Posted in Bootleg Theater on November 12th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
This week, Pittsburgh drone guitarist Fuzznaut — né Emilio Rizzo — is set on Nov. 15 to issue the latest single from the solo-project, the tellingly-titled “Earbleeder.” From a more irony-prone outfit/player, one might expect some element of misdirect behind the title, like Rizzo would call it “Earbleeder” and just have it be a four-minute tone-waffling drone — nothing against that, mind you — but though seemingly committed to an instrumentalist foundation, Fuzznaut have used titles to convey intention before, and “Earbleeder” should be viewed no differently. It is the fourth and likely final single of 2024 for Rizzo, following behind February’s “Sufferlove” (premiered here), May’s “Spacerock” (hey, can’t catch ’em all), and September’s “Wind Doula” (review here), and like its predecessors, it draws attention to just how broad a stylistic expanse one can accomplish with just the guitar and effects.
The name “Earbleeder” likely refers to the distortion with which most of the song is executed (one never knows, but that’s a way to read it, anyhow), which is rawer than was “Wind Doula,” though certainly that most-recent-until-now track had its rumbling and distorted aspects as well. “Earbleeder” feels even more open in comparison, perhaps just as a result of the largesse in Rizzo‘s application of tone and the reverb reaching out therefrom, but it gets as wide as it does tall. Though there are no drums, Dylan Carlson and Earth remain strong points of influence for Rizzo, and some of “Earbleeder”‘s character can be traced to that, but shortly before three minutes into the song’s four and a half, there emerges a r-i-f-f riff that is purposefully solid so that another layer can take hold overtop and lead into the fade with due ethereality. As for evocation or meditation, that feels like less the priority here, but I have to admit part of that is the power of suggestion. I’m sure if Rizzo had called it “Sitting by a Campfire at Night Thinking About Stars,” in all likelihood I’d be singing praises for the specificity of the impression. These things are all subjective, is what I’m saying. Regardless of what it’s called, “Earbleeder” wants nothing for immersion.
An accordingly atmospheric video for the song, which again lands this Friday on streaming outlets, follows here. I put “Wind Doula” at the bottom too, in case you want to do a side-by-side and see where you end up.
Fuzz was born from overloaded signals—a happy accident that gives music a powerful, psychoacoustic edge. Fuzznaut’s Earbleeder blends the heavy fuzz of doom with the distorted intensity of post-metal, creating a sonic landscape that’s as crushing as it is cohesive.
Stock footage from Freepik/Pixbay releases November 15 2024 Fuzznaut “Earbleeder” Digital Release Leafy Brain Recordings Time: 4:40 Mixed and Mastered by Fuzznaut at Leafy Brain Sounds 2023-2024. Artwork by Fuzznaut
Posted in Reviews on October 11th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
I got a note from the contact form a bit ago in my email, which happens enough that it’s not really news, except that it wasn’t addressed to me. That happens sometimes too. A band has a form letter they send out with info — it’s not the most personal touch, but has a purpose and doesn’t preclude following-up individually — or just wants to say the same thing to however many outlets. Fair game. This was specifically addressed to somebody else. And it kind of ends with the band saying to send a donation link, like, “Wink wink we donate and you post our stuff.”
Well shit. You mean I coulda been making fat stacks off these stoner bands all the while? Living in my dream house with C.O.C. on the outdoor speakers just by exploiting a couple acts trying to get their riffs heard? Well I’ll be damned. Yeah man, here’s my donation link. Daddy needs a new pair of orthopedic flip-flops. I’ma never pay taxes again.
