Straight out of the “Fucking A” file comes the news that Brooklyn post-sludgers Hull have joined the lineup for Roadburn 2014. One can only hope that by the time April rolls around the now-foursome will be supporting a follow-up to 2011’s triumphant sophomore outing, Beyond the Lightless Sky (review here) — they’ve been playing new material live for a while — but even if not, it’s awesome to see them on the bill for Roadburn, where they’re almost certain to lay waste to what and whomever should stand in their path at the 013.

News has also come out in the last couple days that Boston funeral doomers Morne and CA sludge mainstays 16 have been added to the fest. Updates follow, courtesy of the Roadburn site:

Hull: Brooklyn Sludge Rock Alchemists Added To Roadburn 2014 Lineup

Brooklyn, New York sludge rock alchemists, Hull have been confirmed for Roadburn Festival 2014 on Thursday, April 10th at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Hull will be performing alongside a jaw-dropping lineup that already includes Opeth, Yob, Triptykon, A Storm Of Light, Crowbar, Graves at Sea, Lord Dying, and so many more.

Comments guitarist Nick Palmirotto, “Hull is absolutely elated to be a part of the vastly diverse lineup that will be gracing the stages of Roadburn 2014. Having had the tremendous experience of performing bass guitar duties for Jarboe in 2010, it is an honor for Hull to be a part of one of the most unique and unprecedented festivals in the world of heavy music. Our gratitude speaks no bounds, we shall forge onward through the barren lands, beyond the lightless sky.”

Hull released their monolithic Beyond The Lightless Sky full-length via The End Records in 2011. Commended by The Village Voice (NYC) its “motorcycle-revving D-beat, bog-trawling doom, sinister black metal, Neurosis drum-offs and hypnotic passages that gnash like a venom-dripping cousin to the final Isis album,” Beyond The Lightless Sky features guest appearances by vocalist Jarboe, keys/ambiance by Fade Kainer (Batillus / Jarboe / Inswarm) and has reaped critical acclaim internationally for its delicate balance of staggering heaviness and poetic grace.

Hull materializes as a massive entity storming stages and immersing their audiences in a blanket of grandiose down-tuned compositions. A shifting fault line of decibel heavy harmony, this collective force converges in a collision of thrash, doom, classic rock, and formal orchestral works.

Hull commands their listeners through each riff with incredible precision, as a seafarer guides vessels through ominous waters. Submerged in cosmic soundscapes, Hull challenges the mind with flowing, off-time fugues and powerful, dynamic movements.

Brace yourself for an onslaught of eruptive force as a new world of music is formed in the deafening clap of thunder that is Hull.

Roadburn Festival 2014 will run for four days from Thursday, April 10th to Sunday, April 13th 2014 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Boston’s Morne To Bring Outsider Funeral Doom To Roadburn 2014 Afterburner

Boston’s Morne has everything you could ever want in an outsider funeral doom band. Their sound, revolving around guitarist / singer Milosz Gassan, shifts from crushing bombast to dark psychedelia, from crumbling, downtuned riffage to lumbering drone and from post rock to gothic gloom and metallic crust. They traverse this wide range of sounds without dwelling in trendy post-metal circles or being part of the seemingly never ending enclave of Neurosis adepts.

On their latest album, Shadows (out on Profound Lore), Morne even delves into classic rock and 70s prog, which drives the band onwards though a darkened wasteland of melancholy and menace, fueled by bleakness, airily textural progressions, moody melodies and a fierce, riffy, but also straightforward chug.

Morne, huge favorites of Darkthrone’s Fenriz and Nocturno Culto –who incorporated the Morne logo into the artwork of Circle The Wagons, will bring their vulnerable slabs of despair to the 2014 Roadburn Afterburner on Sunday, April 13th at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Roadburn Festival 2014 will run for four days from Thursday , April 10th to Sunday, April 13th 2014 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

-(16)- To Bring Jagged Blocks of Buzzing Sludge To Roadburn Festival 2014

Over the last two decades, Califorian veterans -(16)- have been pioneering heavy-as-hell, ill tempered sludge metal, alongside fellow luminaries Buzzov*en, Eyehategod and Crowbar (among others).

Despite all the anguish, pain and countless lineup changes that 20 years brought, -(16)- remained a dependable source of gutsy, misery infested, torturous sludge, captured on albums like Drop Out, Zoloft Smile and Deep Cuts from Dark Clouds (out on Relapse Records).

Whether its the band’s mid tempo, aggressive metal assault, their sludgy dissonance or aggro-punk-hardcore filth, -(16)- spits it out with hateful, jaw-punching glee – thriving on chugging guitars, grinding bass and growling vocals that drive home the point like a blast of scuzzed-up vitriol.

We’re looking forward to get punched in the gut, and smacked in the face as well by -(16)-‘s jagged blocks of buzzing sludge on Saturday, April 12th at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands. Nope we won’t mind it abit, as we’ve been waiting for so many years for this to happen!

Turn up, tune down, give up…

Roadburn Festival 2014 will run for four days from Thursday, April 10th to Sunday, April 13th, 2014 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Hull, Live at St. Vitus Bar, Brooklyn, Feb. 10, 2013

There’s no doubt in my mind that when 2013 is over, this will have been one of its best shows. Out from Oregon prior to sequestering themselves to write a new album, YOB joined forces with Hull and Bezoar for the first of a two-night stay at the St. Vitus bar. It was Sunday as well — and I know the mystique of weeknight shows is that everybody acts like they don’t have to get up the next morning because rock and roll means more when it’s painful — but man oh man, whatever assault and battery I may have inflicted on myself, my neck, my hearing and my ongoing semi-conscious waking state, it was worth it. And not just to have my bald spot show up headbanging down front on those unARTigNYC videos, but you know, for the music, dude.

It was one of those front-to-back nights. They don’t come along all that often, where you can show up to a venue and rest assured that everything you see is going to blow your ass out of the room — without literally doing so, lest you miss a minute of the righteousness. The St. Vitus was sold out for the night, and it was through the much-appreciated grace of Bezoar that I was able to get into the show at all. Having seen an impressive couple of their gigs over the last few months (see here and here), you’re damn right I was showing up early so as not to let their frequently bizarre invocations and riffly conjuring pass me by. I dig that band more the more I see them, and I plan on seeing them more.

