Posted in Whathaveyou on March 30th, 2026 by JJ Koczan
Denver-based hashtronauts Hashtronaut — wait, what? — just finished a run of tour dates through the Southeestern US, bringing their ultra-stonerly worship through places like Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee, where it is surely needed. The trio in May will let out to Europe for the first time to appear at Desertfest London 2026 and more as they continue to support their 2024 album on Blues Funeral, No Return (review here), which doesn’t feel like it’s two years old but apparently is anyhow. Can’t imagine how I would’ve lost time or anything.
The news here is that after they get back from Desertfest and their sundry other on-the-continent bookings, Hashtronaut will take to the road in the States once again, hitting the Northeast just as summer’s wretched haze settles in this June. There’s a stoner joke in there about them bringing their own haze, but I’ll spare you in the name of friendship. I’m putting June 20 in New Haven on my calendar (yeah I know NYC is ‘closer,’ maybe, but if we’re staying up there with my wife’s mom anyhow, it’s not far from there) and hoping that, provided I’m in CT, I can drag my ass out when the time comes.
Euro dates are below as well, just in case that’s where you’re at and you decided to read this anyway:
The traveling amplifier exhibit rides again! 👨🏽🚀🚀😶🌫️
We’ll be hitting some familiar spots this June, as well as a few new ones. Hope to see y’all out there. And as always…come try and outsmoke us at any of these dates!!! 😶🌫️😶🌫️😶🌫️
6/12 – Oklahoma City, OK @resonant_head 6/13 – St. Louis, MO – TBD 6/14 – Louisville, KY @portal_louisville 6/16 – Richmond, VA @gallery5arts 6/17 – Washington, DC @pieshopdc 6/18 – Philadelphia, PA @kungfunecktie_bar 6/19 – Brooklyn, NY @maindragmusic 6/20 – New Haven, CT @cafenine 6/21 – Troy, NY @nofunshows 6/23 – Cleveland, OH @beachlandcle 6/24 – Detroit, MI @sanctuarydetroit 6/25 – Columbus, OH @cafebourbonstreet 6/26 – Chicago, IL @liars.club 6/27 – Minneapolis, MN @cloudlandtheater
HASHTRONAUT current lineup: Michael Honiotes – Drums* Kellen McInerney – Regular Guitar Robb Park – Stunt Guitar Daniel Smith – Bass/Vocals *all tracks on the album recorded by Eric Garcia
Posted in Whathaveyou on February 6th, 2026 by JJ Koczan
Denver stonerollers Hashtronaut will head to Europe for the first time their April, bringing their particular brand of worship to the UK for Desertfest London 2026 and prefacing that slow with club shows throughout Germany, with one show in Luxembourg and a handful of TBDs for which, if you happened to be somewhere on the path, I bet you could hook something up. I mean, I’m not saying you should become a promoter or anything — I’m sure whatever job you have, it’s thankless enough — but maybe just this one time, you could be the hero who comes through and makes the show happen in your town. History probably won’t remember you, but the band might. It’s worth helping out if you can.
Dates were posted thusly on socials:
Hey Europe… we’re coming to smoke all your weed!!
It’s official, the traveling amplifier exhibit will be making its inaugural trip across the pond and we’re bringing some earsplitting riffs with us 😶🌫️
If any European promoters want to try and help us fill in a few dates let us know…we’d be more than happy to bring all our amps to your country and ruin your hearing.
Red-eyed at the crossroads of thunderous stoner sludge and towering doom, HASHTRONAUT daze and inebriate the riff-obsessed masses on this planet and beyond. Released in 2024 on Blues Funeral Recordings, their acclaimed debut album “No Return” is a resiny slab in the grand tradition of weed-fiend odysseys from Sleep to Bongzilla, an intoxicating and pummeling trip with a lungful of potent hook-doom and strikingly anthemic vocals that will enthrall fans of Monolord, Windhand or Dopelord. Stream their debut album “No Return” at this location:https://lnkfi.re/hashtronaut
HASHTRONAUT current lineup: Michael Honiotes – Drums* Kellen McInerney – Regular Guitar Robb Park – Stunt Guitar Daniel Smith – Bass/Vocals *all tracks on the album recorded by Eric Garcia
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 3rd, 2025 by JJ Koczan
I’m not sure if this is everybody playing next year’s Legalize Lex, or just Legalize, at Al’s Bar in Lexington, Kentucky. This year had 17, and this is 14 bands, so if they’ve pared it down a bit, fair enough, but it’s also next April, so if they’re allowing for a couple others to get on board or for plans to chance, also fair enough. Note that Hashtronaut, Crop, Swamp Hawk, Shi and Veilcaste played this year’s Legalize, and a couple repeats year to year, friends and associated acts, is part of building a festival culture as well.
