. That’s kind of the whole idea, in fact. The song releases to streaming services on Friday.

Enjoy:

Bogwife, “Shivering” lyric video premiere

BOGWIFE: From Ashes – Danish Doom Blues Quartet Return with New Album | Listen to ‘SHIVERING’ now!

Returning with their third album, step into the folkloric world of Scandi stoner psychedelia with the Danish doom blues giants…

From Ashes is the new album from Bogwife and will be released 7th November 2025 on Majestic Mountain Records

Watch the new video for ‘Shivering’ exclusively here

Re-emerging after four years in the wilderness from the murky depths of Scandinavian folklore and the heavy underground of Aalborg, Denmark, Bogwife is a psychedelic stoner/doom blues band known for their crushing riffs, thunderous drums, and immersive, hypnotic soundscapes.

This November will see the official release of their third studio album, From Ashes, and will see them teaming up once more with revered Swedish label Majestic Mountain Records.

Taking their name from a mythological creature said to haunt the swamps of Northern Europe, Bogwife channels that eerie, natural mysticism into their music, crafting atmospheres that are as dark and murky as they are transcendent and cosmic. Conjuring sounds that draw from a legacy of bands like Kyuss and Sleep, weaving bluesy grooves, distorted guitar tones with powerful vocals and haunting melodies that linger long after the final note.

Their debut album, Halls of Rebirth (2020), earned acclaim, and their follow-up, A Passage Divine (2021), expanded their sonic vision with greater depth and intensity.

Under the guidance of Majestic Mountain Records, Bogwife returns with ‘Shivering’, the first single from their forthcoming third album:

“It’s an epic anthem about being on the verge of losing hope and giving up,” explains the band. “It’s about trying to convince yourself that there is a brighter future.”

This new chapter marks a bold evolution in Bogwife’s sound – a continuation of their exploration of light within darkness, and reverence for everything from the tiniest organisms to the vastness of mountains and seas. Rising from the ashes, Bogwife’s music remains a powerful quest to find the small rays of light inevitably emitting from even the darkest corners.

From Ashes, the new album from Bogwife, is released 7th November 2025 on Majestic Mountain Records. Watch the new video for ‘Shivering’ here

Discography:
Halls of Rebirth (Psychedelic Salad Records, 2020)
A Passage Divine (Majestic Mountain Records, 2021)

Bogwife are:
Guitar: Michael Nielsen
Bass guitar: Jonathan Tex Rønne Hansen
Drums: Jonathan Rosendahl Iversen
Vocal and guitar: Mikkel Munk Iversen

Bogwife on Bandcamp

Bogwife on Instagram

Bogwife on Facebook

Majestic Mountain Records webstore

Majestic Mountain Records on Bandcamp

Majestic Mountain Records on Instagram

Majestic Mountain Records on Facebook

Did I miss something? Specifically a Papir album? I can’t find anything about a VIII — or just an 8, since the album before was early 2022’s 7 (review here). Before that, they had the 2LP collection Jams (review here), so there’s something outside the sequence, but I’m paranoid now that they put out a record sometime between 2022 and now and I missed it. It’s not on their Bandcamp. It’s not on Stickman Records‘s site that I could see. What’s up?

There’s no audio yet from IX, but I trust Stickman, and if they’re telling you it’s gonna be an adventure, the easy bet is that’s how it’s going to go. No specific release date either, just ‘Fall,’ but we’re in October/November territory for promo cycles anyway, so it’ll be somewhere in there. Maybe by then I’ll have figured out where the missing Papir record went.

The following came from Stickman‘s newsletter, which if you haven’t yet taken my recommendation to sign up for, you should. Here you go:

Papir – IX

Copenhagen’s aural travellers are back and bearing new music. True to their distinct sound, Papir return with another chapter in their ongoing sonic journey. Terms like post-rock, ambient rock, psychedelia, and krautrock may circle their sound, but none quite capture its shimmering, elusive magic.