The more I see them, however, the clearer the picture becomes about what it is that I enjoy so much. It’s the blend. Their ability to play one influence off another and tip the balance at a moment’s notice between echoey ’90s art rock, visceral doom and scathing extreme metal. Aside from drummer Justin Sherrell‘s fluidity in fast or slow tempos, guitarist Tyler Villard‘s periodic bouts of shred-itis and bassist/vocalist Sara Villard‘s enviable rumbling tone and un-postured vocal ethereality, there’s the course of a given song itself, genre-free and off and running — now at an gallop, now a lurching crash — that nabs the attention and renders moot the bookmaking on what might come next. Factor in the sheer attention-deficit nature of what they’re playing, they almost can’t help but be fun to watch.

For Bezoar, it was a good night to make a lasting impression, and they did precisely that, settling into a groove here and there throughout complex compositions as Tyler‘s variable riffing through a steady hand provided the foundation on which Justin and Sara enacted sped-up post-metal churn, blackened squibblies belted into doomed time-change, ignoring the improbability of it all working as Tyler plucked out a purposefully strange sub-blues lead to somehow answer back. The song about Jim Jones doesn’t have a name yet. I asked Sara afterwards if I could call it “The Song about Jim Jones,” and she said it was cool, so yeah, they played that. Closed with it, in fact, as the new lighting at the St. Vitus bar flickered around the early rush of the cut, which will presumably (hopefully) surface on their next full-length, due sometime this year.

They’ve begun to click as a band on stage, which made them a suitable fit alongside fellow Brooklynites Hull in representing the borough’s heavy creative set. I was up front, but by the time Bezoar had finished, the room was all but packed. Hull aren’t exactly lacking in draw on their own, so I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, but what occurred to me watching them open for YOB was the same thing that occurs to me almost every time I’m lucky enough to see them, and it’s just how much I absolutely take them for granted. It shames me to say it, because I try not to — their last album, 2011’s Beyond the Lightless Sky (review here), I loved and still keep on my person at most times in my trusty CD wallet, but when it comes to seeing them live, I’m way too blase about it. “Oh, I’ll catch them whenever,” or wait for a night like this to come along when they’re on a bill with someone I can’t miss like YOB, or maybe EyeHateGod.

To wit, this was my first time seeing Hull since guitarist Drew Mack left and they embarked on a new era as a double-guitar four-piece last fall. The change was notable, but it’s not like they went from two guitars to one or one to none. The real kicker was how overwhelmingly heavy they were, guitarist Nick Palmirotto and bassist Seanbryant Dunn splitting vocal duties as they sprinted masterfully through the tense thrashing of “Earth from Water” from the last record, hitting the point of no return for payoff largess and ignoring the signs on their way to cliffdiving doom slowdown. Lead guitarist Carmine Laietta, far off to the right and largely in the dark, tore into the stops of the open solo section given thrust by Jeff Stieber‘s kick drum. How had I let it go so long since the last time I saw Hull?

Like the openers, they also had yet-unreleased material which they used as a follow-up for the massive apex of “Earth from Water” and the chugging heft of “Architect” from 2009’s Sole Lord, mentioning after the fact that the song was new in an “oh by the way” kind of fashion. The central method — create tension, release tension, rebuild and dismantle — seemed roughly the same as ever, and Hull‘s ability to turn a churning riff on its head is nothing short of world class, though it was the extended “Viking Funeral” that made the closing statement of their set, parts weaving out in movements over the course of 15-plus minutes. Don’t get me wrong, I remember when they put out that EP in 2007. I spent a lot of time dorking out over that track.A lot. And I appreciate it when a band doesn’t forget their earlier accomplishments in favor of indulging more recent efforts.

But here’s the thing: It’s only an indulgence if the more recent efforts are in any way weaker than the earlier accomplishments, and Hull‘s aren’t. So much as I was thrilled to hear the undulating riff of “Viking Funeral,” I’m not entirely sure I would’ve taken it over “Fire Vein” or “False Priest” (oh hell, both) from Beyond the Lightless Sky. Perhaps it’s not something they do every show and save for special occasions which something like supporting YOB most definitely is, but there’s so much depth to what they do now that I think it’s worthy of highlighting, however epic their first outing may have been. It’s not a complaint, exactly — that is, “Viking Funeral” kicks ass and we all know it — I just also think the Beyond the Lightless Sky material could just as easily have provided the peak Hull were carrying across in closing out their set.

In any case, they destroyed in a manner befitting what was still to come once YOB took the stage, drummer Travis Foster emerging first from the crowd, then bassist Aaron Rieseberg, then finally guitarist/vocalist Mike Scheidt. There was a bit of a delay as Scheidt had to run and grab a vocal mic, but they were sharing Hull‘s gear, so it wasn’t that long before YOB got going, with “Kosmos” from 2005’s The Unreal Never Lived serving as an entry point to their consuming, space-quaking tonality. A band I once thought I’d never have the chance to see live, I’ve caught a handful of YOB shows in the years since they resumed their ascent with 2009’s The Great Cessation — Manhattan, Roadburn, Roadburn, Brooklyn — and have had few experiences as life-affirming in a concert setting. I mean that. I knew I’d only get to see them this one of the two nights they were at the Vitus bar (the next night, Sea of Bones and Batillus opened), so I did my best to make the most of it. You never know when next they’ll come back, if at all.

And while I took a second to pause and wonder, if I lived in Oregon, would I take YOB for granted the way I do with Hull, I soon enough had my face torn off and handed to me. When they finished “Kosmos,” someone in the crowd shouted “play anything!” and they answered with the soft opening strains of “Catharsis.” At first, I didn’t believe it, but Scheidt, his eyes closed, slowly rocking back and forth, kept it going and gradually, the song built to its full breadth, Foster and Rieseberg joining in the long journey to the initial verse. At one point, I looked down on the stage and there was my right earplug, but if it’s any indication as to how loud the band actually were, I don’t think I’d have known it was missing if I hadn’t actually seen it there. The slow rise of “Catharsis” to the chorus, “The tyranny/Built upon our philosophies/Not for me in solitude again,” indeed lived up to the title of the song, the middle chugs and Scheidt‘s echoing deathly growls — somehow not at all in conflict with the psychedelic-shamanistic delivery through which they were metered out — leading to the extended, ultra-slow plod, crashing, lumbering, chaotic. I stood and watched myself be dismantled by it, piece by piece, broken apart and put together the right way at last.

The final movement of the song, its faster rush, swirls to an Olympus Mons of a culmination before cutting off, and though it’s impossible to me to think of anything following that — perhaps because “Catharsis” closes the record of the same name, which turns 10 this year, or perhaps because it’s the heaviest thing I’ve ever heard — but YOB weren’t long in breaking into The Illusion of Motion‘s “Grasping Air,” the rolling groove of which launched on a sea of nodding and banging heads. Not moshing exactly, but there was a crowd push. Maybe it was moshing. I don’t know. I ignored it, and frankly, was so mentally and spiritually gone by the time they got there that it didn’t matter. I didn’t care. It’s been a while since the last time I was subsumed enough into a performance that I felt that way. The religious call it communion. I was just glad to be in the room.

