The Obelisk Questionnaire: Phil Swanson of Solemn Lament, Vestal Claret, ex-Hour of 13, and More

Posted in Questionnaire on August 1st, 2022 by JJ Koczan

Phil Swanson of Solemn Lament

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: Phil Swanson of Solemn Lament

How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?

Surreal is the first word that comes to mind. A massive underground music nerd who was just wanting to be part of something in any way possible. Started writing reviews for a friend’s fanzine in the ’80s that led to interviews. Tape trading and vinyl collecting that led to a small retail and wholesale distro working with bands to get their music heard and released before deciding to sneak my own music into the mix. Eventually I got better at it apparently to the point even more talented people than myself wanted to be a part of it with me.

Describe your first musical memory.

Staying home sick from school in the ’70s bored and exploring my parents’ hi-fi and record collection. Nothing good, but at the time I really didn’t know what listening to music was all about until I pulled the record out of the sleeve and put it on while watching the cover come to life. It literally blew my mind.

Describe your best musical memory to date.

I have been lucky enough to experience everything I could ever want to in music. Met my heroes, played with my friends I idolized and earned their respect. Developed relationships with musicians who are now the closest people to my heart as I will allow whether they know it or not. The journey has been the best memory. To be a part of something I only dreamed of and never thought possible.

When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?

As a child of 13 when I was brutally beaten by a group of kickers in Texas and the people I thought were there to keep me safe looked the other way. My belief in trust was tested and lost forever in that moment and so many moments after.

Where do you feel artistic progression leads?

Catharsis.

How do you define success?

Achieving personal goals however large or small. It’s a very relative thing and can happen in many different ways.

What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?

Violence on more occasions than I would like to admit at this stage of my life. Things that haunt me and make me feel my struggles in present life are justified by things that surrounded me in my past.

Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.

A finished graphic novel or film. I have written several scripts, one came very close to publication but timing was lost. I was writing scripts at the same time as my music progressed and then music took precedent. If I wasn’t so complicated and difficult that I could play along I probably could have had the opportunity, but I tend to pull back every time I have the chance to move forward.

What do you believe is the most essential function of art?

Escape.

Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?

Taking my Brazilian Jiu Jitsu to the highest level I am capable of while I still can. To be a legitimate player and threat in any room I enter. To have the respect of anyone I tap hands with.

https://www.facebook.com/solemnlament
https://www.instagram.com/solemnlamentmusic/
https://solemnlament.bandcamp.com/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrWvrLIkGZEmsJwRx2_Plmw

https://www.facebook.com/svartrecords
https://www.instagram.com/svartrecords/
https://twitter.com/svartrecords
https://svartrecords.com/

Solemn Lament, Solemn Lament (2021)

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Quarterly Review: Hour of 13, Skepticism, Count Raven, Owl Cave, Zeup, Dark Bird, Hope Hole, Smote, Gristmill, Ivory Primarch

Posted in Reviews on October 4th, 2021 by JJ Koczan

the-obelisk-fall-2016-quarterly-review

Hope you had a good weekend. Hope your bank account survived Bandcamp Friday. I gotta admit, I hit it a little hard, made four $10-plus purchases. A certain rainforest-named mega-corporate everything-distro site has me out of the habit of thinking of paying for shipping, but that comes back to bite you. And if there’s a tape or a CD and the download costs $7 and the tape costs $10 and comes with the download too, what would you have me do? Throw another five or six bucks in there for shipping and that adds up. Still, for a good cause, which is of course supporting bands nd labels who make and promote killer stuff. I don’t mind that.

We’ve arrived at the next to last day of the Fall 2021 Quarterly Review. It’s a cool one, I hope you’ll agree. If not, maybe tomorrow.

Quarterly Review #51-60:

Hour of 13, Black Magick Rites

hour of 13 black magick rites

The history of Hour of 13, 14 years on from their self-titled debut (discussed here) is complex and full of comings and goings. With Black Magick Rites — which was posted for a day in Nov. 2020 and then removed from the public sphere until this Shadow Kingdom release — founding multi-instrumentalist Chad Davis takes over vocal duties as well, charting the way forward for the band as a complete solo-project with seven songs and 43 minutes of lower-fi classic-style doom that bears in its title track some semblance of garage mentality but avoids most of the modern trappings such a designation implies. Satan features heavily, as one would expect. “House of Death” leans on its chorus hard, but opener “His Majesty of the Wood” and the eight-minute “Within the Pentagram,” as well as the payoff of closer “The Mystical Hall of Dreams” seem to show where the long-tumultuous outfit could be headed melodically and in grimly grandiose style if Davis — also of The Crooked Whispers, The Sabbathian, countless others in a variety of styles — wills it. Here’s hoping.

Hour of 13 on Bandcamp

Shadow Kingdom Records website

 

Skepticism, Companion

skepticism companion

Graceful death. 30 years later, one might expect no less from Finnish funeral doom progenitors than that, and it’s exactly what they bring to the six-song/48-minute Companion. “Calla” sets the tempo for what follows at a dirge march with keyboard adding melodies to the procession as “The Intertwined” continues the slow roll, with drums and piano taking over in the midsection before the full brunt is borne again. “The March of the Four” follows with church organ running alongside the drawn-out guitar movement, each hit of the kick drum somehow forlorn beneath the overlaid growls. At least superficially, this is the Skepticism one imagines: slow, mournful, beauty-in-darkness, making dirty sounds but emerging without a stain on their formalwear. Closer “The Swan and the Raven” is a triumph in this, a revelry-that-isn’t, and “Passage” and even gives the tempo a relative kick, but that and the consuming drama of “The Inevitable” feel within the band’s aesthetic wheelhouse. Or their mortuary, anyhow. Honestly, they know what they’re doing, they’ve done it for a long time, and they don’t release records that often, so there’s an element of novelty just to the fact that the album exists, but if you put on Companion and listen to it, they also sound like they’re taking an entire genre to school. A genre they helped define, no less.

Skepticism on Facebook

Svart Records website

 

Count Raven, The Sixth Storm

Count Raven The Sixth Storm

Long-running Swedish doom traditionalists Count Raven are in immediate conversation with their own classic era with the album title The Sixth Storm serving as a reference to their 1990 debut, Storm Warning. Indeed, it is their sixth full-length, and it makes up for the decade-plus it’s been since they were last heard from with a 73-minute, all-in nine-track assemblage of oldschool Sabbathian doom metal, tinged with classic heavy rock and a broader vision that picks up where 2009’s Mammons War left off in epics like “The Nephilims” and “Oden,” the latter the album’s apex ahead of the Ozzy-ish piano/keyboard ballad “Goodbye” following on from the earlier “Heaven’s Door.” Some contemplation of mortality perhaps from founding guitarist/vocalist/keyboardist Dan “Fodde” Fondelius to go with the more socially themed “The Giver and the Taker,” “Baltic Storm,” opener “Blood Pope” or even “Oden,” which bases itself around Christianity’s destruction of pagan culture. Fair enough. Classic doom spearheaded by a guy who’s been at it for more than three decades. No revolution in style, but if you’d begrudge Count Raven their first album in 12 years, why?

Count Raven on Facebook

I Hate Records website

 

Owl Cave, Broken Speech

owl cave Broken Speech

Something for everyone in Owl Cave‘s Broken Speech, at least so long as your vision of “everyone” just includes fans of various extreme metallic styles. The Parisian one-man outfit’s debut release arrives as a single 43-minute track, led off by the sample “your silence speaks volumes.” What unfolds from there is a linear progression of movements through which S. — the lone party responsible for the guitar, bass, drum programming and other sampling, as there are obscure bits that might be manipulated voices and so on — weaves progressive black metal, doom, industrial churn, noise rock and other genre elements together with a willful sense of experimentalism and uniting heft. Some stretches are abrasive, some are nearly empty, some guitar-led, some more percussive, but even at its most raging, “Broken Speech” holds to its overarching atmosphere, grim as it is, and that allows it to ponder with scorn and melancholy alike before finishing out with a cacophony of blasts and wash leading to a last residual drone.

Owl Cave on Facebook

Time Tombs Production webstore

 

Zeup, Blind

Zeup Blind

Sharply executed, uptempo heavy/desert-style rock in the Californian tradition as filtered through a European legacy of bands that spans no less an amount of time, Zeup‘s second EP, Blind, is an in-and-out kind of affair. Four songs, 17 minutes. They’re not looking to take up too much of your day. But the energy they bring to that time, whether it’s the swinging bassline in “Belief” or the initial jolt of “Illusions,” the rolling catchiness of “Who You Are” or the closing title-track’s more Sabbath-spirited stomp, is organic, full, and sincere. In terms of style, the Copenhagen three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Jakob Bach, bassist/backing vocalist Morten Rold and drummer Morten Barth aren’t trying to get away with convincing anybody they invented heavy rock and roll, but the stamp they put on their own songs is welcome right up to the capper solo on “Blind” itself. Familiar, but crisp and refreshing like cold beer on a hot day, if that’s your thing.

