Sneaking it in on a Friday? What is this madness? Fair question. The wretched truth is that in slating this Quarterly Review — welcome, by the way — I ran into a scheduling conflict with a stream I booked for Oct. 14. I wasn’t sure how to resolve the logistics there, and 10 reviews plus a full-album stream is more than I have brainpower to write in a day, even if I do nothing else, so think of this as like the soft-launch grand opening of the Fall 2025 Quarterly Review. I’ll go all through next week and then wrap up on Monday the 15th. 70 total releases covered, 10 per day, during that time.

It’s gonna be a lot, and I’m sure as always happens there will be other things I’ll fall behind on, but to be perfectly honest with you, I could really, really stand to force myself to sit down and engage the hardcore escapism of getting lost in 70 records one after the next, so I think I might actually enjoy this this time through. Famous last words, but last time was one of my favorite QRs ever, so I’ve got momentum on my side. I’ll keep you posted as we go, and while I’m here, have a great weekend. We’ll pick up with more on Monday.

Quarterly Review #1-10:

Faetooth, Labyrinthine

While being terrible for most everything else, 2025 is a good year to go dark. Faetooth do so — darker, anyhow — with their sophomore album, Labyrinthine, and find a place where doomgaze and sludgier, scream-topped distortion can meet without seeming any more incongruous than the Los Angeles trio want it them to be. The record runs a substantial 10 songs/55 minutes, and songs like “Iron Gate,” “Hole,” “White Noise,” and “Eviscerate” derive as much of their atmosphere from the band scorching the ground beneath them as from the more subdued, murky and melodic stretches. With these elements put together in a cohesive whole sound, Labyrinthine is less an aesthetic revolution than a (welcome) generational refresh to doom and sludge, with the band set on a path of progression toward an increasingly individualized stylistic take. Idiot dudes will talk shit because they’re women. Don’t listen to idiot dudes. Listen to riffs. Faetooth have plenty to get you started.

Faetooth Linktr.ee

The Flenser website

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Earthbong, Bring Your Lungs

The mighty Kiel, Germany, trio — oops, they just became a four-piece; heads up — recorded Bring Your Lungs this past April while on their first-ever tour of Australia. It’s a three-song, about-35-minute live-in-studio collection, and they’ll reportedly press it to vinyl in no small part so they have copies to take with them when they return down under in 2027. I guess it went well. Bring Your Lungs leaves little question as to why as the band put themselves in line among the heaviest sons of Sleep in the suitably-half-formed oeuvre of bong metal. Even the shortest of the three, the middle cut “Wax” (7:38) lays tonal waste(d), while “Fathead” (11:17) and “Goddamn High” (15:59) bark and crush and caveman plod, hitting into a slowdown and a speedup, respectively, that convey both the plan underlying the mire and the willfully, gleefully insurmountable nature of that mire itself. They’d like to teach the world to stone. Can’t help but think it’d be better for it.

Earthbong on Bandcamp

Black Farm Records store

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Nuclear Dudes, Truth Paste

We may not have circa-2005 Genghis Tron to manifest the in-brain chaos of modern overwhelm, but Jon Weisnewski (Sandrider, Akimbo) stands ready with the extremist shenanigans industrial grind of Nuclear Dudes to pick up the slack. Following the punishing radness of 2023’s Boss Blades (review here), Weisnewski, his keyboards, a buttload of samples and guitar here collaborate with vocalist Brandon Nakamura to manifest a cacophonous stew that almost gets away with tapping into “Welcome to the Jungle” on album opener “Napalm Life” (get it?) by making it almost completely unrecognizable. Further punishment is dealt with semiautomatic fervor on “Concussion Protocol” and “Juggalos for Congress,” but the 11-track/23-minute entirety of Nuclear Dudes‘ second full-length comes across like an intentional brainema, so approach with caution and know that, if it feels right, you’re not alone.

Nuclear Dudes on Bandcamp

Nuclear Dudes on Instagram

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Void Sinker, Echoes From the Deep

A quick glance at the social media for Italian stoner-droner heretofore solo-project Void Sinker, and one finds that sole denizen Guglielmo Allegro is currently searching for a bassist and a drummer to fill out the lineup. Unquestionably this would be a significant change to the proceedings on the five-song/69-minute Echoes From the Deep, which plunges frontal-lobe-first into undulating waveforms and its own distorted expanse. A clear progression of notes can be heard later in closer “Andromeda” (16:21) and “Hollow” is minimalist to the point of being barely there for most of its nine minutes, but obviously a certain kind of meditative monolith is constructed from lead cut “Cetus” onward. There are no shallow dives here, and one can’t help but wonder what Allegro might have in mind for filling out these arrangements with a rhythm section. Will Void Sinker adopt more straightforward stoner-doom riffing, or is the intention to try to make this kind of drone actually convey a sense of movement? Your guess is as good as mine, but for now, the trance induced is noteworthy.