Rieseberg‘s bass swell under Scheidt‘s solo for “Grasping Air” was steady enough to hold up the walls of the place, and in the stop before the last slowdown, Scheidt let out a high-pitched shriek off mic but still picked up by it that was both jarring and awesome at the same time. The finger-picked opening of “Adrift in the Ocean,” which closed 2011’s Atma (review here), made for a somber moment complemented by Foster‘s cymbal washes and the rumbling bass, but there was still energy left in the band when they moved into the faster core of the percussive build and takeoff, and that energy only built over the stretch, cleaner vocals wailing out in the verse en route to one of the most infectious chorus hooks YOB has ever written, taking the universe personally in a way few lyricists would dare, speaking in images that show more than they say.

A long instrumental push begun with seething whispers — led to the mounting final build, cut off suddenly but to which Scheidt added a last slow strum on his guitar. That was to be the end of the set proper, but they added “Burning the Altar” from The Great Cessation to finish an “encore” and as one of YOB‘s several strong album-openers, it made a great closer to their first night at the St. Vitus bar. I was dizzy by the time they were done, but gathered my camera bag, which I’d put on the floor in front of me, and made my way out. It must have been almost one in the morning? Something like that. I don’t know. I was home before two, which was earlier than the night before, the whole world having that “congratulations, you’ve just done serious damage to your hearing” tin-can sound for the next 36 or so hours. At least when it’s gone I won’t be able to say I wasted it.

Extra pics after the jump. Thanks for reading as always.

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Please note: This list is made up of my personal picks, not the results of the Readers Poll, which is ongoing — if you haven’t added your top 11 to that yet, please do.

It was an impossible task to keep up with everything that came out this year. I’ll say flat out that I didn’t. There are records that I just didn’t get to hear, and I should note at the outset that this list is mine. It’s based on my personal opinions, what I listened to the most this year and what I think 2011’s most crucial releases have been.

I’ve spent the better part of this week (and last, if brain-time counts) constructing this list, and I finally got it to a point where I feel comfortable sharing. Since last December, I’ve kept a Post-It of names, and all year, I’ve logged bands I’d want to consider for the final top 20. In the end, there were 78 bands and more that I didn’t get to write down for whatever reason. 2011 was nothing if it wasn’t overwhelming.

But here we are, anyway, and it’s done. Let’s get to it:

20. Suplecs, Mad Oak Redux

Released by Small Stone. Reviewed Nov. 5, 2010.

This is nothing if not a sentimental pick. Last year, I put Electric Wizard in the #20 spot because the record wasn’t out yet, and this year, I’m putting Suplecs (interview with bassist Danny Nick here) in just because I couldn’t imagine this list without them. Until literally a few minutes before I clicked “Publish” on this post, there was someone else in this spot, but ultimately, it had to be them. The New Orleans trio’s first record in half a decade wasn’t what I listened to most in 2011, it wasn’t the best album, or the most important, or career-defining, but when it came right down to it, god damn, I was just happy to have Suplecs back. It had been too long.

19. Elvis Deluxe, Favourite State of Mind

Released by Harmony Records. Reviewed June 14.

After a while, I was kind of shocked to find myself continuing to listen to Favourite State of Mind, the second album by Polish rockers Elvis Deluxe. The record’s dynamics didn’t immediately open up to me, but once I dug into the songs, I was wowed by their balance of catchy hooks and substantial-sounding riffs. The album was genre-relevant without being genre-minded, with vocal changes, organ, atmospheric shifts and a whole host of moods and turns. After hearing their 2007 debut, Lazy, I wasn’t expecting much out of the norm from Favourite State of Mind, and I’m still thrilled by just how wrong I was, and “Take it Slow” is among my favorite single songs of the year.

18. 40 Watt Sun, The Inside Room

Released by Metal Blade. Reviewed Aug. 11.

The gloomy opening statement from former Warning guitarist/vocalist Patrick Walker turned heads around the world with its unabashed emotional conviction, which was so much the central focus of the record as to be made a novelty by those who don’t usually consider doom an emotionally relevant genre (the widespread arguments against that notion I’ll leave for another time). What most stood out to me about The Inside Room was how the sentimentality translated into a gorgeous melodic sensibility and resulted in a lonely mood that was engrossing. On that level, it was easily among 2011’s most effective releases. It made you feel what it seemed to be feeling.

17. Sigiriya, Return to Earth

Released by The Church Within. Reviewed May 27.

It was an album that lived up to its name. Return to Earth marked the remaking of one of heavy rocks most stoned outfits: Acrimony. But, as Sigiriya (interview with drummer Darren Ivey here), the four-piece (down from five) would show that the years since the demise of their former band had found them progressing as musicians, resulting in a sound less directly stoner, more modern, more earthy. The songs, however, were what made it. It’s still a rare day that goes by that I don’t hum at least part of the chorus of “Mountain Goat” to myself, and if Return to Earth was a new beginning for these players, I can’t wait to see where they go next.

16. Totimoshi, Avenger

Released by At a Loss. Reviewed Aug. 16.

In addition to being Totimoshi‘s first album for At a Loss following the end of their deal with Volcom, Avenger was the first Totimoshi record since 2003’s ¿Mysterioso? not to be produced by Page Hamilton, and where 2006’s Ladrón and 2008’s Milagrosa moved away from some of the noisy crunch in the guitar of Tony Aguilar (interview here), Avenger managed to be both a return to form and a progression of the band’s melodicism. It seems, as ever, to have flown under most radars, but Totimoshi continue to refine their songwriting and have become one of the heavy underground’s most formidable and least classifiable bands.

15. Grifter, Grifter

Released by Ripple Music. Reviewed Aug. 30.

With their 2010 EP release, upstart British trio Grifter informed us that The Simplicity of the Riff is Key, and on their self-titled Ripple Music debut, they put that ethic to excellent use, resulting in straightforward, catchy songs that were as high-octane as they were low-bullshit. The ultra-catchy “Good Day for Bad News” showed Grifter at the top of their form, and with a dose of humor thrown in, Grifter was the drunken stoner rock party you always wanted to be invited to and, of course, finally were. Now if only I could get Skype to work and get that interview with Ollie Stygall moving, I’d be happy to tell him personally he put out one of 2011’s most kickass rock records.

