Posted in Whathaveyou on November 14th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
As they make ready to set out on their ‘The Pot and the Pendulum’ tour next week, the Polish worshippers of stone will also be announcing their first new studio LP since 2018, set to release presumably early in 2026 through Heavy Psych Sounds. The Kielce megaweedians and the Italian imprint have a history going back to HPS reissuing the band’s 2011 debut, Sonic Scapes and Weedy Groves (discussed here), in 2022 and following that with their second album, 2015’s Greenferno, just last month.
Belzebong‘s third full-length, 2018’s Light the Dankness (review here) has set the addled crust riffers on a years-long round of touring, and even with a global pandemic break in between, cementing their reputation among the superlatives of sludge. They’ve toured here, there and wheverever to proselytize a dogma that can only properly be measured in milligrams, and if you’re not immediately looking forward to their next record, take an extra couple minutes and really let the news sink into your poor addled brain.
Tour dates (prior posted, so double-check the shows for accuracy before you head out), and the PR wire’s initial announcement follow, to be followed by the first track stream and more details next week:
Heavy Psych Sounds Records to announce Polish bong metal riffers BELZEBONG signing for a brand NEW ALBUM !!
We’re really stoked to announce that the Polish bong metal band BELZEBONG is coming back with a brand new album !!
NEW ALBUM PRESALE + FIRST TRACK PREMIERE: NOVEMBER 19th
BELZEBONG – 💨 THE POT AND THE PENDULUM TOUR 2025 💨 21.11 / GER / Radebeul / barnyard_club 22.11 / GER / Jena / @kuba_jena 23.11 TBA 25.11 / CZ / Brno / @kabinet_muz 26.11 / SK / Bratislava / @zalar666 27.11 / AT / Vienna / @arenawien 28.11 TBA 29.11 / AT / Salzburg / @dome_of_rock_festival_salzburg 30.11 / GER / Munich / @backstagemunich 02.12 / GER / Frankfurt / @ponyhof.club 03.12 / FRA / Paris / @backstagebtm 04.12 / FRA / Nantes / @leferrailleur 05.12 / FRA / Lille / @labullecafe 06.12 / NL / Utrecht / @dbs_utrecht 07.12 / NL / Eindhoven / @effenaar 08.12 / GER / Düsseldorf / @pitcherrocknrollhq 10.12 / GER / Münster / @rare_guitar 11.12 / GER / Hamburg / @hafenklanghamburg 12.12 / GER / Oldenburg / @mts_records 13.12 / GER / Berlin / @wildatheartberlin
BIOGRAPHY
Poland’s loudest riff dealers, Belzebong have been spreading their fuzz-drenched gospel of bong metal since 2008. With no vocals and no compromises, they summon crushing instrumentals soaked in doom, sludge, and psychedelic haze. Their hypnotic live shows and cult-like following have turned them into underground legends, delivering slow, sinister grooves straight from the green abyss. With acclaimed albums like Sonic Scapes & Weedy Grooves, Greenferno, and Light the Dankness, Belzebong have toured extensively across Europe and the U.S., leaving trails of blown minds and smoke-filled venues in their wake. Belzebong is not just a band—it’s a ritual of riff worship for those who live by the fuzz and die by the bong.
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 11th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Uh, so Mario Lalli and Sean Wheeler are taking Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers to Japan for a round of six shows from Jan. 28 through Feb. 2. They start in Okayama and finish in Tokyo.
Badass, right? Of course. Lalli doing a bit of desert ambassadorship is always good news, and Wheeler‘s beat-poet frontmanning makes a welcome complement in the Rubber Snake Charmers context. But check out the part in the blue text where it says they’re improvising, and that they’ll be collaborating with local musicians to round out the lineup of the band. I don’t know the whos and wheres on that, if it’s going to be the same lineup all the time or if they’ll just roll into Kanazawa the third night of the tour and hope a drummer shows up, but for a project that’s so much about exploration and improvising their way forward, a tour like this seems ideal. You’re basically guaranteed something different every night.
In addition to this, Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers — in some incarnation — have also been confirmed for the first-ever Mojave Experience Festival in Joshua Tree, CA, in March, and Desertfest London 2026 in May, so safe to say the project will keep busy at least through the early going of the New Year. Their live-recorded 2024 album, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities (review here), will hopefully get a follow-up from all this traveling and activity, and if that happens on a night in Japan when Lalli and Wheeler are clicking with the cats from Blasting Rod with whom they’ve never shared a stage before and maybe it all just becomes a special, once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing, so much the better.
