I’ll be honest, I don’t even want to talk about how well this Quarterly Review is going because I worry about screwing it up. It’s always a lot of work to round up 10 records per day, even if there’s a single or and EP snuck in there, but it’s been a long time now that I’ve been doing things this way — sometimes as a means of keeping up, sometimes to herald things to come, usually just a way to write about things I want to write about regardless of timeliness — and it’s always worth it. I’ve had a couple genuinely easy days here. Easier than expected. Obviously that’s a win.

So while I wait for the other shoe to drop, let’s keep the momentum going.

Quarterly Review #61-70:

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Massive Hassle, Unreal Damage

Brotherly two-piece Massive Hassle, comprised of brothers Bill Fisher and Marty Fisher — who played together in Mammothwing and now both feature in Church of the Cosmic Skull — get down with another incredibly complex set of harmonized ’70s-style soul-groovers, nailing it as regards tone and tempo from the big riff that eats “Lost in the Changes” to the strums and croons early in the penultimate “Tenspot,” hitting a high note together in that song that gives over to stark and wistful standalone guitar meander that with barely a minute ago gorgeously becomes a bittersweet triumph of nostalgic fuzz reminiscent of Colour Haze‘s “Fire” and having the sheer unmitigated gall to tell the world around them it’s no big deal by naming the band Massive Hassle and stating that as the thing they most want to avoid. When they did Number One (review here) in 2023, it felt like they were proving the concept. With Unreal Damage, they’re quietly pushing limits.

Massive Hassle on Facebook

Massive Hassle website

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Iress, Sleep Now, In Reverse

Iress are the Los Angeles-based four-piece of Michelle Malley (vocals), Michael Maldonado (bass), Glenn Chu (drums) and Graham Walker (guitar). Sleep Now, In Reverse is their fourth full-length in nearly 15 years of existence. As a record, it accomplishes a lot of things, but what you need to understand is that where it most succeeds and stands itself out is in bringing together a heavy post-rock sound — heavygaze, as the kids don’t say because they don’t know what it is — with emotive expression on vocals, a blending of ethereal and the most human and affecting, and when Malley lets loose in the payoff of “Mercy,” it’s an early highlight with plenty more to follow. It’s not that Iress are reinventing genre — evolving, maybe? — but what they’re doing with it is an ideal unto itself, taking those aspects from across an aesthetic range and incorporating them into a whole, at times defiantly cohesive sound, lush but clearheaded front to back.

Iress on Facebook

Dune Altar store

Church Road Records store

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Magmakammer, Before I Burn

When the band put the shimmying “Apocalypse Babes” up as a standalone single last year, it was some five years after their debut full-length, 2018’s Mindtripper (review here) — though there was a split between — so not an insignificant amount of time for Norway’s Magmakammer to expand on their methods and dig into the songs. To be sure, “Doom Jive” and “Zimbardo” still have that big-hook, Uncle Acid-style dirty garage buzz that lends itself so well to cultish themes but thankfully here is about more than murder. And indeed, the band seems to have branched out a bit, and the eight-song/43-minute Before I Burn is well served by divergences like the closing “I Will Guide Your Hand” or the way “Cult of Misanthropy” sounds like a studio outtake on a bootleg from 1969 until they kick it open around a build of marching guitar, even as it stays loyal to Magmakammer‘s core stylistic purposes. A welcome return.

Magmakammer on Facebook

Kozmik Artifactz store

Evil Noise Recordings store

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Evel, Omen EP

The kind of sludge rock Ohio’s Evel play, informed by Mondo Generator‘s druggy, volatile heavy punk and C.O.C.‘s Southern metal nod, maybe a bit of High on Fire in “Alaska,” with a particularly Midwestern disappointment-in-everything that would’ve gone over well at Emissions From the Monolith circa 2003, isn’t what’s trendy. It’s not the cool thing. It doesn’t care about that, or about this review, or about providing social media content to maximize its algorithmic exposure. I’m not knocking any of that — especially the review, which is going swimmingly; I promise a point is coming — but if Evel‘s six-songer debut EP, Omen, is a foretell of things to come, the intention behind it is more about the catharsis of the writing/performance than trying to play to ‘scene’-type expectations. It is a pissed-off fuckall around which the band — which features guitarist/vocalist Alex Perekrest, also of Red Giant — will continue to build as “Dust Angel” and the swinging “Dawn Patrol” already find them doing. The going will likely be noisy, and that’s just fine.

