Iowan guitarist/vocalist Alex Baumann and drummer Anthony Dreyer — who together go by Telekinetic Yeti and have the beards to prove it — stomped their way into the hearts and minds of the converted this past March with the Sump Pump Records release of Abominable (review here). Their debut album and in fact their first offering of any kind, it telegraphs lumbering intent in massive lumber and the shouts of Baumann, playing to the duo-intensity of Black Cobra on its leadoff title-track while later opting for a fuller-fuzzed groove on “Lightbearer” and jamming into more spacious terrain on “Colossus.”

A purposeful sense of variety offered tone that could bring to mind Conan just as easily as Truckfighters or fellow Midwesterners Valley of the Sun, and Baumann and Dreyer proved no less comfortable as songwriters in either context. Working with Luke Tweedy at Flat Black Studios, the pair harness a sound that is just as likely to impress with its detail as with its overarching impact; ambient transitions between songs tying them together and subtle changes in rhythm, structure and intensity go a long way in making Abominable feel like a complete album rather than an initial batch of material from a new band getting their feet under them.

This June will find Telekinetic Yeti on the road throughout the Midwest for their most extensive tour to-date, and they’ve already begun writing songs for a follow-up to Abominable, which could come together for a possible 2018 release, depending on pressing schedule, recording times, further tour plans, and any number of other variables that crop up along the way. Still, it’s in progress, so all the more reason to chase down the busy twosome and get further introduced to their ways and methods.

Baumann and Dreyer opted to answer as a collective, so please consider them speaking on behalf of each other, and please enjoy the following Six Dumb Questions:

Six Dumb Questions with Telekinetic Yeti

What’s Telekinetic Yeti’s origin story? How did you guys get together and how did the band start to take shape with the two of you? At what point did you know you wanted to remain a duo, and what was behind that decision?

Anthony and I had known each other for years from playing in some different bands years before. After that last band broke up in early 2010, Anthony had moved out west. When he moved back to the Midwest in 2014 we tried to revive the old band. When that didn’t work out with the other members we decided to see what we could do as just two people. We got together for a jam session and the first song we wrote was what ended up being the first song on our new album. We were stoked about how things were sounding so we kept with it. Once we were playing out a lot and people loved it so much just as two people, we kind of figured there was no reason to add a third person if its working so well as two.

Tell me about recording Abominable. How long were you in the studio and what was your time there like? The tones seem to vary so much between songs like “Stoned and Feathered” and “Himalayan Hymn,” between doom-thick and more rocker-fuzz. How were these captured?

We started recording in January, ironically enough during a blizzard. We recorded at Flat Black Studios which is a barn in Lone Tree, Iowa, that was converted into a really nice studio by Luke Tweedy. We were in the studio for approximately 14 days. Luke refers to it as his “recording resort,” which is accurate. We were able to sleep and shower and have everything we needed out there, which was really nice. Luke is amazing to work with. He really understands how to get a band to sound as natural yet raw as possible. Sonically each song has its own character whether that’s due to using a lot of whammy in certain songs or using specific fuzz pedals… also a lot of the songs are in different keys which sometimes responds a little differently with the amps and depending on where on the fretboard I’m playing stuff. We also used a wide array of amps to record with from different little combo amps to micing up the rigs we use live. We tried to leave no stone unturned.

How do you feel the results on Abominable represent where you want to go as a band? Are there lessons you’ll take into your next studio session, and if so, what will you be keeping in mind as you move forward from here?

As far as lessons learned, we have a better idea of how long it will take for us to record an album now. We had no idea how long it would take and initially didn’t book enough time. We ended up spending about 100 hours between recording and mixing in the studio, which is something we can plan for a little better for our next full length.

We are really happy with how Abominable turned out and feel it’s a great launching pad for us to show people what we are about. Originally when we were writing most of those songs, we were just trying to round up enough songs to play our first show. Once we had that we started focusing more on writing specific songs that we thought the album needed. Especially like “Himalayan Hymn,” we wrote that specifically as a song we wanted to end the album with. Even “Electronaut” and “Colossus,” those songs we played at our first show but they initially were much shorter songs (probably because we wrote our first set so fast) which had different endings.

We went back and added a lot of cool new parts and revamped them. We thought the songs turned out much better than they were originally. Also when we started creating layers of ambience for between songs it started to feel more like an album. As far as where we will go with our next album, we already have some new songs finished for it, which we think are a continuation of what we did before but in their own way better and different. We aren’t going to drastically change our sound, but we also try to not write the same song twice.

Where did the transitions at the ends of the songs come from and what do you feel they add to Abominable overall?

