Yes, German genre-engulfing post-whatever troupe are heading out on another round of tour dates this Fall. Killer. They’ll be out through most of October and into November, and while they don’t seem as yet to have come to the attention of the Euro festival circuit — something which I imagine their next album will correct — they’ve amassed a significant run between cities across their home country and reaching into neighboring nations.

All well and good. Great, in fact, since touring is exactly what they should be doing at this point, both to build their fanbase and refine their own processes. But I have an issue that I was wondering if you could help me with:

As you scroll down to the tour dates, you’ll notice they’re in bold. I didn’t bold them. The band did. And it’s not done in any kind of html or whathaveyou that I can strip out. I’m sure this makes me old and ignorant — both of which I’ll cop to being — but I don’t know how to make it the plain old text that I turn PR wire blue. So yeah, if you know how to do that, and you could tell me, I’d appreciate it. This isn’t the first time I’ve run into that, but I’m trying to teach my kid to ask for help when she needs it, and so am also putting that into practice for myself. I can’t even find the right phrasing to Google it, and when I ask the Bing AI, it has no clue what I’m talking about. I just don’t want it to be bold, and I want the fonts to match, and I can’t do that in WordPress, apparently.

Thanks if you can help. If not, still good for Coltaine going on tour. Here’s the info:

We’re hyped to announce our next three-week adventure through Europe:

Forgotten Ways European Tour 2023

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✠: with @allochiria.the.band
◆: with @vampyresband

This will be our first time in Poland, Belgium, and Luxembourg. During the first half of the tour, we’ll be joined by post-sludgers Allochiria from Athens, Greece. And for the second half of the tour, our long-time friends ‘Vampyres’ from Austria will join. It’s going to be a lot of fun!

We look forward to meeting each and every one of you on the road!

Coltaine:
Julia Frasch – vocals
Moritz Berg – guitar
Benedikt Berg – bass
Amin Bouzeghaia – drums

https://www.facebook.com/coltaineband
https://www.instagram.com/coltaine/
https://coltaine.bandcamp.com/
https://linktr.ee/coltaine

Coltaine, “Gorit” (2023)

On Aug. 4, which is tomorrow, German post-genre rockers Coltaine will release their new digital single “Gorit.” The song runs five and a half minutes and was captured live in June along with the video premiering below, following a second round of touring the band had done alongside Russian-born dark folk singer-songwriter Kariti earlier this Winter/Spring. It has enough scope to fill a full-length. With elements of sludge, post-rock, post-metal, heavy rock, noise, black metal, psychedelia, doom and some genuinely admirable brutality from vocalist Julia Frasch after its feedback-barrage of a break, “Gorit” finds Coltaine in their element manifesting a progression all their own. Here they pummel more than soothe — and I’m not complaining about that; we all gotta take a beating sometimes — but as their most recent album, 2020’s Afterhour in Walhalla (discussed here), demonstrated, the band are capable of great aural kindnesses as well and just because they’re doing one thing in a given track, part, etc., doesn’t necessarily mean that’s also where the next song is headed.

The unpredictability, then, is part of the appeal going into “Gorit,” and Coltaine — Frasch on vocals, Moritz Berg on guitar, Benedikt Berg on bass, Amin Bouzeghaia making his first studio appearance here on drums — offer crush beyond what one might have expected anyhow. With its still-catchy chorus screamed in Russian and a trajectory that shifts from its initial post-sludge push through an ambient pullback into a mellow part made tense by the toms, slowly building through the measures of the pre-chorus before surging back with the hook itself at full volume/impact. Just before two minutes in, they swap out for a stoner rock riff — don’t tell anybody; I think it’s a secret — and Moritz takes a plotted lead over it, not flashy but effective, and the mid-paced insistence of that riff is more fervent for his return after.