Evel on Facebook

Evel on Bandcamp

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Satan’s Satyrs, After Dark

Some six years and one reunion after their fourth album, 2018’s The Lucky Ones (review here), Virginia-born classic heavy barnburners Satan’s Satyrs are back with a fifth collection beating around riffs from Sabbath and the primordial ooze of heavy that birthed them, duly brash and infectious in their energy. Founding bassist/vocalist Clayton Burgess and guitarist Jarrett Nettnin are joined in the new incarnation of the band by guitarist Morgan McDaniel (also Mirror Queen) and drummer Russ Yusuf — though Sean Saley has been with them for recent live shows — and as they strut and swing through “Saltair Burns” like Pentagram if they’d known how to play jazz but were still doom, or the buzzy demo-style experimentation of “Genuine Turquoise,” which I’m just going to guess came together differently than was first expected. So much the better. They’ve never been hugely innovative, but Satan’s Satyrs have consistently delivered at this point across a span of more than a decade and they have their own spin on the style. They may always be a live band, but at least in my mind, there’s not much more one would ask that After Dark doesn’t deliver.

Satan’s Satyrs on Instagram

Tee Pee Records website

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Whoopie Cat, Weight in Gold

Delivered through Kozmik Artifactz, Weight in Gold is the second long-player from Melbourne, Australia’s Whoopie Cat, and it meets the listener at the intersection of classic, ’70s-style heavy blues rock and prog. Making dynamic use of a dual-vocal approach in “Pretty Baby” after establishing tone, presence and craft as assets with the seven-minute opening title-track, the band are unflinchingly modern in production even as they lean toward vintage-style song construction, and that meld of intention results in an organic sound that’s not restricted by the recording. Plus it’s louder, which doesn’t hurt most of the time. In any case, as Whoopie Cat follow-up their 2018 debut, Illusion of Choice, they do so with distinction and the ability to convey a firm grasp on their songwriting and convey a depth of intention from the what-if-Queen-but-blues “Icarus” or the consuming Hammondery of closer “Oh My Love.” Listening, I can’t help but wonder how far into prog they might ultimately go, but they’ve found a sweetspot in these songs that’s between styles, and they fit right in it.

Whoopie Cat on Facebook

Kozmik Artifactz store

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Earth Tongue, Great Haunting

Cheeky, heavy garage punk surely will not be enough to save the immortal souls of Earth Tongue from all their devil worship and intricate vocal patterning. And honestly the New Zealand two-piece — I could’ve sworn I saw something about them moving to Germany, but maybe they just had a really good Berlin show? — sound fine with that. Guitarist Gussie Larkin and drummer Ezra Simons benefit from the straightforward outward nature of their songs. That is, “Out of This Hell,” “The Mirror,” “Bodies Dissolve Tonight!” and any of the other nine inclusions on the record that either were or could’ve been singles, are catchy and tightly written. They’re not overplayed or underplayed, and they have enough tonal force in Larkin‘s guitar that the harder churn of closer “The Reluctant Host” can leave its own impression and still feel fluid alongside some of Great Haunting‘s sweeter psych-punk. Wherever they live, the two-piece make toys out of pop and praise music so that even “Miraculous Death” sounds like, and is, fun.

