Posted in Whathaveyou on February 4th, 2020 by JJ Koczan
This week they’re in Russia. Next week they’re in Israel. Then Germany, then France, then Australia and New Zealand (on an Obelisk-presented tour, no less), then back in the US after the whopping span of, what, four months? Kadavar just keep going. It’s kind of astounding. Don’t get me wrong, last Fall’s For the Dead Travel Fast (review here) is nothing if not a worthy cause to support, but they’ve taken to the album cycle in a big way. One worries more about burnout than anything else, but they seem as yet immune to such things. As noted, they just keep going.
A kind of tour wrap-up/promo video has been posted and that’s cool and makes you want to go see Kadavar, which you probably should want to do anyhow, and that’s cool, but really the thing for me here is the list of dates. You know, when Kadavar first came along there were people who ragged on them for being stylish, having good hair, whatever the hell. You don’t hear much of that these days. I guess working your ass off for a decade will have that kind of effect.
From the PR wire:
KADAVAR LAUNCH TOUR VIDEO AND NEW TOUR DATES!
After a successful tour through Europe and the following US shows, KADAVAR get ready for the second part of “For The Dead Travel Fast” tournee these days. This tour leads the band to Russia, Israel, New Zealand, to the US and to Australia. In Germany, KADAVAR will hit the stage at the 30th anniversary of VISIONS magazine in Dortmund.
The Spanish photographer Victor Puigcerver captured impressions of their tour and banned them on pictures (http://victorpuigcerver.com/forthedeadtravelfast/) and videos. He created an impressive picture series as well as a tour video that KADAVAR present to their fans.
Fronter Lupus Lindemann about the video: “We are happy and proud that our new album has reached so many new listeners all around the globe and that we can keep on traveling, meeting new people and making music in 2020 as well. We’re looking forward to and we hope to see you all on the road!”
08.02. RUS St. Petersburg – Mod Club 09.02. RUS Moscow – Glastonbury 15.02. IL Tel Aviv – Levontin7 27.02. D Dortmund – VISIONS: 30th Anniversary Festival
»For The Dead Travel Fast« – European Tour 2020 11.03. LUX Esch-sur-Alzette – Kulturfabrik 12.03. F Tourcoing – Le Grand Mix 13.03. F Rouen – Le 106 14.03. F Massy – Paul B 15.03. F Angoulême – La Nef 17.03. F La Rochele – La Sirène 18.03. F Orléans – L‘Astrolabe 19.03. F Besançon – La Rodia 20.03. F Chelles – Les Cuizines
»For The Dead Travel Fast« – Australian & New Zealand Tour 2020 26.03. AUS Sydney – Frankie’s Pizza By The Slice 27.03. AUS Newcastle – The Stag & Hunter Hotel 28.03. AUS Brisbane – Mojo Burning 29.03. NZ Christchurch – The Club Tavern 30.03. NZ Wellington – Valhalla 31.03. NZ Auckland – Whammy Bar 01.04. AUS Canberra – The Basement 02.04. AUS Adelaide – Crown and Anchor 03.04. AUS Melbourne – Stay Gold 04.04. AUS Scarborough – Germanium Daze Fest 05.04. AUS Perth – Lucy’s Love Shack
08.04. USA Los Angeles – The Fonda 09.04. USA San Francisco – The Chapel 10.04. USA Portland – The Hawthorne Theatre 11.04. USA Seattle – El Corazon 12.04. USA Vancouver – The Rickshaw 14.04. USA Salt Lake City – Metro Bar 15.04. USA Denver – Larimer Lounge 17.04. USA Dallas – Gas Monkey Bar N’Grill 18.04. USA Austin – Barracuda 19.04. USA Houston – White Oak Music Hall
Posted in Features on December 24th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
[PLEASE NOTE: These are not the results of the year-end poll, which is ongoing. If you haven’t contributed your list to the cause yet, please do so here.]
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Make no mistake, my friends. 2019 was the year it went off the rails.
Every 12-month period brings a lot of records, and they all seem overwhelming, but this was the first year I’ve ever felt quite so helpless when it came time to sit down and actually make my list. Of course, I keep running notes all year long, but even so, ordering everything, bringing it all together? What a mess.
I almost thought of breaking it down into smaller lists in addition to the big one, subgrouped by style. But then, where does doom end and sludge begin? What about psych and heavy rock? Should prog get its own list? And what the hell counts as prog?
In the end, that didn’t seem like it would be doing me any favors, so we’ll stick with the one big list and then others for debut releases and another for EPs, splits, demos and so on. You know, the usual.
Pretty sure I say this every year too, but it bears repeating: if you read any of the below — and thanks if you do — and have a response, be nice. If I’ve forgotten something — and yes, I have; I’m sure of it — that you think needs to be included, and you want to leave a comment that says so, please, by all means. But keep it civil. I know people are passionate about this stuff and so am I, but consider there are probably over 200 offerings covered here by the time you get through all the lists and honorable mentions, and I’m one person. I’m doing my best, and though I try not to, I tend to take being called a dumbass personally. So yeah, chill out and please be constructive in calling me a dumbass. Words matter.
A few hard choices here, most especially for album of the year. I was back and forth with each of the top three in the top spot for a good long while, and it might change again between now and when this post goes up. But it’s been that kind of year. In 2018, there was no question. It was Sleep all the way. The question was what came after that. This year has been different without that kind of duh, punch-in-the-face obvious pick. Relative parity isn’t a bad thing though.
Enough delay. The usual parameters apply. These are a combo of my personal listening habits and what I think are the most important records/achievements of the year, critical importance, etc.
Here we go:
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The Top 50 Albums of 2019
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#50-31
50. Hazemaze, Hymns of the Damned
49. Lightning Born, Lightning Born
48. Bees Made Honey in the Vein Tree, Grandmother
47. PH, Osiris Hayden
46. Thunderbird Divine, Magnasonic
45. Abrahma, In Time for the Last Rays ofLight
44. Uffe Lorenzen, Triprapport
43. Swallow the Sun, When a Shadow is Forced into the Light
42. Caustic Casanova, God How I Envy the Deaf
41. The Devil and the Almighty Blues, Tre
40. SÂVER, They Came With Sunlight
39. Ogre, Thrice as Strong
38. Lamp of the Universe, Align in the Fourth Dimension
37. Vokonis, Grasping Time
36. Sacri Monti, Waiting Room for the Magic Hour
35. Across Tundras, The Rugged Ranges of Curbs and Broken Minds
34. Duel, Valley of Shadows
33. Orodruin, Ruins of Eternity
32. Zaum, Divination
31. Inter Arma, Sulphur English
Notes: Honestly, if this had been the top 20 of the year, I’d still call 2019 a win. Aside from the fact that I somehow thought Caustic Casanova would enjoy coming in a number 42, the sheer quality of this stuff should tell you what kind of year 2019 was. Inter Arma’s Sulphur English was a significant achievement in genre melding, and Orodruin’s return after more than a decade since their last LP was a masterclass in doom worship. Debut albums from SÂVER and Thunderbird Divine and Lightning Born showed marked promise of things to come — and there’s more on them below as well — while Zaum’s, Bees Made Honey in the Vein Tree’s and Lamp of the Universe’s meditations, Vokonis’ noise, Abrahma’s emotive progressivisim, Swallow the Sun’s melodic melancholy, Sacri Monti’s boogie, and whatever the hell PH were doing on Osiris Hayden remind just how much the word “heavy” can encompass. The Devil and the Almighty Blues, Duel and Uffe Lorenzen and Hazemaze were musts here, and Ogre are perennial favorites whose work always brings a doomly grin. Don’t sleep on any of it.
Until they put out a complementary follow-up record of such fare, one might’ve accused Idaho three-piece Sun Blood Stories of becoming less experimentalist/droned-out/noisy on Haunt Yourself, but they seem to have met their quota one way or the other with the Oct. 2019 advent of Static Sessions Vol. 1. Still, it’s melody, heavy post-rock/psychedelic drift and emotive soul that rule the day on the crushing and enriching Haunt Yourself, and no complaints from me on that.