Saw the dates on socials and here they are:
Desert rock veterans Sean Wheeler & Mario Lalli are heading to Japan for a series of improvised performances, collaborating with musicians from Japan, including the psychedelic rock trio @blastingrod !
RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS JAPAN 2026 Jan 28 Pepperland, Okayama Jan 29 Sengoku Daitouryo, Osaka Jan 30 Music Base Extreme, Kanazawa Jan 31 Brazil Coffee, Nagoya Feb 1 El Puente, Yokohama Feb 2 Fever, Tokyo
Posted in Reviews on November 11th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Eternal Sunriseis the second full-length from SoftSun, following behind Nov. 2024’s Daylight in the Dark (review here), as well as their first release through Heavy Psych Sounds. Like that album, the six-song/40-minute Eternal Sunrise features drums by the recording engineer — in this case that’s Robert Garson at Red Barn Recorders, who also mixed — and furthers the collaboration between bassist/vocalist Pia Isaksen (of Oslo’s Superlynx and her own Pia Isa solo work) and guitarist Gary Arce (Yawning Man, Big Scenic Nowhere, Zun, etc.), whose tonal blend and the mellow-complement of Isaksen‘s voice create a feel that’s both textural and organic, able to be open-spaced as in the finale “Cremation Sunlight” or to find a heavy-post-rock wash in the midsection of “Anywhere But Here.”
Those who heard the first record will find the sophomore outing operating in a similar vein. By and large, the mood is serene and exploratory, as a piece like the opening roller “Sacred Heart” (not a Dio cover) unfolds with strident punctuation in the drums and despite that a fervent sense of Eternal Sunrise as a place to dwell. This was true of Daylight in the Dark as well — one will note the on-theme title of the follow-up; songs like “Sleep the Day Away” and “Cremation Sunlight” seem to be working to capture a place and time too, and fair enough — as not only is place declared in big bright letters that say ‘desert’ to the indoctrinated heads who will no doubt make up the majority of the album’s listenership, but there’s a spirit and declaration of self-in-place as well. That is to say, as much as Eternal Sunrise feels primarily geared toward giving their audience space for itself in the material — which they do, amply and ably — but finding space for themselves in the songs too. There is no undercutting the value of a place to be in this day and age, finding a deeper resonance with the moment you’re living through. That seems to be happening in these songs for this version of this project.
It happens through a combination of elements, and the core of SoftSun remains how well Isaksen and Arce pair musically. Isaksen‘s bass feels richer and more present in tone on Eternal Sunrisein pieces like “Sleep the Day Away” and in the second half of side A’s slow-churning second cut “A Hundred and Sixteen,” with a slow and molten fluidity that — in complement to Garson‘s drumming, which for sure is the grounding element throughout — gives Arce‘s signature guitar tone a corresponding lower-frequency to float over. Vocals are languid in their delivery, breathy and melodic; shoegazey, for want of a better word. But as Isaksen has showed time and again, she’s able to bring emotion to a heavier movement, and the penultimate “Abandoned Lands” shows this as Isaksen (in layers), Arce and Garson follow a subtle structure while continuing their focus on immersion. A verse changing to a chorus might just happen with an emphasized syllable, and the solo might just be a howl in the night. Where you go with it is up to you.
“Anywhere But Here” closes aide A and is the shortest inclusion at 4:53. More linear than verse/chorus in feel, it feels more exploratory than some of the jam-born-but-worked-on material that surrounds, but was likely included on the record because how much it encapsulates and says about where this band is at this point. With Garson steadily keeping things moving beneath, Isaksen and Arce set forth a tonal shimmer and fill it out with verses that are somewhat obscure in the lyrics but clear in the melody just the same. If it’s escapism, as the title hints, it seems to have a clearer idea of where it wants to be than the title might lead one to believe. In closing the album, “Cremation Sunlight” (also the longest track at 8:28) enacts a few bursts of guitar noise that hint toward synthier or more psychedelic improving or just more weirdness to come, none of which is reason to complain as Arce‘s solo rises before the comedown to finish out.
Like a lot of Eternal Sunrise, it’s pretty simple math in terms of each of these players — and I’m not discounting Garson‘s contributions here, either behind the kit or the mixing board — particularly Arce and Isaksen bringing recognizable personality aspects to the band and SoftSun deriving its own persona from the combination. There are balance shifts throughout in tempo, in who’s written what part, in how the vocals might flow alongside a guitar that’s mostly worked instrumental for the last 40 years, and those serve to make Eternal Sunrise that much broader, and at no point do SoftSun step away from the atmosphere they’re creating as they go. If anything, at the moment where they otherwise might have, “Sleep the Day Away” doubles down on the entrancing scope with its reaching-into-the-ether solo. By the time it’s done, your head’s deeper into it than you realized.