We’ve always been inspired by concept albums, whether that’s albums by the Mars Volta, or a band like Rosetta. We’ve always liked music that had more drama and depth to it, we feel like transitions in between songs can make an album feel deeper and more interesting. We feel like bands that add extra layers in between songs leaves you hearing something new every time you listen to it, which adds to replay value. Also when you listen to records like that, you can listen to the album from front to back and it feels more like an experience then just a collection of songs.

Will you tour to support the album?

Yes. We did a handful of Midwest dates as our album release, and this June we are going out for 19 days touring the Rust Belt. Here are those dates:

June 14 Dubuque IA  @ The Smokestack
June 15  Dekalb IL  @ The House Cafe
June 16 Grand Rapids MI @ The Workshop
June 17 Kalamazoo MI @ Shakespears
June 18 Wyandotte MI  @ The Rockery
June 19 Toledo OH @ The Ottawa Tavern
June 20 Cleveland OH @ Mahall’s
June 21 Kent OH @ The Stone Tavern
June 22 Pittsburgh PA @ Mr Roboto
June 23 Altoona PA @ Mcgarveys
June 24 Philadelphia PA @ Pharmacy
June 25 Baltimore MD @ The Depot
June 26 Morgantown WV @ 123 Pleasant St
June 27 Columbus OH @ No Culture (House)
June 28 Fort Wayne IN @ The Brass Rail
June 29 Indianapolis IN @ Kuma’s Corner
June 30 Joliet IL @ Drunken Donut
July 1 Peoria IL @ Rail II
July 2 Rock Island IL @ The Arena

We are also playing the Stoned Meadow of Doom Fest in Omaha on Friday, Sept. 29, and are doing a West Coast tour this Fall, which starts in September and ends around the second week of November.

Any other plans or closing words you want to mention?

Thanks to The Obelisk for doing this interview. We look forward to hopefully meeting many of you on the road this year!

Telekinetic Yeti, Abominable (2017)

Telekinetic Yeti on Thee Facebooks

Telekinetic Yeti on Bandcamp

Sump Pump Records

Supporting their new crusher Hopes of Failure on Thrill Jockey, Iowan doomers Aseethe will hit the road this summer following an appearance at the 71Grind fest in Colorado. They’ll be joined in the Midwestern and East-Coastal endeavor by Cobalt, and it’s basically a major-market run, they’re playing some cool spots, among them the Great Scott in Boston — get it before it’s condos! — and of course Brooklyn’s famed Saint Vitus Bar. Those two shows are framed around the July 4 holiday, so one assumes they’ll be partying in between somewhere cool as well, because, you know, that’s what you do when you get into town like that. Good for them.

If you haven’t heard it, Hopes of Failure is the heavy’s heavy. I’ve posted the album trailer below, but Thrill Jockey has it up in various places, digital outlets and whatnot, as well, for digging into. Just saying.

From the PR wire:

Aseethe bringing their mammoth riffs to North American Midwest and East Coast this Summer with Cobalt

Aseethe’s immense Hopes of Failure out now

As part of their relentless touring regimen in 2017, masters of mammoth riffs Aseethe will be embarking on a tour throughout the Midwest and East Coast this Summer with black metal duo Cobalt (Profound Lore). This follows Aseethe’s tours throughout the U.S. with Bereft, and Hell, as well as the release of their acclaimed album Hopes of Failure, and will include a set at 71 Grind Fest with Conan, Barghest, and many more.

Aseethe’s unrelenting slow-doom is often compared to drone music because of its core repetitions. This distinctly non-metal approach combined with harsh vocals and unusual samples gives Aseethe a unique voice among metal’s boundary pushers. On Hopes of Failure, the Iowa band’s primary influences of doom and drone share a similar ethos, but rarely do they converge with as much restraint, and patience, drawing on inventive sound sources and distorted, just enough, to add some sludge. Aseethe is the direction that heavy music is moving in.

Aseethe Summer tour
Jun. 2 – Colorado Springs, CO – The Black Sheep: 71 Grind Volume II #
Jun. 27 – Kansas Ciy, MO – Riot Room *
Jun. 28 – Minneapolis, MN – 7th Street *
Jun. 29 – Chicago, IL – Subterranean *
Jun. 30 – Deroit, MI – El Club *
Jul. 1 – Toronto, ON – Coalition *
Jul. 2 – Montreal, QC – Bar Le Ritz *
Jul. 3 – Boston, MA – Great Scott *
Jul. 5 – Brooklyn, NY – St. Vitus *
Jul. 6 – Philadelphia, PA – Kung Fu Necktie *
Jul. 7 – Washington, DC – DC9 *
Jul. 8 – Atlanta, GA – Drunken Unicorn *
Jul. 9 – Memphis, TN – Growlers *
Jul. 11 – Austin, TX – Lost Well *
Jul. 12 – Dallas, TX – Three Links *
# w/ Conan, Hell, Barghest
* w/ Cobalt