Zeup website

Zeup on Bandcamp

 

Dark Bird, Out of Line

Dark Bird Out of Line

A drift calls you forward as Dark Bird‘s fourth album (amid many short releases and experimentalist whathaveyous), Out of Line, begins with “And it All Ends Well” and its title-track, the Toronto-based Roan Bateman pushing outward melodically before adding more fuzz to the shroom-folk of “Stranger,” an underlying sense of march telling of the made-in-dark-times spirit that so much of the record seems to actively work against. “Down With Love” is a dream given shimmer in its strum and no less ethereal when the maybe-programmed drums start, and “Undone” is the bummed-out-with-self ’90s-lysergic harmony that you never heard at the time but should have. So it goes en route to the buzzing finale “This is It,” with “Minefied” echoing “Out of Line” with a vibe like Masters of Reality at their most ethereal, “With You” making a late highlight of its underlying organ drone and the vocals that top it in the second half, and “The Ghost” somehow turning Western blues despite, no, not at all doing that thing. 43 minutes of a world I’d rather live in.

Dark Bird on Facebook

NoiseAgonyMayhem website

Cardinal Fuzz webstore

 

Hope Hole, Death Can Change

hope hole death can change

I’m not saying they don’t still have growing to do or work ahead of them in carving out their own approach from the elements their self-released debut album, Death Can Change, puts to work across its nine songs, but I am definitely saying that the Toledo, Ohio, duo of M.A. Snyder and Mike Mullholand, who’ve dubbed their project Hope Hole, are starting out in an admirable place. Throughout a vinyl-ready 37 minutes that makes a centerpiece of the roughed up The Cure cover “Kyoto Song,” the two-piece bridge sludged nod, classic heavy rock, progressive doom ambience, stonerly awareness — see “Cisneros’ Lament” — and a healthy dose of organ to result in a genre-blender sound that both chases individuality and manifests it in rudimentary form, perhaps arriving at some more melodic cohesion in the of-its-era closer “Burning Lungs” after rougher-edged processions, but even there not necessarily accounting for the full scope of the rest of the songs enough to be a full summary. The songs are there, though, and as Hope Hole continue to chase these demons, that will be the foundation of their progress.

Hope Hole on Facebook

Hope Hole on Bandcamp

 

Smote, Drommon

smote drommon

Newcastle, UK, weirdo solo-outfit Smote released the two-part Drommon concurrent to March 2021’s Bodkin (review here), with tapes sold out from Base Materialism, and Rocket Recordings now steps in for a vinyl issue with two additional tracks splitting up the two-part title-cut, each piece of which runs just on either side of 16 minutes long. Drones and acid folk instrumentation, acoustics, sitars, electrified swirl — all of these come together in purposeful passion to create the textures of “Dommon (Part 1)” and “Drommon (Part 2),” and though it feels more directed with the complementary “Hauberk” and “Poleyn” included, the album’s experimental heart is well intact. Smote will make a stage debut next month, apparently as a four-piece around founder Daniel Foggin, so how that might play into the future of Smote as a full band in the studio remains to be seen. Drommon serves as argument heavily in favor of finding out.

Smote on Instagram

Rocket Recordings on Bandcamp

 

Gristmill, Heavy Everything

Gristmill Heavy Everything

East Coast dudes playing West Coast noise, it may well be that Gristmill deserve points right off the bat on their debut long-player, Heavy Everything, both for the title and for avoiding the trap of sounding like Unsane that defines so, so, so much of Atlantic Seaboard noise rock. They’re too aggro in their delivery to be straight-up doom, but the slower crawl of guitar in “Remains Nameless” and “Glass Door” adds depth to the pounding delivered by the initial salvo of “Mitch,” “Mute” and “Irony,” but the punch of the bass throughout is unmistakable, and though I can’t help be reminded in listening about that time Seattle’s Akimbo went and wrote a record based in my beloved Garden State, the drawn-out roll of “Stone Rodeo” and final nod-into-chug in “Loon” show readiness to encompass something beyond the raw scathe in their work. Yeah, if they wanted to put out like six or seven albums that sound just like this over the next 15 or so years, I’d probably be on board for that for the meanness and more of this debut.

Gristmill on Instagram

Gristmill on Bandcamp

 

Ivory Primarch, As All Life Burns

Ivory Primarch As All Life Burns

This is a satisfying meat grinder in which to plunge one’s face for about an hour. A Buschemi-chipper. A powdering-of-bone that begins with the lurching of longest track (immediate points) “The Masque” — beginning with an acid-test sample, no less — and moving through “Gleancrawler” and the faster-for-a-while-but-still-probably-slower-than-you’re-thinking title-track, having just consumed half an hour of your life and a little of your soul. Hyperbole? Of course. But these are extreme sounds and extreme times, so fuck it. Melbourne duo Ivory Primarch, throughout As All Life Burns, demonstrate precious little regard for whatever standard of decency one might apply, and the deathly, fetid “Keeper of Secrets” and the keyboard-laced “Aetherbeast” — seeming to answer back to the opener — are self-aware enough to be willful in that, not to mention the fact that they top off with the noise-drone of “Aftermath,” as if to survey the devastation they just wrought, mangled and duly bludgeoned. Nothing sounds cruel enough? Try this.

Ivory Primarch on Facebook

Cursed Monk Records on Bandcamp

 

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Hour of 13 to Release Black Magick Rites on Shadow Kingdom

Posted in Whathaveyou on June 1st, 2021 by JJ Koczan

Last September, Hour of 13 founding multi-instrumentalist and spearhead Chad Davis let slip the info that the band’s fourth record would be released through Shadow Kingdom Records and titled Black Magick Rites. The new song “His Majesty of the Wood” also went up at that point. That announcement apparently was preface to a 24-hour limited digital release of the album on Nov. 1 — shame on me for missing it — and it seems likely that it’ll be Sept. 2021 before the album sees broader release, as Davis said, through Shadow Kingdom. Or maybe they’ll wait for Halloween. Why the hell not? It’s been nine years since 2012’s 333 (discussed here). You mean to tell me they’re gonna rush it now?

In addition to the LP sneak-peak, Davis also released the Deathly Nights EP under the Hour of 13 moniker last Fall. You can stream that as well as “His Majesty of the Wood” below, following this info from the PR wire:

hour of 13

HOUR OF 13 sign with SHADOW KINGDOM for long-awaited new album

Shadow Kingdom Records announces the signing of the legendary Hour of 13 for the release of their long-awaited fourth album, Black Magick Rites, on CD, vinyl LP, and cassette tape formats.

By now, Hour of 13 should require little introduction. For the better part of two decades, mainman Chad Davis has pursued a unique and intensely personal iteration of traditional doom metal. Along the way and over the course of three albums and numerous EPs, Hour of 13 have built a formidable discography that’s amassed a fanatic following awaiting each spooky ‘n’ somber offering Davis and his rotating cast of cohorts creates. And while he’s released records for a variety of labels over the years, in between a couple breakups, Davis brings Hour of 13 back to Shadow Kingdom, who released the band’s self-titled debut album in 2007 long before the hype started.

Hour of 13’s first full-length offering in over eight years, Black Magick Rites was available digitally on November 1st, 2020 for only 24 hours. Just as uniquely, Black Magick Rites also marks the first Hour of 13 album where he handles not only all instruments, but also all vocals. Indeed, Davis’ vocals evoke an ancient nostalgia, of doom metal before it was “doom metal” – of the days when bands like Black Sabbath, Pagan Altar, and Witchfinder General simply followed their respective muses wherever it took them. And for Davis, Black Magick Rites sees him taking his Hour of 13 muse toward a rougher, more rock ‘n’ roll expression and yet tinged with an emotive melancholy that resonates deeply within the soul. No, no flavor-of-the-week “occult rock” cliches here, for Davis still prizes blue-collared authenticity in his doom, but he likewise never lets it hamper his immediately recognizable songwriting, which here ever so subtly inches closer to classic deathrock territory (think the likes of early Christian Death and Voodoo Church). Naturally, with a title like Black Magick Rites, an indulgence in occultism is expected, and you can literally feel the fingers of the black beyond reaching out to you across every electric minute of this 44-minute monolith.

Despite those isolated breakups, Hour of 13 continue to get better with age. Perfectly titled as any record in their enviable discography, Black Magick Rites is the sweet sound of salvation…through damnation.