Life, sometimes.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
—
Alunah, Fever Dream
The seventh full-length from UK outfit Alunah, Fever Dream, will be immediately noteworthy for being the band’s last (though one never knows) with vocalist Siân Greenaway fronting the band, presiding over an era of transition when they had to find a new identity for themselves. Fever Dream is the third Alunah LP with Greenaway, and its nine songs show plainly how far the band has come in the six-plus years of her tenure. “Never Too Late” kicks off with both feet at the intersection of heavy rock and classic metal, with a hook besides, and “Trickster of Time” follows up with boogie and flute, because you’re special and deserve nice things. The four-piece as they are here — Greenaway on vocals (and flute), guitarist Matt Noble, bassist Dan Burchmore and founding drummer Jake Mason — are able to bring some drama in “Fever Dream,” to imagine lone-guitar metal Thin Lizzy in the solo of the swaggering “Hazy Jane,” go from pastoral to crushing in “Celestial” and touch on prog in “The Odyssey.” The finale “I’ve Paid the Price” tips into piano grandiosity, but by the time they get there, it feels earned. A worthy culmination for this version of this band.
Swiss heavy post-hardcore unit Coilguns‘ fourth LP and the first in five years, though they’ve had EPs and splits in that time, Odd Love offers 11 songs across an adventurous 48 minutes, alternately raw or lush, hitting hard with a slamming impact or careening or twisting around, mathy and angular. In “Generic Skincare,” it’s both and a jet-engine riff to boot. Atmosphere comes to the fore on “Caravel,” the early going of “Featherweight” and the later “The Wind to Wash the Pain,” but even the most straight-ahead moments of charge have some richer context around them, whether that’s the monstrous tension and release of capper “Bunker Vaults” or, well, the monstrous tension and release of “Black Chyme” earlier on. It’s not the kind of thing I always reach for, but Coilguns make post-hardcore disaffection sound like a good time, with intensity and spaciousness interwoven in their style and a vicious streak that comes out on the regular. Four records deep, the band know what they’re about but are still exploring.
Subconscious Awakening is Robot God‘s second album of 2024 and works in a similar two-sides/four-songs structure as the preceding Portal Within, released this past Spring, where each half of the record is subdivided into one longer and shorter song. It feels even more purposeful on Subconscious Awakening since both “Mandatory Remedy” and “Sonic Crucifixion” both hover around eight and a half minutes while side A opens with the 13-minute “Blind Serpent” and side B with the 11-minute title-track. Rife with textured effects, some samples, and thoughtful melodic vocals, Subconscious Awakening of course shares some similarity of purpose with Portal Within, which was also recorded at the same time, but a song like “Sonic Crucifixion” creates its own sprawl, and the outward movement between that closer and the title-track before it underscores the progressivism at work in the band’s sound amid tonal heft and complex, sometimes linear structures. Takes some concentration to wield that kind of groove.
Especially for an experimentalist, drone-based act who relies on audience theater-of-the-mind as a necessary component of appreciating its output, Pittsburgh solo outfit Fuzznaut — aka guitarist Emilio Rizzo — makes narrative a part of what the band does. Earlier this year, Fuzznaut‘s “Space Rock” single reaped wide praise for its cosmic aspects. “Wind Doula” specifically cites Neil Young‘s soundtrack for the film Dead Man as an influence, and thus brings four minutes more closely tied to empty spread of prairie, perhaps with some filtering being done through Earth‘s own take on the style as heard in 2005’s seminal Hex: Or Printing in the Infernal Method. One has to wonder if, had Rizzo issued “Wind Doula” with a picture of an astronaut floating free on its cover, it would be the cosmic microwave background present in the track instead of stark wind across the Great Plains, but there’s much more to Fuzznaut than self-awareness and the power of suggestion. Chalk up another aesthetic tryout that works.
Trad metal enthusiasts will delight at the specificity of the moment in the history of the style Void Moon interpret on their fourth album, Dreams Inside the Sun. It’s not that they’re pretending outright that it’s 1986, like the Swedish two-piece of guitarist/bassist Peter Svensson and drummer/vocalist Marcus Rosenqvist are wearing hightops and trying to convince you they’re Candlemass, but that era is present in the songwriting and production throughout Dreams Inside the Sun, even if the sound of the record is less directly anachronistic and their metallurgical underpinnings aren’t limited to doom between slowed down thrash riffs, power-metal-style vocalizing and the consuming Iommic nod of “East of the Sun” meeting with a Solitude Aeturnus-style chug, all the more righteous for being brought in to serve the song rather than to simply demonstrate craft. That is to say, the relative barn-burner “Broken Skies” and the all-in eight-minute closer “The Wolf (At the End of the World,” which has some folk in its verse as well, use a purposefully familiar foundation as a starting point for the band to carve their own niche, and it very much works.