That SoftSun turned around Eternal Sunrise in a year’s time speaks to the band’s having some measure of priority in relation to other ongoing projects, whether that’s Arce in Yawning Man — who also have a new record out this week, called Pavement Ends (review here) — or Isaksen in her solo work, and an urgency that might seem counterintuitive to the quiet nature of the songs if you’ve never been in love before. As it stands, I won’t predict what’s to come for SoftSun, but I’m glad to have Eternal Sunrise as an answer to Daylight in the Dark, and it feels like if they keep the band going on the path they’re on now, an organic progression in songwriting is taking hold as the Arce/Isaksen collab becomes more familiar and each has a better sense of what to expect from the other. They succeed in giving Eternal Sunrise the breadth that feels so intentionally made for the listener to lose themselves in, and show that there’s still more ground in the infinite unknown to cover.
In 2022, Lord Elephant released their debut album, Cosmic Awakening (review here), through Heavy Psych Sounds. The next year, the Florence trio took part in an HPS-backed split with labelmates Oreyeon. And even as Ultra Soul, their second full-length introduced to listeners with the premiere of “Black River Blues” below, and they’ve been playing live all the while. Last week, Heavy Psych Sounds announced the album’s existence in saying it had re-signed the band, and in addition to the advent of “Black River Blues” — a sweetly desert-hued number as regards tone, but definitely cast with the intent to roll — the kind of thing that makes Sleep fans raise an eyebrow while the Kyuss heads are already drunk to it. You understand this. I know you do.
As to the ‘blues’ in the title, if you’ve got a quota, the solo in the first half will meet it en route to the more brash volume trades later in the instrumental procession. There’s a break right about halfway — because of course — where the bass leads the way back in, and if you and your family celebrate groove in any of its forms, well, you might like to make a donation to Lord Elephant‘s church. Riffs for the glory of riffage. Riffs to save us all.
But most essentially, riffs. Lord Elephant have already been confirmed for Heavy Psych Sounds Fest in Belgium next year. I would not expect that to be the last you’ll see of their name in 2026.
Audio, PR wire info, links and more follow. Please enjoy:
Lord Elephant, “Black River Blues” track premiere
BLACK RIVER BLUES is LORD ELEPHANT first single taken from the band’s upcoming new album ULTRA SOUL.
The release will see the light January 30th via Heavy Psych Sounds.
Lord Elephant on “Black River Blues”: “The first single taken from the album is a stoned-paced hard blues delirium, written in honor of the cheapest and deadliest whiskey we could find on the market, Black River Whiskey, that quenched our thirst so many times for travels and live shows! The limping time of the beginning evolves into a second doomy section, that hits hard as the last sip of the low-priced bottle of whiskey in our hand! In the end, this is something like a real love song if you think about that, isn’t?”
Lord Elephant are back with their second studio album “Ultra Soul”, a psyched blend of 70’s, 90’s and 00’s extravaganzas mixed together with the distinctive heavy breath of the band. Blues, doom and sludge are fused again in the strange trademark of the trio, allergic to genre-labels and ready to expand the vision beyond cages!
Recorded, mixed and mastered at Studio 73, Ravenna, by Riccardo Pasini (Nero Di Marte, Ephel Duath, Ottone Pesante..) Artwork and Layout by JJ Farfante ArtLab (Melvins, Mudhoney, Ufomammut)
LORD ELEPHANT is: Leandro Gaccione – Guitar Edoardo De Nardi – Bass Tommaso Urzino – Drums
Posted in Questionnaire on October 15th, 2025 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: Clifford Dinsmore of Dusted Angel & Bl’ast
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
I would never try to define what I do. I’m more of a “go with the natural flow” kind of person. I got into music through punk rock in the late 70s and early 80s. Steve, the drummer for Dusted Angel is actually one of the very 1st people I ever jammed with. Then I met the guys that I formed M.A.D. with when I was 17 and that eventually evolved into the band BL’AST!.
Describe your first musical memory.
One of my first musical memories was my uncle Steve and my Mom taking me to see Tower Of Power and Credence Clearwater Revival at the Oakland Coliseum in 1972. Totally life changing!
Describe your best musical memory to date.