Release date, cover art, tracklisting, and preorder info to be announced shortly. For more info, consult the links below.

https://hourofthirteen.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/ShadowKingdomRecords/
http://www.shadowkingdomrecords.com/

Hour of 13, “His Majesty of the Wood”

Hour of 13, Deathly Nights (2020)

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Friday Full-Length: Hour of 13, Hour of 13

Posted in Bootleg Theater on September 18th, 2020 by JJ Koczan

Think Hour of 13‘s history is complicated? They have three Bandcamps. Three of them. Foremost among them is that from which the player above comes, run by Northern Silence Productions imprint Eyes Like Snow, where the 2013 reissue of their 2007 self-titled debut, originally on Shadow Kingdom Records, and physical editions of their other two full-lengths can be found. There’s also one from Earache Records, which signed the band in Sept. 2010 to release their 2010 second album, The Ritualist (discussed here), and third, 333 (discussed here), in 2011 and 2013, respectively. The third — because, yes, we’re still listing Bandcamp pages — is the band’s and it’s operating under the semi-changed moniker of Hour of Thirteen, in order to represent the shift from doom to classic metal and horror punk and the continuation of the band as a solo-project of founding guitarist Chad Davis. By the way, it was announced earlier this week that Hour of 13 — not Hour of Thirteen — will release a new full-length called Black Magick Rites. That’ll be out on — wait for it — Shadow Kingdom. Lest the circle lack fullness.

And which release came out where and when — that’s really just the beginning when it comes to the story of Hour of 13 and the tumultuous path the band has walked since their 2007 Hour of 13 Hour of 13 originalinception as a studio-only duo of Davis and vocalist Phil Swanson. With Davis based then in Hickory, North Carolina, and operating as a member of U.S. ChristmasTasha-YarSetAnu, etc. — he can now be found in San Francisco, working through The Crooked WhispersJenzeits and probably six or seven more — and Swanson living in Connecticut and working in bands like Upwards of Endtime and Earthlord — I saw him in Maryland last year but I’m not sure if he lives there or what; he’s currently in Vestal Claret and Seamount, and likely others — the workings of the band were immediately complicated. It was possible if more difficult than it is now to send recordings back and forth to work remotely as a group, but with Davis providing guitar, bass and drums and Swanson adding his Satanic, ritual-fueled, sometimes murderous lyrics and enviable post-Sabbath vocal approach, the self-titled was indeed tracked in-person in two sessions between 2006 and 2007 ahead of that Shadow Kingdom release. Bringing together eight songs across 42 minutes, it was simply an album ahead of and outside of its time.

By that I mean it arrived early for what soon enough took hold as a more cultish branch of doom metal. A few years later, or even now, it would be readily in league with a slew of other groups — if more lyrically deranged; Swanson always had a knack for skirting and sometimes crossing the line between good-fun devil worship like the un-Trouble and uh-that’s-not-okay kidnap and ritualistic murder, as on Hour of 13 closer “Missing Girl” — but at its time it was an immediate standout, despite also taking on the genre trappings of traditionalist doom. On their face, songs like early cuts “Call to Satan” and “Submissive to Evil” are straightforward and ask little of the listener. Riffs roll out, vocals follow the established rhythmic pattern, groove is had, doom is purveyed. But between an edge of rawness to the production and a flourish of classic metal in “The Correalation” (sic) and the relatively brief “Grim Reality,” which is snuck in like three and a half minutes of Judas Priest to lead off side B as though no one would notice, Hour of 13‘s invocations of darkness found a resonance that few in the traditional sphere of doom could hope to capture — not quite retro in style, but willfully primitive in aesthetic and construction. With each song carrying something of a narrative, whether it was obscure in “Endurement to the Heirs of Shame” or straight-ahead spellcasting in “Hex of Harm,” trying to get the devil on the line in “Call to Satan” and “Allowance of Sin,” the debut not only established Hour of 13 as a band with a clear mission in terms of what they were going for sound-wise, but a perspective of their own through which they’d manifest that. It would be hard to overstate the potential that could be heard in this record when it came out.

“Missing Girl,” which even 13 years later remains singularly fucked up in a Buffalo-Bill-wearing-your-face-like-a-mask kind of way, caps the album and is its longest track at eight minutes even, but all across its span there’s immersion in and consorting with a sense of evil. It’s not supposed to be comfortable when Swanson sings about Hour of 13 Hour of 13cutting himself and jerking off into the blood in “Call to Satan,” and that interplay between sex, violence, and ritual is, if not ubiquitous in the songs, then certainly lurking in the background. It is the one adult male at the playground sitting on the bench watching the children who clearly has no child of his own. Call-the-cops creepy. The reality behind “Aqualung.”

Fruitful as their collaboration was, Davis and Swanson never seemed to click as a lineup. They played few gigs together — I was fortunate enough to see them in 2010 (review here) — and the vocalist left the band in 2011, following the release of The Ritualist, and Davis hooked up with Beaten Back to Pure‘s Ben Hogg shortly thereafter as part of what became a touring configuration of the band. But shifts in personnel were common, and though Hogg was on board for a tour with Kylesa and fronted some demos, by the time Hour of 13 issued 333Swanson was back in the band. Still, the momentum they’d had leading into Earache releasing the second album had largely evaporated, and touring was never a huge priority. When the band posted a single in tribute to The Gates of Slumber bassist Jason McCash (R.I.P.) in 2014, that was to be their final recording, but Davis revived the project two years later for the Salt the Dead: The Rare and Unreleased (review here) compilation, before shifting in 2018 to Hour of Thirteen, seeing Davis release a debut in 2019 with The Sabbathian (review here) on Svart, while still issuing a couple EPs to keep the flame burning and now, apparently, moving toward a fourth Hour of 13 full-length done completely as a solo affair.

Whatever the future brings for Hour of 13 — you can understand I’m sure why one might hesitate to predict, but maybe more Bandcamps? — their self-titled continues to be a defining document of their take on doom and what they represented at their outset. It is one of those kinds of albums that had more of an effect than people generally realize, and in discussion of acts who helped foster revivalist doom in the last ten years-plus should in no way be ignored.

As always, I hope you enjoy.

It’s 7:20AM and I’ve already had half a xanax this morning, which may or may not be a good sign for how the rest of the day is going to go. The Pecan has been up for an hour — woke up early as I was finishing the above, ran in his closet and proceeded to take a massive dump in his diaper as he will; fortunately it was contained — so I grabbed him, changed him, started him on breakfast. He’s had a snotty nose the last three days or so but seems to be on the mend if his bouncing-off-the-walls, complete-lack-of-focus is anything to go by. It was after I found myself on my knees on the rug begging him for not the first time in my life to eat a spoonful of yogurt that I hopped up and took a pill. I expect in about 20 minutes life will seem more manageable in that particular my-blood-is-moving-slower-than-it-was kind of way that the medication induces.

What a week.

The dog continues to be what I feel is an unnecessary challenge. Case in point she went to doggy-daycare on Tuesday — same time The Pecan was at actual-daycare — and the two-plus hours I had to sit quietly were some of the most satisfying I’ve experienced in at least the last two months since she came into our home. I was on board with getting this dog. I am now on board with getting rid of this dog. Sometimes it just doesn’t work, and while The Patient Mrs. — being more patient as she is — is advocating professional training, unless we’re going to do the same for our child, I fail to see how that substantial, multi-thousand-dollar investment might pay off. As projects go, I’d much prefer to get started redoing the kitchen now that we own the house.

These are adult concerns, and shitty besides. Far more fun is that I’ve had Cardi B. and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP” stuck in my head for the better part of the last 72 hours. “Catchy” doesn’t begin to cover it.

New Gimme Metal show today at 5PM Eastern: http://gimmemetal.com or their app to listen. The app is easier.

Alright, I gotta get this kid to leave the house before it burns it down so I’m punching out. Have a great and safe weekend. Be well, hydrate. All that good stuff.

FRM.

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Hour of 13 Announce Black Magick Rites LP; Post New Song “His Majesty of the Wood”

Posted in Whathaveyou on September 16th, 2020 by JJ Koczan

For an original post that was all of one sentence long — actually it was two, but the second one was just encouraging social media sharing so I left it out — there’s an awful lot to unpack in this post concerning Hour of 13. By astounding coincidence, I was already planning on closing out the week with the band’s 2007 self-titled debut, and I may or may not still do that, but the announcement that the band has a new album in the works is a genuine surprise. Founding guitarist/multi-instrumentalist/sometimes-vocalist Chad Davis would seem to have put the original incarnation of the band to rest in 2016, issuing the compilation Salt the Dead: Rare and Unreleased (review here) on Shadow Kingdom Records, which also put out the aforementioned debut.