IX is a wide-open record in every sense. From the flowing compositions – which linger but never overstay, jam and unfold organically – to the wonderful airy production, you get the sense of being both in studio with the band and simultaneously on the beach with wind blowing through your hair. In addition to the ever free-flowing nature of the band’s live recordings, additions such as synthesizer or extra percussion appear always tastefully right when needed, adding the perfect seasoning on top.

If you’re only now discovering this band, and you’re into post-rock, psychedelia, krautrock, or ambient sounds, this is one to keep on your radar.

IX arrives in fall 2025—more details coming soon.

Papir will perform in Hamburg together with Angad Berar (featuring members of Weite) this September 18th at Hafenklang. The performance is our very own Stickman Showcase at Treffen Hamburg 2025. Join us if you can and you’re sure to hear some brand new tunes for the first time ever live.

http://www.papir.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/papirband/
http://www.facebook.com/papirband

http://www.stickman-records.com/
http://stickmanrecords.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/Stickman-Records-1522369868033940/

Papir, 7 (2022)

So, the good news here is that in late-2023 when Edena Gardens completed what was then purported to be a trilogy with their third LP, Dens (review here), that wasn’t actually their last studio record. Dispossessed is the name of the fourth album from the trio featuring members of Causa Sui, London Odense Ensemble and Papir, and the first single from it is the mellow-immersive “Fills the Well,” which you’ll find streaming below. I wasn’t expecting another Edena Gardens, necessarily, but I’m awfully glad such a thing exists.

Edited down from raw jams tracked this past February, Dispossessed begins a new phase for Edena Gardens as an ongoing project. I look forward to the adventure to come, and pretty soon since the release is only a month out.

A no-brainer to dig in, courtesy of the PR wire:

Edena Gardens – Dispossessed

“Fills the Well” – First single from LP Dispossessed, out Aug. 22nd 2025.

Preorder link: https://elparaisorecords.com/product/edena-gardens-dispossessed/

Stripping away excess layers, Dispossessed lives up to its title. The band went into Causa Sui’s Jonas Munk’s studio on the last day of February 2025. In an a priori session, the first note played together since 2023’s Dens – the conclusion of a trilogy and a live album all in less than a year. Has something shifted during the silence? Added aggression? Faster tempo? Darker ambiance? The feeling of losing time? Or is it simply the listener who’s world has tilted? In a fast paced world, Edena Gardens shows us how to resist and tune to our own inner chord.

Edena Gardens deals in subtle shifts that can only be summoned from something played for the first time. From the sludgy blasts of opener Hiraeth to the droning ambience of 10-minute ender Aftenstjerne. As always, the band travels far yet stays in the same internal realm. The band’s own Jakob Skøtt has made minor edits to cut a record from hours of free improvisation, and every dubbed ambience has been culled directly from the material recorded that day, bringing into play the band’s gestalt in a way that shows their both outer and inner workings: Dispossessed.

Edena Gardens is:
Jakob Skøtt: Drums (Causa Sui)
Nicklas Sørensen: Guitar (Papir)
Martin Rude: Baritone guitar & Bass (London Odense Ensemble)

https://www.instagram.com/edenagardens/
https://www.facebook.com/p/Edena-Gardens-100087551630512/

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Edena Gardens, “Fills the Well”

To no surprise, Causa Sui know what they’re about on In Flux. The Danish innovators of heavy psychedelic jazz crossover — the returning lineup of guitarist/synthesist Jonas Munk (who also engineered, mixed and mastered), drummer Jakob Skøtt, keyboardist Rasmus Rasmussen and bassist Jess Kahr — offer 50 minutes across seven songs on In Flux, and from the proggy rhythmic urging of “The Circus is Back,” the 1:49 intro ahead of the resonant guitar and organ raga of “Milkweed’s Pod” through to the blissful outer reaches of the 16-minute side-consuming “Astral Shores,” movement is central to the proceedings.