Void Sinker Linktr.ee

Void Sinker on Instagram

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Hebi Katana, Imperfection

Raw oldschool doom with a punker edge permeates Hebi Katana‘s first album for Ripple Music and fourth overall, Imperfection. And the title becomes somewhat ironic, because while the implication is they’re talking about a warts-‘n’-all sound perhaps in reference to the production rawness of the seven-track/35-minute outing highlighted by cuts like “Dead Horse Requiem” and “Blood Spirit Rising,” which shuffle-pushes into and out of a pastoral midsection, as well as the finale “Yume wa Kareno,” it just about perfectly suits the material itself, and the band bring vigor to the deceptively catchy “Praise the Shadows” that, while dark in atmosphere, speaks to a dynamic that’s developed in their sound over time. That is to say, they might be a ‘new band’ to listeners outside the band’s native Japan, but Imperfection conveys their experience in craft and in its chemistry. If it wasn’t recorded live, close enough. They’re not reshaping genre, but there is perspective at work, to be sure.

Hebi Katana website

Ripple Music website

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Khan, That Fair and Warlike Form/Return to Dust

That Fair and Warlike Form/Return to Dust, a two-songer full-length with each consuming about 23 minutes of a vinyl side, sure feels like a landmark, but that seems to happen when Melbourne trio Khan are involved. Here they set a sprawl matched by few in heavy progressive psychedelia as the three-piece of Josh Bills (vocals, guitar, keyboard, recording, mixing, mastering), Will Homan (bass) and Beau Heffernan (drums) enact a linear build across the massive soundscape of “That Fair and Warlike Form,” as sure in their purpose as they are defiant of the expectation that these extended pieces might just be jams. Rather, that opener and “Return to Dust” are structured pieces, and resonate emotionally as well as immerse the listener in their clear-eyed breadth. “Return to Dust” is a level of triumph not every act achieves, and “That Fair and Warlike Form” is no less impactful throughout its procession. One of the best of 2025, but less about the fleeting moment than providing a place to dwell long-term. That is to say, it’s a record that has the potential for its own cult, never mind the wider following amassed by the band.

Khan Linktr.ee

Khan website

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Sarkh, Heretical Bastard

The first Sarkh LP, Helios (review here), arrived through Worst Bassist Records in 2023 and was a purposeful adventure across genre lines, taking elements of post-rock, heavy riffing, and even aspects of black metal and more extreme ideas into a context that became its own. The shimmer at the outset of “Helios” that starts their second full-length, Heretical Bastard, speaks immediately of communion, and as the German instrumentalists have set about refining and coalescing their sound, ambience remains central to what they do regardless of how outwardly heavy a given part gets, which, in tracks like “Kanagawa” and “Glazial,” is pretty gosh darn heavy, never mind the chug that pays off “Zyklon” or the wash that culminates 11-minute capper “Cape Wrath,” though admittedly, the latter is more about push that heft. It’s movement either way, and Heretical Bastard‘s greatest heresy might just be how convincingly invisible it makes the (yes, imaginary) lines that divide one style from another. A band on their own path, forging their own sound. If you can’t respect that, it’s your loss.

Sarkh on Bandcamp

Worst Bassist Records website

Echodelick Records on Bandcamp

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Professor Emeritus, A Land Long Gone

Eight years on from their well-received 2017 debut, Take Me to the Gallows, Chicagoan classic doom metallers Professor Emeritus reach pointedly into the epic with A Land Long Gone, their second record. The band’s traditionalism of form means there’s something inherently familiar about the proceedings, and certainly they’re not the only ones with an affinity for ’80s metal of various stripes these days, but in addition to being distinguished by the forward-mixed vocals of Esteban Julian Pena, the sheer weight of “Pragmatic Occlusion” and “Defeater” and the crescendo of “Kalopsia Caves” sets well alongside the graceful flow of “Zosimos” or the later, partly-acoustic “Hubris,” portraying the dynamic and sense of character brought into the material. Like Philly’s Crypt Sermon, they’re not pretending the intervening decades didn’t happen — you wouldn’t call A Land Long Gone retro, I mean — but their collective heart clearly bleeds for the classics just the same; Trouble, Candlemass, Iron Maiden. If that’s your speed, their blend of chug and soar should hit just right.

Professor Emeritus website

No Remorse Records website

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Florist, Adrift

Florist know what they’re here for, and as they push through the let’s-start-with-the-universe’s-frequency “432Hz” into the modern, cavernous, riffage and nod of “Another Moon,” my brain sings a hearty fuck yes. They pack 29 minutes of rad into Adrift, their sophomore, six-songer LP, and while they’re not shy about lumber in “Grow” and the closer “Adrift (Part B),” that’s only one end of a style that’s able to move with marked fluidity across a range of tempos that, with a vibrant production, fullness of tone and hard-hit drums shoving it all, make for a refreshing take on what are unrepentantly familiar ideas. That is to say, there’s no pretense in Florist. Volume worship, riff worship, whatever you want to call it, it matters so little when the band are bashing away at “Out of Space” and hell’s bells it’s actually fun. Like, real life fun. The kind you might have with friends in a crowded room with the band on stage killing it through a set likewise heavy and intense but unashamed of the good time it’s having. Also giving, as one might a gift.