Davis, who relocated to California as one will, sort-of-revived the band in 2018 under the banner of Hour of Thirteen and professed with a couple short releases a love of dark punk and heavy rock, traditional metal and cultish. The sound was tied in some ways to what Hour of 13 had been, but as 2019’s two-originals-and-two-Samhain-covers EP, A Knell Within the Crypt, showcased, it was also a new direction worthy of consideration on its own level. In re-adopting Hour of 13 — the number “13” instead of the word — as a moniker, Davis likewise refocuses on the doomlier side of the band. He handles vocal duties on “His Majesty of the Wood,” the new song that’s been posted with the announcement of the forthcoming Black Magick Rites that will apparently also see release through Shadhow Kingdom.

When? I don’t know, but I’ll take it whenever. Kind of hard to imagine it’ll be out before 2021 — because, I mean, if you weren’t contractually obligated to put something out in 2020, why would you? — but maybe Black Magick Rites can serve as an “October surprise” late next month. I suppose anything’s possible since, you know, it exists in the first place.

So here you go. One sentence and a song. Some bands, that’s all it takes to get excited for a new record:

HOUR OF 13

**HOUR OF 13 premiere**

I present to you a track from the upcoming album “Black Magick Rites” on Shadow Kingdom Records.

https://hourofthirteen.bandcamp.com/
http://www.shadowkingdomrecords.com/

Hour of 13, “His Majesty of the Wood”

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Hour of Thirteen Post New Song “Harvest Night”; Deathly Nights LP Coming Soon

Posted in Whathaveyou on July 9th, 2018 by JJ Koczan

Late in 2016, multi-instrumentalist/spearhead Chad Davis of Hour of 13 announced the return of the band following a breakup and years of inactivity. Davis, who’d been through two frontmen in Phil Swanson (also Upwards of Endtime) and Ben Hogg (also Beaten Back to Pure), would take on vocal duties himself, but before the band moved forward, there was a look back to be had in 2017’s compilation, Salt the Dead: The Rare and Unreleased (review here), issued in a likewise-revitalized accord with Shadow Kingdom Records.

Davis had at that point moved from his longtime home in North Carolina to California, and hinted toward new material. Well, here we are. Hour of 13 has become Hour of Thirteen, and Davis checks in below with a discussion of the sonic shifts that correspond to that of the moniker on the band’s new album, Deathly Nights. Also coming out through Shadow Kingdom, it doesn’t have a release date as yet, but the track “Harvest Night” has been posted as well as the cover art, so, you know, it exists. That’s a pretty important first step.

A tape EP may or may not precede, and a 7″ single will reportedly follow, as Davis informs:

HOUR OF THIRTEEN DEATHLY NIGHTS

HOUR OF THIRTEEN – SOMETHING DEATHLY COMES…

In the years before the debut HOUR OF 13 album was unleashed, there was an earlier history that belonged to the name…

Beginning in the early part of 1995, there was an entity known as HOUR OF 13 PRODUCTIONS that was an experimental music label I was running that proved to be only fruitful to one double cassette compilation release. Upon a late night pondering which was/is a very common practice, I had decided to shelve the name as I knew it was something to be used for a better purpose. And then one fateful day in September of 2003 it was unearthed again. Even thought the masses know of the first “professional” time the HOUR OF 13 name was used in regards to the Shadow Kingdom release of the self-titled 2007 album, there in fact was a prior use of the name and in a much different format…

Year 2003 saw the coming together of drummer Dave Easter (also a member of the live Ho13 lineup during 2010-2011 and on the first demo recording of “Grim Reality”) and bassist Scott Cline, the three of us also forming the psychedelic doom monster MOUNTAIN OF JUDGEMENT. We had been doing MoJ for some months and decided to play a Halloween show in 2003 with a local fave band of ours (PUJ) and some goons from Charlotte NC (Graveyard Boulevard) at a local music venue. I had written a handful of tunes that were more horror/deathrock sounding so we learned them along with our favorite MISFITS and SAMHAIN tunes and played the show. And the name of the entity for that performance was…

HOUR OF THIRTEEN

A few months followed after that and we had decided to do it again for a show with local NC band WEEDEATER and Virginia maniacs DICK BUTKIS (members now of INTER ARMA) and shortly afterwards the band/name was once again to be saved for a later time. Maybe there was an idea to do the same the following Halloween, but we never did so it slept until 2006, when the early versions of the debut HOUR OF 13 songs had begun to be written. The name was resurrected, THIRTEEN changed to 13, and everything else after that written in stone… Until now…

In this year, 2018, I have faithfully resurrected the HOUR OF THIRTEEN name to move this musical entity forward, regaining the original idea of the focus of the music to what it once was, but also still retaining some of the signature sound that most of you have become accustomed to. This was a decision I had to make, not only for the die hard supporters of the previous incarnation of the band, but also to myself in the midst of letting something I have worked so hard to keep alive just fade into obscurity again. As amazing as that seemed in the past year, I simply cannot let it go, nor will I allow past acquaintances to be privy to my hard work and ideas only to be bastardized into something second rate. There will be no live shows as there is no point in bringing anymore strife and hardship against the name, for it never ceases to seem like any type of plans to do so result in injured feelings and cursed promises. It shall remain a studio effort only, as I’d rather give you quality music than empty hopes.

With this writing, I am pleased to announce the next chapter of this music’s existence with “Deathly Nights”, and brand new album from HOUR OF THIRTEEN to be released by the mighty Shadow Kingdom Records on all formats available. This “revitalization” of the sound can be explained as the mix of the sound everyone has known but with more atmosphere and less guitar solos. Not too far away from the styling of the debut Ho13 album, but also not “imitating” the said album either. One simply will need to listen with open ears and minds and help smash the devastation of the modern day Metal scene that has become more stagnant that the pop music radio stations of today. A pre-release discussed before the new album could possibly see a cassette EP to debut some different mixes from the new album, and following will be a 7″ EP featuring a new tune along with two cover songs, all to be announced in due time (but knowing me I’ll post them early anyway).

In closing, I want to thank each and every one of you that have been along for the ride, both personally and impersonally, as your support for this entity is eternally grateful. I look forward to moving this musical vessel into a direction that steers away from cliche’ and begins to spread even more darkness than before.

Regards,
Chad Davis – 2018

http://hourofthirteen.blogspot.com/
http://www.shadowkingdomrecords.com
http://www.facebook.com/shadowkingdomrecords
https://shadowkingdomrecords.bandcamp.com

Hour of Thirteen, “Harvest Night”

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Quarterly Review: Enslaved, Hour of 13, Operators, MaidaVale, Audion, Bone Man, Riff Fist, Helén, Savanah, Puta Volcano

Posted in Reviews on July 12th, 2017 by JJ Koczan

quarterly-review-summer-2017

I don’t know about you, but I could do this all day. Listening to records, writing reviews, getting things done that I’ve been trying to get done in some cases for actual months of my life — suffice it to say I’m way into this process. Wednesday is always a special day for the Quarterly Review because we pass the halfway point, and as much as I wish this edition went to 60 or even 70 releases, because rest assured even with 50 total there’s way more I could be covering if I had space/time, the good news is there’s still much more awesomeness to come. Today gets into some different vibes once again, so let’s get started.

Quarterly Review #21-30:

Enslaved, Roadburn Live

enslaved-roadburn-live

In their storied and groundbreaking career, Norwegian progressive black metallers Enslaved have never put out a live record, and it kind of makes sense as to why. The nuance of what they’ve come to do in their studio material doesn’t really lend itself to the rawness of a live album. Accordingly, Roadburn Live (on ByNorse and Burning World Records) feels almost as much of an homage to the event itself as to the performance. Captured in 2015 as Enslaved guitarist Ivar Bjørnson co-curated and the band headlined playing a special set of their more prog-focused songs – here more recent material like “In Times,” “Building with Fire,” “Daylight” from 2015’s In Times (review here) and “Death in the Eyes of Dawn” from 2012’s RIITIIR (review here) shines along with “Convoys to Nothingness” from 2001’s Monumension, “As Fire Swept Clean the Earth” from 2003’s Below the Lights and the requisite “Isa” from the 2004 landmark of the same name, and a special highlight comes at the finale when they cover Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” and bring guitarist Menno Gootjes of Dutch proggers Focus out for a guest spot. Roadburn Live might be a step away from the band’s usual modus, but Enslaved have made their career on pushing themselves beyond their comfort zone, so why stop now?

Enslaved on Thee Facebooks

Burning World Records website

ByNorse Music website

 

Hour of 13, Salt the Dead: The Rare and Unreleased

hour of 13 salt the dead

An overdue compilation from a band making an overdue return, Hour of 13’s Salt the Earth: The Rare and Unreleased reunites the doomers led by multi-instrumentalist Chad Davis with Shadow Kingdom Records and brings together early demos from 2007 – on which the collaboration between Davis and vocalist Phil Swanson was arguably at its most vibrant as they headed into their self-titled debut full-length later that year – with other previously unissued cuts like three songs with Davis on vocals including the Jason McCash tribute piece “Upon Black Wings We Die” (premiered here) and the original rehearsal demos that introduced Beaten Back to Pure singer Ben Hogg as Swanson’s replacement in the band in 2011 (premiered here). If you want a direct feel for the breadth of the band, look no further than the three versions of “Call to Satan” that appear on Salt the Earth. Widely varied between them in sound and overall feel, they underscore the tumult that has existed since the outset at the core of Hour of 13 even as they provide hope that the band previously laid to rest can revitalize enough to put out a fourth studio offering.