Aseethe is:
Brian Barr – Guitar / Vox
Danny Barr – Bass / Vox
Eric Diercks – Drums / Samples

http://www.facebook.com/aseethecreation/
https://www.instagram.com/aseethedoom/
http://www.thrilljockey.com/artists/aseethe
http://www.thrilljockey.com/products/hopes-of-failure

Aseethe, Hopes of Failure album trailer

You may or may not be overly concerned to find out, but we’re still running on the backup server for The Obelisk Radio while the data is transferred to the new hard drive. Judging by the number of listeners at any given point, you’re not. The numbers are still pretty good. Nonetheless, I cannot express the depth of my appreciation to Slevin for sorting out this mess. I had no idea when I hit him up on a Sunday to be like, “Uh, the stream is down” that it would be a project requiring more than a month of his valuable time. Dude is a godsend. I should send him a cheese basket.

Instead, he gets a zip file with the following releases to add to that temporary stream (they’ll go on the new server as well when that’s operational). Because I am a shitty friend, and because cheese baskets are expensive as hell. Let’s do this.

The Obelisk Radio Adds for April 10, 2017:

Tia Carrera, Laid Back (Frontside Rock ‘n’ Roll)

It’s been a hot minute since last we heard from Austin, Texas, three-piece instrumentalists Tia Carrera. The last offering the heavy psych jammers had out with a 2013 vinyl edition (review here) of their 2011 full-length, Cosmic Priestess (review here). So upwards of six years, if you want to go by the original release date of what was their second album for Small Stone Records. They reportedly have a new one coming this Fall, so one might think of the nine-and-half-minute single “Laid Back (Frontside Rock ‘n’ Roll),” which was recorded live this past January with the lineup of guitarist Jason Morales, bassist Curt Christiansen and drummer Erik Conn, as a lead-in for that. True, Tia Carrera haven’t been completely absent — they played Psycho Las Vegas in 2016 and one sees their name on various SXSW bills each year — but either way, it’s a welcome studio return from a band who were ahead of the post-Earthless curve that has swelled further out West, and who, despite a kind of raw, garage-style recording here, nonetheless showcase the chemistry and fluidity that separated them from the pack to start with. As the title promises, the jam is laid back, rife with swirling guitar, winding basslines and drumming that, while propulsive doesn’t take away from the languid overarching vibe. They’ve made the song a name-your-price download, so all the better should you be inclined to dig in. And you should be.

Tia Carrera on Thee Facebooks

Small Stone Records website

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Humulus,Reverently Heading into Nowhere

With nodding groove, fuzzed tonality and, for good measure, flourish of psychedelia, Brescia, Italy, trio Humulus may be working amid familiar elements on their second long-player, Reverently Heading into Nowhere (on Taxi Driver and Oak Island Records), but the results are impeccably constructed. The album, which follows their 2015 Electric Warlrus EP (review here) and 2012 self-titled debut, offers six tracks that carefully balance atmosphere and heft, cuts like “Catskull” digging into classic desert rock sensibilities via the modern European approach of a band like 1000mods while longer pieces like opener “Distant Deeps or Skies,” “Anachronaut” and the 11-minute finale “Rama Kushna” save room for increasingly expansive jamming, the latter the most spacious of all with floating guitar over a satisfyingly warm bass in its midsection leading to an instrumental apex that, while predictable, is no less engaging for that upon its arrival. Even shorter pieces like “The Gold Rush” and “The Great Hunt” find a balance between rolling rhythm and broader psychedelic consciousness, and when guitarist/vocalist Andrea Van Cleef, bassist Giorgio Bonacorsi and drummer Massimiliano Boventi lock into a slowdown, as at the end of “The Great Hunt” or in the Snail-esque “Anachronaut” earlier, the effect is duly massive to fit with the rhinoceros on the album’s cover. Their reverence is palpable, and throughout the 43-minute outing, Humulus make it plain that wherever they’re actually heading, they welcome their audience to come along for the trip.