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29. Church of the Cosmic Skull, Everybody’s Going to Die
I don’t have to do anything more than read the name of the album to have the chorus of the title-track stuck in my head, and it’s a reminder that although the Nottingham troupe put so much into their progressive style and vocal harmonies and arrangements, and a more conceptual theme in the case of Everybody’s Going to Die — their answer to 2018’s excellent Science Fiction (review here) — their roots are in songcraft, and it’s the foundation of songcraft that lets them soar. Would be higher on the list if it weren’t so new.
With their sixth album, Indianapolis’ Devil to Pay collect 10 tracks of unpretentious-almost-to-a-fault of straightforward heavy rock songwriting that continues to be woefully underappreciated. They have become utterly reliable in that regard — you know, to a certain extent, what’s coming — but the vocals of guitarist Steve Janiak (also Apostle of Solitude) and some more metallic turns to the riffing give Forever, Never or Whenever a subtlety that holds up all the more on repeat visits. I don’t know if Devil to Pay will ever get their due, but suffice it to say, they’re due.
If you’re of a certain age, you remember when the first Playstation came out and everyone looked around at their Nintendos and Segas like, “What the hell am I messing around with Mario Golf for? I could be playing Resident Evil!” That’s kind of what Howling Giant are as compared to “regular” rock bands. They’re the Playstation of heavy: that next progressive step forward carrying an inhuman amount of swagger and personality while still delivering a stepped-up product from their would-be peers. The scariest thing about The Space Between Worlds is it’s their first LP. One looks forward to the next generation.
I know for a fact that bassist Pat Bruders and drummer Henry Vasquez had a hand in writing some of the material on Saint Vitus’ second self-titled LP, and yet the album so much bears the indelible mark of guitarist Dave Chandler that it’s hard not to think of it all as his. The album marked their first release with original singer Scott Reagers since 1995’s Die Healing (discussed here) and featured among their trademark low-tuned slog, an actual punk song, which showed the grinning glee that underlies all they do. Four decades on, Saint Vitus sound like they’re having fun. How is that not a win?
Woodsy Rocky Mountain psychedelia abounded on Boise foursome Ealdor Bealu’s second full-length, and their blend of landscape meditations and grounded heavy progressive melodicism made Spirit of the Lonely Places as much about impact as about space, though of course the real joy was the experience of the entirety. Very much a sophomore album, it learned lessons from 2017’s Dark Water at the Foot of the Mountain (review here) that one only hopes the band will continue to push forward in scope as they so gracefully did here.
Though hard- and to-date quick-working Maryland trio Yatra have already moved on and are looking ahead to releasing their second album, Blood of the Night (review here), their Grimoire-delivered debut, Death Ritual, is impossible to ignore for the impact it had on reminding listeners of the impact that primeval extreme sludge can have. Another couple tours and some bigger label — Relapse, Prosthetic, eOne, Season of Mist, whoever — will decide they’re “ready,” whatever that means, and then sign them and I won’t be cool enough to do track premieres for them anymore, but as far as accolades go, Yatra earn whatever they get and Death Ritual stands among 2019’s most landmark debuts. They’ve already outdone it, but it’s a stunner just the same.
Ecstatic Vision frontman Doug Sabolik has cast himself in the mold of Arthur Brown or Dave Wyndorf or probably seven or eight dudes who were in Hawkwind at some point as a manic-but-stoned space rock preacher with as he and his band behind him plunge headfirst-or-feetfirst-it-doesn’t-matter-because-your-body-is-an-illusion-man into the molten multicolor void. For the Masses. The ‘masses,’ such as they are, should be so lucky, but the double-meaning is the real tell for where the Philly unit are coming from. Their shows are the masses — gatherings of spirit and song to give praise to the willful expansion of mind. If you can’t get behind that, you might as well go get a job or something. This ain’t no lightweight party for squares and dabblers. This is a high-potency happening for werewolves on motorcycles and freaks of all stripes. Get weird stay weird. Ecstatic Vision are one mostly-mellow 15-minute “Spine of God”-style psych-epic away from perfection.
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22. Beastwars, IV
Released by Destroy Records. Reviewed June 27.
But for the circumstances that brought it about — i.e. Beastwars vocalist Matt Hyde’s cancer — the unexpected fourth installment in the Beastwars trilogy was nothing if not welcome. An grand-feeling sense of largesse was nothing new to the New Zealand four-piece, but after breaking up and getting back together to make the album, the grim sincerity with which they presented this exploration of mortality and betrayal by one’s own body was no less palpable than the undulating riffs that threatened, as ever, to consume all in their path. I don’t know their future plans in terms of continuing to write and/or record, but there are reports of touring beyond Aus/NZ for 2020, so one way or another, stay tuned for more from them. Whether or not they do anything else, IV was a triumph in spirit and execution.
With the nine songs of Slow Burn Suicide, Brooklyn’s Eternal Black began to unveil the true depth of their project. Their 2017 debut, Bleed the Days (review here), was well received, and rightly so, but operated more in a straight-ahead doom sphere. The second outing, by contrast, delved into a particular vision of the style informed by the crunch of peak-era New York noise and crossover hardcore, and it succeeded not just because it did this, but because it did so around a conjuration of memorable riffs and tracks building on accomplishments carried over from its predecessor. Is this an awaited arrival of next-generation ‘New York doom’? Will theirs be a blueprint others will follow? It’s impossible to know now, and their next album will be telling either way, but the course they’ve set is significant.
It may have been the Tony Iommi guest appearance that got Swedish doom legends Candlemass — the world’s earliest and foremost purveyors of doom both classic and epic — their recent Grammy nomination, but it was the long-overdue reunion with original vocalist Johan Längquist that made the album as a whole as powerful as it was. Pairing Längquist’s theatrical and vital approach with founding bassist Leif Edling’s second-to-none doomcraft, The Door to Doom was a catapult not to the bygone days of the band’s landmark debut, 1986’s Epicus Doomicus Metallicus, but an inspired look at not just what might’ve been had Längquist remained with the band longer, but what might still be if he does this time around. Candlemass have been through their share of singers, but as fresh as The Door to Doom sounded, it’s hard not to hope for something more than a one-off with he who got there first. The songs, the spirit, the sheer heart poured into Candlemass’ doom some 35 years past the band’s start only emphasizes how special they have always been.
Anyone who might’ve predicted Nebula getting into the studio and making a new album was either in the room when it happened or talking out their ass. And speaking of, was Nebula’s Holy Shit named for the shock one might’ve felt at its existence, or the surprise at how good it actually sounded when you put it on? I don’t know. I probably won’t ever know. It was the best title I saw all year, but more than that, it was a Nebula record, fueled by the classic riffing and unmitigated desert punk soul of founding/guitarist Eddie Glass, whose absence from the heavy underground for the last decade left a void only too many others whiffed on filling. Holy Shit showed just how singular a player Glass was and is, and how much character there is in his style, particularly in solos, but also in rhythmic changes, and so on. I won’t discount the work of bassist Tom Davies and drummer Mike Amster in making Nebula what they are in this incarnation — they’re essential, obviously — but there’s simply no denying that presence at the band’s core.
This was a heavy rock record that had everything. Everything. It had songs, style, ups, down, purples, greens, ins, outs, all kinds of whathaveyou. Riffs forever. Valley of the Sun should keep their eyes on Sasquatch, because if they want it, that path is theirs. I know the Cincinnati outfit have had trouble keeping lineups together, but if they can hold onto one, and maybe after their next record start touring more, domestically and abroad — not at all a minor ask, I know — then people will catch on. Old Gods is evidence of the fact that they genuinely have something to offer, and frankly, it’s not at all the first such effective case they’ve made in their career. But they’ve never put anything out that wasn’t a step forward, and yet they’ve never lost sight of the roots of their initial inspiration. And they’ve never sacrificed the song for the riff, which so many do. They’ve only ever gotten better. Let Old Gods be a step toward them getting attention they’ve long since deserved.