Hour of 13 on Thee Facebooks

Shadow Kingdom Records website

 

Operators, Revelers

operators revelers

Nearly four years in the making, Revelers is the third full-length from Berlin’s Operators behind 2013’s Contact High (review here) and 2012’s Operators (review here), and it starts off by smashing Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats swing headfirst into Goatsnake riffing on “Leveled Reveler,” the first of its six component tracks. Their arrangements, as ever, are marked by the featured position of organ along with guitar, bass and drums, and whether it’s a more extended jam like that opener, “Messina” or the closing “Rolling Hitch” – which boasts a guest vocal/guitar spot from Wight’s René Hofmann, who also recorded and mixed (Tony Reed of Mos Generator mastered) – or the shorter momentum-building winding course through “Pusher,” “Walkin’ on Air” (I’m not sure what’s happening at the end there, but I’m not about to spoil it) and the winning-at-song-titles “Fuzz Muncher,” Operators function with a maturity of approach that seems to have been earned during the longer stretch between releases. To wit, all the turns and pivots even out in the last movement of “Rolling Hitch” and Revelers caps with a classic heavy rock groove that’s neither in a hurry nor staid – Operators finding crucial balance amidst all their revelry, and much to their credit.

Operators on Thee Facebooks

Fuzzmatazz Records on Bandcamp

 

MaidaVale, Tales of the Wicked West

maidavale tales of the wicked west

Blues Pills. There. I said it. Now that the blues-rocking elephant in the room has been acknowledged, perhaps we can get on with Swedish four-piece MaidaVale’s debut full-length, Tales of the Wicked West (on The Sign Records). Yes, the Fårösund-based band owe a bit of their soulfulness to the aforementioned, but the nine-track/44-minute long-player thrives most of all as Linn Johannesson, Sofia Ström, Matilda Roth and Johanna Hansson purposefully meander into psychedelic flashes, as in opener “(If You Want the Smoke) Be the Fire,” the midsection of “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” the penultimate Zep-vibing/Bukowski-referencing “Find What You Love and Let it Kill You” and the 11-minute post-“Maggot Brain” closer “Heaven and Earth.” It’s in these moments and the manner in which they blend with the driving rock of “Dirty War,” the bluesy swagger of “Restless Wanderer” and the deft turns of “Colour Blind” early on that MaidaVale’s individualism is beginning to take shape, and if that’s the story that Tales of the Wicked West is telling, then it’s one well worth following through subsequent chapters.

MaidaVale on Thee Facebooks

The Sign Records on Thee Facebooks

 

Audion, La Historia de Abraham

audion-la-histora-de-abraham

Audion’s debut, La Historia de Abraham, is immediately noteworthy in no small part because it brings the rhythm section of Los Natas back together for the first time since that band’s breakup following 2009’s excellent Nuevo Orden de la Libertad (review here). Drummer Walter Broide and bassist Gonzalo Villagra join forces in the new outfit with guitarist Dizzy Espeche, and all three contribute vocals throughout at least in backup capacity, adding variety to go with the instrumental breadth that runs from the serene end of “Llegaron Sordos” right into the rush of “La Maquina del Tiempo” and well beyond later as the interlude “Para Rosita” introduces an earthy acoustidelic feel and “El Carancho” explores ‘70s anthemic rock before the fuzz- and horn-laden finisher “Queruzalem” closes out with a surprising progressive wash. Cuts like opener “Clarence,” the title-track and “Colmillo Blanco” can call to mind Villagra and Broide’s previous work, but Audion make a fresh impression on La Historia de Abraham in the variety throughout, and as they make their way through “Lesbotrans” and “Diablo vs. Dios” and into the second half of the album, it becomes increasingly clear how distinct this first offering actually is.

Audion on Thee Facebooks

Audion on Bandcamp

 

Bone Man, III

bone man iii

To go along with the propulsive rhythm of “False Ambition” and the wash in the payoff of the earlier “These Days are Gone,” there’s a sense of gothic drama to vocalist Marian’s delivery that adds further atmosphere to Bone Man’s III (on Pink Tank Records), and in kind with the cohesive foundation of Arne’s bass, Ötzi’s drumming and his own scorch-prone guitar, that gives cuts like “Cold Echo” and the alternately brooding and explosive centerpiece – layered acoustic and electric guitar filling out the sound further – even more stylistic depth. That moodiness comes perhaps most into focus on the more subdued “Incognito,” but it’s there from the boogie-laced opener “Pollyanna” onward, and in the jagged push of “Years of Sorrow” and the more spacious finale “Amnesia” (still a tightly structured four minutes in length), it lends III a persona stretching beyond what one might think of as the standard genre fare and gives the Kiel, Germany, outfit a presence decidedly their own. It’s their third record, so maybe that’s not a surprise for a band who made their first offering eight years ago, but it serves as a major source of resonance in the material nonetheless.

Bone Man on Thee Facebooks

Pink Tank Records website

 

Riff Fist, King Tide

riff fist king iii

Going back to 2013, Melbourne, Australia, trio Riff Fist have basically summed up their approach in the eight letters of their name: a tight-knit approach to guitar-led heavy rock, as straightforward as a fist in your face. King Tide is their debut album after three EPs named for the Clint Eastwood Dollars trilogy of westerns – 2015’s The Good, the Loud and the Riff, 2014’s For a Few Riffs More and 2013’s Fistful of Riffs (review here) – and it significantly expands their breadth. Opening with its longest track (immediate points) in the 11-minute title cut (video premiered here), King Tide covers new, more patient and encompassing ground from bassist/vocalist Cozza, guitarist Casey and drummer Joel than anything they’ve touched on before, and while the subsequent “D.T.U.B.,” fuzz-laden “Fist Bier (Noch Eins)” and even the first half of eight-minute centerpiece “Chugg” bring that all-ahead sensibility back into focus, King Tide remains effectively and engagingly informed by its leadoff impression through its total 33-minute run, which is rounded out as “Beer and a Cigarette” melds the more spacious and atmospheric take with a still-swinging post-Clutch groove. There’s more work to do in tying the various sides together, but King Tide is a rousing introduction to the process through which the band can make that happen.

Riff Fist on Thee Facebooks

Riff Fist on Bandcamp

 

Helén, Helén

helen helen

Hexvessel multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Kimmo Helén makes a willfully peculiar and experimentalist self-titled debut with the solo-project Helén via Svart Records, setting a course through melodic indie wash in “Uusi Olento” even as “Jumalan Hullu” threatens in its bounce and the later “Lystia” moves into yet-darker expanses. Keys, electric and acoustic guitar, sax, and of course Helén’s own Finnish-language vocals, there’s very little that feels like it might be outside his comfort zone in terms of craft, and Helén, the album, is just as effective in the plus-cello-acoustic-minimalism of the penultimate “Lopussa” as in the earlier atmospheric breadth of “Puolen Metrin Syvyydessä.” Closing out with the alternately melancholy and dreamy “Kaikki Isä,” the record brings out a full-band feel despite Helén having handled the vast majority of the instrumentation on his own and impresses in that as well as in its range of moods and overarching sense of purpose. May it be a first exploration in a series of many.

Helén on Thee Facebooks

Helén at Svart Records webstore

 

Savanah, The Healer

savanah the healer

I won’t take away from a wah-drenched rocker like “The Healer,” which still jams out plenty before digging into doomier lumbering, but where Austrian trio Savanah’s Stone Free Records debut album, The Healer, really gets its point across is in the fluidity of its longer-form material, whether that’s post-“Intro” opener “Mind,” the ebbing and flowing heavy psych instrumental “Pillars of Creation” or the over-10-minutes-apiece closing pair of the doom rocking “Black Widow” and “Panoramic View of Stormy Weather,” which effectively draws together the multiple aesthetic faces the three-piece demonstrate throughout the record preceding, culling rock, psych and doom into a single riff-driven entity and, most importantly, making it theirs. Guitar leads the way with big, natural fuzz, but the rhythm section is crucial here, and as Benny, Felix and Jakob follow-up their 2015 EP, Deep Shades, they seem to establish a path along which they can flourish and hopefully continue to capture the listener’s attention as they do here.