Within and between parts of songs, sure, but also in the overarching groove that carries through the album as a whole. “Milkweed’s Pod” builds tension as it goes and hints at a heavier-bottomed payoff without ever actually losing itself in the fuzz, while “Silver in the Gathering Light” takes the All Them Witches-y pastoralia of the initial guitar line and pushes deeper into airy wistfulness. There are a series of short builds, but instead of the standard crescendo, Rasmussen‘s keys run a melodic drone over much of the second half of the song, giving it a shimmer and moving to the forefront as the guitar, bass and drums step back.

On the most superficial level, this isn’t anything new for Causa Sui in terms of methodology — they’ve been an exploratory instrumental band for a long time now, and In Flux does not radically altar these principles — but the band has posited it as a looser companion to their 2024 studio album, From the Source (review here), and 20 years on from their debut, one’s inclination is to take them at their word.

That said, I’m not sure I agree with the suggestion for two reasons. First, it implies From the Source and In Flux are related somehow, and yeah, they are, because the same band made them, but I don’t think the latest is a sequel to the last and I don’t think they were recorded at the same time (not that they’d necessarily have to be), and second, while they’ve got some shake in “The Circus is Back,” “Milkweed’s Pod” and “Boogie Lord’s Revenge,” they’re not sloppy about it.

Even in the post-script “Spree” after the epic “Astral Shores,” as it builds to its finish with keys out front and drums kind of marching behind; it sounds like it’s about to come apart, and maybe it was in the studio, but there’s no real danger there as Causa Sui are either going to hold it together or end it altogether. One gets Dead Meadow-y mellowness from the 11-minute “Moledo,” but as it follows the energy of Munk‘s wah going into its second half, the energy pickup is palpable and feels impromptu in a way that makes it all the more special.

Perhaps an uptick in the improvisational aspect of their approach is the source of some of that ‘looseness’ discussed in the release info, or at least part of it, but relating In Flux to the album before it gives it a kind of baggage I’m not sure it needs. That is to say, however it may ultimately lie on the broader timeline of Causa Sui‘s stylistic progression — because surely it’s part of that story as well; I’m not saying it isn’t — its own merits give it plenty to stand on, be it the hypnotic, drifty psych rock in the first half of “Moledo” or the solidified push that takes hold for a while in the second. Munk on guitar leads the way into much of the material captured, and the mood is vibrant and spontaneous.

Unsurprisingly, Causa Sui thrive in this context, and if what they’re reveling in and/or celebrating is the raw chemistry between the four of them and the kinds of musical conversations that can happen when you’re these people, in that room, at that time, then fair enough. The basic fact of the matter is that their chemistry can carry them through a record if it needs to; it just doesn’t need to on In Flux.

There’s enough going on in the songs — even “Boogie Lord’s Revenge,” which winds itself a round a relatively straight-ahead progression, somewhere between garage psych and Morricone and a reminder that Summer Sessions was a whole thing with this band before it fades out in medias res ’60s-style — from the jammed-out to the plotted that even fickle attention spans can be fed, and when they dedicate a side of the double-10″ release to “Moledo” or “Astral Shores,” the presence in that material holds up to the vaunted position. “Astral Shores” isn’t without its intended direction — that is, it’s headed somewhere from the start — but the way in which In Flux‘s most extended track is given the space it needs to unfold is perhaps emblematic of precisely what Causa Sui mean in terms of this as a ‘looser’ record.

Maybe it’s about the balance between holding firm and letting go of what one thinks of as control over one’s own creative plots. This can be more of a challenge than hammering out every minute detail for some artists, while others are perfectly happy to claim themselves as mere vessels through which a song, a riff, whatever, is realized. I don’t know where Causa Sui stand in terms of their own creativity — why the hell not? why have I never interviewed this band? — but whether it’s the spacey push later in that longest inclusion or the more subdued manner in which “Spree” unfolds afterward, both songs being defined in no small part by the live feel in the recording, they don’t sound like passive participants in their craft, and honestly, they never have.