It’s hard to pick from so many great musical memories. One that stands out is seeing Black Flag, Adolescents, Minute Men and China White at the Mabuhay Gardens in SF when I was 16 . We were at all those shows back then, but that particular night was absolutely amazing.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
Going through my experiences with cancer was definitely an ultimate test of will and my belief in myself. It’s definitely not for everyone, and is an extreme exercise in self-discipline, and that discipline is the key to survival in that kind of fucked up life-altering situation.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
Artistic progress eventually leads to self liberation and a more personalized view of life on earth and the universe as a whole.
How do you define success?
I would define success as being in a position of personal autonomy and still being able to get by and survive. Traveling and playing music with friends and making enough to get from one place to the next.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
The last presidential election!!! Sheer Terror!!
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
Another Dusted Angel record!!
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
The most essential function of art, in my opinion is to emphasize the incredible aesthetic of natural vs. unnatural in the world we live in. And musically, to create the soundtrack that moves through history. Imagine a world without art and music, it would be insanely bland!
Say something positive about yourself.
I’m kind of a nice person when I’m in a good mood?
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
I’m looking forward to going to Hawaii this winter with my girlfriend to hang out with family and friends. Being in the ocean over there is always so revitalizing.
Posted in Reviews on October 9th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Today is Thursday, but it’s day five of the Fall 2025 Quarterly Review because I snuck in that first day last Friday. I cannot convey to you how much that has screwed me up. Turns out when you do one thing precisely one way for like 13 years and then all of a sudden flip it around another way it can be confusing. Stay tuned for more deep-impact life hacks and insights like this.
Or maybe riffs instead. It’s okay. That’s most of what keeps me coming back too.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
Paradise Lost, Ascension
More than 35 years on from their outset, Paradise Lost are an institution. I know they’ve had their stylistic divergences, but since recommitting themselves to their morose take on doom metal more than 15 years ago, they’ve hit a rare echelon of reliability one can only call Kreator-esque. That’s not a sonic comparison, but like the German thrash stalwarts, Paradise Lost have their sound — dark and more malleable in tempo than the thickened tones make it feel across these 10 songs — and within that sphere are able to do basically what they want musically and make it work. Side A’s “Salvation,” the longest inclusion at seven minutes, is a tour de force of the appeal of modern Paradise Lost, and a fitting summary of how encompassing they’ve become while still remaining recognizable as themselves. They even get hooky on “Deceivers,” so yes, still growing, still pushing, still Paradise Lost. A once-a-generation band, even as part of a cohort as they were, and not to be taken for granted.
The sixth full-length from still-younger-than-some-bands-who-haven’t-been-around-as-long Icelandic heavy rockers The Vintage Caravan plays out across 17 tracks and 59 minutes, with groups of songs presumably corresponding to double-vinyl side splits separated by interludes each of which is named “Portal.” So, Portals. The first of them follows “Philosopher,” the lead single which features Mikael Åkerfeldt, who turns out to be one of several guests across the record, but the real headliner is the songwriting. In the big choruses of “Here You Come Again,” “Give and Take,” and others, the band recall a heyday when rock could be heavy and accessible outside its own sphere, while “Electrified” later on builds into a tense boogie hook before “Portal V” transitions to the acoustic-based “My Aurora” and the closer “This Road,” one more uptempo, shred-inclusive, exceptionally well-crafted piece of The Vintage Caravan‘s classic-heavy-informed style, efficient in getting its point across despite allowing itself time to dwell as it does throughout.
It’s not really a huge surprise that Los Angeles dark heavy psych rockers Spirit Mother would ‘go acoustic’ at some point, given the dynamic they’ve showcased to-date on their definitely-plugged studio albums. The most recent of those, 2024’s righteous, Heavy Psych Sounds-issued Trails (review here), is the source for “Wolves” and “Below,” which feature on this short, stripped-down offering. “Wolves,” which capped the record in memorable fashion, leads off here with its foreboding feeling all the more realized given the state of the world, while “Below” finds violinist SJ pushing into a soft crescendo taking off from Armand Lance‘s guitar and vocals. Recorded live, Songs From the Basin sounds duly organic, and whenever Spirit Mother in any form — that is, the full band or just the duo as they are here — wants to drop a full acoustic set, I’m here for it. Once again, the lesson is once you have well-written songs, you can make them do and be just about whatever you want.