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17. Kadavar, For the Dead Travel Fast
Released by Nuclear Blast. Reviewed Oct. 28.
In style and production, For the Dead Travel Fast is the most vintage-sounding offering Berlin trio Kadavar have made in over a half decade, yet neither is it looking backward wistfully toward 2013’s Abra Kadavar (review here) or giving up the modern clarity of 2017’s Rough Times (review here) or 2015’s Berlin (review here). Instead, it strikes a balance with a more sinister edge à la Uncle Acid in songs like “Children of the Night” and “Demons in My Mind” — both singles — and makes a home for itself between proto-metal and garage doom. Whatever genre tag you want to give it — and that might vary from track to track, mind you — it’s unmistakably Kadavar, with the signature hooks and memorable craftsmanship that have made them one of the decade’s most pivotal heavy bands. The real challenge at this point in their career is not to take for granted that Kadavar will produce material of such quality, because, frankly, that’s all they’ve ever done.
Welsh sci-fi cosmic doomers Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard billed Yn Ol I Annwn as the final installment of a trilogy that includes their two prior LPs, 2015’s Noeth Ac Anoeth (review here) and 2016’s Y Proffwyd Dwyll (review here), and while that may be true thematically, there’s also no question the third is a marked step forward from anything they’ve done before. They’re one foot out of the airlock and into space as their synth-laden longform riffing and melodies take them to places they’ve not yet gone, explorations of sight as much as sound, aural translation of colors humans aren’t gifted to see. Their songs across the 65-minute span unfold with the grace of a gravity spiral, pulling the listener deeper into the proceedings with each new phase that emerges until, what, obliteration? Stellar genesis? I’m not sure. They’ve reportedly got one more record to make and then they’re done. If that’s true, they’ll be missed then they’re gone.
They’ve found their way to die, and it’s upon an altar of classic metal and doom. And honestly, they make a pretty good case for it. Departed Souls is the third full-length from the Boston unit and their most stylistically realized work yet, with vocalist Brendan Radigan giving a standout performance alongside the guitars of Chris Corry and Renato Montenegro, the bass of Justin DeTore and Michael “Q” Quartulli’s drums, as the entire band taps into vibes from mid-’70s Black Sabbath and brings them to bear with an energy that is unlike anything in Magic Circle’s history. 2015’s Journey Blind (review here) brought in NWOBHM flash in the guitar work, sure enough, but Departed Souls doesn’t so much carry the torch of classic metal as it does use it to burn down the whole village and rebuild it in the five-piece’s image. From their doomed beginnings on their 2013 self-titled debut (review here) to now, they’re an act who’ve genuinely earned cult status. If you can find a backpatch, buy it.
Controversy! Drama! Well, probably not, but at very least some respectful disagreement on my part. You see, Poland’s Spaceslug have stated publicly that their latest release, the late-2019 surprise Reign of the Orion is an EP. Their albums regularly top 50 minutes, and at 36 minutes, I guess relative to that, you can see where they’re coming from. However, with the flow of these five songs and the ease with which they carry the listener from front-to-back through the listening experience, I’m sticking to my guns and calling Reign of the Orion an album. Sorry guys. True, it’s shorter than the other full-lengths, but it’s got everything you could ask an album to have in terms of how tracks like “Spacerunner” and the shouty “Half-Moon Burns” play into each other, and the fluidity of the outing on the whole is inarguable. An LP by any other name? Whatever you or they want to call it, there’s no question in my mind Reign of the Orion is one of 2019’s best records. If they insist on it being an EP, then it’s the best one of the year, but I still say it belongs in another category altogether, so here it is.
As hyper-crowded as London is with bands at this moment in history, there continue to be acts who sneak through with an individualized and intriguing perspective on doom and heavy rock, and Green Lung are a perfect example, learning from fellow Brits like Alunah and Elephant Tree and incorporating folk and forest goth vibes to their debut album, Woodland Rites. Laced with organ and stuck-in-the-head choruses like “Let the Devil In” and the creeper “Templar Dawn,” the record also pushed into drifting verses on “Into the Wild,” setting up future experimentation with atmospheric variety and genre manipulation. If part of any first album’s appeal is the potential it represents, Green Lung’s offers plenty, but wherever their subsequent course may or may not take them, their accomplishments here shouldn’t be overlooked. Woodland Rites is nothing less than the heavy rock debut album of the year, and though they emerge from a packed field, the work they do to stand themselves out already carries their mark and an apparent will toward progression. They’re on their way.
My head immediately goes to the hooks of “Ten Days” and “Ascension Day” and “Savage Heart,” but the up-down surges of guitar in “Old News/New Fire” and the midtempo soulfulness in “A Thousand Miles” are no less resonant when it comes to the actual listening experience of the fifth Lo-Pan LP. Subtle, when it came to living up to its name, as much wasn’t as it was. Flourishes of harmony in the vocals of Jeff Martin, the pops in Jesse Bartz’s snare punctuating and propelling in kind, turns in Scott Thompson’s bass work twisting around the guitar of Chris Thompson, a relative newcomer to the fold making his debut with the band and showing no apparent trouble fitting in. I don’t imagine Lo-Pan is an easy band to join, especially at this point. They thrive on personality clash and, through years of touring, have a chemistry they’ve built between them that comes through even on their recordings. Nonetheless, Subtle is their clearest, sharpest-edged work yet, and as tight as their songwriting has become, they still groove and groove mightily. They are a treasure of American heavy rock and roll. Believe it.
While members of Roadsaw have spent the intervening years in projects like Kind, White Dynomite, Sasquatch and Murcielago, the Boston heavy rock kingpins have indeed been missed, and Tinnitus the Night works quickly to show why. It’s been well over 20 years since their first LP — hell, it’s been eight since they put out their 2011 self-titled (review here) — but their craft is at its own level, and Tinnitus the Night comes barreling through with “Shake” and “Along for the Ride” and “Final Phase” before opening up to broader fare on side B with “Find What You Need,” “Under the Devil’s Thumb” and “Midazolam” ahead of the subdued finale “Silence,” and the result is nothing less than a classic heavy rock LP structure as befitting what is itself a classic heavy rock LP. What’s Roadsaw’s future? I don’t know. It took them the better part of a decade to make this one happen, so take from that what you will, but to me, all it says is there’s even more reason to be grateful they got it done and out. To say the songs deserve that is putting it mildly.
I’m not doing a ‘song of the year’ post, but if I was, Worshipper’s “Coming Through” might be it. The opening track from the Boston four-piece’s second album, Light in the Wire, marries classic pop drama in its melody with careening progressive riffing, and sets the tone for a record that is of both future and past, twistingly complex and yet immediately accessible, immersive as an entirety and still comprised of standout moments. These aren’t contradictions in Worshipper’s skillful hands, but the stuff of what’s already becoming their own take on rock. Tied together through melody, skillful rhythmic intricacy and solid structural foundations, “Light in the Wires,” “Visions from Beyond,” “Wither on the Vine” and others throughout post their own triumphs en route to enhancing the album as a whole, while “Nobody Else” and closer “Arise” underscore the emotive basis from which the perspective of the whole LP emanates. There are a lot of “next-gen” heavy rock bands out there weaving prog elements and traditional riffing together to some degree or other. Few, if any, can write a song like Worshipper can. I mean it. This band is something special.