You don’t know it yet, but the band are about to throw down. With his headstock on the floor first and then the drop ceiling, Moritz squeals out harsh amplified noise as Benedikt and Bouzeghaia dig into the slowdown with vital force. In the video premiering below, Frasch kneels in front of the drums and makes ready to unleash the above-noted punishment. Laced with echo enough to be cavernous, she joins the lurch and lends the crescendo the destructive presence it has earned before the final minute gives over to a noise-wash comedown, ending in feedback as the clip fades out, somehow seeming short at 5:39 when one considers the amount of ground Coltaine cover. And not just cover, but bring together, because while the band might flash an element of this or that stylistic particularity along the way, their sound is cohesive all the while, purposeful even at its most unhinged. They’ve got a new video now to (further) prove it.

And you’ll find it below, followed by some more comment from the band, recording info, upcoming shows, and so on.

Please enjoy:

Coltaine, “Gorit” live in studio premiere

Benedikt Berg on “Gorit”:

“‘Gorit’ was written by us during a very difficult time. We always played the song last on the ‘Tales of Southern Lands’ tour. However, by now, we also associate positive feelings with the song. Even though the world has still darkened, the many different people we encountered at our concerts in Europe have given us a lot of strength and hope. It is the first song we recorded with Amin Bouzeghaia, who joined Coltaine on the drums during the ‘Summer Death Anthems’ tour in September 2022.”

Spotify, Bandcamp and Youtube release date: August 4th

“Gorit” is a powerful and diverse song that explores themes of burning pain and Weltschmerz. It delves into various subjects, including closure, loss, emotional burden, adaptation to authority, remorse, and the pursuit of reconciliation. The lyrics are written in English and Russian. The live session for “Gorit” was filmed in one continuous take, capturing the raw energy of the band’s performance. The song was recorded in Coltaine’s rehearsal room in Karlsruhe, Germany.

Formed by the Berg brothers, Moe and Benedikt, in 2014, Coltaine emerged in the Black Forest of southern Germany. Channeling their emotions into a unique sound, their music blends 70’s rock, black metal, and ethereal melodies with powerful rock and metal arrangements. Fronted by the versatile singer, Jules, their atmospheric sound spans from soulful harmonies to the darkest growls. With Amin’s relentless drumming, Coltaine’s lineup promises an exciting future.

Lyrics:
This whole canon is final.
Burning into the sky.
The fallen, your child is haunting.
You can’t forget all those fights.

горит, горит
душа горит
сердце болит

(engl.: Burning, burning, the soul is burning, my heart aches)

Adjust to leaders.
Soul lost for real.
Tell my careless trait.
I’ve hurt your soul.

– “Gorit” recorded on June 30th in Karlsruhe, Germany by Coltaine.
– Audio captured by Jables.
– Mixed & Mastered by Alex Pojda at Holodeckstudio.
https://www.holodeckstudio.de
– Live session video filmed and edited by Jonas Berg.

Coltaine’s next shows:
13/08 DORTMUND Junkyard Rock with Messa
15/08 MUNICH Backstage München with Messa + Crowbar

BAND MEMBERS
Julia Frasch – vocals
Moritz Berg – guitar
Benedikt Berg – bass
Amin Bouzeghaia – drums

Coltaine, Afterhour in Walhalla (2020)

Coltaine on Instagram

Coltaine on Facebook

Coltaine on Bandcamp

Coltaine on Spotify

Coltaine on Songkick

Coltaine links

It was late — but not that late; there was work to be done after all — on one night or another of this year’s Freak Valley Festival in Germany, which I was electrified with gratitude for witnessing. I was catching a ride back to the little hotel where I was staying who first didn’t, then did, have a room for me, and chatting to the volunteer driving the shuttle about the day, music, and so on. I am rarely “chatty,” but it had been a very good day, and I feel comfortable saying that without remembering specifically which day it was. Her name was Jule, short for Julia Frasch, and over the course of the seven minutes or so, I found out she was the lead vocalist in Coltaine on the band’s 2020 album, Afterhour in Walhalla. I had the Bandcamp page on my phone before I even opened the door to get out of the vehicle, and made the investment more or less immediately upon entering my room. That was June, and I’ve been working to get my head around the record one way or another since.