Earth Tongue on Facebook

In the Red Records website

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Las Historias, House of Pain (Demos)

The collection House of Pain (Demos) takes its title from the place where guitarist/vocalist Tomas Iramain recorded them alongside bassist Matias Maltratador and drummer Jorge Iramain, though whether it’s a studio, rehearsal space, or an actual house, I won’t profess to know. Tomas is the lone remaining member carried over from the band’s 2020 self-titled LP, and the other part of what you need to know about House of Pain (Demos) can also be found in the title: it’s demos. Do not expect a studio sound full of flourish and nuance. Reportedly most of the songs were tracked with two Shure SM57s (the standard vocal mic), save for “Nomad” and “The Way I Am,” I guess because one broke? The point is, as raw as they are — and they are raw — these demos want nothing for appeal. The bounce in the bonus-track-type “Mountain (Take 1)” feels like a Dead Meadowy saunter, and for all of its one-mic-ness, “Nomad” gives a twist on ’50s and early ’60s guitar instrumentals that’s only bolstered by the recording. I’m not saying Las Historias should press up 10,000 LPs immediately or anything, but if this was the record, or maybe an EP and positioned as more substantial than the demos, aside from a couple repeated tracks, you could do far worse. “Hell Bird” howls, man. Twice over.

Last Historias on Instagram

Electric Valley Records website

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Aquanaut, Aquanaut

Certainly “Come With Me” and others on Aquanaut‘s self-titled debut have their desert rocking aspects, but there’s at least as much The Sword as Kyuss in what the Trondheim, Norway, newcomers unfurl on their self-titled, self-released debut, and when you can careen like in “Gamma Rays,” maybe sometimes you don’t need anything else. The seven-track/35-minute outing gets off to a bluesy, boozy start with “Lenéa,” and from there, Aquanaut are able to hone an approach that has its sludgier side in some of the Eyehategod bark of “Morality” but that comes to push increasingly far out as it plays through, so that “Living Memories” soars as the finale after the mid-tempo fuzzmaking of “Ivory,” and so Aquanaut seem to have a nascent breadth working for them in addition to the vigor of a young band shaping a collective persona. The generational turnover in Norway is prevalent right now with a number of promising debuts and breakouts in the last couple years. Aquanaut have a traditionalism at their core but feel like they want to break it as much as celebrate it, and if you’re the type to look for ‘bands to watch,’ that’s a reason to watch. Or even listen, if you’re feeling especially risk-friendly.

Aquanaut on Facebook

Aquanaut on Bandcamp

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Ghost Frog, Galactic Mini Golf

While I would be glad to be writing about Ghost Frog‘s quirky heavy-Weezerism and psychedelic chicanery even if their third album, Galactic Mini Golf didn’t have a song called “Deep Space Nine Iron” on it, I can’t lie and say that doesn’t make the prospect a little sweeter. It’s an interlude and I don’t even care — they made it and it’s real. The Portland, Oregon, four-piece of guitarist/vocalist Quinn Schwartz, guitarist/synthesist Karl Beheim, bassist Archie Heald and drummer Vincent LiRocchi (the latter making his first appearance) keep somewhat to a golfy theme, find another layer’s worth of heavy on “Shadow Club,” declare themselves weird before you even press play and reinforce the claim in both righteous post-grunge roll of “Burden of Proof” and the new wave rock of “Bubble Guns” before the big ol’ stompy riff in “Black Hole in One’ leads to a purposeful whole-album finish. Some things don’t have to make the regular kind of sense, because they make their own kind. Absurd as the revelry gets, Ghost Frog make their own kind of sense. Maybe you’ll find it’s also your kind of sense and that’s how we learn things about ourselves from art. Have a great rest of your day.

Ghost Frog on Facebook

Ghost Frog on Bandcamp

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Kind of an odd Quarterly Review, huh? I know. The two extra days. Well, here’s the thing. I’ve already got the better part of a 50-record QR booked for next month. I’ve slid a few of those albums in here to replace things I already covered blah blah whatever, but there’s just a ton of stuff out right now, and a lot of it I want to talk about, so yeah. I tacked on the two extra days here to get to 70 records, and in May we’ll do another 50, and if you want to count that as Spring (I can’t decide yet if I do or not; if you’ve got an opinion, I’d love to hear it in the comments), that’s 120 records covered even if I start over and go from 1-50 instead of 71-120. Any way you go, it’s nearly enough that you could listen to two records per week for the next full year based just on two weeks and two days of posts.

That’s insane. And yet here we are. Two weeks in a row wouldn’t have been enough, and any more than that and I get so backed up on other stuff that whatever stress I undercut by covering a huge swath in the QR is replaced by being so behind on everything that isn’t said QR. Does that make sense at all? No? Well fine then. Shit.