One assumes Spotlights will headline, and Hashtronaut and Crop would seem to have moved up the bill as well. Crystal Spiders will surely be awesome, and Fairie Ring and Doomsday Profit and Insomniac and well basically I’m just listing names at this point because I think the bands are cool and somehow you’re just supposed to get that reading. Come on, man. You were at that Insomniac gig in Brooklyn, right? Talking to myself and Gavin Zollo because I don’t think Ron actually reads. Ha. I don’t think anybody reads.
I digress. Driving untold hours to stand around a place to see bands? Sounds right up my alley. Not even joking:
Legalize Lex 2026
Hello everyone, we had a couple of errors on the initial release post and we want to make sure we represent all our bands the best we can, so we’re reposting this bad boi! We definitely appreciated all of your likes and comments the first time around, your support means the world to us. If you feel so inclined, please share this post so we can keep spreading the word! Year 3 is gonna be a banger! Excited to see you all!
Lineup: Spotlights Hashtronaut Crop Crystal Spiders Swamp Hawk Faerie Ring Uga Buga Insomniac Doomsday Profit Veilcaste Dead Vibes Ensemble Shi Acromancer Blonde Cauldron
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 7th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Am I crazy (granted) or are we a little early arriving at the place where Desertfest throws down 20-someodd bands — in this case 28 — added all at once to the lineup? I mean, 28 bands, even for a four-day festival, would be a festival lineup. So Desertfest London 2026 is basically showcasing an entire fest’s worth of fest as just part of its broader lineup, the first announcement for which came out just a little over a month ago. I’m not worried about the promo plan or anything, you understand. They know what they’re doing. But I usually think of this kind of thing coming in winter as a hopeful portent of spring. Here in the backwater US, we haven’t even changed the clocks yet.
But can you blame them for being excited? If I had Hermano, Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, Solace, Causa Sui, High Desert Queen, Steak, Abrams, Alunah, Moundrag, Bismut and the rest of this cohort — Dandy Brown pulling double-duty between Hermano and Lorquin’s Admiral; nice — locked in, I might splurge too. And hopefully I’ll have more to say on this subject, but Solace‘s booked return to the UK has me convinced their new album will be out by the time they go. Do me a favor and don’t prove me wrong.
There’s a lot to like here, and also just a lot for what’s a relatively straightforward list of names. Read ’em and weep:
OUR SECOND ANNOUNCEMENT IS HERE! We’ve got 28 juicy additions to our 2026 edition and this announcement one is truly one for the DF OGs right here: desert legends HERMANO will headline the Electric Ballroom at Desertfest 2026.
Back to show us all how it’s done, John Garcia and the California cult icons will be playing their first UK show in almost two decades and we know that they’ll receive the homecoming they deserve at Desertfest London.
↠ Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – returning to Desertfest stage for the first time in 8 years.
↠ Danish heavy psych heroes turned instrumental wizards Causa Sui make their Desertfest London debut!
↠ New Jersey stoner-doom veterans Solace playing their first UK show in over a decade.
And that’s not all, folks! We’ve still to announce our final headliner for our second stint at the Roundhouse, but in the meantime we’ve prepared a mighty offering that we know you’ll love in our latest round of artists set for 2026:
HERMANO Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Causa Sui Zig Zags Steak Band Solace Deaf Club Witchsorrow High Desert Queen MOUNDRAG KOMODOR Alunah CULT OF OCCULT Forlorn LORQUIN’S ADMIRAL OMO ALPHAWHORES Abrams Bismut Okay You Win UK Ironrat Kannabinõid MOLTEN SLAG HASHTRONAUT ISAK SUPERNAUGHTT Teiger Nomadic Reign
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 21st, 2025 by JJ Koczan
So here’s a moment where I’m just going to be honest with you. I’m pretty sure this lineup has been announced for a bit. If you’ve been to Legalize Lex and you accordingly keep up with the Lexington, Kentucky-based two-dayer set for April 18-19 on social media, maybe you’ve seen that the likes of Horseburner, Lo-Pan, Temple of the Fuzz Witch and Hashtronaut are making the trip. Fine. So maybe it’s not ‘breaking news,’ as much as anything in the heavy underground short of Bobby Liebling memes could hope to be. I haven’t posted the lineup here yet, so even if it’s not new to you, it’s new to me. Thanks for indulging my late-to-the-party ass once again.