Savanah on Thee Facebooks

StoneFree Records website

 

Puta Volcano, Harmony of Spheres

puta volcano harmony of spheres

The kind of release where by the end of the first song you want to own everything the band has ever put out. Don’t let Athens’ Puta Volcano get lost in the wash of bands coming out of Greece these days, because there are many, but if you miss out on the blend of desert-style tones and graceful melodies of “Bird,” it’s to your general detriment. I’m serious. In craft and performance, Puta Volcano’s third album, Harmony of Spheres, takes on unpretentious progressivism in songwriting and blends it with a post-Slo Burn/Hermano sense of freedom from genre. Witness the funky “Zeroth Law” or the later, more subtle post-grunge linearity of “Moebius,” the odd chanting repetitions in closer “Infinity” or the nigh-on-maddening hook of “Jovian Winds.” Really, do it. With the lineup of vocalist Luna Stoner, guitarist Alex Pi, bassist Bookies and drummer Steven Stefanidis, Puta Volcano are onto something special in aesthetic and delivery, and if Harmony of Spheres might be your first experience with the band as it’s mine, it’s one that will no doubt warrant multiple revisits. Consider it sleeper fodder for your year-end list – I know I will.

Puta Volcano on Thee Facebooks

Puta Volcano on Bandcamp

 

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Tomorrow’s Dream: 200+ of 2017’s Most Anticipated Releases

Posted in Features on January 23rd, 2017 by JJ Koczan

tomorrow's dream 2017

Looks like it’s going to be another busy 12 months ahead. It’s been a busy better-part-of-a-month already, so that stands to reason, but you should know that of the several years now that I’ve done these ‘Tomorrow’s Dream’ posts, this is the biggest one yet, with over 150 upcoming releases that — one hopes — will be out between today and the end of 2017.

Actually, at last count, the list tops 180. Do I really expect you to listen to all of them? Nope. Will I? Well, it would be nice. But what I’ve done is gone through and highlighted 35 picks and then built lists off that in order of likelihood of arrival. You’ll note the categories are ‘Gonna Happen and/or Likely Candidates,’ ‘Definitely Could Happen’ and ‘Would be Awfully Nice.’

Beyond that last one, anything else just seems like speculation — one might as well go “new Sabbath this year!” with zero info backing it up. The idea here is that no matter where a given band is placed, there has been some talk of a new release. In some cases, it’s been years, but I think they’re still worth keeping in mind.

Another caveat: You can expect additions to this list over the next week — probably album titles, band names people (fingers crossed) suggest in the comments, and so on — so it will grow. It always does. The idea is to build as complete a document as possible, not to get it all nailed down immediately, so please, if you have something to contribute and you’re able to do so in a non-prickish, “You didn’t include Band X and therefore don’t deserve to breathe the same air as me,” kind of way, please contribute.

Other than that, I think it’s pretty straightforward what’s going on here and I’ll explain the category parameters as we go, so by all means, let’s jump in.

— Tomorrow’s Dream 2017 —

Presented Alphabetically

1. Abrahma, TBA

Late last year, Paris heavy progressives Abrahma announced a new lineup and third full-length in progress. No reason to think it won’t come to fruition, and a follow-up to 2015’s Reflections in the Bowels of a Bird (review here) is an easy pick to look forward to. Even with the shift in personnel, it seems likely the band will continue their creative development, driven as they are by founding guitarist Seb Bismuth.

2. All Them Witches, Sleeping Through the War

all them witches sleeping through the warIf 2017 ended today, Sleeping Through the War would be my Album of the Year. Of course, there’s a lot of year to go, but for now, Nashville’s All Them Witches have set the standard with their second album for New West Records behind 2015’s Dying Surfer Meets His Maker (review here) and fourth overall outing. They’ve got videos up so far for “3-5-7” (posted here) and “Bruce Lee” (posted here). Both are most definitely worth your time. Out Feb. 24. Full review should be later this week.

3. Alunah, Solennial

Seems like UK forest riffers Alunah are on this list every year. Wishful thinking on my part. Nonetheless, their fourth LP and Svart Records debut, Solennial, is out March 17, and if the tease they gave already with the clip for “Fire of Thornborough Henge” (posted here) is anything to go from, its Chris Fielding-produced expanses might just be Alunah‘s most immersive yet.

4. Arbouretum, TBA

I asked the Baltimore folk fuzzers a while back on Thee Facebooks if they had a new record coming in 2017 and they said yes, so that’s what I’m going on here. The last Arbouretum album was 2013’s Coming out of the Fog (review here), and even with frontman Dave Heumann‘s 2015 solo outing, Here in the Deep (review here), factored in, you’d have to say they’re due. Keep an eye on Thrill Jockey for word and I’ll do the same.

5. Atavismo, Inerte

This is another one that already has a spot reserved for it on my Best-of-2017 year-end list. Spanish heavy psych rockers Atavismo up the progressive bliss level with their second full-length, Inerte, without losing the depth of style that made 2014’s Desintegración (review here) so utterly glorious. It probably won’t have the biggest marketing budget of 2017, but if you let Atavismo fly under your radar, you are 100 percent missing out on something special.

6. Bison Machine, TBA

In addition to the video for new track “Cloak and Bones” that premiered here, when Michigan raucousness-purveyors Bison Machine put out the dates for their fall 2016 tour, they included further hints of new material in progress. As much as I dug their earlier-2016 split with SLO and Wild Savages (review here) and 2015’s Hoarfrost (review here), that’s more than enough for me to include them on this list. Killer next-gen heavy rock.

7. Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, TBA

News of a follow-up to Brothers of the Sonic Cloth‘s 2015 Neurot Recordings self-titled debut (review here) came through in October, and it remains some of the best news I’ve heard about 2017 doings. Took them a while to get the first record out, so we’ll see what happens, but it kind of feels like looking forward to a comet about to smash into the planet and cause a mass extinction, and by that I mean awesome. Can’t get here soon enough.

8. Cloud Catcher, Trails of Kosmic Dust

cloud catcher trails of kosmic dustOkay, so maybe I jumped the gun and did a super-early review of Denver trio Cloud Catcher‘s second long-player and Totem Cat Records debut, Trails of Kosmic Dust, but hell, no regrets. Some albums require an early-warning system. Their 2015 debut, Enlightened Beyond Existence (discussed here), was a gem as well, but this is a band in the process of upping their game on every level, and the songwriting and momentum they hone isn’t to be missed.

9. Colour Haze, TBA

I’ve gotten some details on the upcoming full-length from Colour Haze. They do not include a title, artwork, audio, song titles or general direction. Less details, I guess, than word that the CD version of this answer to 2015’s To the Highest Gods We Know (review here) is set to come out next month, as ever, on Elektrohasch. That puts it out in time for Colour Haze‘s upcoming tour with My Sleeping Karma (announced here). Fingers crossed it happens. Colour Haze are perpetual top-albums candidates in my book.

10. Corrosion of Conformity, TBA

Signed to Nuclear Blast after being rejoined by guitarist/vocalist Pepper Keenan, North Carolina’s C.O.C. have been in the studio since last year. The lineup of Keenan, bassist/vocalist Mike Dean and guitarist Woody Weatherman and Reed Mullin on drums is the stuff of legend and last worked together on 2000’s America’s Volume Dealer, so no question this reunion makes for one of 2017’s most anticipated heavy rock records. They nailed the nostalgia factor on tour. Can they now add to their legacy?

11. Elder, TBA

I was incredibly fortunate about a month ago to visit progressive heavy rockers Elder at Sonelab in Easthampton, MA, during the recording process for their upcoming fourth album. I heard a couple of the tracks, and of course it was all raw form, but the movement forward from 2015’s Lore (review here) was palpable. That LP (on Stickman) brought them to a wider audience, and I expect no less from this one as well, since the farther out Elder go sound-wise, the deeper the level of connection with their listeners they seem to engage.

12. Electric Wizard, TBA

Could happen, could not happen. That’s how it goes. Announced for last Halloween. That date came and went. Word of trouble building their own studio surfaced somewhere along the line. That was the last I heard. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if it showed up tomorrow, if it showed up in 2018, or if the band broke up and never put it out. They’re Electric Wizard. Anything’s possible.

13. John Garcia, The Coyote Who Spoke in Tongues

Out Jan. 28 on NapalmThe Coyote Who Spoke in Tongues (review here) is the first-ever acoustic album from former Kyuss frontman John Garcia, also of Unida, the reunited Slo BurnHermanoVista ChinoZun, etc. — basically the voice of desert rock. He does a couple Kyuss classics for good measure, but shines as well on the new/original tracks, and while it’s a piece for fans more than newcomers — that is, it helps if you know the original version of “Green Machine” — his presence remains as powerful as ever despite this new context.

14. Goya, Harvester of Bongloads

Riffs, dude. Goya seem to have them to spare. The Arizona-based wizard doomers have set a pretty prolific clip for themselves at this point, with at least two short releases out in 2016, one a 7″ of Nirvana covers (review here), and the The Enemy EP (review here). Set for a March 3 release through their own Opoponax Records imprint, Harvester of Bongloads continues the march into the abyss that 2015’s Obelisk (review here) and 2013’s 777 set in motion, finding the band coming more into their own as well. Creative growth — and bongloads! The best of both worlds.