What is there to say about Solace? A band who, nine years after revealing the expectation-slaughtering masterpiece A.D. (review here), return with three-fifths of a swapped-out lineup and simply do it again? This band is explosive. Really. Like, they might explode at any minute. It’s a miracle The Brink ever happened. I’ll be honest, I had my doubts. But Solace are a force like nothing else I’ve ever encountered in music. They take metallic aggression, hardcore’s sense of self-righteousness and heavy rock’s groove, set it all to a doomly swing and they play it in such a way as to leave you utterly dumbfounded by what you just experienced. Here’s a challenge though, for the band personally. From me to them. Do another one. Go ahead. Put out another album. You don’t even have to do it in 2020. Do it 2021. Write the songs and give me a no-holds-barred 45-minute LP of the tightest, meanest shit you’ve ever written. Because massive as the accomplishments are on The Brink, it’s the potential to build from them that resonates most here. So do it, guys. Step up and take advantage of the moment. Call me greedy if you want, I don’t care. Give me another Solace record. I dare you.
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8. Brume, Rabbits
Released by Doom Stew Records & DHU Records. Reviewed Nov. 6.
Simply a case of a band wildly outdoing themselves. Easy story, yeah? In some ways, maybe, but the truth of what Brume achieve on Rabbits. Their second long-player behind 2017’s Rooster (review here), the five-track offering sees the San Francisco three-piece of vocalist/bassist Susie McMullan, guitarist/vocalist Jamie McCathie and drummer Jordan Perkins-Lewis working with producer Billy Anderson to bring theatricality and emotionalism together in a flowing post-heavy context that’s neither derivative nor working at cross purposes. Instead, it is a gorgeous and blooming undertaking across its 43-minute span, working in its own light/dark spectrum and bringing not just the sense of trapped fragility evoked by the cover art, but a corresponding sureness of intent to its ascendant heavy surges. Like Rooster before it, it is loaded with potential, but in “Scurry” and “Lament” and “Despondence” and “Blue Jay and “Autocrat’s Fool,” there’s a patience and command that absolutely does not waver. So yes, a band outdoing themselves. But so much more too.
This may forever be known as the Mars Red Sky album they wrote in a cave, but the Bordeaux three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Julien Pras and bassist/vocalist Jimmy Kinast and drummer Matieu “Matgaz” Gazeau nonetheless plunged forward along the progressive course they charted back on 2014’s sophomore outing, Stranded in Arcadia (review here), and continued to manifest in 2016’s Apex III (Praise for the Burning Soul) (review here). Their blend of melody and tonal heft has become a hallmark of their work to this stage in their career, but The Task Eternal continues to add a sense of breadth to the proceedings, giving their sound a full three-dimensional pull that feels tailor-made for headphones and is consuming in its entirety. With experiments in structure like the pairing of “Recast” and “Reacts,” and the rushing sweep of melody in “Hollow King,” Mars Red Sky’s latest is, as ever, their finest. Outdoing themselves would seem to be the task from which the record derives its title. Fine. Just keep going. Please.
Every time I think I understand where Kings Destroy want to go as a band, they pull the rug out. That’s what Fantasma Nera is. After their 2015 self-titled (review here) third LP seemed to declare them once and for all in a space between doom and noise rooted in their respective hardcore pasts, the Brooklynite five-piece hooked up with producer David Bottrill (Tool, etc.) and composed a rock album. A real live rock album! With progressive undertones in the guitar work and the most accomplished melodicism of their career, Kings Destroy put everything they had into making Fantasma Nera and one need look no further than the title-track to hear the result of that monumental effort. It is the realization of a band challenging themselves to go so far out of their comfort zone as to be only recognizable in the most rudimentary of ways, and to say it as plainly as I can, “Dead Before” is enough of an accomplishment — and enough of a full-length, at all of 4:25 — to make this list on its own, whatever surrounds it. Song of the year. I’ll say every time I’m a Kings Destroy fan, but I’ve never been gladder to say it than I am in talking about Fantasma Nera.
If you’re saying to yourself, “Ah come on, Colour Haze are always on the list when they put out records,” I have two answers. One, you’re right, and two, if you have a problem with that, blow it out your ass. The Munich forefathers of the European heavy psychedelic underground — yup — marked their 25th anniversary this year, and did so not just by putting out an album, but by putting out We Are, which introduces a full-fledged fourth member to what’s been a three-piece since 1998. Granted, it’s not the first time guitarist/vocalist Stefan Koglek, bassist Philipp Rasthofer and drummer Manfred Merwald have worked with organist/keyboardist/synthesist Jan Faszbender, but never has the presence of keys been so integral to their work, and never has the dynamic between players shifted in the way it does on tracks like “The Real” and “Life” and “I’m With You,” with keys fleshing out melodies and enriching the bass and guitar. Add to that the Spanish-style guitar on centerpiece “Material Drive” or the operatic flash in the penultimate “Be With Me,” and it’s one more example of one of the best bands on earth refusing to rest on their laurels. Which, as it happens, is why they’re one of the best bands on earth. So hell yes, they’re on all my lists. Fact is my lists are lucky to have them.
Like nothing else I heard in 2019, Veils of Winter had repeat listenability. It was the album that, most often, when I was choosing something I actually wanted to hear, I went back to time and again. Its dark, moody psychedelic and heavy vibe stands alone among the year’s releases, and is a stylistic milestone that one only hopes other artists will pick up on. Toying with pop melodies on tracks like “Death Realms” and bringing hypnosis and clarity in kind to the subtly traditionalist winding riff of “Moonlit” — would it have been out of place on the first Witchcraft LP? — the Portland, Oregon, five-piece worked on a speedy turnaround and squashed even the significant expectations I had after their self-titled debut (review here) last year. They’ve begun to tour, so I don’t know if another full-length is in the works for 2020, but their craft is enviable in its flow and their songs are shimmering in tone and cohesion alike. Given how bold a step forward Veils of Winter is, I hear nothing in their material to this point to make me think their momentum won’t continue to carry them forward. But, you know, if not, I’d also take about six or seven records just like this one. That’d be fine too. Whatever they want, really.
Belfast, Northern Ireland, three-piece Slomatics — guitarists David Majury and Chris Couzens and drummer/vocalist/synthesist Marty Harvey — finished a narrative trilogy with 2016’s Future Echo Returns (review here), and though the storyline was always vague throughout that and the preceding two offerings, the question of how they would proceed nonetheless hung over Canyons prior to its release. The answer is in the songs themselves. From the sci-fi majesty of lumbering, rolling groove in opener and longest track “Gears of Despair” — oh, they grind — through the mega-stomp of “Telemachus, My Son” and the righteously synth-laden wash that consumes “Mind Fortresses on Theia,” Slomatics bring together concept and execution with a readiness that highlights the fact of their 15th anniversary. They are mature in their approach, yes, but the fact is their approach is so much their own and so given to their particular mode of progression that it almost can’t help but feel fresh. How could something so utterly crushing also feel rejuvenating? As they plod through finale “Organic Caverns II” ending with more waves of synth and tectonic guitar — no bass, remember — they are as restorative as they are punishing, and they stand astride that duality with neither mercy nor pretense. Canyons, whether it’s setting up a new story, building from the old, or doing something completely different, stands on its own.
My anticipation for and expectations of Year of the Cobra’s second long-player were high most especially after 2017’s Burn Your Dead EP (review here), which along with the dead, set alight the notion that the Seattle duo of bassist/vocalist Amy Tung Barrysmith and drummer Jon Barrysmith were simply a heavy/doom band. With elements of post-punk, psych wash, minimalist stretches and propulsive gallop, Ash and Dust cast itself out over an aesthetic range that set a new standard not just for Year of the Cobra, but for anyone who’d dare match them at their own game — and that list will grow with time, absolutely. As their first outing through Prophecy Productions, Ash and Dust threw itself into the very melting pot of its own ambition and emerged with songs that didn’t just bring together disparate ideas, but made them flourish and engage and challenge the listener while still proving consistent in tone and underlying groove. For a two-person, two-instrument outfit (not counting voice, though I should), they proved more malleable than many with more than twice the number of hands on deck, and pushed the notion of what heavy rock is and does forward without stopping to look back or ask for permission. They just did it, and maybe Ash and Dust is the aftermath of all that burning.