I’m pretty sure the now-Berlin-based experimentalist duo of Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff are north of 30 full-lengths released since their first one in 2002, and that doesn’t count blurring the lines between one project and another with collaborations or Baker‘s solo work. Prolific as they are, they remain expressive in the hard-drum-machined “It’s Cold When You Cut Me” (15:09), one of the four extended inclusions of Cut, where the sinister undercurrent comes to fruition in the song’s second half of manipulated, noisy drone. “Dark, No Knowledge” (13:26) lays out a distorted landscape and rolls through it, Godflesh in a hand-cranked meat grinder, becoming a swell of apocalyptic noise, while “She Ate His Dreams From the Inside and Spat Out the Frozen Fucking Bones” (15:14) dares to be pretty as it leaves spaces open and fills out later with psychedelic processionmaking, leaving the immediate ritual of “Omenformation” to resonate high before piling on low end frequencies while also freakjazzing and riffing out. The noise swallows all but it turns out there’s salvation in that monster’s stomach, so I’ll take it. One Nadja album may be an inevitable precursor to the next one, but that doesn’t mean they don’t make it a world of its own.
Düsseldorf-bred psych rockers Vibravoid belong in a class of undervalued all their own. As they mark their 35th anniversary, they begin their new studio album Remove the Ties with a mischievous redirect of krautrock-style electronics before the garage-wavey “Neustart” and pop-shimmerier “Power of Dreams” dig further into the heart of the record, letting side A round out with the longer, deeper-reverbed “Follow Me Follow You” and its effects barrage play out atop the steady kick drum tasked with holding it together. But nobody who’s been in a band for 35 years is about to actually be sloppy, and there’s no actual danger of off-the-rails on Remove the TiesBaby Woodrose roamed the earth. Vibravoid were there then too. It’s easy to get around when you’re from a different dimension.
Do you have six minutes for a good pummeling? Of course you do. Brooklynite four-piece For Fuck’s Sake offer two tracks like a digital punker 7″ with 7-Minute Abs/Lobotomy, and they make no attempt to hide the fact of their sights being set on destruction. Their sound, rooted in hardcore and sludge in like measure, counting in with the snare on “7-Minute Abs” and daring to cross the three-minutes-long threshold with the fervent chug and bone-on-bone impact of “Lobotomy,” reminds of nothing so much as earlier 16, but with an unmistakable edge of Northeastern confrontationalism. That is, they’ll fuck you up and they know it, so that’s what they’re setting out to do. Barking, gnashing intensity set a harsh backdrop for what’s an engaging groove so long as you’re pissed off enough to process it (which you should be; look around), and the rawness of their delivery, the unabashed assault of it, comes through as genuine. Also punishing.
Classic heavy rock and roll forms the core of Paralyzed‘s approach, with guitarist Michael Binder‘s low, gravelly vocals reminiscent of Jim Morrison at his least hinged, suited to the blues behind second cut “Railroad” and the subsequent march of “Rosie’s Town” on the band’s third LP, Rumble & Roar. To say they — that is, Binder, organist/rhythm guitarist Caterina Böhner, bassist Philipp Engelbrecht and drummer Florian Thiele — make it a party across the nine-song/41-minute outing is perhaps understating the case, but if you’d accuse “Heavy Blues” of being too on the nose, you’re missing the fact that on the nose is the point. There’s no irony here, no sneer to the boogie of “White Paper” or the slow organ-laced fluidity of “The Witch,” just heavy vibes and reaffirmation of the band’s growth as songwriters. I’m not even sure where one would start complaining about such a thing.
Delivered as their label-debut for Magnetic Eye Records, the 10-song/40-minute Bear is the fourth full-length from Nashville two-piece Friendship Commanders, with guitarist/vocalist Buick Audra and drummer/bassist/synthesist Jerry Roe having recorded with Kurt Ballou in addition to doing some at home for an affect accordingly tight in craft and heavy in impact. “Melt” pushes toward a ’90s-style reimagining of heavy rock as both commercially viable and empowering, while “X” pairs its tonal crunch with the keyboardy reach of its midsection, poppish but still heavy even unto the snare hits. Pop becomes another tool in their arsenal, whether it’s the layered ascent and push of “New” or the weighted culmination presented with closer “Dead and Discarded Girls,” and the band don’t seem to shy away from being able to compose at the level they are. At the same time, “Dripping Silver” feels fully cognizant of the radness in the riff it’s riding, so there’s a balance to it as well. They sound like professionals.
Former Iron Man and, as of recently, former Spiral Grave vocalist “Screaming Mad” Dee Calhoun is pissed. The Maryland-based acoustic metal troubadour sounds resolute on Angry Old Man, and while his past solo work could hardly be said to pull punches, he hits a different level of laying it all out there on “Kill a Motherfucker” late in the procession here. As ever, hollow-bodied-resonance is the foundation throughout, but other elements like the harmonica in “Voodoo Queen” and the tolling bell at the outset of “VVitch (A Chant)” (not really a chant) fill out the reaches when Calhoun‘s powerhouse voice — still his primary instrument, though the guitar work has gotten more complex with time as well — recedes to a softer delivery. But when he belts it out — looking at you, “Rise Up to March” — he can shake the ground, and if you have any prior familiarity with his work, you already know he’s unmistakable in that regard. That remains the case here, even as he positions himself the titular Angry Old Man. Ain’t none of us getting any younger, dude.