14. The Book of Knots, Garden of Fainting Stars

Released by Ipecac. Reviewed June 16.

I don’t know what’s most impressive about The Book of Knots‘ Garden of Fainting Stars — the songs themselves or that they were able to make any songs at all. With upwards of 20 guest spots around the core four-piece, the third in a purported trilogy of records from the avant rock originalists was an epic in every listen. Songs like “Microgravity” and the Mike Watt spoken word “Yeager’s Approach” pushed the limits of both genre and expectation, and miraculously, Garden of Fainting Stars was cohesive and enthralling in its narrative aspect. If it really was their last album, it was triumphant in a manner befitting its expanding-universe thematics.

13. Ancestors, Invisible White

Released by Tee Pee. Reviewed July 5.

Had it been a full-length, Invisible White would be higher on this list. Many out there who were enamored of Ancestors‘ 2008 Neptune with Fire debut have gone on to bemoan the Californian collective’s shift away from extended sections of heavy riffing and tales of sea monsters and other things that go “doom” in the night. I’m not one of them. The Invisible White EP was a brave step along a fascinating progression, and as Crippled Black Phoenix didn’t release a new album in 2011, I was glad to have Ancestors there to fill that morose, contemplative void, and I look forward to seeing how they expand on the ideas presented on Invisible White (if they decide to stick to this direction) for their next full-length.

12. Elder, Dead Roots Stirring

Released by MeteorCity. Reviewed Oct. 5.

Speaking of shifting approaches, still-young Massachusetts trio Elder also moved away from the Sleep-centric methods of their 2008 self-titled debut on the follow-up, Dead Roots Stirring. Still based very much around the guitar work of Nick DiSalvo (interview here), Elder songs like “Gemini” and the über-soloed “The End” pushed an influence of European heavy psych into the band’s aesthetic, and the result was both grippingly heavy and blown of mind. As an album long delayed by mixing and business concerns, when Dead Roots Stirring finally arrived, it was a relief to hear that Elder, though they’d varied the path, were still headed in the right direction.

11. The Gates of Slumber, The Wretch

Released by Rise Above. Reviewed May 5.

Hands down the year’s best traditional doom release. The Wretch so gleefully and so earnestly employed the conventions of ’80s-style doom — most especially those of Saint Vitus and Trouble — that even though the lyrical and musical content was miserable, I couldn’t help but smile as I listened. Songs like “Bastards Born” and “The Scovrge ov Drvnkenness” pushed The Gates of Slumber away from the barbarism the Indianapolis outfit had been touting on their last couple albums, including 2008’s Conqueror breakthrough, in favor of a more purely Chandlerian plod. “To the Rack with Them” remains a standout favorite and a line often referenced in my workplace dealings.

10. Weedeater, Jason… the Dragon

Released by Southern Lord. Reviewed Jan. 6.

I don’t know what you say to someone at this point who doesn’t like Weedeater. It just seems like a terrible way to go through life, without the madman ranting of “Dixie” Dave Collins (interview here) echoing perpetually in your ears, or never having witnessed their ultra-viscous fuzz in person. Jason… the Dragon was one of the earliest landmark releases of 2011, and practically the whole year later, it retains its hold, whether it’s the stomping fury of “Mancoon,” the lumbering groove of “Long Gone” or the surprisingly melodic “Homecoming.” The hard-touring, hard-hitting band did right in recording with Steve Albini to capture their live sound, and Jason… the Dragon was their strongest outing yet in terms of both songwriting and that unmistakable quality that makes Weedeater records Weedeater records.

9. Rwake, Rest

Released by Relapse. Reviewed Sept. 6.

I was surprised to see Rwake crack the top 10. Not because their first album in four years, the Sanford Parker-produced Rest, wasn’t superb, but because of how much the songs on the album stayed with me after listening. The Arkansas band’s last outing, Voices of Omens, was heavy and dark and had a lot going for it, but Rest upped the songwriting on every level and together with frontman CT (interview here) adopting a more decipherable shout over most of the record’s four main extended tracks, Rwake felt like a band reborn, and theirs was a highlight among several 2011 albums that showed there’s still room for individual growth and stylistic nuance within the sphere of post-metal.

8. Hull, Beyond the Lightless Sky

Released by The End. Reviewed Oct. 14.

It was back and forth, nine and eight, between Rwake and Hull for a while, but when all was said and done, the fantastic scope of Beyond the Lightless Sky gave the Brooklyn triple-guitar masters the edge. With a narrative structure behind it and a breadth of ambience and crushing, post-doomly riffing, Beyond the Lightless Sky was the defining moment that those who’ve followed Hull since their Viking Funeral demo have been waiting for. In concept, in performance, in sound and structure and heft, it absolutely floored me, and of all the heavy records I’ve heard with the tag applied to them in 2011, Hull‘s second full-length seems most to earn the tag “progressive.” A stunning and groundbreaking achievement.

7. Mars Red Sky, Mars Red Sky

Released by Emergence. Reviewed Aug. 29.

One of 2011’s most fascinating developments has been the boom in European heavy psychedelia, and the self-titled debut from French band Mars Red Sky was among the best releases to blend a jam-based sensibility with thick, warm fuzz and memorable riffs. Together with the sweet-hued vocals of Julien Pras (interview here), those riffs made for some of the most infectious hooks I heard all year on songs like “Strong Reflection” and “Way to Rome,” and where other bands jammed their way into psychedelic oblivion, Mars Red Sky were able to balance their focus on crafting quality songs, so that although they sounded spontaneous, the material was never self-indulgent or lacking accessibility. One just hopes they don’t lose sight of that musical humility their next time out.

6. Grayceon, All We Destroy

Released by Profound Lore. Reviewed on March 8.

There was a point earlier this year at which I had forgotten about All We Destroy. After reviewing it in March, I simply moved on to the next thing on my list, and the thing after, and the thing after. But before I knew it, in my head was the voice of Jackie Perez Gratz, singing the line “As I live and breathe” over her own cello, the guitar of Max Doyle and Max Doyle‘s drums. It got so persistent that, eventually, I went out and bought the record, because the mp3s I’d been given to review simply weren’t enough. That was probably July, and I don’t think I’ve gone a week since without listening to Grayceon. So although I classify it in the same league as Rwake and Hull in terms of what it accomplishes in and for its genre, All We Destroy gets the extra nod for the fact that I simply haven’t been able to let it go. And though I’ve come to further appreciate “Shellmounds,” “Once a Shadow” and “A Road Less Traveled,” the 17-minute “We Can” — from which the above-noted lyric is taken — remains the best single song I heard in 2011.