Look back over the course of this list, and you will find no shortage of bands and releases that surpassed the group in question’s past work. With Gothenburg, Sweden’s Monolord, it wasn’t just about No Comfort — their debut on Relapse, fourth full-length overall — being better than 2017’s Rust (review here), because that was pretty jolly gosh darn enjoyable, but about the band reaching a moment of transcendence to which Rust and all their prior work across 2015’s Vænir (review here) and 2014’s Empress Rising has been leading. With the six tracks of No Comfort, guitarist/vocalist Thomas Jäger, bassist Mika Häkki and drummer Esben Willems not only overcome the influences that launched them — taking full ownership of their sound and defending that claim with the sheer quality of their songwriting — and they not only become as identifiable as those influences themselves, but they overcome themselves. No Comfort means no comfort. Monolord take the simplicity that once fueled their riffing, the willful primitivism of their earliest work, and with songs like “Larvae” and “The Bastard Son” and the closing title-track use it as the foundation it was apparently always intended to be. Monolord have toured plenty and certainly their studio output has shown an increasing complexity from one LP to the next, so progression isn’t unexpected, but the manner in which Monolord have executed that progression has been. Even on “The Last Leaf,” which is arguably the most straightforward fare on the album, one hears it as them rather than the manifestation of the acts that inspired them. The same holds for “Skywards” later on, and for the immersion that takes hold as the mournful “Alone Together” plays into “No Comfort” itself. Monolord take their place among the best bands on the planet, and deliver an Album of the Year for 2019 that, like the absolute best, will have an impact lasting much longer than any period of 12 months might convey.
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The Top 50 Albums of 2019: Honorable Mention
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You didn’t think we’d stop at 50, did you? Come on. You know me better than that. The fact is that the list itself, humongous as it is, is just the start of the tip of an iceberg attached to a glacier that’s somewhere on an entire planet constructed of ice.
Honorable mentions, you say? Yeah, a few. Here they are in no order whatsoever:
Lord Vicar, Goatess, The Lord Weird Slough Feg, Zone Six, Lykantropi, Earth, White Manna, Atala, Tia Carrera, Merlin, WEEED, Híbrido, Cities of Mars, Stone Machine Electric, Bretus, Blackwolfgoat, The Black Wizards, Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell, Alunah, V, Pale Grey Lore, Leeds Point, Sons of Alpha Centauri, Spidergawd, Bus, Death Hawks, BBF, Vessel of Light, Crypt Trip, The Pilgrim, Uffe Lorenzen, Brant Bjork, Doomstress, Black Lung, Kandodo3, Monkey3, Bask, Horseburner, Zed, Bright Curse, Spillage, Sigils, Papir, Dune Sea, Destroyer of Light, Mastiff, Warp, Centrum, Varego, Lord Dying, Volcano, Saint Karloff, Firebreather, High Reeper, Bible of the Devil, Obsidian Sea, Torche, Motorpsycho, Sunn O))), Deadbird, Russian Circles, El Supremo, Pyramidal, Holy Serpent, Elizabeth Colour Wheel, Demon Head, Red Beard Wall, Onhou, Kamchatka, Iguana, Arrowhead, The Whims of the Great Magnet, Serial Hawk, Scissorfight, Monte Luna, Lingua Ignota, Valborg, Sageness, Ruff Majik, The Giraffes, High Fighter, Comacozer, Burning Gloom, Swan Valley Heights, Mark Deutrom, Cable, AVER, Superlynx, The Munsens, No Man’s Valley, Old Mexico, Skraeckoedlan, Godsleep, Øresund Space Collective Meets Black Moon Circle.
Seems cruel to leave it to you to sort through those, but I’m tempted to do just that. You might notice some bigger names there in bands like Earth, Russian Circles, Torche and Sunn O))). Nothing against those bands, but I think we’re seeing a moment where a different group of artists are taking point in terms of innovating heavy styles across an entire swath of microgenres. Either way it’s not a slight that something is here instead of above. And of course, there are plenty of up and coming groups here as well, with Ruff Majik, Elizabeth Colour Wheel — who I’m sure would be a top 30 if I knew the record better than I do — Pale Grey Lore, Monte Luna, Papir, Destroyer of Light, The Munsens, No Man’s Valley, Skraeckoedlan, and so on, but hell’s bells, there’s already a list of 50 and I’m only one man. How high is the list supposed to go and still be a list?
Bottom line: Music is as endless as space and has as much beauty in it for those willing to hear. Do more digging.
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The Top 20 Debut Albums of 2019
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1. Green Lung, Woodland Rites
2. Yatra, Death Ritual
3. Howling Giant, The Space Between Worlds
4. Thunderbird Divine, Magnasonic
5. SÂVER, They Came with Sunlight
6. Lightning Born, Lightning Born
7. Elizabeth Colour Wheel, Nocebo
8. The Pilgrim, Walking into the Forest
9. Sigils, You Build the Altar You Lit the Leaves
10. E-L-R, Maenad
11. Hey Zeus, X
12. Bellrope, You Must Relax
13. Asthma Castle, Mount Crushmore
14. Thronehammer, Usurper of Oaken Throne
15. Inner Altar, Vol. III
16. Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember, Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember
17. Hippie Death Cult, 111
18. Faerie Ring, The Clearing
19. Gone Cosmic, Sideways in Time
20. Haze Mage, Chronicles
Honorable Mention: Warp, Pelegrin, Lucy in Blue, Volcano, The Sabbathian, Red Eye Tales, Dune Sea, Dury Dava, Pharlee, Giant Dwarf, Ghost:Hello, Surya, Workshed, Children of the Sün, Burning Gloom, Temple of the Fuzz Witch.
Notes: As ever, I consider a band’s debut album something unique and separate from everything else they’ll ever do, and so worthy of highlighting in its own category. It’s a different standard in my mind, one that takes into account what a group might accomplish going forward as well as what they do on the record itself. Plus, putting out an album is hard. Getting two, three, four, five or more people to agree on anything is an accomplishment. Making a cohesive album? Come on. So yes. We see some crossover from the main list above, but I want to draw attention to Howling Giant, Thunderbird Divine and SÂVER particularly here. There’s a swath of genres represented and I feel like a couple of these releases — Sigils, Bellrope, Thronehammer, Inner Altar, Faerie Ring, Infinity Forms of Yellow Remember — didn’t get their due attention. It’s a busy year, I get it. But if you’re skimming through looking for stuff to check out, DON’T IGNORE THIS LIST. Aside from whatever line about the best of tomorrow you want to trot out, there’s important work being done by these acts today. As somebody who’s constantly behind the times, I urge you not to miss it.
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The Top 20 Short Releases of 2019
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1. Geezer, Spiral Fires
2. Ufomammut, XX
3. All Them Witches, 1×1
4. Mount Saturn, Mount Saturn
5. Dopelord, Weedpecker, Major Kong & Spaceslug, 4-Way Split
6. Horehound, Weight
7. Molasses, Mourning Haze
8. Saint Karloff & Devil’s Witches, Split
9. Here Lies Man, No Ground to Walk Upon
10. The Golden Grass, 100 Arrows
11. Mount Atlas, Mistress
12. Midas, Solid Gold Heavy Metal
13. Glory in the Shadows, Glory in the Shadows
14. Hot Breath, Hot Breath
15. Crystal Spiders, Demo
16. Red Wizard, Ogami
17. Thermic Boogie, Fracture
18. Pinto Graham, Dos
19. High Priest, Sanctum
20. Set Fire, Traya
21. Seedium, Awake
Honorable Mention: Love Gang & Smokey Mirror Split, Forebode, Land Mammal, Very Paranoia, Plague of Carcosa, Daal Dazed, Komodor, Mourn the Light & Oxblood Forge Split, High on Fire, Mount Soma.