The narrative of the band getting together after a few years, enjoying each other’s company as they wrote and recorded Sörmland — named for where in Sweden they were — becomes real with the mellowprog delve of “Honey Trap” more than the shorter leadoff “Video,” as pastoralia takes centerstage with organic melodies and a casual groove. Unsurprisingly if you know Twin Peaks, “Laura Palmer’s Theme” is darker, but the real reference it’s making seems to be to “Moonlight Sonata” as regards the keys, but “Neon Lights” answers back by being in no hurry whatsoever with sweet intertwining guitar lines and a subtle build to later movement. At 11 minutes, the title-track that caps is the longest inclusion, but fair enough since they have to make room for that tenor sax and all. I wouldn’t know from experience, but Sörmland is what I imagine it would sound like to be emotionally regulated, ever, and anytime Automatism want to get together out in the woods or by some fields or a lake or whathaveyou, I hope someone has the presence of mind to hit record.
Posted in Reviews on October 8th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
If you’ve been keeping up, you already know this Quarterly Review goes through next Monday (because screw weekends anyhow) and will top out at 70 releases covered. Today, then, is when we hit the halfway mark en route to that number. Does it matter? Probably not unless you’re the guy on the other side of the laptop writing it, but maybe you just enjoy having the division done for you.
More of a range of styles today than yesterday, which I need to keep this going, so you’ll pardon me while I dig in in the hope that you do the same. Thanks for reading.
Quarterly Review #31-40:
Mountain of Misery, Shades of the Ashes
Somewhat impressively, Mountain of Misery remains the solo-project of Kamil Ziółkowski, who perhaps if he wasn’t also the drummer/vocalist in Spaceslug might’ve put together a full band by now, but seems committed to keeping the band in-house. But it is a band, to be sure. Shades of the Ashes is Ziółkowski‘s third LP under the moniker, and it pushes deeper into a progression distinct from Spaceslug however familiar some of the vocals are, and offers depth of its own, whether that’s tonally in the thickened fuzz of “Follow the Sun” or the way he makes it boogie in “Speed King” (not a cover) while at the same time setting up the lush nod of “From Fall to Rise.” Between “Thornado” at the outset and the eight-minute finale “Blow,” Ziółkowski refines Mountain of Misery‘s sound with a freshness that is metal, grunge, heavy rock and psychedelic all at once, and stronger for that cohesion with his signature mellow vocals over top. It’s kind of surprising at this point he hasn’t been tempted to do it live, but clearly this is working, so I wouldn’t necessarily encourage messing with the process either.
A fresh take on the notion of Southern heavy from Asheville, North Carolina’s Dërro, who put a bit of twang into the post-Alice in Chains harmonies of “Brain Worm” (surely a song for our times) and a bit of emotive soar into “Echo Mountain” in complement to a guitar tone that feels kin to earlier Tool, all while retaining a ‘doing its own thing’ vibe. That is to say, the six-song Halcyon — which is the band’s first outing so far as I know — feels like the credited-as-composers duo of Neal Brewer and Corey Tossas, working with Pat Gerasia on drums, would seem to have come into this debut offering with a firm idea of what they wanted the band to be sound-wise, and unless they’ve secretly been working on it for a decade, the results of that shimmer with intention and feeling alike in the chuggy “Alone” and the drawl-into-power-nod opening title-track. One to watch? Maybe, but way more of a thing to hear now.
The guitar/drum duo of Marco Bianciardi (The Somnambulist, ex-Arte, etc.) and Sara Neidorf (Mellowdeath, Sarattma, ex-Aptera, etc.) apparently recorded their six-track/36-minutes self-titled debut in a day. That implies much of it was done live, though it doesn’t account for the keyboards that show up in “Spectral Swell” and “Countershading,” or the lead layering in “Talking Moonshine,” but it’s not unlikely that after showing up and banging it out they had a little time for overdubs. Fair enough. The pieces are varied and prone to getting weirder toward their respective ends, rooted in doomjazz but groove-conscious just the same, and the garage-y strum in “Gruttling From Outer Space” bends and twists as it goes in a way that surely defines what ‘gruttling’ might be, while “Edge of Forthcoming Rain” hints at more peaceful ideas without giving up its restlessness and “The Cosmonaut’s Secret” turns out to be the shove into its own finish. They close with a saunter in “Talking Moonshine” and that feels as right as anything for a collection that’s so casually eclectic while minimizing the actual elements involved in its making.