Quarterly Review #51-60:

Ecstatic Vision, Live at Duna Jam

This is a good thing for everyone. Here’s why: For the band? Easy. They get a new thing to sell at the merch table on their upcoming European tour. Win. For the label? Obviously the cash from whatever they sell, plus the chance to showcase one of their acts tearing it up on European soil. “Check out how awesome this shit is plus we’re behind it.” Always good for branding. For fans of the band, well, you already know you need it. I don’t have to tell you that. But Ecstatic Vision‘s Live at Duna Jam — as a greater benefit to the universe around it — runs deeper than that. It’s an example to follow. You wanna see, wanna hear how it’s done? This is how it’s done, kids. You get up on that stage, step out on that beach, and you throw everything you have into your art, every fucking time. This is who Ecstatic Vision are. They’re the band who blow minds like the trees in the old videos of A-bomb tests. They’ve got six songs here, a clean 38-minute live LP, and for the betterment of existence in general, you can absolutely hear in it the ferocity with which Ecstatic Vision deliver live. The fact that it’s from Duna Jam — the ultimate Eurofest daydream — is neat, but so help me gawd they could’ve recorded it in a Philly basement and they’d still be this visceral. That’s who they are. And if we, as listeners, are lucky, others will hear this and follow their example.

Ecstatic Vision on Facebook

Heavy Psych Sounds website

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Usnea, Bathed in Light

Oppressive in atmosphere regardless of volume but with plenty of volume to go around, Portland all-doomers Usnea return after six years with their third full-length, Bathed in Light, a grueling and ultimately triumph-of-death-ant work spanning six songs and 43 minutes of unremitting drear positioned in the newer-school vein of emotionally resonant extreme death-doom. Plodding until it isn’t, wrenching in its screams until it isn’t, the album blossoms cruelties blackened and crushing and makes the chanting in “Premeditatio Malorum” not at all out of place just the same, the slow-churning metal unrelentingly brutal as it shifts into caustic noise in that penultimate track — just one example among the many scattered throughout of the four-piece turning wretched sounds into consuming landscapes. The earlier guitar squeals on “The Compleated Sage” would be out of place if not for the throatripping and blastbeating happening immediately prior, and whether it’s the synth at the outset and the soaring guitar at the end of “To the Deathless” or the Bell Witchian ambient start to closer “Uncanny Valley” — the riff, almost stoner — before it bursts to violence at three minutes into its 8:27 on the way to a duly massive, guttural finish for the record, Usnea mine cohesion from contradictions and are apparently unscathed by the ringer through which they put their audience. Sometimes nothing but the most miserable will do.

Usnea on Facebook

Translation Loss Records store

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Oceanlord, Kingdom Cold

The more one listens to Kingdom Cold, the impressive Magnetic Eye Records debut LP from Melbourne, Australia’s Oceanlord, the more there is to hear. The subtle Patrick Walker-style edge in the vocals of “Kingdom” and the penultimate roller “So Cold,” the Elephant Tree-style nod riff in “2340,” the way the bass underscores the ambient guitar and layered melodies in “Siren,” the someone-in-this-band-listens-to-extreme-metal flashes in the guitar as “Isle of the Dead” heads into its midsection, and the way the shift into and through psychedelia seems so organic on closer “Come Home,” the three-piece seeming just to reach out further from where they’ve been standing all the while for the sake of adding even more breadth to the proceedings. If the Magnetic Eye endorsement didn’t already put you over the edge, I hope this will, because what Oceanlord seem to be doing — and what they did on their 2020 demo (review here), where “Isle of the Dead” and “Come Home” appeared — is to work from a foundation in doom and slow-heavy microgenres and pick the elements that most resonate with them as the basis for their songs. They bring them into their own context, which is not something everyone does on their fifth record, let alone their first. So if it’s hearing the potential that gets you on board, fine, but the important thing is you should just get on board. They’re onto something, and part of what I like about Kingdom Cold is I’m not sure what.