Florist website

Threat Collection Records website

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Church of Hed, Under Blue Ridge Skies

Ohio’s Paul Williams has released three ‘audio travelogues’ of the Blue Ridge Highway, with the Moog-only Under Blue Ridge Skies preceded directly by A Blue Ridge Spaceway and Our Grandfather the Mountain earlier this year. Maybe you have, and if so, that’s awesome, but to my knowledge I’ve never been on the Blue Ridge Highway, so I can’t necessarily speak to how the droney “Ghost Over a Pointed Top” or the kraut-style blips and bloops of “See Mount Mitchell” correlate to the experience of driving it. I’ll soak my ignorance in the keyboardy melancholia of “A Carolina Elegy,” which closes with evocations of past storms and forebodes of those still to come. Likewise, I’m not sure what the title “Abbott’s Fantasia” is a reference to, if anything at all, but you don’t get much more dug in than entire compositions played out on various layered, hyper-specific, probably-vintage-and-expensive-to-repair synthesizers, and it’s a kind of nerdery for which I’m very much on board.

Church of Hed website

Church of Hed on Facebook

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Heads up, friend-nerds. New Faetooth track is a ripper. Raw throat screams, lumbering tones, slow-churn bones to powder; that sort of thing. Ambient enough to keep the ‘gaze’ tag alive it comes forward with gnashing presence and consuming spaciousness in kind. They’re touring the hell out of it.

Not that I get a say in these things or my opinion matters in the slightest — to be sure, neither is the case — but I’d be utterly cool with it if this band took off. Right? Feels like the underground is due for a band to cross over. It’s been a few years. I’m not saying Faetooth need to be Sleep Token in terms of popularity, but clearly they have more potential audience reach than they’ve yet seen through.

Aiding them in that campaign to-date has been the self-applied ‘fairy doom’ tag. I dig the subversion of gender norms there, and if one thinks of fairies as little things that fly around you and restore life force — of course I’d be working on the Zelda model; less ‘hey, listen!’ and more tiny fragile glowing pixie with wings — then yeah, I can hear in the new single “White Noise” where there’s a soothing aspect. By then they’ve already put you through the ringer, though.

Enjoy that, by the way. The PR wire sent the follow:

LA’s “Fairy-Doom” Trio (Doom, Sludge, Shoegaze) Faetooth Announce New Album Labyrinthine Out September 5th

Releases New Track “White Noise”

Digital LP to be Released by AWAL and Vinyl/CD by Flenser

Touring in EU now & in Fall with Slow Crush

Spawning from Los Angeles, Faetooth forges “fairy-doom”: an eclectic amalgamation of doom metal, sludge, and shoegaze. From spellbinding melodies to guttural shrieks, Faetooth’s music conjures a looming atmosphere offering you a glimpse into their mystifying realm. Having recently released the ferociously beautiful track “Death of Day,” sound, Faetooth returns with their sophomore album, Labyrinthine.

Labyrinthine is a visceral, haunting, disturbing vision filled with introspection. Enter through the “Iron Gate” — the garden, the light, the void, the body. This is exemplified by their new track, “White Noise,” out today. “White Noise” emerged from a diary entry, and is a relentless and intense reflection on inner turmoil. We’re often drawn to the familiar, even when we don’t realize we’re reaching out for it. It is an emotional upheaval, carrying harsh truths that weigh heavily on the heart. Guitarist, Ari May mentions, “Performing the song always takes me back to a specific place, even if just for a moment.”

From profoundly intimate to explosively cathartic moments — Faetooth’s latest offering features their distinctive blend of ethereal clean and roaring harsh vocals, fuzzy guitars, and pounding rhythms. Coming off of 2022’s Remnants of the Vessel, the trio continues to explore sounds ranging from gliding to grinding, from the rhythmic grunge of “Death of Day,” to the bittersweet melodies of “October.” While embracing a newly softened, more intimate tone, Faetooth releases even more emotional rawness. Themes of loss, self-pity, personal relationships, and more find a focus in singles like “Hole,” and “White Noise.” This new intimate balance doesn’t dilute their palpable intensity; rather reframing it, offering listeners a haunting yet delicate atmosphere layered with entrancing textures that build up into eruptive climaxes.

Like the ancient myth of the minotaur in the labyrinth, at its core, Labyrinthine is a deeply personal, shrouded, monster of an album; It is a winding, toilful, maze to a tender center not quite prevalent yet in Faetooth’s mystical and metaphorical universe.

Album Track List
1. Iron Gate
2. Death of Day
3. It Washes Over
4. Hole
5. White Noise
6, Eviserate
7. October
8. Mater Dolorosa
9. The Well
10. Meet Your Maker

Catch Faetooth on tour now, across Europe this summer & on tour with Slow Crush in fall!

06/12 Derby, UK – Download Festival
06/13 Glasgow, UK – The Hug And Pint (feat. Cwfen)
06/14 Huddersfield, UK – Northern Quarter (feat. Cwfen)
06/15 Derby, UK – Download Festival
06/17 London, UK – The Black Heart (feat. Cwfen)
06/18 Manchester, UK – Star & Garter (feat. Cwfen)
06/19-22 Clisson, FRA – Hellfest
06/19 Norwich, UK – Norwitch Arts Centre (feat. Cwfen)
06/20 Ramsgate, UK – Ramsgate Music Hall (feat. Cwfen)
06/26 Brussels, BEL – La Source Beer Co.