Melbourne three-piece VVarp — also stylized all-caps: VVARP — seem to imagine a universe wherein the thickened tones and keyboard flourish of Slomatics meets with more traditionalist doom riffing, but that’s still just half the story as bassist Claudia Sullivan and guitarist/keyboardist John Bollen share lead vocals in harmonized style over the voluminous roll of “Druid Warfare,” the cavernous and lumbering “A Path Through the Veil,” assuring there’s beauty to coincide with all the crush that surrounds. Running 34 minutes and five tracks, Power Held in Stone follows 2020’s First Levitations and is accordingly their second full-length, given ethereal, almost-chanting presence through the vocals on centerpiece “Equinox Portal” where “Iron Cloak” is more resolved to its own heads-down-all-go bombast fueled by drummer Scott McLatchie as the song shoves into the residual keys that carry to the rumble at the outset of 10-minute capper “Stone Silhouette,” likewise gorgeous, immersive and encompassing.
Easily among the best debut albums I’ve heard in 2025 comes this modernized-classic psychedelia outreach from Poland’s Atom Juice, who would seem to have some relation to meloproggers Weedpecker through guitarist/vocalist Bartek Dobry, but who take a different path to get to bright and melodic fruition. The five-piece outfit’s self-titled debut (on Heavy Psych Sounds) runs shortest to longest on each of its component sides, with copious Beatles influence in “Gooboo” (circa ’70) and delves elsewhere into modern space rock (“Dead Hookers”), the most engaging funk-psych I’ve heard since Wight on “Sexi Frogs,” and an identity in the doing conjured through a blend of influences older and new. As closer “Honey” gives a bit of push in its first half, there’s nowhere Atom Juice wind up on the record that they don’t make themselves welcome, and with rare warmth, they give hopeful hints at the shape of heavy psychedelia to come. I haven’t seen a lot of hype for this one. If you’re reading this, don’t skip it.
The 15 tracks of Hooveriii‘s Manhunter have a foundation in garage rock and an according off-the-cuff feel, but at the same time, interludes and exploratory instrumentals like “In the Rain,” “Night Walks in Montreaux,” the spacey title-track and the penultimate organ soundscaper “Awful Planet” assure that nothing actually comes across as haphazard in a way that undercuts the dynamic. “Melody” and “Tin Lips” open in rocking style, while the fuzz grows more fervent in “Westside Pavilion of Dreams” and “Heaven at the Gates” before “Cul-de-Sac” marks the transition to the next phase with the forceful shuffle of “The Fly,” answered a short while later by the heft of “Question.” It goes like this, flowing except where it doesn’t want to, and with the jazzy “Me King” and the aforementioned mellow-vocalized “Awful Planet” for setup, “Stage” reroutes into pastoralism and feels pointedly kind in so doing. Clearly a band for whom genre takes a secondary role to their own craft, and one whose appeal is broader for that.
Fluidity is part of the nature of what Sweden’s Gaupa do, as the Falun-based troupe have established over their two-to-date LPs and other sundry outings. The five-song/35-minute Fyr finds them working with producer Karl Daniel Lidén — which was a very good idea that somebody had — and is billed as a mini-album, which I think is to account for its being only one minute shorter than their most recent LP, 2022’s Myriad (review here). Vocalist Emma Näslund remains a focal point in the songs, but the balance of the mix is malleable as “Heavy Lord” demonstrates, and “Elastic Sheep” finds the entire band aligned around a fullness that one only hopes is emblematic of their third to come. Plus a big ol’ slowdown, and while we’re talking bonuses, the 11-minute live take on “Febersvan” from their first EP is a welcome glimpse at how far they’ve progressed to this point to complement the potential still so obvious in their sound. They’re the kind of band you hope never stop growing.
With multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Paul Holden still at the center of the project — Mathias Dowle is also credited with playing on and co-engineering the album with Holden and Ryan Fallis — Melbourne psych-grunge rockers Foot seem to pick up where they left off with 2022’s You Are Weightless, tapping into a style that’s grounded in terms of structure and committedly straightforward but that still lends a feeling of scope and space to the nine cuts on the 45-minute Copper Feast-issued LP. The fuzz is prevalent, perhaps nowhere more so than “Walking Into Walls All Week,” where “Intensify” is more of a vocal showcase until its later heavy sweep. Holden does a cover of Marcy Playground‘s “Sex and Candy”… for… some reason… and but for that, as one would both expect and hope for the band at this point, they remain a songwriting-based unit, able to present a diversity of ideas and moods without ever making it feel like a departure at all.