Oceanlord on Facebook

Magnetic Eye Records store

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Morass of Molasses, End All We Know

Thoroughly fuzzed and ready to rock, Reading, UK, three-piece Morass of Molasses follow 2019’s The Ties That Bind (review here) with their third album and Ripple Music label debut, End All We Know, breaking eight songs into two fascinatingly-close-to-even sides running a total of 37 minutes of brash swing and stomp as baritone guitarist/vocalist Bones Huse, bassist Phil Williams and drummer Raj Puni embrace more progressive constructions for their familiar and welcome tonal richness. With Huse‘s vocals settling into a Nick Oliveri-style bark on opener “The Origin of North” and the likes of “Hellfayre” and “Naysayer” on side A, the pattern seems to be set, but the key is third track “Sinkhole,” which prefaces some of the changes the four cuts on side B bring about, trading burl and brash for more dug in arrangements, psychedelic flourish on “Slingshot Around the Sun” and “Terra Nova” — they’re still grounded structurally, but the melodic reach expands significantly and the guitar twists in “Terra Nova” feel specifically heavy psych-derived — before “Prima Materia” combines those hazy colours with prog-rock insistences and “Wings of Reverie” meets metallic soloing with Elder-style expanse. Not a record they could’ve made five years ago, End All We Know comes through as a moment of realization for Morass of Molasses, and their delivery does justice to the ambition behind it.

Morass of Molasses on Facebook

Ripple Music website

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Fuzzy Grapes, Volume 1

Real headfucker, this one. And I’ll admit, the temptation to leave the review at that is significant, since so much of the intent behind Fuzzy Grapes‘ Volume 1 seems to be a headfirst dive into the deepweird, but the samples, effects, of course fuzz and gong-and-chant-laced brazenness with which the Flagstaff, Arizona, unit set out on “Sludge Fang,” the Mikael Åkerfeldtian growls in “Snake Dagger” and the art-surf poetry reading in “Dust of Three Strings” that becomes a future cavern of synth and noise before the “Interlude” of birdsong and meditative noodling mark a procession too individual to be ignored. Three songs, break, three songs, break goes the structure of the 25-minute debut offering from the five-piece outfit, and by the time “The Cosmic Throne” begins its pastoral progadelic “ahh”s and dreamy ride cymbal jazz, one should be well content to have no idea what’s coming next. Once upon a time elsewhere in the Southwest, there was a collective of kitchen-sink heavy punkers named Leeches of Lore, and Fuzzy Grapes tap some similar adventurousness of spirit, but rarely is a band so much their own thing their first time out. “Made of Solstice” harsh-barks to offset its indie-grunge verse, fleshing out the bassy roll with effects or keys from the chorus onward, jamming like Blind Melon just ran into Amon Amarth getting gas at the Circle K. “Goatcult” ties together some of it with the harsh/chant vocal blend and a cymbal-led push, finishing with the line “Every day the world is ending” before the epilogue “Outro” plays like a vintage 78RPM record singing something about when you’re dead. Don’t expect to understand it the first time though, or maybe the first eight, but know that it’s worth pursuing and meeting the band on their level. I want to hear what they do next and how/if their approach might solidify.

Fuzzy Grapes on Facebook

Fuzzy Grapes on Bandcamp

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Iress, Solace EP

Conveying genuine emotionality and reach in the vocals of Michelle Malley, the four-track Solace EP from L.A.’s Iress turns its humble 16 minutes into an expressive soundscape of what the kids these days seem to call doomgaze, with post-rock float in the guitar of Graham Walker (who makes his first appearance here) atop the solemn and heavy-bottomed grooves of bassist Michael Maldonado and drummer Glenn Chu for a completeness of experience that’s all the more immersive on headphones in a close-your-eyes kind of listen — that low contemplation of bass after 2:20 into “Soft,” for example, is one of a multitude of details worth appreciating — and though leadoff piece “Blush” begins with a quick rise of feedback and rolls forth with a distinct Jesu-style melancholy, Iress are no less effective or resonant in the sans-drums first two minutes of “Vanish” in accentuating atmosphere before the big crash-in finishes and “Ricochet” offers further dynamic display in its loud/quiet trades, graceful and unhurried in their transitions, the surge of the not-cloying hook densely weighted but not out of place either behind “Vanish” or ahead of “Soft,” even as it’s patience over impact being emphasized as Malley intones “I’m not ready” as a thread through the song. Permit me to disagree with that assessment. The whole band sounds ready, be it for a follow-up album to 2020’s Flaw (which was their second LP) or whatever else may come.