Notes: This is probably the least complete of the lists, because it’s the hardest category for me to keep up with. EPs, singles, demos, splits and basically anything else that isn’t an album, all lumped together. Still, I stand by the picks here, and I don’t think anyone who takes on any of them will regret doing so, whether it’s All Them Witches’ surprisingly weighted first single as a trio, Mount Saturn’s debut release, or Geezer’s cosmic jams. Felt a little like cheating putting Ufomammut on there, since technically XX wasn’t new material so much as reworked stuff captured live, but if you want to call me out on it, my own listening habits also factor in, and I’ve spent plenty of time with those reimagined tracks. But anyway, I’m sure there’s a ton of stuff that hasn’t been included here, so please feel free to let me know in the comments and I’ll work accordingly.
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Postwax
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I haven’t felt comfortable with the idea of writing about it editorially, since I’ve been involved in discussions about it since before it came together and since I did the liner notes for each of the six releases (plus one to come), but I wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the incredible work done on the Postwax vinyl subscription series by Blues Funeral Recordings. Label head Jadd Shickler and design specialist Peder Bergstrand (also of Lowrider) put together six offerings that came out in the span of this year and when you hold the LPs in your hand, you can feel the passion that went into making them, from the artists in question to those curating the series in the first place. I hear tell there’s going to be a Postwax Year Two, and I don’t know if I’ll be involved or not, but I’m proud of my miniscule part in the work that went into making these and wanted to bring them to your particular attention. They are something special for those who got to partake:
Elder, The Gold and Silver Sessions
Daxma, Ruins Upon Ruins
Besvärjelsen, Frost
Big Scenic Nowhere, Dying on the Mountain
Domkraft, Slow Fidelity
Lowrider, Refractions
And while we’re talking about projects I was proud to be involved with, I also did liner notes for Acrimony’s The Chronicles of Wode box set from Burning World Records and was honored to do so. Thanks to any and everyone in question for having me involved and dealing with me blowing past deadlines one after the next. It is humbling.
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Looking Ahead to 2020
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A few names and nothing more about what definitely is and/or might be in the works for next year. Woefully incomplete, so feel free to add to it:
1000mods, Wolves in the Throne Room, Deathwhite, Mondo Drag, Drug Cult, Ocean Chief, Soldati, Sergio Ch., Mitochondrial Sun, Geezer, Mirror Queen, Mondo Generator, The Otolith, Asteroid, Yatra, Vestal Claret, Farer, Ryte, Shadow Witch, Six Organs of Admittance, Naxatras, Wolftooth, Snail, Elder, Pale Divine, Grey Skies Fallen, Ruby the Hatchet, Yuri Gagarin, Sasquatch, Godthrymm, Wo Fat, Red Mesa, CB3, Onsegen Ensemble, Insect Ark, Acid Mammoth, Ritual King, Ulls, Om.
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Thank You
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Thank you for reading, and please, if you have a thought or something you want to share in the comments, please remember to be kind to each other. We are all human beings behind our phones and keyboards, and while we’ll disagree, often in some ways and some cases, a basic level of respect is always appreciated. At least by me.
I am not so deluded as to think anyone might still be reading, but I want it on record how much I appreciate you being a part of this site and a part of my experience in making it. I’ve been ruminating all year since marking the 10th anniversary back in January about how much The Obelisk has become a part of who I am, and it’s utterly essential to my every day. The way I continue to think about it — and myself, as it happens — is a work in progress, and that would not be possible without you. One more time. Thank you. Always. Always thank you. Thank you.
I’m rarely so filled with pride and sheer delight as I am when I see a logo for The Obelisk on a poster for a tour happening very, very far away from where I live. And if it’s something amazing, all the better. German heavy rock forerunners Kadavar will head Down Under for a tour in Spring — or I guess Fall — 2020 supporting their latest long-player, For the Dead Travel Fast (review here). As that album is sure to feature on my list later this month of 2019’s finest offerings, I’m all the more stoked to have The Obelisk on the admittedly-not-insignificant list of presenters for the run. I mean, seriously, I’m a dork from New Jersey. Who the hell am I to (even co-) present anything on the other side of the world? So awesome.
Special thanks to Beats Cartel for having The Obelisk on board for this one. To say it’s an honor would be putting it mildly.
Here’s the press release, as much for future-me to look back on fondly as for your current information:
GERMAN FUZZ KINGS KADAVAR ARE COMING TO NEW ZEALAND
There are few bands who’ve had more of an effect on the course of classic heavy retro rock this decade than Germany’s KADAVAR, having never sounded so much in command of their music.
Arguably the hardest working band in European rock, Kadavar have established themselves quite simply in a different league form their retro-rock labelled peers, smashing out large capacity international tours and festivals (Hellfest/Psycho Las Vegas/Download/Wacken) en masse and landing German and US chart positions for a host of album releases. Latest album release For the Dead Travel Fast (Nuclear Blast), reignites new depths and heights alike on this their fifth and darkest full-length.
Highly regarded as one of the most explosive heavy psych live experiences on the planet, Kadavar return to Australian and New Zealand shores in March/April 2020 for Beats Cartel on the back of a Mojo Burning Festival appearance. Not having visited Australian since their 2013 tour with Blues Pills and the follow-up 2016 headline tour, interest will be paramount in 2020 to catch one of the best names in the business perform albums worth of new live material.
The band’s fifth record is a perilous journey into the land of the dead, a foray into the bleakest corners of our minds. A heavy, slow-paced, throbbing force of guitar, bass and drums, preciously enriched by spooky synths and a brooding narrative reminiscent of the Victorian death-cult.
“Something like this wouldn’t have been possible earlier in our career. Only now do we know each other well enough to pull off something like this” drummer Tiger nods, “We have the feeling we created something new while at the same time having rediscovered our core DNA. Feels damn good.”
Get ready to witness something special… Kadavar are coming. For the Dead Travel Fast 2020 Australian and New Zealand tour stops in a host of cities across the two countries including Sydney, Newcastle, Brisbane, Christchurch, Wellington, Auckland, Canberra, Adelaide, Melbourne, Scarborough and Perth. All shows on sale now at www.beatscartel.com. National supports will be announced soon.
KAVAVAR 2020 AUSTRALIAN & NEW ZEALAND TOUR “For the Dead Travel Fast” Thursday March 26 SYDNEY Frankies Pizza Friday March 27 NEWCASTLE Stag & Hunter Saturday March 28 BRISBANE MOJO BURNING FESTIVAL Sunday March 29 CHRISTCHURCH Club Hotel Monday March 30 WELLINGTON Valhalla Tuesday March 31 AUCKLAND Whammy Bar Wednesday April 01 CANBERRA The Basement Thursday April 02 ADELAIDE Crown & Anchor Friday April 03 MELBOURNE Stay Gold Saturday April 04 SCARBOROUGH GERMANIUM DAZE *Festival to be announced Sunday April 05 PERTH Lucy’s Love Shack
Posted in Reviews on October 28th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
Five records into a career as one of the most influential European heavy bands to come along this decade, Kadavar would seem to be returning to their roots. For the Dead Travel Fast is indeed the fifth long-player from the Berlin-based trio — fourth for Nuclear Blast — and in following up the modern sheen of their last two albums, 2017’s Rough Times (review here) and 2015’s Berlin (review here), the band would seem to have sought some middle ground in aesthetic conversation with their earlier work on 2013’s Abra Kadavar (review here) and their landmark released-in-2012-but-perpetually-reissued self-titled debut (discussed here), digging into an organic production style mirrored in the gritty sepia and severe contrast of the photo on their cover art.