Crop are the affiliated act here, and they seem to be setting up the fest as a regional nexus, pulling bands from all cardinal directions to solidify what’s turned out to be a pretty banger bill. Reminds me of an old Emissions lineup, and not just because Rebreather are there, but also in some of the stoner-sludge later down the poster. The day-split is out — you can see the Saturday is more packed than the Friday, as it should be, but the first night is by no means lacking — and the lineups are rad. I won’t be there to see it, but if you get to go, I’d expect it to be a party as much as a festival. Certainly that’s the vibe I’m getting from the poster.
The day-split came down the PR wire as follows:
LEGALIZE Announces Full Lineup and Set Times for its 2nd Annual Festival in Lexington KY!
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 11th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
You would not accuse Hashtronaut of not knowing what they’re about in Ufomammut-style cosmic largesse and crush and unmititgated stoner idolatry. The suitably-mile-high Denver rollers of very, very large riffs will head out next month on a Spring tour supporting their 2024 debut full-length, No Return (review here), which will see the anniversary of its release shortly before this run starts. Woe unto the eardrums of the masses.
I’m not sure if this is their first time on the Eastern Seaboard or not and I’m not going to pretend to know, but they mention a bunch of new cities either way in the quote below and hint at new material perhaps making its way into the set, to take it as a win either way. I spent half of last year wondering why I didn’t hear more people sloberring on this record on social media and the other half of the year being like “it’s because you don’t pay attention to that shit, duh.” Either way, somebody should be going door-to-door telling nodders about these dudes, and to-date I’ve heard nary a knock.
From the PR wire:
HASHTRONAUT announce East Coast spring tour; debut album available now on Blues Funeral Recordings
Denver, Colorado’s stoner doom specialists HASHTRONAUT are set to spread their skull-crushing, weed-laden gospel with an extensive East Coast tour this spring. Their debut album “No Return” is available now on Blues Funeral Recordings.
Red-eyed at the crossroads of thunderous stoner sludge and towering doom, HASHTRONAUT daze and inebriate the riff-obsessed masses on this planet and beyond. Released in 2024 on Blues Funeral Recordings, their acclaimed debut album “No Return” is a resiny slab in the grand tradition of weed-fiend odysseys from Sleep to Bongzilla, an intoxicating and pummeling trip with a lungful of potent hook-doom and strikingly anthemic vocals that will enthrall fans of Monolord, Windhand or Dopelord. Stream their debut album “No Return” at this location:https://lnkfi.re/hashtronaut
About the upcoming US tour, the band says: “We couldn’t be more excited to get back out on the road again this spring, and even more excited to visit a whole bunch of new cities along the way!! It’s been a long, cold winter in our bunker somewhere outside of Denver, but we emerge with new amps, new riffs, and a new trick or two up our sleeve! See you out there!”
Hashtronaut upcoming US shows: 4.4 – Chicago, Illinois – Reggies 4.6 – Youngstown, Ohio – Westside Bowl 4.7 – Troy, New York – No Fun 4.8 – Brooklyn, New York – The Woodshop 4.9 – Boston, Massachusetts – Middle East Upstairs * 4.10 – Providence, Rhode Island – Alchemy * 4.11 – Lewiston, Maine – The Cage * 4.12 – New London, Connecticut – Telegraph A.Z. * 4.13 – Washington, D.C. – Pie Shop * 4.14 – Atlanta, Georgia – Bogg’s Social 4.15 – Nashville, Tennessee – The Cobra 4.17 – Boone, North Carolina – Lily’s Snack Bar 4.18 – Lexington, Kentucky – Legalize Lex @ Al’s Bar 4.19 – Kansas City, Missouri – Minibar 4.20 – Denver, Colorado – Hi-Dive * with Worshipper
HASHTRONAUT current lineup: Michael Honiotes – Drums* Kellen McInerney – Regular Guitar Robb Park – Stunt Guitar Daniel Smith – Bass/Vocals *all tracks on the album recorded by Eric Garcia
Posted in Whathaveyou on April 8th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
This is one of the best lineups I’ve seen for a US-based heavy fest in the 15-plus years I’ve been running this site. I don’t know what else to say about it, honestly. For the fact that Ripplefest Texas is bringing Dozer over alone, let alone any of the other Euro acts involved who have, say, been to North America in the last 20-plus years, it’s astonishing. And not just bigger bands like Dozer and Truckfighters or Mars Red Sky and Belzebong, but Domkraft and Kal-El, bands you know if you’re into this thing but that haven’t been around as long and aren’t as ‘huge’ in the whatever sense that applies in underground music.