Iress on Facebook

Dune Altar website

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Frogskin, III – Into Disgust

Long-running Finnish troupe Frogskin ooze forth with extremity of purpose even before the harsh-throated declarations of 10-minute opener “Mistress Divine” kick in, and III – Into Disgust maintains the high (or purposefully low, depending on how you want to look at it) standard that initial millstone-slowness sets as “Of Vermin and Man” (8:30) continues the scathe and tension in its unfolding and the somehow-thicker, sample-inclusive centerpiece “Serpent Path” (7:21) highlights violent intention on the way to the shift that brings the atmosphere forward on the two-minute still-a-song “B.B.N.T.B.N.” — the acronym: ‘Bound by nature to be nothing’ — which feels likewise pathological and methodical ahead of closer “The Pyre” (11:46). One might expect in listening that at some point Frogskin will break out at a sprint and start either playing death or black metal, grindcore, etc., but no. They don’t. They don’t give you that. And that’s the point. You don’t get relief or release. There’s no safe energetic payoff waiting. III – Into Disgust is aural quicksand, exclusively. Do not expect mercy because there’s none coming.

Frogskin on Facebook

Iron Corpse store

Violence in the Veins website

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Albinö Rhino, Return to the Core

No strangers to working in longform contexts or casting spacier fare amid their doom-rooted riffery, Helsinki’s Albinö Rhino downplay the latter somewhat on their single-song Return to the Core full-length. Their first 12″ since 2016’s Upholder (review here), the trio of guitarist/vocalist/Moogist Kimmo Tyni, bassist/vocalist VH and drummer Viljami Väre welcome back Scott “Dr. Space” Heller (also of Space Rock Productions, Øresund Space Collective, etc.) for a synthy guest appearance and Mikko Heikinpoika on vocals and Olli Laamanen on keys, and the resultant scope of “Return to the Core” is duly broad, spreading outward from its acoustic-guitar beginning into cosmic doom rock with a thicker riff breaking doors down at 9:30 or so and a jammed-feeling journey into the greater ‘out there’ that ensues. That back and forth plays out a couple times as they manifest the title in the piece itself — the core being perhaps the done-live basic tracks then expanded through overdubs to the final form — but even when the song devolves starting after the solo somewhere around 22 minutes in, they’re mindful as well as hypnotic en route to the utter doom that transpires circa 24:30, and that they finish in a manner that ties together both aspects tells you there’s been a plan at work all along. They execute it with particular refinement and fluidity.

Albinö Rhino on Facebook

Space Rock Productions website

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Cleõphüzz, Mystic Vulture

Self-released posthumous to the defunctification of the Quebecois band itself, Mystic Vulture ends up as a rousing swansong for what could’ve been from Cleõphüzz, hitting a nerve with “Desert Rider”‘s blend of atmosphere and grit, cello adding to the space between bass and guitar before the engrossing gang chants round out. With its 46 minutes broken into the two sides of the vinyl issue it will no doubt eventually receive, the eight-song offering — their debut, by the way — makes vocal points of the extended “Desperado” with its organ (I think?) mixed in amid the classic-style fuzz and “Shutdown in the Afterlife” bringing the strings further to the center in an especially spacious close. But whether it’s there or in the respective intros “The End” and “Sarcophage” or the proggy float of “Sortilège” or the Canadiana instrumental and vocal exploration of the title-track itself, Mystic Vulture flows easily across its material, varied but not so far out as to lose its human underpinning, and is more journey than destination. It’s gotten some hype — I think in part because the band aren’t together anymore; heavy music always wants what it can’t have — but in arrangement as well as songwriting, Cleõphüzz crafted the material here with a clear sense of perspective, and the apparent loss of potential becomes part of hearing the album. Some you win, some you lose. At least they got this out.