Humulus on Thee Facebooks

Taxi Driver Records webstore

Oak Island Records on Thee Facebooks

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King Buffalo, Live at Wicked Squid Studios (6.16.16)

It’s nothing more or less than a live set, but as King Buffalo have already wrapped a round of US touring and were recently announced as support for Stickman Records labelmates Elder on their next European run, it seems only fair to grab the name-your-price Live at Wicked Squid Studios (6.16.16) while the grabbing’s good and consider the four-track/29-minute release a document of their chemistry as a live band as they marked the release of their debut album, Orion (review here), last summer. Not everything they play comes from that record — “New Time” was featured on their 2015 STB Records split with Lé Betre (review here) — but in their tone, breadth and expanse, they represent the full-length all the same. The psychedelic wash of “New Time” leads the way out of opener “Orion” and into a one-two medley of “Kerosene / Goliath Pt. 2,” and they finish by setting the controls for the heart of a nine-minute rendition of “Drinking from the River Rising,” which also closed Orion and proves no less immersive in this setting than it did on the studio offering. I’ve made no secret of the potential that I think resides in the Rochester, NY, three-piece, and as they move further into becoming a touring band, they’re only doing the work of bringing that potential to life. It may be that at some point we’ll look back on Live at Wicked Squid Studios as a kind of primitive beginning — I don’t want to predict where they’ll go or how their sound will continue to develop — but even so, it’s fortunate that we’ll have it to look back on at all.

King Buffalo on Thee Facebooks

Stickman Records website

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Telekinetic Yeti, Abominable

This shit is like catnip for riff-hounds. Iowan two-piece Telekinetic Yeti stoner-march their way into the hearts and minds of the converted and onto the list of 2017’s best debuts with Abominable (on Sump Pump Records), a clean eight-track/41-minute long-player marked out by its tonal thickness and shifts between using it for Sleep-style roll and fuzzier fare, perhaps most directly and efficiently summarized on the single “Stoned and Feathered,” but in fluid proportion throughout cuts like the lumbering “Lightbearer” and the neo-stoner-delic chug of “Beneath the Black Sun” as well. Comprised just of guitarist/vocalist Alex Baumann and drummer Anthony Dreyer — though I’ll be damned if somebody isn’t playing bass on “Electronaut” — Telekinetic Yeti seem to burst out of the gate with a solid idea of who their audience is and what their audience wants, and to their credit, they deliver just that and have been met with a flurry of hyperbole for their efforts. I can’t really argue with the heft or cohesion of the material on Abominable, and the willingness on the part of Baumann and Dreyer to inject some atmospheric depth into the aptly-named nine-minute tour de force “Colossus” and closer “Himalayan Hymn” bodes well for their chances of leaving a mark over the longer term, even if there’s growing to be done before they get there. Still, as their first time out, Telekinetic Yeti‘s Abominable signals a righteousness of intent and wholly succeeds in capturing the attention it plainly seeks. The next few years will write their story, but if these guys take this show on the road, they could indeed turn into a monster.

Telekinetic Yeti on Thee Facebooks

Sump Pump Records on Bandcamp

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High Plains, Cinderland

The story goes that Cinderland was recorded in Wyoming in a refurbished schoolhouse by the duo of ambient multi-instrumentalist Scott Morgan and classical cellist Mark Bridges — working together under the moniker High Plains — and composed very much with that high-altitude, utterly empty landscape in mind. Represented in a pervasive minimalism that makes every swell of volume on “The Dusk Pines” stand out and shifts between piano, cello, guitar, drone and electronics cinematic in their drama like the soundtrack to one of those foreboding Westerns where nobody talks because they’re afraid that if the earth hears them speak it will open up and swallow them whole — which it might — it is an immersive, resolutely melancholy execution across nine tracks and 36 minutes that is likewise stark and beautiful. “A White Truck” and “Hypoxia” carry some nuance of the paranoid, but there’s resolution in “Blood that Ran the Rapids” and “Song for a Last Night” that, like the high desert itself, teems with life while giving the impression of being a void for the lack of human presence. Mood-affecting in its atmospherics, Cinderland draws the listener into this world that is both gorgeous and threatening, and fits itself to the narrative that birthed it with resonance and depth. One hopes it is not a one-off collaboration between the Canadian Morgan and Wisconsin-based Bridges and that wherever their next trip together takes them — go to New Mexico! — they’re able to likewise capture the setting in such evocative fashion.

High Plains on Thee Facebooks

Kranky Records on Bandcamp

—

Even before you hit play, Dubuque, Iowa, duo Telekinetic Yeti have started ticking off boxes. Hair and beards, see-through drums, prominent logos for Orange, Hiwatt, Marshall, etc., cover art with druids on it (thankfully no cartoon tits). These things should be visual dogwhistles to the converted by this point — “you’re in for some heavy shit.” And so you are. Telekinetic Yeti‘s debut album, Abominable, will see vinyl release on March 17 via Sump Pump Records and is available for preorder now (link below). I haven’t heard the full thing yet, but the tonal sampling they give in their new video for “Stoned and Feathered” lives up to the promise of their moniker and superficial aesthetic — and yes, by that I mean that it’s some heavy shit. I dig it. You might also dig it. That’s why we’re here.