Best known for slinging his six-string alongside brother Kyle Juett in Texas rockers Mothership, Kelley Juett‘s debut solo offering, Wandering West pulls far away from that classic power trio in intention while still keeping Juett‘s primary instrument as the focus. Some loops and layering don’t quite bring Wandering West the same kind of experimental feel as, say, Blackwolfgoat or a similar guitarist-gonna-guitar exploratory project, but they sit well nonetheless alongside the fluid noodling of Juett‘s drumless self-jams. He backs his own solo in centerpiece “Breezin’,” and the subsequent “Electric Dreamland” seems to use the empty space as much as the notes being cast out into it to create its sense of ambience, so if part of what Juett is doing on Wandering West is beginning the process of figuring out who he is as a solo artist, he’s someone who can turn a seven-minute meander like “Lonely One” (playing off Mos Generator?) into a bluesy contemplation of evolving reach, the guitar perfectly content to talk to itself if there’s nobody else around. Time may show it to be formative, but let the future worry about the future. There’s a lot to dig into, here and now.
With vocalists Kristian Eivind Espedal (Gaahls Wyrd, Trelldom, ex-Gorgoroth, etc.) and Lindy-Fay Hella (Wardruna, solo, etc.), guitarist Ronny “Valgard” Stavestrand (Trelldom) and drummer/bassist/keyboardist/producer Iver Sandøy (Enslaved, Relentless Agression, etc.), who also helmed (most of) the recording and mixed and mastered, Whispering Void easily could have fallen into the trap of being no more than the sum of its pedigree. Instead, the seven songs on debut album At the Sound of the Heart harness aspects of Norwegian folk for a rock sound that’s dark enough for the lower semi-growls in the eponymous “Whispering Void” to feel like they’re playing toward a gothic sentiment that’s not out of character when there’s so much melancholy around generally. Mid-period Anathema feel like a reference point for “Lauvvind” and the surging “We Are Here” later on, and by that I mean the album is intricately textured and absolutely gorgeous and you’ll be lucky if you take this as your cue to hear it.
You know how sometimes in a workplace where there’s a Boss With Personality™, there might be a novelty sign or a desk tchotchke that says, “The beatings will continue until morale improves?” Like, haha, in addition to wage theft you might get smacked if you get uppity about, say, wage theft? Fine. Orme sound like what happens when morale doesn’t improve. The 24-minute single-song No Serpents, No Saviours EP comes a little more than a year after the band’s two-song/double-vinyl self-titled debut (review here) and finds them likewise at home in longform songwriting. There are elements of death-doom, but Orme are sludgier in their presentation, and so wind up able to be morose and filthy in kind, moving from the opening crush through a quiet stretch after six minutes in that builds into persistent thuds before dropping out again, a sample helping mark the transitions between movements, and a succession of massive lumbering parts trading off leading into a final march that feels as tall as it is wide. I like that, in a time where the trend is so geared toward lush melody, Orme are unrepentantly nasty.
Budapest instrumentalist duo Azutmaga make their full-length debut with the aptly-titled Offering, compiling nine single-word-title pieces that reside stylistically somewhere between sludge metal and doom. Self-recorded by guitarist Patrik Veréb (who also mixed and mastered at Terem Studio) and self-released by Veréb and drummer Martin Várszegi, it’s a relatively stripped-down procession, but not lacking breadth as the longer “Aura” builds up to its full roll or the minute-long “Orca” provides an acoustic break ahead of the languid big-swing semi-psychedelia of “Mirror,” informed by Eastern European folk melodies but ready to depart into less terrestrial spheres. It should come as no surprise that “Portal” follows. Offering might at first give something of a monolithic impression as “Purge” calls to mind Earth‘s steady drone rock, but Azutmaga have a whole other level of volume to unfurl. Just so happens their dynamic goes from loud to louder.