Based in Karlsruhe, Coltaine would seem to have made crossing genre lines central to their purpose since the outset. Founded by guitarist/vocalist Moritz Berg, and bassist Benedikt Berg under the somehow-less-memorable-but-hey-witches-gotta-get-some-too moniker Witchfucker, the band’s first outing in 2014, Üntrve Bläck Metäl — pressed in an edition of 30 CDs; there are five left as of this post — immediately engaged with the idea of knowing the rules and standards by which styles are designated and shirking them. The personnel and name of the project may have changed, but listening to the psychedelic ritualized char of Afterhour in Walhalla‘s periodically-saxed 11-song/47-minute run, the core intention would seem to be the change. With Michelle Langer on drums, Frasch on lead vocals, and flutist/saxophonist/percussionist Stephan Schimassek in the six-piece lineup, plus guests Julie Grimmer (vocals, percussion) and Fast Fred (percussion), the pulling together, mixing, separating, reconfiguring of aesthetic is central to what Coltaine do.

Songs occupy spaces minimal or overwhelming, beginning with the procession-into-the-water of “Surfing Skeleton Undead,” which gathers itself over the course of its first minute and comes to a swell of blackened heavy psych rock and atmospheric density. Wherever the album goes thereafter, whether it’s the intertwining melodies and shouts and swirls of “God is Nature, God is Dead” or the three-minute mood-guitar/croon of “Berge,” it remains decisively not-metal, and basks in the freedom of movement allowed for that. Afterhour in Walhalla is the band’s sophomore full-length following 2016’s Mutter Morgana — they have a slew of other live offerings, EPs, two-songers, and so on as well, before and after this record — and while I don’t know over how long a period its material came together, the prevailing vibe is expansive enough, especially as the album proceeds into its second half, to make me think it was spread over some time. “Berge” begets the sharper tension of “Verlust,” a different version of which appeared on the first LP, and the flute, acoustics, chimes and chants of “Green Table,” the ritualized psychedelic aspects of which speak to the spirit of everything that surrounds even as they come to purposeful contradiction in the “eins, zwei, drei, vier” count-in at the start of the buzz-toned, dual-vocal, oh-and-a-tambourine-because-of-course blackened punk rock of “Kreative Freiheit” that ends side A in such a manner as to highlight the point that Coltaine — or Witchfucker as they were at the time — have loosed the reins of their aural inhibitions and that the fire-on-the-hillside-at-dusk vibe as depicted on the cover art is very much alive in the music.

That becomes even more true (or ‘trve,’ perhaps, at least to itself) as the whoops and howls in the early going of the nine-minute “Warsong” make an especially ethereal launch for side B. A significant achievement unto itself, “Warsong” is rife with art-rock pulse, Grace Slickian vocal declarations, psychedelic jazz and echoing tremolo guitar, a bit of mouth harp at the end as it comes apart making it feel as though somehow the jam was just starting even as it finished. Interludes play more of a role on the second half of the album than the first, with “Wüstling” renewing the chimes and flute of “Green Table” amid some added shaker, light percussion and fingers sliding on guitar strings before “Reflections,” and the penultimate “Waterfallout” with its toy piano or whatever that is and deep-mixed fuzzy electric guitar ahead of the finale “Intergalaktische Mondzuckerpiraten,” which raises the crucial question, if Coltaine aren’t intergalactic moon-sugar pirates, then who is? Certainly I have no idea.

The back and forth aspect of Afterhour in Walhalla‘s latter half, thankfully, does not come with a loss of focus on the part of the band. “Warsong” is a marked accomplishment in vibe and spaciousness, and “Reflections” solidifies around impulses toward psychedelic and progressive black metal shown earlier but dispenses with the harsher shouts and screams, leaving a fluid-sounding ghost of extremity in their place amid the saxophone, rolling groove and forward-thinking arrangement. “Intergalaktische Mondzuckerpiraten” follows suit in closing the record, so that, having eaten whatever ayahuasca-esque lysergic plant — organically grown, no pesticides — was on offer with “Warsong,” the listener then careens into and out of lucidity through the final four cuts. It is Coltaine‘s willful defiance of the rules of genre that make this world-building possible, and as much as one so often is tempted to compartmentalize music, they show what can happen when the mission becomes to encompass, not to limit, various styles and methods. It is refreshing how individualized Afterhour in Walhalla ultimately is.