5. Red Fang, Murder the Mountains

Released by Relapse. Reviewed Feb. 16.

On paper, this one should’ve flopped: Band with minor buzz and a cool video hooks up with indie rock dude to record an album of dopey riffs and beardo bombast. Instead, Red Fang‘s second album and Relapse debut became the 2011 vanguard release for the Portland heavy underground, which is arguably the most fertile scene in the US right now. They toured the record widely, and made another killer video for the mega-single “Wires,” but the reason Murder the Mountains is top five material is because it’s lasted. It was February that I reviewed this record, and March that I interviewed guitarist/vocalist Bryan Giles, and I still can’t get “Into the Eye” and “Hank is Dead” and “Number Thirteen” (especially the latter) out of my head. When it came down to it, the songs on Murder the Mountains lived up to any hype the album received, and I’m a sucker for quality songwriting. I mean, seriously. That key change late into “Number Thirteen?” It’s the stuff of the gods.

4. Graveyard, Hisingen Blues

Released by Nuclear Blast. Reviewed Feb. 25.

I wasn’t particularly a fan of Swedish rockers Graveyard‘s 2008 self-titled debut. Even watching them at Roadburn in 2010, I was underwhelmed. But when I heard Hisingen Blues and was able to get a feel for what the retro-minded foursome were getting at stylistically — and most of all, that they were acknowledging that they were doing it without being glib or ironic about it — I found the material irresistible. We’re getting into seriously indispensable records now; ones that I’ve been unwilling to leave home without since they came, in, and Graveyard‘s Hisingen Blues has been a constant feature in heavy rotation. Everything from the devilish testimony of the title-track to the wiry guitars of the chorus to “Ungrateful are the Dead,” to the Skynyrd-ified solo capping “Uncomfortably Numb”: It’s been a year of revelry in all of it, and since they overcame my prejudice to impress on such a level, Graveyard (interview with drummer Axel Sjöberg here) are all the more deserving of their spot on this list.

3. Sungrazer, Mirador

Released by Elektrohasch. Reviewed Sept. 9.

What I hear in the second album from Dutch trio Sungrazer is the heralding of a new generation of fuzz rock. Taking influence from their forebears in Colour Haze and Kyuss, the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets (interview here), bassist/vocalist Sander Haagmans and drummer Hans Mulders followed and surpassed their stellar 2010 debut on every level, playing heavy riffs on expansive psychedelic jams and still finding room for some of 2011’s most memorable choruses in songs like “Sea” and “Goldstrike.” In so doing, Sungrazer affirmed the character of next-gen European fuzz and placed themselves at the fore of their scene, with touring and festival  appearances to support. For their warmth of tone and for the fact that I spent the better part of the summer streaming the record through the Dutch website 3voor12, there was no way they were going to be left out of the top 20. It wasn’t until I sat down and actually put the numbers together, though, that I realized how vital Mirador actually was.

2. Lo-Pan, Salvador

Released by Small Stone. Reviewed Feb. 16.

I was lucky enough to be sent some rough listening mixes of Ohio outfit Lo-Pan‘s Small Stone Records debut (following a reworked reissue of their Sasquanaut sophomore full-length), and in my email back to label head Scott Hamilton, I told him I thought he had a genuine classic on his hands. A year, I don’t even know how many Lo-Pan gigs and listens through Salvador later, I still feel that way 100 percent. If you were from another planet, and we got to talking at a bar, and you asked me what rock and roll should sound like in the place where I’m from, I’d hand you Salvador. I still think they should’ve started the album with “Generations,” but if that’s my biggest gripe, they’re clearly doing alright. “Bird of Prey” was the best live song I saw all year, and I saw it plenty, and cuts like “Bleeding Out” and “Struck Match” set the standard by which I’ll judge American heavy rock for a long time to come. Like the best of any class, Salvador is bigger than just the year in which it was released, and at this point, I don’t know what else to say about it.

1. YOB, Atma

Released by Profound Lore. Reviewed July 6.

This is as good as it gets, and by “it,” I mean life. YOB‘s last album, 2009’s The Great Cessation, was my album of the year that year as well, and I knew from the second I heard the self-produced Atma that nothing to come this year would top it. Like Ufomammut‘s Eve in 2010, Atma brings the entire genre of doom along with it on the new ground it breaks, refining what’s fast becoming YOB‘s signature approach even as it pushes ever forward. I still have to stop whatever I’m doing (not exactly good for productivity) whenever “Prepare the Ground” comes on, and songs like “Adrift in the Ocean” and “Before We Dreamed of Two” were humbling. Seriously. Humbling. Listening to them was like looking at those photographs from the Hubble that cover trillions of miles that we’ll never know and reveal gorgeous colors where our naked eyes only see black. If that sounds hyperbolic, thanks for getting it. YOB guitarist/vocalist Mike Scheidt (interview here) is, almost in spite of himself, one of American doom’s most crucial contributors, and with Atma, he and the rhythm section of bassist Aaron Reiseberg and drummer Travis Foster released what is without a doubt the best album of 2011.

A few quick housekeeping items and we’ll call it quits. First, honorable mentions. If this list went to 25, also included would be The Wounded Kings, Earth, Larman Clamor, Olde Growth and The Atlas Moth. Roadsaw were also in heavy consideration, so they’re worth noting, as are many others.

Obviously, I couldn’t include them, but two of my favorite releases in 2011 also came from Blackwolfgoat and HeavyPink, and I’m thrilled and honored to have helped put them out in the small way I did.

And as I said above, there are records I didn’t hear. I haven’t heard the new Black Pyramid yet. Or Orchid. Or a bunch more that I could go on listing. I’m only one man and this is only my list, for better or worse. Again, I really do hope you’ll contribute yours to the group poll, the results of which will be out Jan. 1.

I’ll probably have some more to wrap up 2011 as the month winds down, but until then, thank you so much for reading this and the rest of the wordy nonsense I’ve put up the whole year long. Your support and encouragement means more than I’m able to tell. Here’s to 2012 to come.

Coming down Rt. 3 East heading toward the Lincoln Tunnel, the clouds hung low over Manhattan and reflected the lights of Midtown back onto itself. I couldn’t help but think of this again later last night as I watched EyeHateGod reflect back to Brooklyn the rigors of societal ills largely ignored by art and mainstream politics: addiction, disaffection, nihilism, riffing. The list goes on.

