After spending the better part of the last month hobbling around on a bum right ankle, it was finally time for me to get the fuck out. Between work and that injury, which has endured in one degree or another since the beginning of the year, I don’t think I could even tell you how many shows I’ve missed in 2015, but this was at least my chance to end the year on a positive note, with Kind headlining a gig at Midway Cafe in Jamaica Plain that I’d come to think of essentially as the office party for Boston heavy rock and roll. The place was packed, from before Leather Lung got started as the first of the three support acts, through sets by Summoner and Worshipper, and the spirit of the evening was clearly celebratory. It’s the holidays. People were looking for a good time.

And they’d have one. Leather Lung gave the four-band night a sludgy start at about quarter to 10. Outright in their weedianism in a kind of “Hey check us out isn’t pot awesome?” sense, their sound ultimately fell flat with me. I’ll say immediately I was in a minority of about one in that regard, but with a sort of proto-rap-rock flow from their singer’s rhythmic screams, all I could think about was early Incubus or 311 crossed with Eyehategod-style aggro sludge, and the combo left me cold. So far as I know they have one 2014 EP out called Reap What You Sow — they may or may not have aired “Green Bitch” from it — and I don’t want to rag on a local band just getting their feet under them, so I won’t. Again, the crowd was into it.

It’s been a little more than a year since I last saw Summoner live (review here). Not much has changed — though vocalist/bassist Chris Johnson said from the stage that they had a new record in the works. Where they might be in that process, I couldn’t say, but the bulk of what they played came from their two full-lengths, 2013’s Atlantian and 2012’s Phoenix, both of which drew on heavy and progressive influences, plotted dual-guitar leads from AJ Peters and Joe Richner and the foundation of Scott Smith‘s swings and builds on drums. Their material careens and turns on a dime, is atmospheric and heavy and melodic and propulsive, and their dynamic has been honed to a continually impressive degree. I don’t know how often they rehearse, but they sure sound rehearsed.

“Winged Hessians” and “Into the Abyss” fed one into the next to leadoff their comfortable but still engrossing set, and the peaks built on peaks of “Let the Light In” from Phoenix provided an apex before Atlantian‘s shuffling “Horns of War” closed out. I’d expect their next outing, whenever it might arrive, to follow the thread from those two records in Summoner‘s thought-out approach. Nothing they do seems to be an accident, and the fact that there’s consciousness at work behind it only makes their scope more impressive. They remain underrated, and were an upbeat lead-in for relative newcomers Worshipper, who’ve found near-immediate success, taking home a Boston Music Award for Best Metal Somethingorother. Fair enough.

My first time seeing the band, but I’ve dug both their two-song singles, so was eager to hear those cuts and whatever else might be on offer live. With a two-guitar assault that was at times Thin Lizzy and at times Iron Maiden/slow-Slayer, Worshipper very nearly stole the night, and considering they don’t have a record out yet and considering who the headliners were, that’s saying something. Their singles — all four tracks of which were aired, “High Above the Clouds” opening, “Black Corridor” closing, with “Step Behind” and “Place Beyond the Light” appearing early on — have told only about one-sixth of the full story of their breadth, and fronted confidently by guitarist/vocalist John Brookhouse with on-point backing harmonies by bassist Bob Maloney, they found a niche for themselves between early metal, heavy and hard rock, adding just a touch of doom to the rolling progression of “Another Yesterday” but going into a more classic form for the shorter, penultimate “Julia.”

Guitarist Alejandro Necochea both took his own leads and held down riffs while Brookhouse did likewise, and drummer Dave Jarvis seemed to throw his whole body into the kit to pull off such swing. They played a nine-song set with poise that defied their being such a new band, and showcased a breadth that made me understand quickly why people seem to be getting so fervently behind what they do. I’ll look forward to hearing what comes out of their next studio session — my sense is they should skip the EP, go right for the album — but their potential and their awareness of what they wanted to be as a band bled into each piece they played. They looked like a group coming into the realization that they could be something special together, and it was exciting to watch.

Like I said, they very nearly stole the night, but it was ultimately Kind‘s evening. The headlining four-piece’s recently-issued Rocket Science (review here) is among the year’s best, debut or not, and opening with “German for Lucy,” they played a good portion of it. From the charmingly-titled “Pastrami Blaster” through the swinging “Fast Number One,” through the expansive “Hordeolum,” the hook-laced “Grogan” and the space-jamming “The Angry Undertaker,” Kind took Midway Cafe on a run that brought out the best from the four players onstage — guitarist Darryl Shepard (Milligram, Hackman, etc.), vocalist Craig Riggs (Roadsaw), bassist Tom Corino (Rozamov) and drummer Matt Couto (Elder) — without being adherent to the past work of any of them.