Aside from the name change, Coltaine have continued to stay busy in terms of music as well. 2021 wrought the lockdown jams collection, Bäd Vibez Önly – Aufarbeitung einer Krise, and earlier-2022 brought the live single “When Tigers Used to Smoke (Live)” as a 10-minute preview of what reportedly will be the opening track of their third full-length. That may or may not change as Coltaine move toward that eventuality, but the song is an adventure just the same, and with the band recently announcing tour dates alongside mournful folk singer-songwriter Kariti, one way or another, they’re clearly starting to think about moving past this record and on to the next.

So be it. What will come will come when it comes. I’m just glad I got to hear this one, and as always, I hope you enjoy too.

Thanks for reading.

—

5:49AM. Kid is expected awake any minute now. It’s been at least a week, maybe two, since he slept this late. We went to the zoo yesterday and I guess I kind of ran him into the ground. Good. He needs that. Was falling asleep on the couch next to me during end-of-day-comedown tv time yesterday evening, which is also rare. No fever, if that’s your next question. It’s usually mine at this point, even though we’re all vaccinated and so on.

It was a hard week. In the continuing saga of me being off my meds, I feel a bit more even this week but am generally speaking from a lower place in myself, and I think if you look around here at some of what I’ve written over the last few days, you can see that.

Ah, here he comes down the stairs…

I emailed a friend yesterday about burnout. I rarely do that kind of thing. Most of my relationships are transactional. My “friends” are my friends when they have new albums or tours coming. But I have been feeling hard exhaustion, before and after coming back from Psycho Las Vegas, and am somewhat at a loss how to handle it. I’m tired. Tired of emails. Tired of Facebook. Tired of tour announcements for European bands hitting the road in October and tired even more from caring about it. He told me he meditates for half an hour in the morning, has his routine, tries to find time to relax during the day. I’m not really in a place where I can do that kind of thing, the routine notwithstanding. If I have a spare minute, and even if I don’t, if I’m sitting on my phone during the aforementioned tv time, I’m trying to write. The sad truth is I need this. I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a part of me who feels pathetic knowing that.

Homeboy, who would perhaps raise an eyebrow at being referred to as such, expressed faith that I’d sort my shit out. Based on my 40-plus years of very much not, I have my doubts, but the sentiment was appreciated.

Nonetheless we proceed. Burnt or not. Next week is packed, the week after is packed, and the two weeks after that are the Quarterly Review. I told that to The Patient Mrs. last night as she was talking about going to Montreal for a conference the week of the 15th and she said, “happy anniversary baby,” because that’ll be the second week of the Quarterly Review. I said give me a fucking break. She said she was just joking. I said in that case, give me two breaks. We went to bed. That’s life.

Anyway, The Pecan starts school next Tuesday, so that will help get me more time to work and take some of the edge off that has built up over the course of this Summer of Pivot. The Patient Mrs. starting her semester, first full week this week, is added stress, so these things balance out, but we keep going. That’s the thing, keep going. Someone told me this week I was doing a good job as a parent. I damn near cried. No one who actually knows me says that. Certainly not anyone who’s actually seen me parent. I’m fucking awful. I hover. I over-parent. I get mad. I get sad. I grab him and move him and threaten to take shit away because that’s basically the only time he’ll listen to me and, say, stop pushing a 45-year-old woman out of his way at the touch-tank at the zoo. All your bullshit, there it is. I knew going into becoming a father that I would be the source of this kid’s emotional baggage owing to the circumstances of his birth, the donor sperm, all kinds of families, however else we reframe the narrative of ‘daddy shoots blanks so we had to bring in outside help’ to make it palatable/livable for all, but adding to that baggage because I can’t let go of my own crap is a downward emotional spiral that I’ve been riding for the better part of the last five years. Longer even. It’s all part of the same, thoroughly fucked, thing. Me. I’m the problem. Always. So much old shame.

I’m trying. I’m doing my best. Every day, I’m doing my best. And I’m failing all the time.