With Slow Crush:
09/04 Allentown, PA – Archer Music Hall
09/05 Philadelphia, PA – The Foundry
09/06 Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair
09/07 Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall Of Williamsburg
09/09 Montreal, QC – Bar le Ritz PDB
09/10 Toronto, ON – Velvet Underground
09/11 Detroit, MI – El Club
09/12 Chicago, IL – Reggies Rock Club
09/13 Indianapolis, IN – HI-Fi
09/14 St. Louis, MO – The Duck Room
09/16 Fort Worth, TX – Tulips FTW
09/17 Austin, TX – Radio/East

Photo by Autry Haydon-Wilson.

https://linktr.ee/faetooth
https://faetooth.bandcamp.com/
https://instagram.com/faetooth
https://www.facebook.com/faetoothband

Faetooth, “White Noise”

Not too much wandering for today, but I did check out the Archiving Heaviness showcase downstairs at the 013 full of the cultural detritus of past editions. There were even a couple old Weirdo Canyon Dispatch issues in there. It’s nice to think of that as being a part of this whole thing when it was. It was a ‘zine in the truest sense of being a labor of love, and apart from the fact that it was about the fest, I think that’s what tied it most into the fold of Roadburn.

I missed the opening of the art gallery by minutes, but got to see Walter say a few words to the first-timers meeting, welcoming them to the festival and encouraging them to interact with each other, go off schedule and wander, and so on. I also signed the guestbook. The meeting was downstairs at the 013 at the bar near the Archiving Heaviness displays. Walter’s right, of course, about all of it, and it’s the most Roadburn thing ever that the guy who started the fest would take time 25-plus years later to greet the people who’ve never been here before. Roadburn is a lot. It can be overwhelming. Walter radiates a warmth and kindness few people know. When he welcomes you, you stay welcomed.

Xiu Xiu were going on up at the Koepelhal, on the The Terminal stage, but I hadn’t had endnote half a meal since Tuesday, so I grabbed a few slices of kaas and some greens for nutritional reconciliation. Lee and I had come to the office this morning to put some shortb text in the TMSQ app that has the schedule and all that info, and that went quickly enough that I’d gone back to the hotel to sit quietly for a bit, nod off, answer email, etc. I was dragging before food. Headache, a little nauseous. But the thing about Roadburn is no matter how crowded it gets, there are always pockets and places where you can be. If it feels like the whole world is in one place and the line’s out the door and it feels like too much, all you ever have to do is step back, realize that, and find a corner, or a chair, or a bench, whatever it is, and take the minute you need.

For me, that’s usually up on the balcony of the 013, though of course there are times where that’s packed as well. You make it work.

In the main hall, Costin Chioreanu’s animated film ‘The Hunter’ screened to open the day. Oranssi Pazuzu were soon to go on to perform last Fall’s Muuntautuja in its entirety. The one led very well into the other. I remember when Oranssi Pazuzu were here last, circa 2012 or thereabouts — Archiving Heaviness has a wall outside Koepelhal with all the years’ lineups printed on it; I should check that — they were at Het Patronaat, and it was a very big deal. Line down the block. Good to know the ensuing decade-plus hasn’t dulled the reception. I took one song’s worth of pictures in the photo pit, and made my way up to the balcony, because when engaging with intermittently furious groundbreaking cosmic experimentalist black metal, I’ll take the bird’s eye view anytime.

No doubt I was in the minority among the room for not knowing the album, but I was fine hearing a thing for the first time and appreciating the unexpected twists that have helped the band become a generational presence, like the intro to the first song sounding like Nine Inch Nails’ “Mr. Self-Destruct,” or how prone they were to locking in a bigger groove when not channeling dissonance or shred, or, more likely both. I don’t know that they’ll ever be my ‘thing’ as far as that goes, but that didn’t keep it from being awesome.

Spent a few minutes in my own head sitting upstairs on the balcony. Shit self-talk, just tearing myself down because I worry about THINGS and it’s a terrifying moment. Thinking of seeing Dool on the big stage last year, feeling that empowerment resonating, was restorative. Oranssi Pazuzu are on a different trip entirely, and I didn’t expect the same experience twice because I’ve been to Roadburn before and I know better, but there was a sense of freedom conveyed alongside so much catharsis, and I tried my best to home in on that. Also this weird thing had been happening where every time I sat in a place for more than five minutes, no matter what else was going on or its volume level related to human tolerances, I started to fall asleep. I assure you that’s not a dig on the set.

Oranssi Pazuzu finished droned out and fair enough. I thought about popping over to the Next Stage for Toby Driver’s new trio, Alora Crucible, but there was a line outside the room by the time I got there, so I broke off downstairs for a water and then was back up to the Main Stage for the coming of Kylesa. I don’t know how many times I saw them during their ‘original run’ in various lineups and constructions of the band, mostly because I was drunk and it was a long time ago (having a archive of nearly every show I’ve seen in the last 16 years has its advantages in not relying on my memory; Kylesa and my affection for their work pre-date this site), but with Phillip Cope and Laura Pleasants reigniting the band now completed by journeyman metaller Roy Mayorga (Ministry, Stone Sour, Soulfly, etc.), who hits hard enough to remind you Kylesa once had two drummers, and NY-based artist John John Jesse (Nausea) on bass, they were a must-see for me. Something of a silly feeling, being nostalgic for the aughts, but it was 20 years ago. Brains are ridiculous.