I got to Europa in Brooklyn‘s traditionally Polish Greenpoint neighborhood just in time to see the blackthrash duo Knight Terror open the gig. I’d have pegged them for locals, but apparently they came all the way from Portland, Oregon, to be there (though I imagine there’s a wormhole that makes that trip easier). With lead-vocal/drums and guitar, they blasted through a set of Slayer riffs and blackened screaming — think Midnight or Toxic Holocaust — and did nothing to offend. They had the first pit of the evening, if that’s any example of how they were well received by the crowd who, like myself, was still basically just showing up while they played.

The bill was right on. A Sunday show is a daunting prospect, and you could see in the crowd right from the start who had to get up and go to work Monday morning and who didn’t. I’ll say at the outset I was mostly there to see Hull play new material from the Beyond the Lightless Sky album. Having missed them at their release show with Rwake owing to family concerns and having missed them with Naam at the recent Acheron benefit because I live under a rock, I wasn’t going to let 2011 end without seeing them play those songs. EyeHateGod is great, don’t get me wrong, but it was Hull that got me off my ass.

And no regrets. The three-guitar five-piece gave solid confirmation of why I’ve come to think of them as Brooklyn‘s most formidable and creative metal export in the wake of Beyond the Lightless Sky. Playing second in front of Doomriders and EyeHateGod, their set was about 45 minutes, and in that time, they played only stuff from the new album, which suited me just fine since that’s what I’d been hoping for to start with, and hit off immediately with the complex rhythmic mayhem of “Earth From Water,” which, like the rest of it, they nailed.

Guitarist Nick Palmirotto‘s delivery of the songs — his vocals are probably the most consistently present in the songs, but at any point in a Hull set, anyone but drummer Jeff Stieber could be singing, and there’s usually more than one at once — is among the most passionate I’ve seen in a long time, and just off a recent month-long US tour, Hull made the Europa stage look and sound too small. Palmirotto, fellow guitarists Drew Mack and Carmine Laietta and bassist Seanbryant Dunn traded parts back and forth, growls and screams and shouts comingling with cleaner singing that seemed to be drowning in its own massive tonality. For Stieber‘s part, every snare hit on Beyond the Lightless Sky sounds like a sentence ending, and that remained true for the live set as well, but watching him play, I was all the more impressed for the ghost notes and subtler hits he works into his timing amidst the massive fills.

There’s some of that on the album, listening back now, but the impression I got during their set was it’s even more than they captured in the studio, which is saying something. The only place Hull saw a dip in momentum was between the songs. After tearing through “Beyond the Lightless Sky” or “Fire Vein” before closing out with “False Priest,” they had to stop and tune after each cut. Obviously they’re busy while they’re playing the songs themselves, but I felt like with three guitars, the bass and the drums, there should be noise the whole time, something to keep that forward drive moving. On the record, their longer tracks are offset by ambient/instrumental pieces, and I wanted some of that side to show up in the live setting as well.

Of course, it was a homecoming show for them, basically, playing to a crowd who knows them and has known them for a while, so I think it’s safe to say they were playing it casual, and either way, they killed it. Each off-time hit, on-a-dime turn and tempo shift was powerful, and they hit it all hard enough to remind what a month solid on the road can really do in service to a band’s chemistry. Some of Laietta‘s leads came through low in the mix (it might have been where I was standing), but I didn’t envy Doomriders having to follow.

But then, I’ve never been a particularly huge fan of Doomriders, or at least not as big a fan of the music as I am of the band’s name, which is unfuckwithably cool. Guitarist/vocalist Nate Newton had “Property of Converge” spraypainted on the back of his Orange cabinets (he was also in Old Man Gloom), and the Boston foursome took a bit to get into the swing of their set, but handled the songs well once they did. The thing about Doomriders that’s always kind of gotten to me, especially seeing them live as I have a couple times over the years, is I feel like the riffs are purposefully dumbed down. There’s nothing wrong with a band trying to keep their approach simple, but somehow Doomriders seem to be winking while they’re playing as if to say, “Yeah, we know we’re smarter than this.”

It wouldn’t be anything near the felonies committed when EyeHateGod took the stage — stabbings, arson, police brutality, jury tampering — but there was some violence in honor of Doomriders‘ energetic riffing and Newton‘s Tom Araya-esque shouts. I stood in back for most of the set, and did the same for EyeHateGod, and the now-full room was more than glad to go along with what the band had on offer, bassist Jebb Riley and drummer Chris Bevalaqua working up a sweat keeping up with the trying pace of Chris Pupecki and Newton‘s guitars, which were very much at the fore.

They didn’t really have me hooked until their last song, the irresistible groove of which was as an appropriate a lead-in as EyeHateGod could ask for. Regarding the New Orleans sludge mainstays/progenitors/forebears, I’ll say this: I had previously sworn off seeing EyeHateGod. I had (and I’m sure they were really feeling the loss) done so because I felt like every time I went and saw EyeHateGod, I was just enabling them to further delay putting out a new album, and god dammit, it’s time for a new EyeHateGod album. It’s about six years past time for a new EyeHateGod album, actually, and you know what the band’s not doing when they’re popping up to New York for shows? They’re not putting out a new album. So I said I wasn’t going to see them anymore until they had a new record to support.

Didn’t work out, clearly, but I did manage to gain some hope that the next EyeHateGod album will be good. Hear me out. When I last interviewed Jimmy Bower, he subtly expressed some concern that part of the reason it had taken the band so long to record and release a new album was that he didn’t know if they could be as dirty, as gritty and as fucked up as they once were. And after watching last night’s EyeHateGod set in Brooklyn, I realized this: EyeHateGod are fuck ups. Through and through. And it wasn’t even watching drummer Joe LaCaze snort something before they started playing, and it wasn’t frontman Mike Williams‘ occasional professions of his desire to die, it was Bower himself.

Arguably, unless bassist Gary Mader or guitarist Brian Patton (also of Soilent Green) owns a small business or something like that, Jimmy Bower seems to be the dude in EyeHateGod who most has his shit together. He plays in Down, he’s usually the public face, and he seems all around like a down to earth kind of guy. But when he broke a string last night before the band even started playing — it was during their big feedback opening — and effectively derailed the set before it even began, I stepped back and said, “You know, things are gonna be okay for the next EyeHateGod.”

Because that’s not the kind of fuck up you actively make. No one’s setting out to do that. It just happens. It’s who you are. Believe me, I know. I once watched as my car keys swirled around in a toilet and then were gone. If Jimmy Bower is at all worried EyeHateGod wouldn’t be able to be what they once were, he need have no such concerns. Ultimately, you can’t fight what you are, and as I watched Patton set his guitar down (still feeding back) and go over to help Bower restring his own, I was utterly comforted in knowing that whenever the next EyeHateGod studio effort materializes, things will be just fine.