Oh yeah, fuck Scott Kelly though. At least I’m not beating anybody or trying to convince anyone I’m anything other than a fucking mess. Low bar, perhaps. Fine.

Monday is Labor Day in the US, which is fucking laughable since anytime someone starts talking about supporting worker’s rights or helping poor people in this country on any level more than a snarky tweet, they get assassinated. Happy Labor Day. Here’s a bullet in your face. I’m surprised we still get the day off. The sad American progressive left, waiting for the day when being right about a whole bunch of shit will be enough to actually convince anyone to support a cause. Don’t hold your breath.

I’m gonna go before this gets any worse. Gimme show today, 5PM Eastern. I say “fuck” a few times in the first voice track. I got frustrated. I don’t know. It’s been a hard week. It’s been a hard summer. I’m ready to be done with it and shift into a different routine. I doubt I’ll have time to meditate then either, but I’ve stopped getting high every day, which I was doing for a few weeks there in my I’ll-make-a-habit-of-anything lifestyle (see also this site), and I treated myself to a new Pelican shirt, so if you want to end on a positive note, at least the shirt’s comfortable for now before it goes in the wash.

Have a great and safe weekend. Gonna go to a wedding on Saturday which will be fun and I’ve got two nights of shows in a row next week — Rammstein and Stöner — that are both in New Jersey. One I’ll write about. The other is Rammstein. Both will be awesome. Hope to see you out there, and thanks for reading in the meantime.

FRM.

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German post-metallic trio Codeia are most likely aware the allusion they’re making in the rather lengthy title of their second album. Due out through Hand of Doom Records on April 13, As He Turned Back Towards the Eye of the Storm indeed has its moments that seem in conversation with the patient ambience that genre-godfathers Neurosis brought to their 2004 effort, The Eye of Every Storm, but at five songs and a consuming 73 minutes, the Karlsruhe/Stuttgart-based trio bring together a host of other elements that would seem to be crafted toward bridging that kind of open, atmospheric minimalism with the mathematical crunch of Isis at their most intense, or some of Cult of Luna‘s more lush phrases. These are not unfamiliar aspects of post-metal, but through manipulating the textures at play especially over longform pieces like 20-minute opener “Canon of Echoes” and the 21-minute finale “Mantra-Karma,” the band smoothly execute shifts in volume and intensity in a way that is able to play toward stark contrasts when it so desires but draws itself forward in thoughtful fashion, maintaining conscious presence in the midst of hypnotic suggestion.

All but one of the inclusions on As He Turned Back Towards the Eye of the Storm — which, like the band’s name itself, is also stylized all-lowercase — starts out quiet and progresses toward an inevitable build in volume with a fine sonic detailing that is both emblematic of the style and fluidly executed by Codeia as it was on their 2017 debut, “Don’t be Afraid,” She Whispered and Disappeared (review here), and across both releases there is a clear move toward evocation. Guitarist Markus Liebich, bassist/vocalist Denis Schneider and drummer Timo Langhof aren’t just employing the combination of airy guitar effects and massive roll that provides the early apex of “Emerald Deception” for their own ends. They’re using them to construct a moving entity that is the album as a whole. It’s about putting the listener into a specific mental and emotional place, and even in the five-minute noise-wash centerpiece “Mantra,” they’re able to accomplish what they set out to do, whether it’s through effects, tonal weight, bellowed shouts or a sense of sonic drift.

The outlier, which starts at relative full-bore is “Medallion,” which has been broken into three parts for the purposes of video-making and, presumably, ease of consumption. A blasting intensity gives way gradually to barely-there minimalism, and the three-piece build back up to a nodding, crushing heft that recedes again to set the foundation of a last crescendo leading into the closer with a final resonant wisp of guitar ahead of the arrival at the footsteps of “Mantra-Karma.” Of course, no 73-minute full-length is going to be a minor undertaking — nor is it intended to be, on any level — but As He Turned Back Towards the Eye of the Storm holds sway over its extended runtime with an immersive vibe that calls all to worship alongside it.

“Medallion (Part III)” can be seen premiering below. When all three videos are out (“Part II” is yet forthcoming), they’ll be pieced together for the entirety of the song. Until then, please enjoy the clip below, followed by more info from the PR wire.