After trickling out singles for over a year, including the title-track of the album and, in 2022, an early version of the instrumental “The Freaks Come Out at Night” that may or may not have been from before vocalist Virginie D. joined the band, the hashtag-named #chaleurhumaine delights in shirking heavy rock conventions, whether it’s the French-language lyrics or divergences into punk and harder fare, but nothing here — regardless of one’s linguistic background — is so challenging as to be inaccessible. Catchy songs are catchy, whether that’s “Fada Fighters” or “La Diable au Corps,” which dares a bit of harmonica along with its full-toned blues rock riffing. Likewise, nowhere the album goes feels beyond the band’s reach, and while “La Ligne” doesn’t sound especially daring as it plays up the brighter pop in its verse and shove of a chorus, well made songs never have any trouble finding welcome. I’m not sure why it’s a hashtag, but #chaleurhumaine feels complete and engaging, at once familiar and nothing so much as itself.
This Friday, Pittsburgh drone guitarist Emilio Rizzo, otherwise known as Fuzznaut, will release the new single “Sufferlove,” as the first outing from the project since 2022’s Apophenia (review here) full-length. And like that album, “Sufferlove” cries out into empty space with solo guitar and unmitigated breadth, creating and inhabiting an atmosphere that draws the listener further across the five-and-a-half-minute expanse. Cycles of ‘riff’ bleed in amid the ambient sprawl, and with a title that perhaps hints toward its expressive purpose, an emotional crux is conveyed along with the depth of tone and the weight that emerges in the second half of the piece.
That’s a contrast — tonally, between air and earth — which Rizzo readily identifies in his own work, and which is audible in the track itself. It comes through immediately in the meditative vibe at the outset of “Sufferlove,” which echoes out not too far removed from Lamp of the Universe before finding and exploring its own space as Fuzznaut makes it sound much easier to do than it actually is, and the harder, lower-noted distortion strum that arrives at 1:35 broadens the scope of the nonetheless hypnotic piece, which cycles through the back and forth again before a thoughtful bridge leads to the more open-sounding progression — the air — to finish, interpreting a classic structure from what in another context might’ve manifest as verse/chorus/verse with a clarity of intent in following a different path.
I’ve done a few premieres for Fuzznaut at this point. Both the video for “5184” that you can see below the entirety of Apophenia that’s also down there streaming made their debut here. As Rizzo perhaps looks to move forward from the 2022 LP and headed to another collection of one sort or another, “Sufferlove” brings quick assurance of progression in sound, and one would expect no less.
Whatever it may lead to, “Sufferlove” is out Friday as a standalone single, and its patience, resonance and groove live up to that challenge of representing Fuzznaut post-Apophenia.
Enjoy:
Emilio Rizzo on “Sufferlove”:
Meditation is the practice of death. A practice of immersion and dissociation. Similar to shoegazers staring at their pedals and shoes. Are they shy or fully immersed in their music that all they can do is stare at the ground? Present and absent. Sufferlove by guitarist Fuzznaut is the sonic performance of creating a state of non return. As intangible as that might be, the latest single brings mind bending tones that are further grounded in shoegaze. However, the guitarist continues to inject crushing down tuned riffs in between the flurry of pitch bending vibrato, and fuzzed out drones. At 5:33 seconds one cannot help to be engaged in the flurry of tones, and either be lifted or grounded. Either way it’s a trip to another sonic dimension.