To that end, they did play two new songs they’ve been kicking around for a while: “Medicine Noose” and “New Orleans is the New Vietnam” amidst the host of noisy, groovy familiars. Their set was a wash of riffs, cigarette smoke, and crowd violence. People were on and off the stage the whole time, and the rush to the stage when they finally got going was immediate. My back still hurts. Brooklyn, it seemed, didn’t care that it’s seen this show before. The crowd — myself included — was happy to revel in the sonic “opting out” that has always been EyeHateGod‘s hallmark, though at around midnight, the room started to thin out, as the aforementioned “had to work today” portion split.

With some acknowledgement of the blasphemy, I’ll add that I didn’t stay to see them finish either. At 12:30, I looked at my watch, realized I wouldn’t be home until 2AM, and made my way out. I can only assume, since I haven’t heard otherwise, that the show is still going on, well into Monday afternoon, and that EyeHateGod are continuing to destroy Europa as they’ve done so many times in the past.

A bunch of extra pics after the jump. Thanks for reading.

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I don’t usually do things this way, but because so much of what makes Hull’s second album for The End Records, Beyond the Lightless Sky, as ascendant as it is is how the Brooklyn triple-guitar five-piece have it organized, I feel it’s better to lay out the tracklist and runtimes up front rather than to go through the process of exploring each cut into the next and trying to mirror the experience of listening (at least that’s the theory behind it) in the review. Here they are:

1. Earth From Water (11:16)
2. Just a Trace of Early Dawn (5:02)
3. Beyond the Lightless Sky (6:50)
4. Curling Winds (2:36)
5. Fire Vein (9:40)
6. Wake the Heavens, Reveal the Sun (2:42)
7. False Priest (8:43)
8. A Light that Shone From Aside the Sea (3:12)
9. In Death, Truth (6:40)

Now, in looking at the list and listening through the narrative Beyond the Lightless Sky, which follows behind Hull’s 2009 The End debut, Sole Lord, and 2007 self-released Viking Funeral EP, the first thing one might notice is the disparate track times, and that gets to the very center of the album’s methodology. Everything under six minutes is instrumental, and with the exception of “Just a Trace of Early Dawn,” which is longer and a more substantive introduction to that side of the record’s personality, can be read as transitional material between the longer and more extreme (in a heavy metal sense) songs. With this album, Hull play post-metal ideology off post-rock ambience, and by that I mean they’re crushingly heavy in a cerebral sense – the drums of J. Stieber show immediate theory on “Earth From Water” and prove to be an excellent grounding force throughout – but given also to emotional stretches of guitar-led ambience, as on “Curling Winds” or the Pelican-esque “A Light that Shone From Aside the Sea.” Hull work so fluidly within these different but not necessarily clashing parameters that one is through the album’s 56:37 multiple times before the structure necessarily becomes apparent.

Helping that as well is that, as much as “Curling Winds,” “A Light that Shone From Aside the Sea” and the Neurosis-style tribal drumming of “Wake the Heavens, Reveal the Sun” — on which Jarboe (ex-Swans and current, well, Jarboe) offers distinct guest incantations and engineer Brett Romnes joins in the percussive pulse – are transitional leading from one longer piece to the next, they’re substantial in their own right, harnessing cloud-covered atmospheres to match Hull’s stated conceptual framework for Beyond the Lightless Sky, which tells the story of two ancient Mayan brothers, one who, “finds salvation amongst the stars and the wisdom of a stranger, while the other is mesmerized with the bloodthirsty belief of sacrifice and self-mutilation” (source). While they can’t necessarily match the likes of the title-track for intensity or the luminescent triumph of “Fire Vein,” they have their own progression, and particularly in the case of the last, underscore the strong interplay of guitarists A. Mack, C. M. Laietta V and N. Palmirotto (Hull are notoriously guarded when it comes to full names) leading into the rampant complexity of the closer. Beyond the Lightless Sky joins the ranks of strong 2011 releases from the likes of Rwake and Grayceon that affirm there’s more to be done in post-metal than aping Isis’ Panopticon. On their second album, Hull have come into their own and not only join the ranks of forward-thinking American metallers, but position themselves at the front of the pack with a few moments of unabashed, unashamed modern metal.

And of course there’s more to the appeal of Beyond the Lightless Sky than structural intricacies. The guitars are fairly compressed – one imagines that with three and such thunderous tones between them they have to be to achieve any clarity – and a Billy Anderson (Melvins, Eyehategod, Sleep, et al) mix puts a lot of emphasis on S.B. Dunn’s bass, which only makes the start-stop progression that agonizes during the final moments of the title-track all the more tense. Hull earns immediate kudos by starting with their longest song, and “Earth From Water” soon earns respect on a sonic level as well with a driving pummel and the multi-vocal tradeoff approach that typifies most of Beyond the Lightless Sky. That variety makes the record feel manic at times, and perhaps busier than Hull might have intended, but to coincide with the ebb and flow structure of the songs is an ebb and flow structure within them. Palmirotto, Laietta and Mack play off each other excellently for “Earth From Water” and across the rest of the album, coming together to amass a giant riff for the song’s instrumental chorus (also where Stieber first shines) as one soon takes flight for one of Beyond the Lightless Sky’s several landmark solos. It can be an overwhelming listening experience, but the real genius of the way its put together is that Hull, in effect, provide breathing room for each of their longer tracks.

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Among the seemingly endless horde of bands coming out of Brooklyn these days, Hull remain unique in that their mission is to crush without discretion. Their 2009 The End Records debut, Sole Lord, showed a conceptual edge that was new to the band, and with the forthcoming follow-up, Beyond the Lightless Sky — due out Oct. 11 once again via The End — they seem to have refined the approach. And as far as that “crushing” thing goes, a Billy Anderson mix on the new record probably isn’t going to hurt.

Feast your eyes on the prophesying of the PR wire:

Hailing from the streets of Brooklyn, New York, Hull has yet again emerged with a creation to outlive the ages. Hard at work since the release of their 2009 debut, Sole Lord, ideas were envisioned and the mighty wind of creativity brought upon this Earth the latest saga, Beyond the Lightless Sky.

Digging further into the past, the Mayan epic takes the listener through a division of two brothers and the struggles that they are faced with. One finds salvation amongst the stars and the wisdom of a stranger, while the other is mesmerized with the bloodthirsty belief of sacrifice and self-mutilation. In silence lies a realm that exists outside the plane of fear.