Kylesa were last at Roadburn in 2010, but I missed them because volcano. One assumes the irony of “Keep moving/Don’t look back” as a signature hook at a reunion show isn’t lost on Kylesa, but never mind that shit, here comes Mongo, and in this case, Mongo is the guitar tones of Pleasants and Cope at the forefront of this band. And hey, sometimes a path brings you somewhere you’ve been before. With punk in their metallic hearts as it always was, Kylesa renewed their individual blend of elements, influences and craft, dug into some of the rawer ends of their catalog as well as the later and proggier fare, and though it was their first Euro show in more than a decade, I don’t think it took long for them to remind the room who they were and what they were about. That space was packed and rightly so. Kylesa was always just a little different than everybody else, sound-wise. Cope and Pleasants sharing vocals was always part of it, for sure, but for me it goes to the shape of their riffing and their ability to take what seem like straightforward ideas like “here’s a fuggin’ thrash riff in your face,” and beat them into more complex shapes.

As to what their going-forward plans might be, I haven’t a clue, but there’s life in them, and where I can think of an act like Jesus and Mary Chain, who were here for a reunion last year — different band and context, but still — and it felt pretty hollow. Kylesa, on the other hand, were always about the soul and the charge put into their songs, and they remain so. And the lineup, in the parlance of 2023, is fire. But of course it is. Nodding heads front to back. A mosh opened up. Dudes were dancing on the balcony. Hail hail.

They closed with “Running Red,” which, yes. I lurched my sad physicality up to Koepelhal when they were done to catch Faetooth at The Terminal. The Los Angeles three-piece self-tag as ‘Fairy Doom,’ and I wouldn’t argue if I could. Bringing together doomed nod, sludge nod and, indeed, some more nod, their dual-vocal approach moved between harsh and cleans, and the songs didn’t want for dynamic, but the overarching impression was heavy and dug-in. I think this is their first time in Europe? I don’t know that, so don’t quote it, but yes I just checked and it’s true. Quote away, I guess. In any case, they drew a massive crowd to bask in the largesse of fuzz, and the darker shoegaze side of what they were doing was balanced by both the screams and the tonal heft. They didn’t look like a band to fuck with. Someone yelled out they were beautiful before they played and I was embarrassed to be a dude. Cringe shit.

Speaking of, walking back to the 013 after Faetooth, there was a street preacher in a tshirt with a cross on it yelling about god in Dutch. He started in on me and I let him go a few seconds before I told him I didn’t even speak his language and to fuck off. He switched to English to thank me and say god bless you, to which my shouted reply was “only if he gives me a handjob first — again, fuck you.” I could live a thousand years and there would be no time in my life for that fucking garbage. I was completely lucid. I didn’t hit him.

An abrasive noise wash after that kind of adrenaline spike turned out to be just the thing, and after breaking a kick drum pedal right off the bat, like, with the first kick, The Body and Dis Fig tapped electronic and organic malevolence. I knew it would be heavy. But feeling the bass wub in my chest was nonetheless affecting. There was a big part of me that was ready to call it a night — arguably it was still evening — but I was scared to go back to the hotel and crash too hard, lest I sleep then instead of overnight. I had screwed up Wednesday so much in how I did and didn’t sleep that I’d been feeling it all day, but the lonely conscious fragment of my mind knew the room was a trap. Brutal noise, drone, thud and melodic-vocal cutthrough it is. Roadburn means I’m lucky to be alive. I can sleep later. I hope.

I hid my face in my arms at one point to get away from the strobe. They were droning at the time and yeah, I kinda nodded off. That’s how it was today. Adrenaline and lots of coffee were a help, likewise good music, but at no point in the day did I feel like I was at my best or even functioning beyond the basics and yelling at that jeezaroo. I know that’s not rock and roll. It’s not cool. It’s not positive. It’s not hey I’m here and let’s be an influencer and here’s some content isn’t it contenty? It’s real life. If you’re going to be a lifer at this shit or anything else, including just life itself, some days are going to be easier than others. Did not the Ben Ward sayeth, “Some you win, some you lose?” Well I won today outright, even if I had to pull myself by my collar to do it.

Back at the room afterward, I put in a video call to home, got to talk to The Patient Mrs. and The Pecan, which was a treat, I’d gotten myself one more espresso from the machine in the lobby of the hotel, of which I drank about half in a single sip and poured out the rest. Yes, absolutely for all my Nespresso homies. You know who you are, you classy bastards.

Sorting photos and finishing the writing were precursors to screwing off and going to bed, so that was the order of it. Tomorrow and Saturday nights are more packed for me, so resting while I can while my body gave me fewer and fewer choices in the matter anyway made sense. In the end, I slept like a bastard for like nine hours, which I very much hope brings me closer to whatever vision of ‘caught up’ might apply.

Thanks for reading. A couple more pics after the jump.

Read more »

Guess this is it, huh? Always bittersweet, the end of a Quarterly Review. Bitter, because there’s still a ton of albums waiting on my desktop to be reviewed, and certainly more that have come along over the course of the last two weeks looking for coverage. Sweet because when I finish here I’ll have written about 100 albums, added a bunch of stuff to my year-end lists, and managed to keep the remaining vestiges of my sanity. If you’ve kept up, I hope you’ve enjoyed doing so. And if you haven’t, all 10 of the posts are here.

Thanks for reading.