Fuzznaut “Sufferlove” Single 2/2024 Digital Release Independent Time: 5:33
Mixed and MASTERED BY Fuzznaut at Leafy Brain Sounds 2023-2024. Artwork by Fuzznaut
Posted in Bootleg Theater on December 16th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, solo drone guitarist Fuzznaut — né Emilo Rizzo — released his new album, Apophenia (review here), on Nov. 4. And you have to believe me when I say I know it seems like the world is full of drone projects. You’re not wrong. Between the fact that just about any phone on the market can double as a recording studio and that about a year and a half out of the last two years were spent in lockdown, yes, it is not uncommon to find the rigors and anxieties of our age translated into varying sorts of soundscapes, manipulated effects, and so on. But you saw the three words ‘solo drone guitarist’ in the first sentence above and your eyes immediately glazed over, you’re missing out.
Here’s why: the thing about Fuzznaut isn’t the novelty of the makeup of the ‘band.’. Because it’s not a novelty; drone projects abound, as noted. It’s the expression in the sounds themselves. Across Apophenia, and emphasized in the closing track “5184,” for which there’s a suitably atmospheric video premiering below, Rizzo ties his guitar not only to immersive and hypnotic progressions, but to a genuine and purposeful sounding setting of mood. He uses it to convey emotion — in this case, it’s homage born of admiration and tribute, and that certainly counts — and the song rings out with a construction that’s both easy to follow and deep-running enough to lose oneself within, if only for a couple minutes.
I’m reasonably sure the footage in the early part of the clip is of Pittsburgh, and if you take the visual subtlety that brings the viewer from floating around in the ether above the city into a venue before and during a show as a clue to the song itself also following something of a plotline, I think that’s probably the idea too.
The full stream of Apophenia, whether for meditative or deep-dive purposes, is at the bottom of this post. You’ll find the video for “5184” below, followed by some comment from Rizzo on its intent.
Please enjoy:
Fuzznaut, “5184” video premiere
5184 off the album Apophenia by Fuzznaut.
5184 the closing track of Apophenia. The main riff was written the day Eddie Van Halen died. It was a somber day in the guitar community and just felt the need to play and that just came out. During a part of the song, I tried to get some vibes as a nod to his tone. His influence is so profound that anyone who picks up a guitar, it would resonate. Overall, this album is about sitting with adversity, but not letting inside/outside negative forces devalue your struggle.
Apophenia written and recorded by Fuzznaut at Strega Sana Sounds March-July 2022 Mixed and Mastered by Erik Peabody at Viking Guitar Productions Artwork by Fuzznaut
Pittsburgh-based drone outfit Fuzznaut will release the 28-minute debut full-length, Apophenia, this Friday, Nov. 4. Following up 2019’s Form is Emptiness (review here) and the 2020 single “Haunting Mantra” (premiered here), the six-tracker is more definitively a first album in flow as well as runtime, which is still on the don’t-overstay-welcome end of short but for guitarist Emilio Rizzo, owner-operator and sole-proprietor of the project, it’s still plenty of time to lay out a course of expressive standalone riffing, marked throughout by changes in effects and maybe some layering, but almost exclusively centered around the chords and repetitions of the instrument itself.
With tracks on either side of five minutes — longest is “What You Seek, Seeks You” (5:45), shortest is closer “Seconds Between a Swing and a Hit” (4:13) — Apophenia evokes a meditative atmosphere quickly as the initial feedback of the leadoff title-track gives way to the first declining, established riff, not as slow or empty-space Americana as mid-period Earth, and obviously more sparse in arrangement since it’s just guitar, but definitely taking inspiration from the Dylan Carson oeuvre in tone and style, hinting in that regard even unto the David V. D’Andrea-style fonts and color scheme of the cover art, also by Rizzo. Clearly he knows what he’s going for.
Despite the fact that there’s just one instrument repeating parts, gradually building one progression on top of the one before it, a kind of natural movement through each piece, I don’t think it would be fair to call Apophenia — the title referring to the fine art of making connections where there aren’t any, which I think applies both to reading too much inflection into a text message and to modern obsession with conspiracy theories — minimalist, since wherever Rizzo goes, whether it’s the stark spiremaking of “Parasitic Oscillation” or the Black Mare/Ides of Gemini-style tension of “What You Seek, Seeks You,” which follows, the feeling of movement is always palpable. If we’re meditating, that doesn’t seem to mean the world has stopped.