If they’ve proven anything over the course of the last seven-plus years, it’s their ability as songwriters, and they’ve only grown more complex and more expressive in that regard, with guitarist/vocalist Christoph “Lupus” Lindemann emerging as a genuine frontman presence, drummer Christoph “Tiger” Bartelt functioning as the proverbial madman behind the kit and bassist Simon “Dragon” Bouteloup the quieter presence but ever more responsible for the band’s weight of impact. For the Dead Travels Fast leans on that weight more than did Rough Times, but it takes some cues from that album just the same, with the darker themes that pervaded there in songs like “Die Baby Die” and “Words of Evil,” “Skeleton Blues” and “Vampires” showing up in the ready-for-Halloween pieces “Children of the Night” — a highlight here — “The Devil’s Master,” “Evil Forces,” “Dancing with the Dead,” “Poison” and “Demons in My Mind.” Despite something of a shift on the most basic sonic level from one style to another — i.e., the re-adoption of a more vintage mindset — this continuity feels natural from the brooding opening of “The End” as an intro to “The Devil’s Master” onward.
By the time they get through the cavernous side B dark-psychedelia echoes of “Demons in My Mind” and into the closing duo of “Saturnales,” an organ-laced minimalia with hypnotic guitar and duly obscure lyrics, and the 7:49 capper build of “Long Forgotten Song,” mood becomes a central feature of For the Dead Travel Fast and where Rough Times did more than flirt with horror rock and a grimmer outlook, the newer work unquestionably pushes further. Songs are more patient in their execution and unfold in brooding fashion at least where they want to, and even a rocker like the proto-metallic “Evil Forces” finds room for a section of cackling, howling laughter at its conclusion, moving into the starts, stops, stomps and hooks of “Children of the Night” with a smoothness that signals the intent that always seems to be lurking beneath the surface of Kadavar‘s work. That is to say, they know what they’re doing here, as they always do.
Kadavar are not a haphazard band, at least in their finished product (I can’t really speak to the process that brings that product about), and For the Dead Travel Fast shows yet again that their will is to have more than just a stylistic impact, but to back that up with a quality of craft and delivery that they’ve at this point put in years of work to hone on tour and in the studio. Frankly, it shows. I don’t think one could listen to “Dancing with the Dead” and say they sound tired, because they don’t, but there’s a maturity at play throughout their fifth record that suits them and their material well. They’re not the brash ’70s rockers anymore. They’re a band who’ve toured the world, headlined festivals and done gigs on multiple continents, and whose fanbase has grown to encompass not just listeners, but other bands who’ve taken up their influence. Again, there are few in Europe or anywhere else who’ve had more of an effect on the course of this particular branch of classic-minded heavy rock this decade than Kadavar, and they round out the 2010s in prime fashion on For the Dead Travel Fast, claiming their place not quite as statesmen of the underground, but as a band who never wanted to be a fluke and went on to prove it in the most righteous manner possible.
I’ll stop short of calling For the Dead Travel Fast a victory lap for that notion, mostly because I don’t think that’s what the band intended it to be, and because the characterization doesn’t really suit the mood of most of the material — which, again, is more grim even in its uptempo moments on “The Devil’s Master,” “Evil Forces” or the echoing thrust of “Demons in My Mind” — but it ends up being a powerful argument in favor of the idea just the same. Across a clean nine-track/45-minute run, Kadavar demonstrate their utter mastery of their form, hard won but ultimately uncompromised, and as much as one might be tempted to think of the sound of For the Dead Travel Fast as a “return to form” or something like that — and maybe that’s not entirely wrong — it’s also important to consider the ways in which the three-piece continue to push themselves forward, as on “Saturnales” or even the atmospheric beginning “The End” provides the record as it moves into the alternatingly broadly spaced and pushing “The Devil’s Master,” that dynamic persisting throughout nearly everything that follows.
Principally, Kadavar write memorable songs, as they always have. Whatever form that takes, whatever turns of aesthetic they might bring to that, they never seem to lose that foundation beneath them, and much as Bouteloup‘s bassline underscores Lindemann‘s scorcher solo in “Evil Forces,” it’s always right where it needs to be at the structural root of their material. They’ve made themselves harder to predict with For the Dead Travel Fast, which is refreshing. After the outright sheen of Berlin and the harder-edged modern sound of Rough Times, one might have expected Kadavar to stay on that path, but by shifting their production style, they’ve elbowed their way through whatever preconceptions might’ve existed of where they were headed and instead decided to chart their own course in the manner befitting a mature outfit of their stature. They’ve never sounded so much in command of their songs.
Posted in Bootleg Theater on September 3rd, 2019 by JJ Koczan
Kadavar played at Psycho Las Vegas a couple weeks ago, and in a couple more weeks, they’ll release their new album, For the Dead Travel Fast, which they’ll support beginning in November with a pretty substantial European tour. That’s how it goes. Put out a record and tour. Kadavar, certainly, have done it before.
The difference this time, I guess, is the album itself. I’ll get a review up at some point — mostly because I like writing about Kadavar, rather than the expectation that anyone gives a crap what I have to say about them or that Nuclear Blast is eagerly awaiting my opinion on the record — but it’s a different vibe as Kadavar embark on their fifth album, and the slick modernity that showed itself through 2017’s Rough Times (review here) and 2015’s Berlin (review here) seems to be at least meeting halfway with their more vintage-minded early work, 2013’s Abra Kadavar (review here) and 2012’s self-titled debut (discussed here). The track for which they’re sharing a new video now, “Children of the Night,” brings that pretty clearly to the forefront.
It’s a proto-metallic fuzz crunch in the guitar and an organic sounding bassline that wouldn’t be out of place on an Uncle Acid record were they perhaps dirtied up a bit, but of course guitarist Christoph “Lupus” Lindemann puts his own vocal stamp on it and for my money there aren’t a lot of heavy rock drummers in Europe’s well-populated underground who play with the vitality of Christoph “Tiger” Bartelt, his roll in the ending section of the track matched fluidly by the low-end air-push of Simon “Dragon”Bouteloup. Less immediately hooky and more dug-in feeling, “Children of the Night” has the mood of For the Dead Travel Fast well summarized, and it’ll be interested to see how the LP is received especially by those fans of their first two records.
But it’s the internet, so people will probably bitch either way. Whatever. I dig it.
They spliced old movie clips together for the video, obviously going for something simpler than the last one. A respite well earned.
Enjoy:
Kadavar, “Children of the Night” official video
After their insanely ambitious spaghetti western video for the “The Devil’s Master”, Berlin, Germany-based rock overlords KADAVAR have released the official music video for the brand new single, “Children Of The Night”. The song comes off the band’s highly anticipated new album, For The Dead Travel Fast.
Pre-order For The Dead Travel Fast and/or accompanying merchandise here!
Recently the band had announced their European headlining tour in support of the album.
KADAVAR – FOR THE DEAD TRAVEL FAST EUROPEAN TOUR 2019 Special Guests: HÄLLAS & PABST 06.11. SE Copenhagen Pumpehuset 07.11. NO Oslo Bla 08.11. SE Göteborg Brewhouse 09.11. SE Stockholm Debaser 10.11. DE Hannover Capitol 12.11. FR Lyon Le CCO 13.11. FR Nantes Le Stéréolux 14.11. FR Paris L’Alhambra 15.11. FR Bordeaux BT 59 16.11. ES Madrid Mon 17.11. ES Barcelona Razzmatazz 2 19.11. FR Strasbourg La Laiterie 20.11. DE Wiesbaden Schlachthof 21.11. DE Nu?rnberg Hirsch 22.11. DE Mu?nchen Backstage Werk 23.11. AT Wien Arena 24.11. DE Dresden Beatpol 25.11. BE Brussels Orangiere at Botanique 27.11. DE Stuttgart LKA Longhorn 28.11. DE Köln Essigfabrik 29.11. DE Hamburg Große Freiheit 30.11. DE Berlin Columbiahalle
With a release date set for Oct. 11, Kadavar‘s For the Dead Travel Fast is well on its way to being the Berlin trio’s most complex and atmospheric outing to-date, and yet, at the same time, it’s also kind of a return to the vintage production style of their first two records. No question that Kadavar modernized their initial retro sound over their last couple full-lengths — 2017’s Rough Times (review here) most of all — but as their new video for “The Devil’s Master” shows, they’ve not only grown bolder as songwriters, but they’re willing to once again more fully embrace a sonic naturalism in doing so. It is, as the entirety of the album proves, a winning combination.