Enter Diagram with a ready definition for ‘dug in’ on their second album, Short Circuit Control. The Berlin duo of founder Hákon Aðalsteinsson and Fred Sunesen offer heady listeners a heady listen with nine inclusions that commune with the history of electronics in krautrock while still keeping both a modern and a psychedelic affect. Is that neo-kraut? I honestly don’t know, but cuts like “This is How We Lead Our Lives” transcend their outward poppiness through repetition and exploration, and the abiding lesson seems to be that just because something is dancey doesn’t also mean it can’t be purposefully building an atmosphere — “Close Your Eyes” walks by and waves (not that you can see it with your eyes closed). The single “Dub Boy” answers the New Wave aspects of opener “Breath in Your Fire,” and a ’90s electro finale awaits in “Through the Wall of Sound” for anybody adventurous enough to take it on.
Brookynite heavy progressive rockers The Phantom Eye offer blend across Cymatic Waves‘ four tracks that feels metallic at its root but has grown and redirected to more complex fare. Between the volume trades of “Circuit Rider,” the noise baked into the finish of “Palindrome,” the synth adding drama to “Black Hotel” and the intricate balancing of guitar layers in “Silent Symphony,” the focus is never purely on just being heavy, but ‘heavy,’ as a musical ideal, is a piece of the puzzle here, framing a broad melodic reach and giving shape to the structures underlying. I wouldn’t hazard a guess as to what they might sound like in five years, but as they’re following 2021’s Chromesthesia EP (review here) with this second short release, it’s even more difficult to pin them down as any one thing. This could hardly feel more intentional than it does in the songs. There’s a plan at work here. It’s just starting to pan out.
Posted in Questionnaire on September 30th, 2025 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: Garrett Garlington of Cosmic Reaper
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
It’s a release of energy, raw aggression transmitted through an instrument.
Outside of having fun with a group of people (what a band is really about).
This is pretty subjective, so I can only tell you what it’s like for me. People have compared being in a band to being in a marriage, but I think it’s closer to a gang. It’s a group of individuals acting with purpose and intent for a common goal, whatever that goal may be. Long surviving bands that last are on the same page with their goals, and seeing their bandmates as brothers/sisters. Going about it any other way, you’re likely to miss out on the best moments of being in a band.
Describe your first musical memory.
There was a band called Sukay, they were this high-energy folk music from the Andes of South America. At one point they were relatively known worldwide. My parents took me to see them perform, beside the river in Sacramento, CA when I was probably 6 years old. Planned or by accident, I’m not sure. That very well may have been the moment that set me on the path of chasing music my entire life. I highly recommend Sukay, not only is it a truly unique style of folk, but one album cover has them on top of a fucking mountain wearing robes and their holding instruments. Your average metal band dreams about doing stuff like that.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
We were lucky enough to perform in Joshua tree, CA as part of Heavy Psych Sounds Fest. Performing that far from home, (in the middle of a desert no less) was pretty surreal. It was also a really stacked bill with some staples of the genre. Windhand, Brant Bjork, Weedeater. It also just happened to be the first time my father had ever seen me play music of any genre.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
Basically everyday, anything we were taught about our US government has turned out to be a fabrication or propaganda stretching back at least 100 years. See the lyrics to “Hammer” and “Wasteland II.”
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
It typically progresses with artists’ tastes, which of course change with time. Sometimes the progression comes from trying to fit into a certain mold, to achieve a certain level of success. Ultimately Progression leads to two things, simultaneously, gaining a new fan base and losing another one.
How do you define success?
Most people probably look at success as arbitrary numbers, data involving streams or monetary figures. To me, it’s always been much more about critical acclaim, and a lasting fanbase of whatever you do. Whether that makes money or not.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
Children rummaging for food in the trash, in this country or any other. There’s no reason any human shouldn’t have access to the most basic necessity to survive.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
I’d eventually like to get into some kind of leather working, creating physical objects that serve a purpose. Wallets, gun holsters, cool stuff of that sort. It’s really just a matter of free time, and getting started.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
The most essential, is self expression. The secondary is having that (expression) resonate with another.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
I’ve been trying to make a trip down to Key West, FL. I’ve never been and driving over the ocean that far seems like it would be really peaceful.
[Ed. Note 09/29: I don’t know who took the photo above. If it was you, I’m glad to give credit. Please let me know without being a dick about it.]