Rather, In Flux presents Causa Sui as they are: unwilling to rest on their significant laurels in the face of continuing stylistic growth and a constantly changing goal ahead of them. Whatever their specific goal for each or any of these tracks, I don’t know, but In Flux shows Causa Sui finding new places for their music to go, and in that, it is as accurate a portrayal of who they as a band as one could possibly hope. Such honesty is rare, but so are Causa Sui.

Causa Sui’s Linktr.ee

Causa Sui on Instagram

Causa Sui on Facebook

El Paraiso Records website

El Paraiso Records on Facebook

El Paraiso Records on Instagram

A friendly reminder that the end of the week is not, in fact, the end of the Quarterly Review, which will continue through Monday and Tuesday. That brings the number of releases covered to 70 total, which feels like plenty, and should hopefully carry us through a busy Spring release season. I’m thinking June for the next QR now but don’t be surprised if that turns into July as we get closer. All I know is I wanna do it before it’s two full weeks again.

As always, I hope you’ve found something that speaks to you in all this 10-per-day nonsense. If not, first, wow, really? Second, it ain’t over yet. Maybe today’s your day. One way to know.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Dead Meadow, Voyager to Voyager

You may be mellow-vibes, but unless you’re “Not the Season,” Dead Meadow have one up on you forever. While Voyager to Voyager, which is the L.A. band’s eighth or ninth LP depending on what you count, comes with the tragic real-world context of bassist Steve Kille‘s 2024 passing, he does feature on the long-running trio’s first offering through Heavy Psych Sounds, and whether it’s “The Space Between” or the shuffle-stepping “The Unhounded Now” or the pastoral “A Question of Will” and the jangly strum of “Small Acts of Kindness” later on, guitarist/vocalist Jason Simon, Kille and drummer Mark Laughlin celebrate the ultra-languid take on heavy, psychedelic and shoegazing rock that’s made Dead Meadow a household name for weirdos. Not that they’re not prone to a certain wistfulness, but Voyager to Voyager is vibrant rather than mournful, and the title-track is an album flow unto itself in just eight minutes. If you can slow your manic-ass brain long enough to sit and hear it front-to-back, you’re in for a treat.

Dead Meadow website

Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Seán Mulrooney, This is My Prayer

There is a sense of stepping out as Irish troubadour Seán Mulrooney makes his full-length solo debut with This is My Prayer on Ómós Records. Mulrooney is best known for residing at the core of Tau and the Drones of Praise, and for sure, pieces of This is My Prayer are coming from a similar place, but where there was psychedelic meander for the band, under his own moniker, Mulrooney brings a clarity of tone and presence to lyrics ranging from spiritual seeking to what seems to have been an unceremonious breakup. With character and emotion in his voice and range in his craft, Mulrooney sees a better world on “Ag Múscliaghacht” and posits a new masculinity — totally needed; trainwreck gender — in “Walking With the Wind,” meets indie simplicity with lap steel in “Jaguar Dreams” and, in closer “The Pufferfish,” pens a fun McCartney-style bouncer about tripping sea life. These are slivers of the adventures undertaken in singer-songwriter style as Mulrooney hones this solo identity. Very curious to see where the adventure might take him.

Seán Mulrooney on Bandcamp

Ómós Records website

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MaidaVale, Sun Dog

Issued in 2024, Sun Dog is the third MaidaVale long-player, and with it, the Swedish heavy psychedelic rockers showcase six years’ worth of growth from their second album. Melancholic of mood in “Fools” and “Control” and the folkish “Alla Dagar” and “Vultures,” Sun Dog starts uptempo with the Afrobeat-influenced “Faces,” drifts, shreds, then drifts again in “Give Me Your Attention,” dares toward pop in “Daybreak” and fosters a sense of the ironic in “Wide Smile is Fine” and “Pretty Places,” the latter of which, with a keyboardier arrangement, could’ve been the kind of New Wave hit that would still be in your head 40 years later. The nine-songer (10 if you get “Perplexity,” which was previously only on the vinyl) doesn’t dwell in any single space for too long — only “Wide Smile is Fine” and “Vultures” are over four minutes, though others are close — and that lets them balance the downer aspects with forward momentum. MaidaVale are no strangers to that kind of movement, of course, but Sun Dog‘s mature realization of their sound feels so much more vast in range.