It’s a relatively quick sampling, and a relatively straightforward video — a performance clip featuring guitarist/vocalist Alex Baumann and drummer Anthony Dreyer keeping company with their if-you’re-going-to-tour-make-sure-all-of-this-is-insured gear, plus some trippy manipulation — but the blend of fuzzy bounce and thicker, Sleep-derived groove and howl cues expectation of a burlier side that may or may not be a balance toyed with on Abominable‘s other tracks. It seems like something just under the surface here waiting to bubble up while in the meantime Telekinetic Yeti give fellow Midwesterners Valley of the Sun a run for their money in terms of fuzz quotient. Right around the halfway point, Baumann and Dreyer turn to denser chug, but a righteously hairy lead takes hold — I swear I hear a bassline in there — just before they stomp their way to the finish, once more living up to their name.

I’ll hope to have more on Abominable one way or another as we get closer to the release in March, but until then, you can check out “Stoned and Feathered” below — if you haven’t already; they’re racking up YouTube views at an admirable rate — followed by the info and preorder whatnot from Sump Pump.

Please enjoy:

Telekinetic Yeti, “Stoned and Feathered” official boxes

We are proud to present to you the official music video for our song “Stoned and Feathered” off of our debut album “Abominable” out March 2017!

Pre-order the LP at http://sumppumprecords.com/albums/vinyl/telekinetic-yeti-abominable

Video shot and edited by Joe Gibbs.

releases March 17 2017

Telekinetic yeti is:
Alex Baumann – guitar/vocals
Anthony Dreyer – drums

Recorded at flat black studios in iowa in 2016.
Mixed by luke tweedy
Mastered by carl saff.
Album artwork by headbang design

Telekinetic Yeti on Thee Facebooks

Telekinetic Yeti on Bandcamp

Sump Pump Records

Truth and Janey, No Rest for the Wicked (1976)

Like any such designation, the idea of proto-metal can be pretty nebulous. Generally, one thinks of classic-sounding heavy rock, the early recordings of Pentagram, Black Sabbath or more underground groups like Budgie, Speed, Glue & Shinki, Atomic Rooster, Cactus and so on. Comprised of bassist Steve Bock, drummer Denis Bunce and founding guitarist/vocalist BillyLee Janey and based in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Truth and Janey came along a little bit later. Offered through private press Montross Records, their debut, No Rest for the Wicked, was issued in 1976 — more than a year after what even the farthest-ranging estimates of what was the Psychedelic Era end. That distinction is important because it separates the context in which Truth and Janey arrived. By then, acts like the aforementioned Sabbath, as well as Alice Cooper, Coven and so on had already showed rock and roll’s dark underside to the masses. Soon after, punk would take hold in the UK, pushing what had already by then become heavy metal downward even as groups like Judas Priest, Motörhead and, a little later, Iron Maiden set the stage for what would become the NWOBHM. In the US, the groundbreaking heavy of Midwestern outfits like MC5 and The Stooges had already given way to the arena-rock of Blue Öyster Cult, and early punk would soon rise as well.

So Truth and Janey‘s debut landed at this crucial in-between moment, almost the point at which one generation’s expectations for what rock and roll could and should be doing were swapped out for another’s. No Rest for the Wicked contains elements of many of the above-mentioned artists and movements, whether it’s the brighter strum of its title-track referring back to Thin Lizzy or the grittier guitar in opener “Down the Road I Go” meeting head-on with gorgeous harmonies, “It’s all Above Us” melding psychedelia and progressive tendencies or “Remember, a Child, Building Walls” bringing The Who-style classic progressions to a jazzier instrumental flow. Such breadth doesn’t make No Rest for the Wicked come across as scattershot, and while that seems like something of a miracle on paper, the smoothness of Truth and Janey‘s transitions and the performances of Janey, Bruce and Bock throughout these tracks are a soul salve for any lover of spirited, formative heavy rock. The album proper ends with the easy-rolling “My Mind,” but this version also includes the four songs from Truth and Janey‘s prior singles, “Midnight Horsemen,” “Around and Around,” the Rolling Stones cover “Under My Thumb” and “Straight Eight Pontiac.”

Those cuts have appeared on numerous reissues of No Rest for the Wicked, including CD versions released by Monster Records in 2001 and Rockadrome Records in 2007. Rockadrome also oversaw a vinyl release with the original tracklisting intact in 2010, and that has been pressed up again this year. Truth and Janey, meanwhile, released one more studio album in 1977’s Just a Little Bit of Magic before disbanding, but have had bits of live and other material — the 2001 Erupts! compilation stands out — surface over the years. As further testament to their longevity, they’ll play Psycho Las Vegas in August, alongside Alice Cooper, Blue Öyster Cult and many, many, many more.