Quarterly Review #91-100:

Hazemaze, Blinded by the Wicked

This is one of 2022’s best records cast in dark-riffed, heavy garage-style doom rock. I admit I’m late to the party for Hazemaze‘s third album and Heavy Psych Sounds label debut, Blinded by the Wicked, but what a party it is. The Swedish three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Ludvig Andersson, bassist Estefan Carrillo and drummer Nils Eineus position themselves as a lumbering forerunner of modern cultist heavy, presenting the post-“In-a-Gadda-da-Vida” lumber of “In the Night of the Light, for the Dark” and “Ethereal Disillusion” (bassline in the latter) with a clarity of purpose and sureness that builds even on what the trio accomplished with 2019’s Hymns for the Damned (review here), opening with the longest track (immediate points) “Malevolent Inveigler” and setting up a devil-as-metaphor-for-now lyrical bent alongside the roll of “In the Night of the Light, for the Dark” and the chugging-through-mud “Devil’s Spawn.” Separated by the “Planet Caravan”-y instrumental “Sectatores et Principes,” the final three tracks are relatively shorter than the first four, but there’s still space for a bass-backed organ solo in “Ceremonial Aspersion,” and the particularly Electric Wizardian “Divine Harlotry” leads effectively into the closer “Lucifierian Rite,” which caps with surprising bounce in its apex and underscores the level of songwriting throughout. Just a band nailing their sound, that’s all. Seems like maybe the kind of party you’d want to be on time for.

Hazemaze on Facebook

Heavy Psych Sounds store

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Elephant Tree, Track by Track

Released as a name-your-price benefit EP in July to help raise funds for the Ukrainian war effort, Track by Track is two songs London’s Elephant Tree recorded at the Netherlands’ Sonic Whip Festival in May of this year, “Sails” and “The Fall Chorus” — here just “Fall Chorus” — from 2020’s Habits (review here), on which the four-piece is joined by cellist Joe Butler and violinst Charlie Davis, fleshing out especially the quieter “Fall Chorus,” but definitely making their presence felt on “Sails” as well in accompanying what was one of Habits‘ strongest hooks. And the strings are all well and good, but the live harmonies on “Sails” between guitarist Jack Townley, bassist Peter Holland and guitarist/keyboardist John Slattery — arriving atop the e’er-reliable fluidity of Sam Hart‘s drumming — are perhaps even more of a highlight. Was the whole set recorded? If so, where’s that? “Fall Chorus” is more subdued and atmospheric, but likewise gorgeous, the cello and violin lending an almost Americana feel to the now-lush second-half bridge of the acoustic track. Special band, moment worth capturing, cause worth supporting. The classic no-brainer purchase.

Elephant Tree on Facebook

Elephant Tree on Bandcamp

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Mirror Queen, Inviolate

Between Telekinetic Yeti, Mythic Sunship and Limousine Beach (not to mention Comet Control last year), Tee Pee Records has continued to offer distinct and righteous incarnations of heavy rock, and Mirror Queen‘s classic-prog-influenced strutter riffs on Inviolate fit right in. The long-running project led by guitarist/vocalist Kenny Kreisor (also the head of Tee Pee) and drummer Jeremy O’Brien is bolstered through the lead guitar work of Morgan McDaniel (ex-The Golden Grass) and the smooth low end of bassist James Corallo, and five years after 2017’s Verdigris (review here), their flowing heavy progressive rock nudges into the occult on “The Devil Seeks Control” while maintaining its ’70s-rock-meets-’80s-metal gallop, and hard-boogies in the duly shredded “A Rider on the Rain,” where experiments both in vocal effects and Mellotron sounds work well next to proto-thrash urgency. Proggers like “Inside an Icy Light,” “Sea of Tranquility” and the penultimate “Coming Round with Second Sight” show the band in top form, comfortable in tempo but still exploring, and they finish with the title-track’s highlight chorus and a well-layered, deceptively immersive wash of melody. Can’t and wouldn’t ask for more than they give here; Inviolate is a tour de force for Mirror Queen, demonstrating plainly what NYC club shows have known since the days when Aytobach Kreisor roamed the earth two decades ago.

Mirror Queen on Facebook

Tee Pee Records store

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Faetooth, Remnants of the Vessel

Los Angeles-based four-piece Faetooth — guitarist/vocalist Ashla Chavez Razzano, bassist/vocalist Jenna Garcia, guitarist/vocalist Ari May, drummer Rah Kanan — make their full-length debut through Dune Altar with the atmospheric sludge doom of Remnants of the Vessel, meeting post-apocalyptic vibes as intro “(i) Naissance” leads into initial single “Echolalia,” the more spaced-out “La Sorcie|Cre” (or something like that; I think my filename got messed up) and the yet-harsher doom of “She Cast a Shadow” before the feedback-soaked interlude “(ii) Limbo” unfurls its tortured course. Blending clean croons and more biting screams assures a lack of predictability as they roll through “Remains,” the black metal-style cave echo there adding to the extremity in a way that the subsequent “Discarnate” pushes even further ahead of the nodding, you’re-still-doomed heavy-gaze of “Strange Ways.” They save the epic for last, however, with “(iii) Moribund” a minute-long organ piece leading directly into “Saturn Devouring His Son,” a nine-and-a-half-minute willful lurch toward an apex that has the majesty of death-doom and a crux of melody that doesn’t just shout out Faetooth‘s forward potential but also points to what they’ve already accomplished on Remnants of the Vessel. If this band tours, look out.