MaidaVale website

Silver Dagger Records website

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Causa Sui, Loppen 2024

Here come Causa Sui with another live album. And I’m not saying the only reason the thankfully-prolific Danish psychedelic treasures, heavyjazz innovators and El Paraiso label honchos are only releasing a complement to 2023’s Loppen 2021 (review here) to rub in the fact that I’ve never been lucky enough to catch them on a stage — any stage — but I am starting to take it personally. Call me sensitive. In any case, despite feeling existentially mocked by their chemistry and the fluidity of “Sorcerer’s Disciple” or the 22-minute “Visions of a New Horizon,” the hour-long set is glorious as one would expect, and though Loppen 2024 is a blip on the way to Causa Sui‘s forthcoming studio album, In Flux, especially when set alongside their previous outing from the same Christiania-based venue, it highlights the variable persona of the band and the reach of their material. Someday I’ll see this goddamn band.

Causa Sui’s Linktr.ee

El Paraiso Records website

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Fulanno, Nosotros Somos el Fin del Mundo

Underlying the grit and stoner drawl of “El Rey del Mundo de los Muertos” is the lurching progression of Black Sabbath‘s “Sweet Leaf,” and that reinterprative ethic comes to the strutting Pentagrammery of “La Verdad es Tu Ataud” as well, but in the tonal density and the way their groove snails its way into your ear canal, the vibe Fulanno bring to Nosotros Somos el Fin del Mundo is in line with stoner doom traditionalism, and the revelry is palbale in the slow nod of the title-track or the horror samples sprinkled throughout or the earlier Electric Wizard-style languidity of “El Nacimiento de la Muerte.” They save an acoustic stretch in reserve to wrap “Desde las Tinieblas,” but if you think that’s going to clean your soul by that point then you haven’t been paying attention. Unrepentantly dark, stoned and laced with devil-, death-and riff-worship, Nosotros Somos el Fin del Mundo further distinguishes Fulanno in an always crowded Argentinian underground, and dooms like a bastard besides.

Fulanno on Bandcamp

Interstellar Smoke Records store

Smolder Brains Records on Bandcamp

Ruidoteka Records’ Linktr.ee

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Ze Stoner, Desert Buddhist

Because the age we live in permits such a thing and it tells you something about the music, I’m going to cut and paste the credits for Israeli duo Ze Stoner‘s debut EP/demo, Desert Buddhist. Dor Sarussi is credited with “bass guitar, spaceships, vocals,” while Alexander Krivinski handles “didgeridoo, spaceships, drums, and percussion.” How tripped out does a band need to be to have two members credited with “spaceships,” you ask? Quite tripped out indeed. Across the 12:09 “Part I – The Awakness” (sic) and the 11:41 “Part II – The Trip,” and the much-shorter 1:41 finale “Part III – The Enlightenment,” Ze Stoner take the meditative doom of Om or an outfit like Zaum and extrapolate from it a drone-based approach that retains a meditative character. It is extreme in its capacity to induce a trance, and as Desert Buddhist unfolds, it plays as longer movements tied together as a single work. There is massive potential here. One hopes Sarussi, Krivinski, their spaceships and didgeridoo are just beginning their adventures in the cosmos.