That sense of motion isn’t quite a sweep until “Hawks Over Fifth” marries a backing synth-style drone to a guitar line that’s reminiscent of the Westminster chimes or whatever grandfather clock happens to be in your memory association, and settles into that up and down pattern smoothly, offsetting with a lead in the midsection that feels duly bright before working into more open strum declarations to finish on the way to “5184.” Whatever the reference — is it Van Halen? Black Sabbath? Dune? — the penultimate inclusion answers the landscape-making tendency of “Hawks Over Fifth” with a broader, chugging echo and a howling slow-lo in its second half, fading at the end having returned whence it came as though to reassure structure still exists.
“Seconds Between a Swing and a Hit” — a title that I immediately associate with baseball but could really be about any number of things, among them violence — is perhaps not as tense as the title might make one believe, but the rhythm of its component parts feels designed to drive toward the final interplay of solo and riff, which cuts off cold after swelling in volume but never going so far as to be a ‘grand finale,’ which would inevitably upset the careful balance Rizzo has worked hard to strike in this material. The meditative aspects of Fuzznaut‘s drone are prevalent in Apophenia, but the songs seem to reach out as well as within, and if the connection being imagined is between the listener and the songs themselves, I somehow doubt Rizzo would mind.
Never gonna be for everybody, but some will fall hard into it. Only one way to find out where you land, and that’s listening.
Full stream follows, with more from the PR wire after. Enjoy:
From the artist on Apophenia: I heard the word Apophenia from a true-crime podcast intro in 2020. It is defined as the tendency to perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things. The pandemic was at its peak there was isolation, and a dark uncertainty about everything. Apophenia to me resonated as the state of things at the time.
There are a lot of things in the world have a darkness and intensity to them that can be harnessed to create something that is grounding and affirming. This record is a vehicle of going through turbulent times, mourning, and using that pain into fuel to persevere. There are two specific songs that are tributes. The singer of Planes Mistaken for Stars died In 2021. They were a huge influence on me creatively, and there was always a riff inspired by them. I had wrote it way before Fuzznaut had been created, when I was learning guitar. Seconds Between a Swing and a Hit is a tribute and tonally trying to capture and honor some of that influence. 5184 the closing track of Apophenia. The main riff was written the day Eddie Van Halen died. It was a somber day in the guitar community and just felt the need to play and that just came out. During a part of the song I tried to get some vibes as a nod to his tone. His influence is so profound that anyone who picks up a guitar, it would resonate. Overall, this album is about sitting with adversity, but not letting inside/outside negative forces devalue your struggle.
Credits: Apophenia written and recorded by Fuzznaut at Strega Sana Sounds March-July 2022 Mixed and Mastered by Erik Peabody at Viking Guitar Productions Artwork by Fuzznaut
Posted in Whathaveyou on September 8th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Pittsburgh’s Emilio Rizzo, the lone figure operating under the banner of Fuzznaut and perhaps underserved by the decided-unartsiness of the name, will release the project’s full-length debut, Apophenia, on Nov. 4. Shades of Earth’s drone-minded ways crop up almost immediately in the opening title-track, and the spaces Rizzo creates operating with just a guitar at his disposal are vast in the spirit of that band’s Hex; Or Printing in the Infernal Method without necessarily adopting the Americana bent. At six songs and 28 minutes, the album — the title of which refers to someone’s tendency to draw connections between things that aren’t necessarily related — is manageable despite the dug-in nature of the tracks and the owning-its-own-ambience taking place on “Parasitic Oscillation” or the later volume swell of “5184,” which is Rizzo‘s stated tribute to Eddie Van Halen.
You can hear Fuzznaut setting a course on these tracks, and they are duly encompassing. “Hawks Over Fifth” blends post-rock stretch with harder strummed fuzz, and “Seconds Between a Swing and a Hit” howls at the conclusion in a way that is both pointed and anti-ceremonial. There’s a fair amount to dive into, as Rizzo dives pretty deep himself.