—

What a week. One for the record books. This was the first of three weeks I’ll spend willfully unemployed before starting my new job at Hasbro in Rhode Island on June 28. Vacation. Three weeks off. Europe might scoff, but here in the US, it’s practically unheard of. A gift from the gods. And frankly, it’s felt that way over the last five days.

Monday and Tuesday, pretty quiet. Slept late, got some writing done — steady stream of reviews this week, which was nice — and hung around with The Patient Mrs.. Tuesday evening we headed for Connecticut and I suggested kind of on a whim we should go to the Yankee game the next night. So that was Wednesday. We took the train from New Haven into the Bronx and it was fantastic. I had a roast beef sandwich, minus the bread — still carbless — for dinner, and she had a veggie dog, for which she’s been waiting years and for which she has written suggestion-box emails numbering greater than 10. Thrills abounded, and the team, who are thoroughly and willfully mediocre this year, won a blowout. We got back late, so slept late again yesterday, and when I woke up I checked my email and found a note from Stefan from Colour Haze, that’s like the best kind of email, about their new live album, which was posted about this morning. My family is coming up from New Jersey tomorrow, so this afternoon we’ll go to the farmer’s market in town here and pick up some eats and other such and such, then I look forward to a quiet evening tonight and then more good times tomorrow. Work to do Sunday, but it’ll get done. I’m not worried.

Next week is a little bumpier. I have a doctor stuff on Tuesday that I expect will consume most of the day. I’ll also be announcing the last band and afterparty details for The Obelisk All-Dayer (tickets here) Aug. 20 at the Saint Vitus Bar in Brooklyn. The official poster, with art by Skillit — look up to the header of this site for a sampling of his work — should be done in the next two weeks. It’s going to be bright as hell, happy, psychedelic and weird. It’s going to involve ice cream. I can’t wait.

Still, look out for reviews of Sergio Ch., West, Space and Love and Conclave before next week is through, as well as a new podcast, that All-Dayer announcement and an interview with Dave Sherman of The Obsessed to precede that band’s stop headlining at Maryland Doom Fest in a couple weeks, which I’ll be attending and covering as kind of the last big blowout of this gleeful between-jobs period before I start work again the Tuesday after.

So lots of good stuff to come. Before I put the laptop down, I just want to thank Tom Geddes from the Desertscene Podcast (Thee Facebooks, website) again for having me as a guest for last week’s episode. It was a pleasure to chat with Tom — or, since he’s UK-based, chat to him — about bands and writing and whatnot, and if you didn’t hear it, I thought the end result came out really well. Thanks if you get the chance to check it out.

Please have a great and safe weekend. If you need me, I’ll be endeavoring toward the same.

The Obelisk Forum

The Obelisk Radio

It would be hard to review Crystals and Lasers, the fourth full-length from Council Bluffs, Iowa, five-piece Bloodcow, and not focus on the lyrics. Operating under various assumed names/titles — Bones and 1987 on guitar, Navin on bass, Run DMFC on drums and The Corporate Merger on vocals — cleverness and delinquent charm is nothing new for the band or to any listeners who might’ve caught onto them since the 2007 release of their third offering, Bloodcow III: Hail Xenu, but Crystals and Lasers brings that element more forward than it’s ever been. It is not the only way in which Bloodcow are going for broke. The 13-track/54-minute album was recorded and mixed by Jim Homan, and was finished and pressed thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign (to which, in the interest of full disclosure, I contributed), and it’s easily the most professional-sounding work they’ve done.

With six years between records and a tenure as a band that now spans more than 12 years, one might forgive them the record being on the longer side, between a general buildup of material and the lingering who-knows-when-they’ll-get-to-make-another factor. Still, they rise to the occasion, and while songs like “Keys to the Kingdom,” “Dick for Days,” “Ultra Super Sexual” and “After Party” are all the stronger for the attention to detail on every level. While the music behind varies between punk, thrash, stoner riffing and various kinds of classic metals — Run DMFC proving versatile in anchoring every turn and keeping the record at several points from flying completely off the handle — The Corporate Merger spits out lyrical themes ranging from crossdressing on “Another Country,” “Ultra Super Sexual” and “After Party” to cocaine “After Party,” “HIVampyre” and the faux-tropical ’80s-style instrumental “Coke Break” (though one might call the background yips a cocaine reference, given the title) that serves as the centerpiece, but nothing is quite so prevalent as death.