Ze Stoner on Bandcamp

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Arv, Curse & Courage

Oslo-based newcomers Arv aren’t shy about what their sound is trying to do. Their debut album, Curse & Courage, arrives via the wheelhouse of Vinter Records and brings together noise-laced and at-times-caustic hardcore with the atmospherics, echoing tremolo and churning intensity of post-metal. They lean to one side or the other throughout, and “Wrath” seems to get a bit of everything, but it’s a harder line to draw than one might think because hardcore as a style is all urgency and post-metal very often brings a more patient take. Being able to find a place in songwriting between the two, well, Arv aren’t the first to do it, but they are impressively cohesive for Curse & Courage being their first record, and the likes of “Victim,” the overwhelming rush of “Forsaken” earlier on and the more-ambient-but-still-vocally-harsh closing title-track set up multiple avenues for future evolution of the ideas they present here. Too aggressive to be universal in its appeal, but makes undeniable use of its scathe.

Arv website

Vinter Records website

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Fvzz Popvli, Melting Pop

I’m not sure what’s going on in “Erotik Fvel P.I.M.P.,” but there’s chicanery a-plenty throughout Fvzz Popvli‘s fourth full-length, Melting Pop, which is released in renewed cooperation with Heavy Psych Sounds. Hooks, fuzz, and the notion that anything else would be superfluous pervade the Indiana Jones-referencing “Temple of Doom” and “Telephone” at the outset, the latter with some choice backing vocals, and they kick the fuzz into overdrive on “Salty Biscvits” with room besides for a jangly verse. Running an ultra-manageable 30 minutes, the album breaks in half with four songs on each side. “Kommando” leads off the second half with dirtier low end tone ahead of the slower-rolling “Ovija,” which shouts and howls and is all kinds of righteously unruly, where “Cop Sacher” punks at the start and has both gang vocals and a saxophone, which I can say with confidence nothing else among the 70 records in this Quarterly Review even tried let alone pulled off, and they close with due swagger and surprising class in “The Knight.” Part of Fvzz Popvli‘s persona to this point has been based in rawness, so it’s interesting to hear them fleshing out more complex arrangments, but at heart they remain very much stoner rock for the glory of stoner rock.

Fvzz Popvli on Bandcamp

Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Rust Bucket, Rust Bucket

The tone worship is there, the working-class-dude stoner swing is there, and the humor that might result in a song like “Hypertension” — for which no less than Bob Balch of Fu Manchu sits in — so when I compare Rust Bucket to Maryland’s lost sons Earthride, please know that I’m not talking out of my ass. The Minnesota-based double-guitar five-piece revel in low end buzz-tone, and with no-pretense groove, throaty vocals and big personality, that spirit is there. Doesn’t account for the boogie of “Keep Us Down,” but everybody’s gotta throw down now and then. They shift into a sludgier mood by the time they get around to “The Darkness” and “Watch Your Back,” but the idea behind this first Rust Bucket feels much more like a bunch of guys getting together to hammer out some cool songs, maybe play some shows, do a record and see how it goes. On paper, that makes Rust Bucket an unassuming start, but its anti-bullshit stance, steady roll and addled swing make it a gem of the oldschool variety. Much to their credit, they call the style, “fuzzy caveman dad rock.” They forgot ‘bearded,’ but otherwise that about sums it up. Maybe the beard is implied?

Rust Bucket on Bandcamp

Glory or Death Records website

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Mountain Dust, Mountain Dust

It is appropriate that Mountain Dust named their third LP after themselves, since it finds them transcending their influences and honing a cross-genre approach that’s never sounded more their own than it does in these nine songs. From the densely-weighted misdirect of “Reap” with its Earth-sounding drone riff through the boogieing en route to the mellower and more open soul-showcase “Waiting for Days to End” — backing vocals included, see also “It’s Already Done” on side B — and the organ in “Vengeance,” the dynamic between the Graveyard-style ballad “This is It” and the keyboard/synth-fueled instrumental outro “All Eyes But Two,” Mountain Dust gracefullly subverts retroist expectations with individualized songwriting, performance and production, and this material solidifies the Montreal four-piece among the more flexible acts doing anything in the sphere of 1970s-style heavy rock. That’s still there, understand, but like the genre itself, Mountain Dust have very clearly grown outward from their foundations.

Mountain Dust website

Mountain Dust on Bandcamp

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