No audio yet, but the PR wire shows some love and you can hear Rizzo‘s “Haunting Mantra” single (premiered here) from 2020 at the bottom of the post. Not entirely representative, but not nothing:
Pittsburgh experimental and psychedelic doomgaze band Fuzznaut have announced “Apophenia”: a 26-minute expedition into sonic annihilation. With “Apophenia” Fuzznaut takes the listener on a journey of somber ambience, shimmering textures, and foreboding riffs.
Fuzznaut “Apophenia” will be available digitally on November 4th, 2022.
From the artist on Apophenia: I heard the word Apophenia from a true-crime podcast intro in 2020. It is defined as the tendency to perceive meaningful connections between unrelated things. The pandemic was at its peak there was isolation, and a dark uncertainty about everything. Apophenia to me resonated as the state of things at the time.
There are a lot of things in the world have a darkness and intensity to them that can be harnessed to create something that is grounding and affirming. This record is a vehicle of going through turbulent times, mourning, and using that pain into fuel to persevere. There are two specific songs that are tributes. The singer of Planes Mistaken for Stars died In 2021. They were a huge influence on me creatively, and there was always a riff inspired by them. I had wrote it way before Fuzznaut had been created, when I was learning guitar. Seconds Between a Swing and a Hit is a tribute and tonally trying to capture and honor some of that influence. 5184 the closing track of Apophenia. The main riff was written the day Eddie Van Halen died. It was a somber day in the guitar community and just felt the need to play and that just came out. During a part of the song I tried to get some vibes as a nod to his tone. His influence is so profound that anyone who picks up a guitar, it would resonate. Overall, this album is about sitting with adversity, but not letting inside/outside negative forces devalue your struggle.
Credits: Apophenia written and recorded by Fuzznaut at Strega Sana Sounds March-July 2022 Mixed and Mastered by Erik Peabody at Viking Guitar Productions Artwork by Fuzznaut
Posted in Questionnaire on July 14th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Emilio Rizzo of Fuzznaut
—
How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
I compose and perform instrumental music that is heavy and meditative. I have always played in bands growing up. Due to life constraints it wasn’t always possible to start a band, but I had begun seeing other solo artists and it inspired me to try solo instrumental music. I had also started becoming infatuated with guitar gear especially guitars and pedals. One rule I gave to myself was that if I were to spend money on this, I would also have to make something with it.
At first the idea was to program drums and do a one man band sort of thing, but I did not find that inspiring so I stuck with guitar. This ended up being the blueprint of everything that came after, and with limiting certain things I have to maximize other things. It all sounds like music, and I like how it challenges the listener to first question “ok so it’s just a guitar”.
Describe your first musical memory.
I was about 5-6 years old watching MTV (When they used to show music videos), and Collective Soul “Shine” was my favorite song. It had a great guitar riff and I would play the tennis racket in lieu of an air guitar. I just loved how it sounded. The melody was catchy enough, but something about that guitar riff just sat right.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
I have two answers for this. First, was when I played my first show post-covid. I had a sense of how temporary all of this was and made a conscious effort to savor it. It was a cathartic performance and I felt a new connection with myself, the stage and the audience that was pretty indescribable. All I know is it flowed and is on of the reasons I work so hard is to capture that.
Second, a pleasant surprise is that people have reached out to me via social media, or at shows. Stating their music was influenced by mine, send me over there music, or I saw what you are doing and now I am starting my own solo project. It is an amazing feeling to inspire others.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
I took some time to think about this one. A big one for me is the idea of if I were to play music it would have to be in a band. By that time I just finished grad school and had a 9-5 job and didn’t see much future playing music. It wasn’t until I started seeing heard demos on YouTube and getting into drone metal specifically Dylan Carlson’s solo record “Conquistador”. That showed me a type of solo instrumental artist that I wanted to be. Despite being one guitar in most of these cases there was still so much music being created. It was when this clicked I was able to begin crafting what is now Fuzznaut.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
To me it leads to evolution, continued learning, and honing what you do. It’s not like you’re shooting for perfection (nothing can ever be and if it is its fleeting at best). In all of my pursuits as Fuzznaut when it comes to writing, social media, merch design, video editing, etc. I am always learning something, and then learning how to do it better. At the end of all this it will hopefully resonate with others and then can inspire something else new. It can be endless if you want it to be.