Faetooth on Facebook

Dune Altar on Bandcamp

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Behold! The Monolith, From the Fathomless Deep

Ferocious and weighted in kind, Behold! The Monolith‘s fourth full-length and first for Ripple Music, From the Fathomless Deep finds the Los Angeles trio taking cues from progressive death metal and riff-based sludge in with a modern severity of purpose that is unmistakably heavy. Bookended by opener “Crown/The Immeasurable Void” (9:31) and closer “Stormbreaker Suite” (11:35), the six-track/45-minute offering — the band’s first since 2015’s Architects of the Void (review here) — brims with extremity and is no less intense in the crawling “Psychlopean Dread” than on the subsequent ripper “Spirit Taker” or its deathsludge-rocking companion “This Wailing Blade,” calling to mind some of what Yatra have been pushing on the opposite coast until the solo hits. The trades between onslaughts and acoustic parts are there but neither overdone nor overly telegraphed, and “The Seams of Pangea” (8:56) pairs evocative ambience with crushing volume and comes out sounding neither hackneyed nor overly poised. Extreme times call for extreme riffs? Maybe, but the bludgeoning on offer in From the Fathomless Deep speaks to a push into darkness that’s been going on over a longer term. Consuming.

Behold! The Monolith on Facebook

Ripple Music website

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The Swell Fellas, Novaturia

The second album from Nashville’s The Swell Fellas — who I’m sure are great guys — the five-song/32-minute Novaturia encapsulates an otherworldly atmosphere laced with patient effects soundscapes, echo and moody presence, but is undeniably heavy, the opener “Something’s There…” drawing the listener deeper into “High Lightsolate,” the eight-plus minutes of which roll out with technical intricacy bent toward an outward impression of depth, a solo in the midsection carrying enough scorch for the LP as a whole but still just part of the song’s greater procession, which ends with percussive nuance and vocal melody before giving way to the acoustic interlude “Caesura,” a direct lead-in for the noisy arrival of the okay-now-we-riff “Wet Cement.” The single-ready penultimate cut is a purposeful banger, going big at its finish only after topping its immediate rhythmic momentum with ethereal vocals for a progressive effect, and as elliptically-bookending finisher “…Another Realm” nears 11 minutes, its course is its own in manifesting prior shadows of progressive and atmospheric heavy rock into concrete, crafted realizations. There’s even some more shred for good measure, brought to bear with due spaciousness through Mikey Allred‘s production. It’s a quick offering, but offers substance and reach beyond its actual runtime. They’re onto something, and I think they know it, too.

The Swell Fellas on Facebook

The Swell Fellas on Bandcamp

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Stockhausen & the Amplified Riot, Era of the Inauthentic

For years, it has seemed Houston-based guitarist/songwriter Paul Chavez (Funeral Horse, Cactus Flowers, Baby Birds, Art Institute) has searched for a project able to contain his weirdo impulses. Stockhausen & the Amplified Riot — begun with Era of the Inauthentic as a solo-project plus — is the latest incarnation of this effort, and its krautrock-meets-hooky-proto-punk vibe indeed wants nothing for weird. “Adolescent Lightning” and “Hunky Punk” are a catchy opening salvo, and “What if it Never Ends” provokes a smile by garage-rock riffing over a ’90s dance beat to a howling finish, while the 11-minute “Tilde Mae” turns early-aughts indie jangle into a maddeningly repetitive mindfuck for its first nine minutes, mercifully shifting into a less stomach-clenching groove for the remainder before closer “Intubation Blues” melds more dance beats with harmonica and last sweep. Will the band, such as it is, at last be a home for Chavez over the longer term, or is it merely another stop on the way? I don’t know. But there’s no one else doing what he does here, and since the goal seems to be individualism and experimentalism, both those ideals are upheld to an oddly charming degree. Approach without expectations.

Artificial Head Records on Facebook

Artificial Head Records on Bandcamp

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Nothing is Real, The End is Near

Nothing is Real stand ready to turn mundane miseries into darkly ethereal noise, drawing from sludge and an indefinable litany of extreme metals. The End is Near is both the Los Angeles unit’s most cohesive work to-date and its most accomplished, building on the ambient mire of earlier offerings with a down-into-the-ground churn on lead single “THE (Pt. 2).” All of the songs, incidentally, comprise the title of the album, with four of “THE” followed by two “END” pieces, two “IS”es and three “NEAR”s to close. An maybe-unhealthy dose of sample-laced interlude-type works — each section has an intro, and so on — assure that Nothing is Real‘s penchant for atmospheric crush isn’t misplaced, and the band’s uptick in production value means that the vastness and blackened psychedelia of 10-minute centerpiece “END” shows the abyssal depths being plunged in their starkest light. Capping with “NEAR (Pt. 1),” jazzy metal into freneticism, back to jazzy metal, and “NEAR (Pt. 2),” epic shred emerging from hypnotic ambience, like Jeff Hanneman ripping open YOB, The End is Near resonates with a sickened intensity that, again, it shares in common with the band’s past work, but is operating at a new level of complexity across its intentionally unmanageable 63 minutes. Nothing is Real is on their own wavelength and it is a place of horror.