And it’s not like they’re skimping on within-US geography either. Of course the desert is well represented, and Texas has a significant presence as it invariably would, but with Gozu and Leather Lung headed out from Boston, Borracho traveling from D.C., Temple of the Fuzz Witch from Michigan, Robots of the Ancient World from Portland, Oregon, and so on, they’ve got all the corners and between pretty well covered. La Chinga coming from Canada. Demons My Friends giving Mexico a nod. It is extensive.
And quality. I don’t know that I’ll be there to see it, but I’d imagine that for most who get to be, it’ll be the stuff of legend. Congrats to Ryan Garney and Lick of My Spoon for bringing it into the world, and safe travels to all involved:
Here it is! The lineup for RippleFest Texas and the amazing art by Simon Berndt @1horsetown 🤘🔥❤️
We still have a few surprises left but this roster is stacked! Don’t miss your chance to see the world’s best heavy music at the largest family reunion of the year. Plus this is the ONLY premier festival that has absolutely ZERO OVERLAPPING so you can see every second of every band! Get your tickets now and we will see you in September!
Tier 2 tickets are almost sold out and the price increases on Monday so get your tickets now:
DOZER TRUCKFIGHTERS BONGZILLA MARS RED SKY BELZEBONG DOMKRAFT LEGIONS OF DOOM FATSO JETSON GOZU HOWLING GIANT THE HEAVY EYES HIGH DESERT QUEEN KAL-EL 20 WATT TOMBSTONE THE OTOLITH TEMPLE OF THE FUZZ WITCH LEATHER LUNG THUNDER HORSE HASHTRONAUT BONE CHURCH BORRACHO SUN CROW CRYSTAL SPIDERS TIA CARRERA ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD MR. PLOW LA CHINGA FOSTERMOTHER BLUE HERON TEMPTRESS FORMULA 400 DEMONS MY FRIENDS VERMILION WHISKEY VIOLET RISING HUDU AKIL BUZZ ELECTRO SHADOW OF JUPITER
GRAND FINALE w/ MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS “Desert Jam Session”
Plus the best light show in the business by @themadalchemistliquidliteshow
Denver’s Hashtronaut make their full-length debut on March 22 with No Return, issued through Blues Funeral Recordings. “Dweller,” premiering below, is the third single from the nine-song/41-minute long-player, and like the preceding “Rip Wizard” and “Cough it Up,” it is not subtle as regards intention. At the floor of the open verse is Daniel Smith‘s bass and the crash of Eric Garcia‘s drums (Michael Honiotes is in the lineup now, apparently), setting a languid march that, unlike “Rip Wizard” with its war-on-drugs-PSA samples and unbridled next-gen stoner idolatry — and I say “next-gen” both because Hashtronaut have a modern style and because when bands were following riffs to the Failed-Piss-Test Land about 20-25 years ago, nobody wanted to call themselves “stoner rock”; stigma is clearly not an issue in the same way anymore — emphasizes largesse in the space it creates rather than the fullness of its roll or, as with “Cough it Up,” which seems to come apart during its own sample-laced course and emerge boogieing at the end in genuine Sabbathian scoot, the four-piece’s readiness to conjure an addled feel.
But especially when taken together as representing a third of the tracklist (and more than a third of the runtime) of No Return, the three singles give a suitable impression of the places Hashtronaut go throughout this first collection while still holding back the lurch of eight-minute third cut “Carcinogen,” which dutifully slogs through its first half, sounding like it’s an effort to carry itself through and very much wanting to sound like that, before Robb Park — credited with ‘stunt guitar’ below, as opposed to Kellen McInerney‘s ‘regular guitar,’ which might want further clarification as I don’t know if regular guitars are so huge — slow-wah’s out a solo, Smith‘s vocals grow rougher in their cavernous echo in preface to the harsh-your-mellow, sludgier vibe brought to the gutturalisms of “Lung Ruiner,” which as the PR wire notes situates Hashtronaut in a sphere of low-key volatility — that is to say, the aggression might come but you don’t necessarily know when until it happens — not unlike their now-labelmates in Poland’s Dopelord, while the lumber and melodic reach of “Dead Cloud” solidifies the procession coming out of “Carcinogen.” Hashtronaut show themselves as comfortable shifting into a medium-paced nod, getting noisy, and answering the hook of “Rip Wizard,” which is fortunate because the 1:51 blowout “Hex” awaits at the start of side B.