Opener “Blood and Guts,” “Keys to the Kingdom,” which follows, “Exploding Head,” the masturbation-themed “Sock,” “Crystals and Lasers,” “Little Chromosome,” “After Party” and closer “Torture Days” all feature some explicit reference to death, and that’s just what I could deduce without a lyric sheet. In “Sock,” it’s the narrator dead in front of a computer with porn on repeat. In “Crystals and Lasers” itself, it’s death at the hands of a robotic future. In “Blood and Guts,” it’s a nightmarish devouring, and so on. Nearly each song has its own personality, from “Ultra Super Sexual”‘s self-mocking sleaze — “Do ya wanna do me baby?/Do ya wanna do me now?” — (the ending of that song might also be the pinnacle of the record in terms of vocal arrangements), to the almost unfortunately catchy “Dick for Days,” which revamps Bon Jovi-style glam to a lyric about an all-male gangbang, The Corporate Merger adding whispers of “No you didn’t” after each chorus only to answer, “Yes I did.”

The arrangement on “Dick for Days” is especially telling of the kind of nuance and effort Bloodcow put into this material and their overall mindset. What seems at first not only politically problematic but just plain dumb is actually subverting any number of stereotypes, from the hyper-chauvanistic vision of glam (“I got your medicine inside my fucking dick”) denying its own homoeroticism to the simple fact that while “Dick for Days” could easily tip into some childish mockery of gay sex — particularly two tracks after the very-hetero “Sock” — it never actually crosses that line. Similarly, “Sock” acknowledges the ridiculousness of male fantasy — “They love me, this world of young coeds” — after blindsiding the listener with the opening lines, “When I was just/A young man/I started fucking myself with my own two hands,” and rattling off a list of pornstars, mags and sites perused. That turn isn’t new for Bloodcow either, but between the crispness of the production here, the instrumental tightness of the performances and the ease with which they shift between the freneticism of “Exploding Head” and the later “HIVampyre” and the more complex metal structures of “Sock” and “Little Chromosome.”

“Little Chromosome” is a highlight of the back half of Crystals and Lasers, but the real standout, musically, vocally and thematically, is the penultimate “After Party,” which directly takes on the issue of aging in a party lifestyle:

You have to tell me everything is cool with my life
I’m at the doctor’s office, they’re telling me
That they’ve got some bad news
And it’s time to go under the knife

Repetitions of “Bad for your heart” follow before the song careens into a slowdown wherein The Corporate Merger, as his own doctor, rips him off and tells him he’s going to die because he doesn’t have insurance. As brutal conceptually as it is sonically riotous, “After Party” perfectly sums up the perspective from which Bloodcow work on the album — self-aware within a kind of nihilistic safe zone. Followed by the subdued beginning of closer “Torture Days,” it hits with all the more impact, and while earlier cuts like “Keys to the Kingdom,” “Blood and Guts” and “Exploding Head” seem like they’re all in good fun, it’s “After Party” and the escapism of the prior “Another Country” — early call and response leading to an overwhelming crush of financial worry — that add the depth to make one look beyond the “I’ll push your balls to the side” in “Dick for Days” to really try to understand where they’re coming from.

Ultimately, Bloodcow will not be for everyone, and that point of view is going to be part of it, but it has value as an expression and even when it’s raging about cyborgs and robot lords harvesting unicorn organs, Crystals and Lasers keeps a sense of honesty at its center that makes it an even richer listen. When, or if, Bloodcow might put out another album, I don’t know. This one was in the works for at least three years. But if this turns out to be their last or if it doesn’t, it’s difficult to give Crystals and Lasers repeated listens and not consider it a definitive work, because while they seem to be creating a tornado that touches down on these multiple aesthetic points, they’re also very clearly guiding that energetic tumult with an admittedly unlikely steadiness of hand.

Bloodcow, The Making of Crystals and Lasers

Bloodcow’s website

Bloodcow on Thee Facebooks

Crystals and Lasers at CDBaby

Iowan heavy rockers Superchief released their last album, Corporate Dynamite (review here), in 2011, and as the band explains, some stuff has changed since then. Like the lineup. Their new album, Trophy Room, finds them dude-rocking on Magnetic Eye Records, in whose forthcoming Electric Ladyland [Redux] compilation they’re also taking part, giving “Crosstown Traffic” a no doubt whiskey-soaked treatment.

If you’d like to hear the album at some point before physical copies arrive, that’s easy enough — Magnetic Eye has it streaming now on their Bandcamp. Not sure on the exact release date, but if you can play the whole thing, it can’t be far off. Here’s word from the band and the stream of the record:

Trophy Room is Superchief’s first release on their new label, Magnetic Eye Records. The album was recorded in Des Moines IA at Redd No 7 Studios which is run by Kevin Neal. The album was produced by Superchief and Kevin Neal, it was engineered and mixed by Kevin Neal as well. The album was mastered By Nick Zampiello and Rob Gonnella @ New Alliance East, Cambridge, MA.