Cleõphüzz on Facebook

Cleõphüzz on Bandcamp

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Arriver, Azimuth

Expansive metal. Azimuth is the fourth long-player and first in seven years from Chicago progressive/post-metallers Arriver, who answer melody with destruction and crunch with sprawl. From opener “Reenactor” onward, they follow structural paths that are as likely to meld meditative psych with death metal (looking at you, “Only On”) as they are to combust in charred punker aggro rage on “Constellate” or second track “Knot.” The 10-minute penultimate title-track would seem to represent the crossroads at which these ideas meet — a summary as much as anything could hope to be — but even that isn’t the end of it as “None More Unknown” makes dramatic folkish proclamations before concluding with a purposeful nod. “In the Only” winds lead guitar through what might otherwise be post-hardcore, while “Carrion Sun” duly reeks of death in the desert, the complexity of the drum work alone lending gotta-hear status. Plenty of bands claim to be led by their songs. I won’t say I know how Arriver assembled these pieces to make the entirety of Azimuth, but if the band were to say they sat back and let the record write itself and follow its own impulses, I’d believe them more than most. Bound to alienate as well as engage, it is its own thing in its own place, and commanding in its moments of epiphany.

Arriver on Facebook

Arriver on Bandcamp

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So I kinda wanted to hear some old shit alongside all the new shit, which I guess I feel okay about. I don’t know. Sometimes I feel like every second of every show has to be super-recent as much as possible to get word out about new bands again as much as possible — and again again as much as possible to the extent of whatever the audience for this show is; I honestly have no idea — but that’s not even close to being true in reality. I could play Death, no one would give a shit.

I should play Death. Next show if I remember, which I’m saying up front is like 70/30 no.

Anyway, so old High on Fire into new Dozer and Altered States’ recent “The Crossing” crossing with The Hidden Hand’s “The Crossing” from their brilliant 2004 opus, and JAAW feeding into Celtic Frost feeding into Vape Warlök. Fucking a. This show’s pretty good. I hope I don’t ruin it by, you know, talking.

A few albums here I’m looking forward to knowing better. Swanmay for sure, JAAW absolutely, and I might even say that of Dozer, perhaps into perpetuity or at very least until long after I’ve reviewed it and hailed it as one of the best albums of the year — which I don’t even feel shy in saying because it’s a fucking given — and Bongzilla, because they’re Bongzilla and I’m glad they’re putting out records. They’re a needed reminder of how even the heaviest things can be made to float.

Thanks if you listen to this show. If not, it happens, but thanks for reading anyhow. If you stumbled here and have no idea what I’m talking about, you might still consider checking out a band or two from the playlist and find something to make your day better.

The Obelisk Show airs 5PM Eastern today on the Gimme app or at: http://gimmemetal.com.

Full playlist:

The Obelisk Show – 03.31.23 (VT = voice track)

High on Fire	10,000 Years	The Art of Self-Defense (2001)
Dozer	Dust for Blood	Drifting in the Endless Void
Devoidov	Stab	Stab
MiR	Altar of Liar	Season Unknown
VT
Mars Red Sky & Queen of the Meadow	Maps of Inferno	Mars Red Sky & Queen of the Meadow
Black Rainbows	Superhero Dopeproof	Superskull
Lammping	Better Know Better	Better Know Better
Oceanlord	2340	Kingdom Cold
Arriver	Azimuth	Azimuth
Altered States	The Crossing	Survival
The Hidden Hand	The Crossing	Mother Teacher Destroyer (2004)
Iress	Ricochet	Solace
Grin	Nothingness	Black Nothingness
Bongzilla	Hippie Stick	Dab City
MWWB	Logic Bomb	The Harvest (2022)
Swanmay	Stone Cold	Frantic Feel
VT
JAAW	Rot	Supercluster
Celtic Frost	A Dying God Coming into Human Flesh	Monotheist (2005)
Vape Warlök	Inhale Death	Inhale Death (2022)

The Obelisk Show on Gimme Metal airs every Friday 5PM Eastern, with replays Sunday at 7PM Eastern. Next new episode is April 14 (subject to change). Thanks for listening if you do.

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