“The Devil’s Master,” which combines in the video below with the album-intro “The End,” brings a desert-garage-goth vibe to go with its Spaghetti Western visual thematic — an immediate departure from some of the catchy and uptempo beginnings of LPs past, but immersive just the same, and rich in tone and the vocal melodies of guitarist Christoph “Lupus” Lindemann, who plays one of the three main characters of the cinematic clip, with bassist Simon “Dragon” Bouteloup and drummer Christoph “Tiger” Bartelt filling the other roles, Bouteloup perhaps having the best part, and as usual, the best hat.
I’ll have a full review of For the Dead Travel Fast at some point in the next couple months — hell, with the delayed release, I might even get it posted before it’s out! — but suffice it to say that while “The Devil’s Master” doesn’t necessarily speak for the entirety of the album, it does capture something essential about its spirit, and that Kadavar have never pushed this kind of engagement with their audience so much to the forefront of their approach before. They succeed with the mastery one has come to expect from them.
Preorder info, tour dates — they’re at Psycho Las Vegas this week — and more background follow the video below, all courtesy of the PR wire.
Enjoy:
Kadavar, “The Devil’s Master” official video
Kadavar Release Epic Western Music Video For First Single Off For The Dead Travel Fast
Berlin, Germany-based rock overlords KADAVAR have released the official music video for the song “The Devil’s Master”, the opening track of the band’s highly anticipated new album, For The Dead Travel Fast. The epic western movie styled music video was shot in Fuerteventura and stars actress Lucie Aron as well as the band’s members Lupus, Tiger and Dragon.
Commented the band:
Lupus: “Fuerteventura was the perfect set for the idea to shoot a small Spaghetti Western. In the story, everyone is fighting everyone: there are cutthroats who don‘t trust each other trying to survive in the desert. They are hunted by their enemy, a violent priest who enslaves a young lady, who both of the cowboys admire. In the end, there won‘t be any winners…”
Tiger: “The song is about the worst ideas of the people, the attraction of horror and the seductive scent of the disreputable. Just as it is all too human to feel at the mercy of his fears, so comprehensible it seems to give way to the fascination of evil in the face of death.”
For The Dead Travel Fast will be released on October 11 (initially September 20), 2019 via Nuclear Blast and is now available for pre-order.
The album will be released in various formats:
Limited Box-Set including limited tri-colored vinyl, limited tri-colored bonus vinyl including 4 previously unreleased tracks, CD/Blu-Ray Digi (including the KADAVAR & THE COSMIC RIDERS OF THE BLACK SUN live show, Berlin 2019), Poster, signed photo card, patch, sticker. CD/Blu-Ray Digi (including the KADAVAR & THE COSMIC RIDERS OF THE BLACK SUN live show, Berlin 2019) Vinyl (black, beige, bi-colored, cornetto)
Pre-order »For The Dead Travel Fast« and/or accompanying merchandise here!
Recently the band had announced their European headlining tour in support of the album.
KADAVAR – FOR THE DEAD TRAVEL FAST EUROPEAN TOUR 2019 Special Guests: HÄLLAS & PABST 06.11. SE Copenhagen Pumpehuset 07.11. NO Oslo Bla 08.11. SE Göteborg Brewhouse 09.11. SE Stockholm Debaser 10.11. DE Hannover Capitol 12.11. FR Lyon Le CCO 13.11. FR Nantes Le Stéréolux 14.11. FR Paris L’Alhambra 15.11. FR Bordeaux BT 59 16.11. ES Madrid Mon 17.11. ES Barcelona Razzmatazz 2 19.11. FR Strasbourg La Laiterie 20.11. DE Wiesbaden Schlachthof 21.11. DE Nu?rnberg Hirsch 22.11. DE Mu?nchen Backstage Werk 23.11. AT Wien Arena 24.11. DE Dresden Beatpol 25.11. BE Brussels Orangiere at Botanique 27.11. DE Stuttgart LKA Longhorn 28.11. DE Köln Essigfabrik 29.11. DE Hamburg Große Freiheit 30.11. DE Berlin Columbiahalle
KADAVAR’s latest album, Rough Times, was released in late 2017 to global critical acclaim, including live hits like “Die Baby Die,” “Tribulation Nation” and “Into The Wormhole”.
KADAVAR live: 16.08. F St. Nolff – Motocultor Festival 17-18.08. USA Las Vegas, NV – Psycho Las Vegas
Posted in Whathaveyou on June 12th, 2019 by JJ Koczan
You know, if we’re being honest, I’d probably write this post on another day and be like, “Golly, I wonder what Kadavar‘s new record’ll sound like,” or some overly-wordy equivalent speculation thereof. Truth be told, I don’t care. Not that I’m not looking forward to it or I’m not curious, but after proving their songwriting mettle over four demonstrably different records without falling flat, I think they’ve at least earned the benefit of the doubt to that degree. Wherever they want to go in terms of their sound, I’m willing to trust they know what they’re doing. They might throw in something totally unexpected, they might not. Either way, don’t you just kind of think Kadavar know what they want to do in the studio by now? Hell, it’s even their own studio.
The record, which presumably will be out this Fall in time for their newly-announced European tour, is to be titled For the Dead Travel Fast, and it will see release through the band’s continued partnership with Nuclear Blast, recently reupped.
Details from the PR wire:
KADAVAR Reveal New Album’s Title & Announce European Tour
Berlin, Germany-based rock overlords KADAVAR have announced the dates of the European tour in support of the band’s forthcoming album, For The Dead Travel Fast.
KADAVAR – FOR THE DEAD TRAVEL FAST EUROPEAN TOUR 2019 Special Guests: HÄLLAS & PABST 06.11. SE Copenhagen Pumpehuset 07.11. NO Oslo Bla 08.11. SE Göteborg Brewhouse 09.11. SE Stockholm Debaser 10.11. DE Hannover Capitol 12.11. FR Lyon Le CCO 13.11. FR Nantes Le Stéréolux 14.11. FR Paris L’Alhambra 15.11. FR Bordeaux BT 59 16.11. ES Madrid Mon 17.11. ES Barcelona Razzmatazz 2 19.11. FR Strasbourg La Laiterie 20.11. DE Wiesbaden Schlachthof 21.11. DE Nu?rnberg Hirsch 22.11. DE Mu?nchen Backstage Werk 23.11. AT Wien Arena 24.11. DE Dresden Beatpol 25.11. BE Brussels Orangiere at Botanique 27.11. DE Stuttgart LKA Longhorn 28.11. DE Köln Essigfabrik 29.11. DE Hamburg Große Freiheit 30.11. DE Berlin Columbiahalle
The band recently re-signed with their long-time label Nuclear Blast after a highly successful 7 year run encompassing three studio albums during which the trio has toured the globe relentlessly.
Commented singer and guitarist Lupus: “When we signed our first deal back in 2012, all of this was just a mere idea. Since then a lot has happened and after 3 records, 2 live albums and quite a few singles, we’re a very happy to continue working with Nuclear Blast.”
The band is currently working hard on the successor to 2017’s Rough Times at their own recording studio in Berlin Neukölln.
Added drummer Tiger: “We’re very creative at the moment, writing new songs on a daily basis. Wir very much loooking forward to completing the album soon. So it’s very nice that we have this new contract!”
KADAVAR’s latest album, Rough Times, was released in late 2017 to global critical acclaim, including live hits like “Die Baby Die,” “Tribulation Nation” and “Into The Wormhole”.
KADAVAR live: 27.06. I Segrate (MI)- Magnolia Stone 29.06. D Ferropolis – Full Force 02./03.08. D Beelen – Krach am Bach 08. – 10.08. D Haldern – Pop Festival 16.08. F St. Nolff – Motocultor Festival 17./18.08. USA Las Vegas, NV – Psycho Las Vegas