As He Turned Back Towards the Eye of the Storm is available to preorder now:

Codeia, “Medallion (Part III)” official video premiere

In comparison to their first record “don’t be afraid”, she whispered and disappeared, the new one as he turned back towards the eye of the storm feels more focused and determined than its predecessor. The band therefore likens their previous album to a prologue: “Our debut has introduced our characters, or influences. Now, the storyline unfolds and allows for a more complex character development.”

Spherical sound patterns, hypnotic repetitions, and progressive structures set the stage for facet-like lyrics. Some things, however, shouldn’t change – the band once more has made it their mission to capture a live-feel on the album, making sure to record all guitar loops live. A vinyl-only bonus track of 22 minutes as well as two contributions by N (Denovali Records, Midira Records) lend additional richness to the production.

Ultimately, the seamless transition between the two records gives an entirely new meaning to both, urging the listener to re-evaluate the known and unknown.

as he turned back towards the eye of the storm (produced by Tobias Stieler/Kokomo) is out on April 13th, 2019 (Record Store Day) via Hand Of Doom Records.

Codeia is:
Markus Liebich (Guitar)
Denis Schneider (Bass, Vocals)
Timo Langhof (Drums)

Codeia on Thee Facebooks

Codeia on Bandcamp

Codeia website

Hand of Doom Records webstore

Hand of Doom Records on Thee Facebooks

While there are elements at work that fall into the scope of the modern heavy blues rock one finds increasingly coming out of various Northern European corners, I think if one listens to a Down with the Gypsies track like the piano-into-later-percussion-exploration “Sky Full of Cars” from their 2017 debut album, Kassiopeia, the beginnings of an aesthetic standout can be heard taking shape. I’m also pretty sure the German five-piece are “down” with the gypsies in the sense of “I’m on board with this” rather than like a protest against the Romani people or anything like that, at least judging by the hippie-style presentation. That’s supposition on my part, but it seems like Down with the Gypsies have bigger fish to fry than discriminatory tribalism.

You can stream Kassiopeia in its entirety at the bottom of this post. StoneFree will have the album out on vinyl and CD with new cover art early next year, so keep an eye out and enjoy in the meantime.

The label announced the alliance as follows:

NEW SIGNING // band introduction #7 // Down with the Gypsies

We’re honoured to welcome Down with the Gypsies to the family.

After experiencing their intense live show at this years Void Fest, a real goosebumps moment, we decided to look no further and signed this five piece!

DOWN WITH THE GYPSIES is a young psych / folk / prog five piece, based in Karlsruhe, Germany and Linz, Austria. The band was formed in late 2015 by singer & guitarist Gaba Wierzbicka and drummer Tom Schneckenhaus.

In 2016 they already shared the stage with bands like DEATH HAWKS, Mondo Drag, Forever Pavot, Wucan and many more. The first demo tape was recorded in April, just before Melina Tzimou joined the band on guitar. After the show at Psyka Festival, Karlsruhe in October 2016, Maik left the band and Mitja Besen took over on bass.

As there were a lot of changes in their line-up, the band took a break from playing live and turned it into a creative process of songwriting and a period of finding their own sound.

In March 2017 their debut LP “Kassiopeia” was recorded & mixed by Sabina Sloth at KAPU Studio and self-released in July 2017. The band toured Europe for the first time in August & September.

In early 2018 “Kassiopeia” will be released in a new outfit on vinyl & cd. We’re looking forward to release this beast!

Down with the Gypsies are:
Gaba Wierzbicka – Vocals, Guitar, Keys
Melina Tzimou Weis – Guitar
Mitja Besen – Bass
Philipp Reiter – Flute, Clarinette, Percussion
Tom Schneckenhaus – Drums, Saz

https://www.facebook.com/downwiththegypsies/
https://downwiththegypsies.bandcamp.com/album/kassiopeia
https://www.facebook.com/stonefree.co.at
http://www.stonefree.co.at/kassiopeia.html

Down with the Gypsies, Kassiopeia (2017)