Trophy Room is currently available online on the typical platforms. It is streaming for free out the Magnetic Eye online store currently. Physical copies are being shipped soon, so keep an eye out for those release details. Here is a link to the online store:

http://store.merhq.com/album/trophy-room

Since our last release, Corporate Dynamite, Superchief has gone through changes. James Segovia joined the band as bass player in 2012 and Casey Doser joined as our new lead guitar player in 2013. e took 2013 to write new material and then 2014 to record “Trophy Room”.

2015 we are focusing on hitting the road to support the album and working on material to a follow up to Trophy Room. Now that we have a solid lineup of fellas we plan to release new material more frequently.

http://www.superchiefband.com/
https://superchief.bandcamp.com/
https://twitter.com/SUPERCHIEF_DSM
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Superchief/53609835725
https://www.facebook.com/MagneticEyeRecords
http://store.merhq.com/album/trophy-room

Superchief, Trophy Room (2015)

Radio Moscow, Brain Cycles (2009)

Radio Moscow are one of those bands that it’s really easy to ignore — until you hear them. Then you spend the next couple years playing catchup and feeling like a dumbass for having missed the boat the first time around. That’s my experience with them anyway. All the way up to 2011’s third album, The Great Escape of Leslie Magnafuzz, I managed to resist, but once I caught them live, there was really no more getting around it. The classic psych-blues power trio led by guitarist/vocalist Parker Griggs was based in Iowa when they recorded their second full-length, Brain Cycles, in 2009 and released it on Alive Naturalsound, Griggs also playing drums on the record while Zack Anderson — now of Blues Pills — handled bass, but the band has since relocated to the West Coast and moved into position among the spearheads of a heavy psych revival there, alongside the likes of Earthless and Mammatus, but always keeping one foot rooted in the blues. On Brain Cycles, one can hear it perhaps easiest of all on “250 Miles,” but it’s all over the record, whether it’s opener “I Just Don’t Know,” the acoustic-led “Black Boot,” the later slide-stomping “City Lights” or the Hendrixian funk freakout of “Hold on Me.” Basically, there’s no point on the album at which it’s not caked in classic vibe, that vibe often arriving with blinding riffs, solos and rhythmic turns, as on “I Just Don’t Know,” “No Good Woman,” and so on.

I had the pleasure of seeing Radio Moscow 15-plus times last year, and I can’t honestly say there was a night that wasn’t better than the night before it. Griggs, bassist Anthony Meier and drummer Paul Marrone were out supporting the band’s fourth record, Magical Dirt (review here), which they’ve been doing more or less nonstop since before the album was actually released, playing Europe, South America and the US on a never-ending tour that seems to bounce from one continent to another only to wind up back where it started and going for another round. Air tight on stage with deadly swing, blazing guitar work and enough fuzz to fill any evening’s quota, Radio Moscow have evolved into one of the US’ finest heavy rock acts, ahead of the trend in their ’70s worship and moving faster than most of us mortals can hope to keep up with.

Hope you enjoy.

—

If it seems like I’m ending the week early, maybe I am, but if it makes you feel any better I plan to spend the better part of my Friday evening working anyway. I’m fortunate enough to be editing the Roadburn daily ‘zine again this year, and we’ve gotten some copy in that we’ll try to place ahead of time that needs to be formatted and gone through for grammar and whatnot, so I’m on that tonight. Well overdue, actually. Been a crazy couple weeks to say the least of it.

Speaking of, tomorrow I travel south to NYC for the Enslaved, YOB, Witch Mountain and Ecstatic Vision show in Manhattan. Goes without saying that I am very much looking forward to this gig. I’ll have a review up Monday, but unless a piano falls on my head sometime between now and then, I’m anticipating one of the best nights of the year.

In addition to that review, look out Monday for a track premiere from Acid King, and Tuesday for an album stream from Wake up Lucid and track premiere from Hot Lunch both. That’s right, doubling up. I’ll also have reviews of Monolord and Six Organs of Admittance hopefully before the end of next week, and I interviewed Tad Doyle of Brothers of the Sonic Cloth earlier this week, so I’m going to try to get that transcribed as well. Because, you know, not like I have anything else going on. Ha.

Oh, might also do a video premiere for Band of Spice, but it’s not 100 percent locked in yet. We’ll see.

Hope you have a great and safe weekend. If you’re hitting that show tomorrow in New York, I’ll see you there, and otherwise, I hope you’re having a blast wherever you’re at.

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