Nothing is Real on Facebook

Nothing is Real on Bandcamp

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Red Lama, Memory Terrain

Copenhagen heavy psych collective Red Lama — and I’m sorry, but if you’ve got more than five people in your band, you’re a collective — brim with pastoral escapism throughout Memory Terrain, their third album and the follow-up to 2018’s Motions (discussed here) and its companion EP, Dogma (review here). Progressive in texture but with an open sensibility at their core, pieces like the title-track unfold long-song breadth in accessible spans, the earlier “Airborne” moving from the jazzy beginning of “Gentleman” into a more tripped-out All Them Witches vein. Elsewhere, “Someone” explores krautrock intricacies before synthing toward its last lines, and “Paint a Picture” exudes pop urgency before washing it away on a repeating, sweeping tide. Range and dynamic aren’t new for Red Lama, but I’m hard-pressed to think of as dramatic a one-two turn as the psych-wash-into-electro-informed-dance-brood that takes place between “Shaking My Bones” and “Chaos is the Plan” — lest one neglect the urbane shuffle of “Justified” prior — though by that point Red Lama have made it apparent they’re ready to lead the listener wherever whims may dictate. That’s a significant amount of ground to cover, but they do it.

Red Lama on Facebook

Red Lama on Bandcamp

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Echolot, Curatio

Existing in multiple avenues of progressive heavy rock and extreme metal, Echolot‘s Curatio only has four tracks, but each of those tracks has more range than the career arcs of most bands. Beginning with two 10-minute tracks in “Burden of Sorrows” (video premiered here) and “Countess of Ice,” they set a pattern of moving between melancholic heavy prog and black metal, the latter piece clearer in telegraphing its intentions after the opener, and introducing its “heavy part” to come with clean vocals overtop in the middle of the song, dramatic and fiery as it is. “Resilience of Floating Forms” (a mere 8:55) begins quiet and works into a post-black metal wash of melody before the double-kick and screams take hold, announcing a coming attack that — wait for it — doesn’t actually come, the band instead moving into falsetto and a more weighted but still clean verse before peeling back the curtain on the death growls and throatrippers, cymbals threatening to engulf all but still letting everything else cut through. Also eight minutes, “Wildfire” closes by flipping the structure of the opening salvo, putting the nastiness at the fore while progging out later, in this case closing Curatio with a winding movement of keys and an overarching groove that is only punishing for the fact that it’s the end. If you ever read a Quarterly Review around here, you know I like to do myself favors on the last day in choosing what to cover. It is no coincidence that Curatio is included. Not every record could be #100 and still make you excited to hear it.

Echolot on Facebook

Sixteentimes Music store

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Two weeks ago I was at Psycho Las Vegas, and so didn’t get to post the playlist for episode 91. For posterity’s sake and because I plainly love looking at lists of band names, it’s below along with the playlist for the episode airing today, which is #92. The march to 100 continues.

The esteemed Dean Rispler (who also plays in Mighty High and a bunch of other bands) is in charge of putting the shows together on a practical level from the lists I send, and to him I extend my deepest appreciation. I’m constantly late. I suck at this in general, and worse, I know it. So yeah. Dean does a bit of hand-holding and I am thankful. He emailed me this week and asked if I was thinking yet about episode 100 and would I be doing anything special?

Well… yes. I have been. And I’d like to make it a blowout or some such, but you know what the truth is? I’m more about the work. When it comes to something like that, the most honest thing I feel like I can do is keep my head down, do another episode and then do one after that two weeks later. I’d rather feel good about a thing in myself and move on. I’m not sure I can get away with that. So maybe I’ll hit up Tommi Dozer and see if he wants to chat sometime in the next few weeks.

Thanks if you listen and thanks for reading.

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

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 09.02.22 (VT = voice track)

Elephant Tree	Aphotic Blues	Elephant Tree
Might	Abysses	Abyss
Author & Punisher	Misery	Kruller
VT
Lord Elephant	Hunters of the Moon	Cosmic Awakening
Swarm of the Lotus	Snowbeast	The Sirens of Silence
Big Business	Heal the Weak	The Beast You Are
The Otolith	Sing No Coda	Folium Limina
VT
Elder	Halcyon	Omens
Gaerea	Mantle	Mirage
London Odense Ensemble	Sojourner	Jaiyede Sesssions Vol. 1
Northless	What Must Be Done	A Path Beyond Grief
Conan	A Cleaved Head No Longer Plots	Evidence of Immortality
VT
Forlesen	Strega	Black Terrain

And #91, which was a pretty damn good show:

Dozer	The Flood	Beyond Colossal
Orange Goblin	Blue Snow	Time Travelling Blues
Monster Magnet	King of Mars	Dopes to Infinity
Red Fang	Fonzi Scheme	Arrows
VT
Slift	Citadel on a Satellite	Ummon
Russian Circles	Gnosis	Gnosis
Faetooth	Echolalia	Remnants of the Vessel
Caustic Casanova	Lodestar	Glass Enclosed Nerve Center
Brant Bjork	Trip on the Wine	Bougainvillea Suite
Josiah	Saltwater	We Lay on Cold Stone
Blue Tree Monitor	Sasquatch	Cryptids
VT
Torche	Tarpit Carnivore	In Return
Telekinetic Yeti	Rogue Planet	Primordial
Mezzoa	Dunes of Mars	Dunes of Mars
Thunderbird Divine	Boote’s Void	The Hand of Man
Omen Stones	Burn Alive	Omen Stones
1000mods	Vidage	Super Van Vacation
VT
Truckfighters	Con of Man	Mania

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is Sept. 16 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

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