How do you define success?
Success to me is just living the life you want to live the best you possible can, given the circumstance and situation. Another thought in regard to art is getting as close as you can to your intended output, from vision to creation, which is rare but something I always attempt to do.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
Senseless aggression at a Social Distortion show. The band decided to play all ballads, fights would just start breaking out and people would be getting kicked out. Just too much negative energy and vibe killing when that happens. I get it if it were in the pit, but these were during the slower country stuff and it was so incongruent.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
I would love to design fuzz pedals. I have some ideas in my head but I have no electrical engineering skills. I had bought a pedal building kit once, but I never followed through and ended up selling it. If I could collaborate with someone who knows what they are doing like Earthquaker Devices did when with Wata from Boris, and SUNNO))). That would be a bucket list thing for me for sure.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
This question reminds me of a quote Buzz Osborne said “Art is Communication”. It sticks with me because for me it’s about communicating what can’t be said. Sometimes it’s just me saying to the world I exist and I can only articulate that with the music I make. A side effect of making that communication is also being able to connect with others.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
Finally snagging a PS5. I game casually and feel like it’s time to take the leap into next gen. It is a nice escape to wind down with a single player game and live in that world for a bit.
Posted in audiObelisk on October 27th, 2020 by JJ Koczan
Pittsburgh one-man drone outfit Fuzznaut will release the new single Haunting Mantra on Friday, Oct. 30. It is a crowded pre-Halloween release date, to be sure, but one expects few among the multitudes will so effectively convey the paranoia and uncertainty of the right-now in which we’re living. Part X-Files soundtrack, part post-metallic atmospheric sludge tonality, part pure exploration, the 8:40 work from guitarist Emilio Rizzo follows the 2019 debut Fuzznaut EP, Form is Emptiness (review here), and though it is comprised of material from the same sessions, it feels less specifically Americana-gothic than the prior offering. That could be an affect of the way in which the song was built up from already-recorded pieces, but either way, the somethingelseness works to its benefit.
A clean creeper of a guitar progression — bass, drums, vocals, keys, etc. need not apply — if offset by dense distortion that carries a home-recorded feel as if to emphasize the notion that some projects were just made to exist in an age of quarantine. Rizzo isn’t out to put on a technical show, but there is a precise feeling to the tempo at which “Haunting Mantra” plays out, and the track’s title serves double-duty as a mission statement. The arrangement is of course sparse, but too restless ultimately to be minimal — Rizzo gives himself away as a writer of riffs in an underlying sense of structure to the track — and you can read in the track info below that the guitarist is playing toward notions of tonal weight and creating something “heavy” in the sense of heavy rock or doom while bringing that to a sound based on drone. Such stylistic aims don’t necessarily account directly for the mood in “Haunting Mantra,” but neither do they dismiss it.
It is perhaps the experimentation in “Haunting Mantra” that most resonates, at least in terms of concept, and the fact that Rizzo is willing to pull pieces apart and remake them in such a way only holds promise for things to come from Fuzznaut as his palette continues to expand, even if that just means working with different effects, loops, etc., to create varied atmospheres. One way or the other, the track is indeed a work of heaviness, and you can hear it premiering below ahead of the glut of offerings out this weekend.
“Haunting Mantra” is an 8 + minute sonic experience of echoing riffs and reaping heavy fuzz. The music bursts between lurking feelings of dread, and elation. These atmospheres take hold with pounding intensity. The original pieces were set for “Form Is Emptiness” sessions but were deconstructed and reformed to provide this current offering of earth-shattering tones.