15. Ides of Gemini, TBA

Ides of Gemini are set to record their yet-untitled third album with Sanford Parker early this year, and it will also mark their debut on Rise Above Records upon its release. They’ve also got a new lineup around vocalist Sera Timms and guitarist J. Bennett, so as they look to move forward from 2014’s Old World New Wave (review here), one can’t help but wonder what to expect, but to be honest, not knowing is part of the appeal, especially from a band who so readily specialize in the ethereal.

16. Kind, TBA

Three-fourths of Kind feature elsewhere on this list. Bassist Tom Corino plays in Rozamov. Drummer Matt Couto is in Elder. Vocalist Craig Riggs is in Roadsaw. And for what it’s worth, guitarist Darryl Shepherd has a new band coming together called Test Meat. How likely does that make Kind to release a second LP in 2017? I don’t know, but their 2015 Ripple Music debut, Rocket Science (review here), deserves a follow-up, and I know they’ve demoed some new songs. If it happens, great. If it’s 2018, at least these dudes will be plenty busy besides.

17. Lo-Pan, In Tensions

lo-pan in tensionsYes, Lo-Pan‘s In Tensions (review here) has already been released — CD/LP with an artbook on Aqualamb. It’s out. Limited numbers. You can get it now. Why include it on a list of most anticipated releases? Because that’s how strongly I feel about your need to hear it. The fruit of a shortlived lineup with guitarist Adrian Zambrano, it distinguishes itself from everything they’ve done before in style while still keeping to the core righteousness that one hopes the Ohio outfit will continue to carry forward. It’s more than a stopgap between albums. Listen to it.

18. The Midnight Ghost Train, TBA

It seems to have been a rough ride for hard-boogie specialists The Midnight Ghost Train since their 2015 Napalm debut and third album overall, Cold was the Ground (review here). They’ve never taken it easy on the road or in terms of physicality on stage, and between injuries and who knows what else, their intensity at this point veers toward the directly confrontational. Nonetheless, they’ve been writing for album number four, may or may not have started the recording process, and I expect that confrontationalism to suit them well in their new material.

19. Monster Magnet, TBA

I have it on decent authority that NJ heavy psych innovators Monster Magnet were in the studio this past autumn. I’ve seen no concrete word of a new album in progress from Dave Wyndorf and company, and I wouldn’t necessarily expect to until it was time to start hyping the release, but after their two redux releases, 2015’s Cobras and Fire (review here) and 2014’s Milking the Stars (review here), their range feels broader than ever and I can’t wait to hear what they come up with next.

20. Mothership, High Strangeness

A pivotal moment for Mothership arrives with High Strangeness, and the heavy-touring, heavy-riffing Texas power trio seem to know it. Their third record on Ripple Music pushes into new avenues of expression and keeps the energy of 2014’s Mothership II (review here) and 2012’s Mothership (review here), but thus far into their career, it’s been about their potential and what they might accomplish going forward. 2017 might be the year for Mothership to declare a definitive place in the sphere of American heavy rock.

21. The Obsessed, Sacred

On Halloween 2016, founding The Obsessed guitarist/vocalist and doom icon Scott “Wino” Weinrich announced a new lineup for the band, with his former The Hidden Hand bandmate Bruce Falkinburg on bass/vocals, Sara Seraphim on guitar and Brian Costantino continuing on drums. A genuine surprise. Their first album since 1994, Sacred (due on Relapse) was tracked as the trio of WeinrichCostantino and bassist/vocalist Dave Sherman, but clearly they’ve moved into a new era already. Wouldn’t even guess what the future holds, but hopefully Sacred still comes out.

22. Orange Goblin, TBA

When it was announced that London’s Orange Goblin were picked up by Spinefarm as part of that label’s acquisition of Candlelight Records last Spring, the subheadline from the PR wire was “Working on Ninth Studio Album.” I haven’t heard much since then, but even as 2014’s Back from the Abyss (review here) pushed them deeper into metallic territory than ever before, their songs retained the character that’s made the band the institution they are. Always look forward to new Orange Goblin.

23. Pallbearer, Heartless

pallbearer heartlessDoomers, this is your whole year right here. I haven’t heard Pallbearer‘s third album, Heartless (out March 24 on Profound Lore), but I have to think even those who haven’t yet been won over by the Arkansas four-piece’s emotive, deep-running style have to be curious about what they’ve come up with this time around. I know I am. These guys have been making a mark on the genre since their 2012 debut, Sorrow and Extinction (review here), and there’s little doubt Heartless will continue that thread upon its arrival.

24. Radio Moscow, TBA

Fact: Radio Moscow stand among the best classic heavy rock live acts in the US. They’re the kind of band you can watch upwards of 15 gigs in a row — I’ve done it — and find them putting on a better show night after night, in defiance of science, logic and sobriety. Word of their signing to Century Media came just this past week and brought with it confirmation of a follow-up to 2014’s stellar Magical Dirt (review here), and for me to say hell yes, I’m absolutely on board, seems like the no-brainer to end all no-brainers. Can’t wait.

25. Roadsaw, TBA

Nearly six full years later, it’s only fair to call Boston scene godfathers Roadsaw due for a follow-up to their 2011 self-titled (review here). Granted, members have been busy in KindWhite Dynomite, and other projects, but still. Their upcoming outing finds them on Ripple Music after years under the banner of Small Stone Records, and though I haven’t seen a solid release date yet, my understanding is they hit Mad Oak Studio in Allston, MA, this past fall to track it, so seems likely for sooner or later. Sooner, preferably.

26. Rozamov, This Mortal Road

Speaking of albums by Boston bands a while in the making, This Mortal Road (out March 3 on Battleground Records and Dullest Records) is the debut full-length from Boston atmospheric extremists Rozamov. Haven’t heard it yet, but I got a taste of some of the material when I visited the band at New Alliance Audio in Aug. 2015, and the bleak expanses of what I heard seem primed to turn heads. I’m a fan of these guys, but in addition, they’ve found a niche for themselves sound-wise and I’m curious to hear how they bring it to fruition.

27. Samsara Blues Experiment, TBA

It’s been a pleasure over the last couple months to watch a resurgence of Berlin heavy psych trio Samsara Blues Experiment take shape, first with the announcement of a fourth album in October, then with subsequent confirmations for DesertfestRiff Ritual in Barcelona, and a South American tour. Reportedly due in Spring, which fits with the timing on shows, etc., the record will follow 2013’s righteous Waiting for the Flood (review here) and as much as I’m looking forward to hearing it, I’m kind of just glad to have these guys back.

28. Seedy Jeezus, TBA

Work finished earlier this month on Melbourne trio Seedy Jeezus‘ second full-length. As with their 2015 self-titled debut, the band brought Tony Reed of Mos Generator to Australia to produce, and after their blissed-out 2016 collaboration with Earthless guitarist Isaiah MitchellTranquonauts (review here), it’s hard not to wonder what experimentalist tendencies might show in the trio’s style this time out, and likewise difficult not to anticipate what guitarist Lex “Mr. Frumpy” Wattereus comes up with for the cover art.

29. Shroud Eater, Strike the Sun

Not to spoil the surprise, but Feb. 1 I’ll host a track premiere from Florida’s Shroud Eater that finds them working in a different context from everything we’ve heard from them to this point in their rightly-celebrated tenure. They also recently had a split out with Dead Hand, and their second long-player, Strike the Sun, will be their debut through STB Records. It’s been since 2011’s ThunderNoise (review here) that we last got a Shroud Eater album, so you bet your ass I’m dying to know what the last six years have wrought.

30. Sleep, TBA

If Sleep were any other band, they’d probably be in the “Would be Awfully Nice” category. But they’re Sleep, so even the thought of a new record is enough to put them here. The lords of all things coated in THC are reissuing their 2014 single, The Clarity (review here), on Southern Lord next month, but rumors have been swirling about a proper album, which of course would be their first since the now-legendary Dopesmoker. If it happens, it’ll automatically be a heavy underground landmark for 2017, but it’s one I’m going to have in my ears before I really believe it.

31. Stoned Jesus, TBA

Even as they tour playing their second album, 2012’s Seven Thunders Roar (review here), to mark its fifth anniversary and continued impact, Ukrainian trio Stoned Jesus are forging ahead with a fourth record behind 2015’s The Harvest (review here). The capital-‘q’ Question is whether or not looking back at Seven Thunders Roar and engaging that big-riffing side of their sound will have an impact on the new material, and if so, how it will meld with the push of The Harvest. Won’t speculate, but look forward to finding out.