Taking the new songs on the road, Hull embarked on a successful mission to Austin for the SXSW festival to then triumphantly return and join forces with longtime friend and talented engineer/percussionist, Brett Romnes (IATA). Within an enormous, darkened club, many nights fell into morning as the immense sound was captured for the album, before putting the recording into the hands of a mixing madman, Billy Anderson. With such experience as the Melvins, Neurosis and Eyehategod, the journey was brutally finished.

Known to behold vast sound expanses, Hull maximizes harmony and tone within one monstrous palate. Upon your brow, focus, as a furious whip of intermingling guitars propel you through the atmosphere as a low pulse resonates through your entire being while the pounding drums blanket all chasms of reality. Find yourself immersed in a musical tide as it is played out before your ears beyond the lightless sky.

Beyond the Lightless Sky track listing:

1. Earth From Water
2. Just a Trace of Early Dawn
3. Beyond the Lightless Sky
4. Curling Winds
5. Fire Vein
6. Wake the Heavens, Reveal the Sun
7. False Priest
8. A Light That Shone From Aside the Sea
9. In Death, Truth

As I dove across two lanes of traffic to get to what turned out to be the wrong entrance to the southbound Garden State Parkway, I couldn’t help but be reminded of what happened the last time I tried to see doom mega-legends Pentagram in New York and failed viciously. “Going south to go east?” you ask? Typical.

I rolled into Europa on Meserole Ave. in Brooklyn at maybe 8:30. Bezoar had already played, but that left Judas Priestess, Hull and Pentagram still to go, in that order. Judas Priestess took their time setting up and went on after nine. I knew already it was going to be a late night. A late Thursday is a romantic idea. It’s the ultra-metro NYC myth of “nobody goes out on Friday anymore,” as though no one in the audience had to get up the next day and go to work. For what it’s worth, I didn’t make it to the office today.

Once they got going, Judas Priestess kicked off to a solid start. Everything you need to know about them but their pedigree (members of Van Helsing’s Curse and Angel Rot), the name says. They are, indeed, an all-female Judas Priest cover band. Lots of very elaborate hair, lots of leather, lots of “hey, let’s rock it!” attitude and I had to wonder how many members of decent original bands were in the audience who’d kill to open for Pentagram while Judas Priestess ran their way through a too-fast version of “Metal Gods.” I can’t count myself anymore, but still.

They played “Deep Freeze” from Rocka Rolla in an effort to throw the doom crowd a bone, and it was appreciated. By the time they left the stage, Europa was so crowded that I could barely move. I stood by the bar in the corner and watched as patron after patron came over thinking the bathrooms were down the hallway. They weren’t, and I disappointed several dudes in telling them they had to go all the way around the claustrophobic clusterfuck of humanity to get to the other side of the bar. Too bad.

Hull were good. I like Hull. I’ve known those guys for years in a hand-shaking, “Hi, how are ya?” kind of way, and I’ve watched them grow over the course of however many of their shows I’ve seen into a real force on stage. They were heavy and loud, and they closed with the epic “Viking Funeral,” which might have been a bit much, but was still cool. They’re supposed to have a new album in the works. I look forward to hearing it.

The draw to Pentagram this time around — aside from the fact that they have a new album and thus new songs to play — is that recent Obelisk interviewee Victor Griffin is back on guitar. He had some amp problems before their set, meaning more delays, and they finally got started after 12:30 or so. Not that you need me to say it, but it was late.

Griffin‘s tone was dead on, and he wore the Pentagram songs like a well-fitting shoe on stage. It’s so rare to see a person so obviously born to do what they’re doing, but watching Victor Griffin play doom, that was the feeling I got. Vocalist Bobby Liebling‘s well-reputed stage antics were relatively subdued compared to other times I’ve seen the band, but technical problems are a momentum-killer and as I’ve already said, it was late, so it’s understandable. He still sounded pretty good, and the rhythm section of bassist Greg Turley and drummer Tim Tomaselli (both imported from Griffin‘s other band, Place of Skulls) were in the pocket the whole time.

Even with all the people who’ve been in and out of Pentagram over the years, it’s kind of strange to see Liebling fronting what’s basically Griffin‘s band. Hard not to get a feeling that history is repeating itself, remembering that it was the Griffin-led Death Row that became Pentagram‘s most classic lineup in the ’80s when Liebling joined on vocals. I didn’t get the chance to bring up the parallel to Victor Griffin, or to anyone else, for that matter, because I was too miserable, crushed in by the bar.

The new songs sounded fittingly riffy, and I expect that when Last Rites hits, it’ll be well received, at least by doom heads. Liebling‘s well-publicized sobriety has really given the band new life, and although I was worn out by the end of the show, I don’t think he was. They closed with “Pentagram (Sign of the Wolf)” and threw most of what you’d expect into the set among the new cuts. “Forever My Queen” is always a highlight.

The crowd had thinned out some by the end of the set, so I was able to make my way over to the main area of the venue to watch them finish. It’s astounding, the love that’s behind this band. I know they got paid to be there, but given how late it was, they had every right to cut the show short, or to half-ass it, and they absolutely didn’t. And when Bobby Liebling thanked the crowd at the end and said he loved New York, I didn’t think I was being paid rock-star lip service. He meant it. That’s the difference.

I got back to the valley at 3:45AM, lucky to be alive. I haven’t slept like that behind the wheel in a long time, and if I-287 hadn’t been a ghost town on my way back North (my route was circuitous and affected by my company for the show; would take a longer time to explain than is necessary), I have no doubt it could have been very unpleasant. Last thing I did before head hit pillow was email work and tell them I’d be late this morning. You can see above how that turned out.

It’s a hell of a way to kick off 2011, and I know I’m looking forward to catching Pentagram‘s set tomorrow night at Europa in Brooklyn. If you’re going, look for me. I’ll be the fat dude with a beard and a black t-shirt, probably by the bar. Have fun narrowing it down.

That joke never gets old. Not for me, anyway.

Brooklyn natives Hull sent comment about their supporting slot via the PR wire:

Triple guitar-led sludge metallers Hull are pleased to announce their appearance on a very special show this Thursday opening for doom legends Pentagram. The performance will take place at Brooklyn‘s Club Europa this Thursday, Jan. 6, 2011. Additional support will come from Judas Priestess and Bezoar.

Commented the band: “If anything, come out for the mere comedic value of Bobby Liebling‘s onstage antics! We are excited to be sharing the stage with Pentagram, Judas Priestess, and of course, the mighty Bezoar. Big thanks to Joanne Fillipone and Osiris Presents for the opportunity! Party with us!”