Well, it’s the first blowout, anyhow. Waiting at No Return‘s endgame is the 30-second punker gallop of “Blast Off” — if you need a High on Fire comparison to make it fit, it’s applicable, but it had me wondering if it was named in honor of B’last — to which “Hex” serves as a brash if more complete precursor, with time to squeeze a verse and chorus and a bit of thrashy-scorch soloing before the still-thick movement ends cold to let “Lung Ruiner” take hold as the benefactor of its momentum. Some of the spaciousness to follow in “Dweller” shows itself in the song before as well, in the spoken-word-topped early stretch made foreboding in hindsight as the riff floods in and the vocals turn to a low-register growl for the first time. Higher screams are layered in, but Hashtronaut don’t really depart from the atmosphere they’ve already cast — and it’s murky enough that they don’t need to — so the more extreme turn isn’t out of place as they go back to the verse and cycle through again before they ride the elephantine stomp of the main riff to the finish. “Dweller” certainly has its shout as well, but accompanies that with more of a melodic lean and a feel like they’re doubling-down on what “Lung Ruiner” just proffered without really repeating themselves, finding another corner in the sonic landscape from which to strike.
I can’t help but wonder if “Marsquake” isn’t somehow a sequel to the band’s 2021 debut standalone single “Moonquake” (discussed here) — perhaps a series is beginning that someday will bring Saturnquakes and, with an inevitable snicker, a Uranusquake — but the shred-topped penultimate instrumental feels like a victory lap as it reaffirms the tone and grooving intent Hashtronaut have been communicating all the while, speaking to the modern sphere of stonerized heavy that’s able to touch on doom, sludge or psych and be confident that the listener can keep up and, at what’s still a pretty nascent stage for the band, starting to mark out their place in the genre. “Marsquake” crashes out with due noise before the feedback and snare-drum-count-in of “Blast Off” lead into No Return‘s final statement, which is rousing in the heated-up-molecules sense of its pace but also for highlighting the fact that this is Hashtronaut‘s first album and for as aware of their approach as they come across in these songs and in the changes in personality between the two sides, their growth could lead them in any number of directions.
It’s not the most likely thing in the universe that a band who spends so much time on their debut exploring the monolithic would suddenly go full-on speed rock, but stranger things have happened. In any case, that last half-minute is crucial to No Return in staking a claim for the band on something they may or may not want to explore further and a bookend for “Hex.” Consistent in production, it nonetheless broadens their scope in a a way even “Hex” wouldn’t, and builds on the vibrancy in even the most grueling reaches of “Carcinogen” (which is more addled than confused, but still) for a surprising, brisk culmination that you might not even catch if you’ve been so lulled by the flow of “Marsquake” or had your brain flattened by the heft paraded throughout. Fodder for repeat visits, then, and a listening experience made richer with efficiency that’s hard to ignore. I’ll tell you outright that No Return is already in my notes under the the ‘best debuts of 2024’ section for year-end list time, but that’s secondary to what Hashtronaut are laying out as their own potential course of voluminous communion and what they might continue to bring to it moving forward.
It’s a hell of a thing.
Enjoy “Dweller” premiering below. Under the player is PR wire info, preorder links, the “Rip Wizard” video and the album player from Bandcamp. By all means, dig in:
Red-eyed at the crossroads of thunderous stoner sludge and towering doom, HASHTRONAUT is more than ready to daze and inebriate the riff-obsessed masses on this planet and beyond. their debut album “No Return” is a resiny slab in the grand tradition of weed-fiend odysseys from Sleep, Weedeater and Bongzilla, an intoxicating and pummeling trip with a lungful of potent hook-doom and strikingly anthemic vocals that will enthrall fans of Monolord, Windhand and Dopelord.
Their debut album “No Return” will be released in limited Astral High Splatter vinyl edition, limited Heavy Resin vinyl edition, CD digipack and digital on March 22nd, with preorders available on Blues Funeral Recordings. “No Return” was recorded by Felipe Patino at Green Door Recordings in Denver and Seanan Hexenbrenner at Helvete Sound in Portland. Mixed and Mastered by Matt Qualls at Easley McCain Recording, Memphis TN. Cover art by Francisco Abril and Nuria Velasco (Welder Wings), album layout by Peder Bergstrand.
TRACKLIST: 1. Rip Wizard 2. Cough It Up 3. Carcinogen 4. Dead Cloud 5. Hex 6. Lung Ruiner 7. Dweller 8. Marsquake 9. Blast Off
Hashtronaut upcoming US shows: 3/11 – Replay Lounge, Lawrence KS 3/12 – Opolis, Norman OK 3/14 – SXSW Stoner Jam, Far Out Lounge, Austin TX 3/15 – The Lost Well, Austin TX 3/16 – Black Magic Social Club, Houston TX 3/17 – The Living Room, El Paso TX
HASHTRONAUT current lineup: Michael Honiotes – Drums* Kellen McInerney – Regular Guitar Robb Park – Stunt Guitar Daniel Smith – Bass/Vocals *all tracks on the album recorded by Eric Garcia