32. Stubb, TBA

Since reveling in the soul of 2015’s Cry of the Ocean (review here) on Ripple, London trio Stubb have swapped out bassists, and they were in Skyhammer Studio this month recording a single that may be an extended psychedelic jam. I’ll take that happily, but I’m even more intrigued at the prospect of a third LP and what guitarist/vocalist Jack Dickinson, bassist/vocalist Tom Hobson and drummer Tom Fyfe might have in store as the band moves forward on multiple levels. Might be 2017, might not.

33. Sun Blood Stories, It Runs Around the Room with Us

sun blood stories it runs around the room with usIt Runs around the Room with Us seems to find peace in its resonant experimentalist drones, loops, open, subdued spaces, but there’s always some underlying sense of foreboding to its drift, as if Boise’s Sun Blood Stories could anticipate the moment before it happened. Toward the end of the follow-up to 2015’s Twilight Midnight Morning (review here), they execute the 90-second assault “Burn” and turn serenity to ash. Look for it in April and look for it again on my best of 2017 list in December.

34. Ufomammut, TBA

Any new offering from the Italian cosmic doom magnates is worth looking forward to, and while Ufomammut have left the 15-year mark behind, they’ve never stopped progressing in style and form. To wit, 2015’s Ecate (review here) was a stunner after 2012’s two-part LP, Oro (review here and review here), tightening the approach but assuring the vibe was no less expansive than ever. They started recording last summer, finished mixing in November, so I’m hoping for word of a release date soon.

35. Vokonis, The Sunken Djinn

Born out of Creedsmen Arise, whose 2015 demo, Temple (review here), offered formative thrills, Swedish trio Vokonis debuted with last year’s Olde One Ascending (review here) and proved there’s still life in post-Sleep riffing when it’s wielded properly. They signed to Ripple in November and confirmed the title of their sophomore effort as The Sunken Djinn, as well as a reissue for the first album, which will probably arrive first. I don’t know how that will affect the timing on this one, but keep an eye out anyway.

Gonna Happen and/or Likely Candidates

Obviously some of these are more likely than others. Some have solidified, announced release dates — Dopelord‘s out this month, Demon Head‘s out in April, etc. — and others come from social media posts of bands in studios and hints at upcoming releases and so on. A big tell is whether or not a band has an album title with their listing, but even some of those without have their new albums done, like Atala and Royal Thunder, so it’s not necessarily absolute.

Either way, while I’m spending your money, you might want to look into:

36. Against the Grain
37. Amenra
38. Atala
39. Attalla, Glacial Rule
40. Ayahuasca Dark Trip, II
41. Beastmaker
42. Beaten Back to Pure
43. Blackout
44. Bretus
45. Buried Feather, Mind of the Swarm
46. The Clamps
47. Cold Stares
48. Coltsblood, Ascending into the Shimmering Darkness
49. Come to Grief, The Worst of Times EP
50. Cortez
51. Cruthu, The Angle of Eternity
52. The Dead-End Alley Band, Storms
53. Dead Witches, Dead Witches
54. Dealer
55. Death Alley, Live at Roadburn
56. Demon Head, Thunder on the Fields
57. The Devil and the Almighty Blues, II
58. Devil Electric
59. Doctor Cyclops, Local Dogs
60. Dool, Here Now There Then
61. Dopelord, Children of the Haze
62. Doublestone, Devil’s Own/Djævlens Egn
63. Dread Sovereign, For Doom the Bell Tolls
64. Drive by Wire
65. Elbrus, Elbrus
66. Electric Age
67. Electric Moon, Stardust Rituals
68. Endless Floods, II
69. Five Horse Johnson
70. Forming the Void, Relic
71. Funeral Horse
72. Greenbeard
73. Green Desert Water
74. Greenleaf
75. Grifter / Suns of Thunder, Split
76. Hair of the Dog, This World Turns
77. Heavy Temple, Chassit
78. Here Lies Man, Here Lies Man
79. Hollow Leg, Murder EP
80. Holy Mount, The Drought
81. Hooded Menace
82. Horisont, About Time
83. Hymn, Perish
84. Lecherous Gaze
85. Magnet, Feel Your Fire
86. Mastodon
87. Merlin, The Wizard
88. Merchant
89. Mindkult, Lucifer’s Dream
90. Mirror Queen
91. Moonbow, War Bear
92. Mos Generator
93. The Moth
94. MotherSloth
95. Mouth, Vortex
96. My Sleeping Karma, Mela Ananda – Live
97. Orango
98. Papir
99. PH, Eternal Hayden
100. Psychedelic Witchcraft, Magick Rites and Spells
101. Royal Thunder
102. Saturn, Beyond Spectra
103. Season of Arrows, Give it to the Mountain
104. Siena Root
105. Six Organs of Admittance, Burning the Threshold
106. Six Sigma, Tuxedo Brown
107. Sólstafir
108. The Sonic Dawn, Into the Long Night
109. Spelljammer
110. Spidergawd, IV
111. Steak
112. Stinking Lizaveta, Journey to the Underworld
113. Sula Bassana, Organ Accumulator
114. Summoner
115. Sun Voyager, Sun Voyager
116. Sweat Lodge, Tokens for Hell EP
117. Thera Roya, Stone and Skin
118. Toke
119. Troubled Horse, Revelation on Repeat
120. VA, Brown Acid The Third Trip
121. Weedpecker
122. Youngblood Supercult, The Great American Death Rattle

Definitely Could Happen

Maybe a recording process is upcoming (Gozu, Cities of Mars, YOB), or a band is looking for a label (The Flying Eyes), or they’ve said new stuff is in the works but the circumstances of an actual release aren’t known (Arc of Ascent, Dead Meadow, High on Fire), or I’ve just seen rumors of their hitting the studio (Freedom Hawk, La Chinga, Ruby the Hatchet). We’ve entered the realm of the entirely possible but not 100 percent.

So, you know, life.

Dig it:

123. The Age of Truth
124. Ape Machine
125. Arc of Ascent
126. At Devil Dirt
127. Bantoriak
128. Bask
129. BCAD
130. BoneHawk
131. La Chinga
132. Chubby Thunderous Bad Kush Masters
133. Cities of Mars
134. Crypt Sermon
135. Dead Meadow
136. Death Alley (Studio LP)
137. Dee Calhoun
138. Destroyer of Light
139. Devil
140. Devil Worshipper
141. Duel
142. Dustrider
143. Egypt
144. Electric Moon
145. Elephant Tree
146. Farflung
147. The Flying Eyes
148. Freedom Hawk
149. Gozu
150. The Great Electric Quest
151. Green Meteor, Consumed by a Dying Sun
152. High on Fire
153. Horrendous
154. Insect Ark
155. In the Company of Serpents
156. Iron Monkey
157. Jeremy Irons and the Ratgang Malibus
158. The Judge
159. Killer Boogie
160. King Dead
161. The Kings of Frog Island
162. Lords of Beacon House, Recreational Sorcery
163. Mangoo
164. Mondo Drag
165. Monolord
166. Mountain God
167. The Munsens
168. Naxatras
169. Never Got Caught
170. Ommadon
171. Orchid
172. Ordos
173. Pilgrim
174. Poseidon
175. Purple Hill Witch
176. Ruby the Hatchet
177. Sasquatch
178. Satan’s Satyrs
179. Serpents of Secrecy
180. Shabda
181. Shooting Guns
182. Sleepy Sun
183. Slow Season
184. Snowy Dunes, Atlantis
185. Spectral Haze
186. The Sweet Heat
187. Switchblade Jesus
188. Superchief
189. Tÿburn
190. YOB
191. Zone Six

Would be Awfully Nice

This last category is basically as close as I’m willing to come to rampant speculation. Endless Boogie have hinted at new material, and Queens of the Stone Age have talked about hitting the studio for the last two years. There were rumors about Om, and though Kings Destroy just put out an EP, they have new songs as well, though I doubt we’ll hear them before the end of 2017. I’ll admit that Across Tundras, Fever Dog, Lord Fowl, Lowrider and Hour of 13 are just wishful thinking on my part. A boy can hope:

192. Across Tundras
193. Eggnogg
194. Elephant Tree
195. Endless Boogie
196. Fever Dog
197. Fu Manchu
198. Halfway to Gone
199. Hour of 13
200. Kadavar
201. Kings Destroy
202. Lord Fowl
203. Lowrider
204. Masters of Reality
205. Om
206. Orodruin
207. Queens of the Stone Age

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for reading. Whatever this year brings, I hope it’s been great so far for you and I hope it continues to be so as we proceed inexorably to 2018 and all the also-futuristic-sounding numbers thereafter. At least we know we’ll have plenty of good music to keep us company on that voyage.

As always, comments section is open if there’s anything I’ve left out. I’m happy to add, adjust, etc., as need be, so really, have at it, and thanks in advance.

All the best.

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