True to the record, the material live had a balance between up-front heavy rock riffing and more spacious psychedelia, whether from Couto working synth in addition to drums or Riggs running his vocals through a range of effects, and the combination of his singing being high in the venue mix and the propulsion provided by Couto worked particularly well compared even to other times I’ve seen them play. As Corino threw his bass behind his newly-shorn head and put a foot up on the stage monitor and Couto kept his head down to ride the grooves through between Shepard‘s riffs and leads, it became apparent just how quickly Kind have come together as a band. Of course the eternal fear with a side-project of any sort or other is that it’ll be left to rot while various main outfits take priority, but I remain hopeful that Kind continue to move forward from Rocket Science and embark on a progression of their own. It is an avenue worth pursuing for all involved.

I’ll admit that by the time they got around to “The Angry Undertaker,” I was in considerable discomfort. The crowd had thinned out somewhat by the time I made my way to a bar chair to get off my feet, between shout-outs to the New England Patriots — lest we forget we’re in Boston — and the liberal imbibing all around, clearly the party was still going. Fair enough. It was decided from the stage that everyone was going to Tom‘s house after the show to keep drinking, and that may well have happened, but I split out quickly when Kind were finished, with a sore foot, an hour drive and general social inadequacy for motivation. It was a dark and swervy night on the ride home (even sober, one tends to drift that late), but I felt glad to have made it. I don’t know if this one makes up for everything I didn’t get to see in 2015, but at least it wasn’t another one to go on that list.

More pics after the jump. Thanks for reading.

Read more »

Please note: This list is not culled in any way from the Readers Poll, which is ongoing. If you haven’t yet contributed your favorites of 2015 to that, please do.

—

I’ll note right away that this list started out as a top 10. When it came to it, it didn’t seem fair to cut it off. Too much left out. It gets to a point where you look at your list of honorable mentions and it’s like three times as long as your list itself and you realize maybe you should up the numbers and give a few more records their due. So yeah, a top 20 it is.

The temptation with a list like this, especially since it’s dealing with bands working on their first full-length albums (EPs are counted separately), is to think of it as indicative of future movement overall, to try and measure some overarching trend from some of the best outings of the year. I’m not sure that’s a fair approach either to the bands who made these records or to everyone else who might come after, but if we step back and look at what’s presented in the list below, we see veterans resurfacing in new incarnations, new, young groups coming together with classic ideologies, a bit of heavy extremity, psych melding with pop, heavy rock going prog and much more.

What all that tells me is that notions like “underground” and “heavy,” these vague terms that get applied so liberally, are constantly expanding. Whatever their individual sound might be, these bands all pushed ahead an overarching stylistic progression in whatever they’re doing, and like the best of debut albums, they held promise for further growth beyond this already impressive output. It’s less about which seems like an immediate landmark, touchstone, whatever, than it is about what sets up and effectively begins that development going forward, though striking a chord in the present never hurts either.

To that end, here we go:

The Obelisk Presents: The Top 20 Debut Albums of 2015

1. Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, Brothers of the Sonic Cloth
2. Death Alley, Black Magick Boogieland
3. Cigale, Cigale
4. Kind, Rocket Science
5. Fogg, High Testament
6. Crypt Sermon, Out of the Garden
7. CHRCH, Unanswered Hymns
8. With the Dead, With the Dead
9. Demon Head, Ride the Wilderness
10. Sacri Monti, Sacri Monti
11. Stars that Move, Stars that Move
12. Chiefs, Tomorrow’s Over
13. Sunder, Sunder
14. Ecstatic Vision, Sonic Praise
15. Bison Machine, Hoarfrost
16. Serial Hawk, Searching for Light
17. Cloud Catcher, Enlightened Beyond Existence
18. Khemmis, Absolution
19. Sumac, The Deal
20. The Devil and the Almighty Blues, The Devil and the Almighty Blues

Honorable Mention

By way of honorable mentions, first I have to give a nod to Foehammer‘s self-titled debut EP, which would be on this list probably in the top five if not the top three were it not for the fact that, as noted, it’s an EP. Its list will come. The 2015 release of Horsehunter‘s self-titled on Magnetic Eye was killer as well, but since the album initially came out in 2014, it didn’t seem fair to include it in the list proper.

Releases from Killer Boogie, Snowy Dunes, Sweat Lodge, Planes of Satori, DoctoR DooM, Lasers from Atlantis and Lords of Beacon House (I heard the EP, not the LP) also provided thrills a-plenty, and while I recognize that sounds like sarcasm, please rest assured it’s not. I’m sure there are others, and as always, I reserve the right to tweak mentions and numbers over the next however many days, weeks, years, etc.

Notes

There wasn’t much mystery to this one for me. Brothers of the Sonic Cloth held onto that top spot for most of the year, and it seemed like no matter what came along, the wall of sound that Tad Doyle and company built on that record simply would not be torn down. As oppressive in tone as it is in atmosphere, it was a long-awaited debut that produced devastating results the ripples from which I expect will continue to resonate well into 2016 and beyond.

Brothers of the Sonic Cloth is one example of a veteran presence finding a new home, as several did this year. See also, Sumac with former members of Isis, Ecstatic Vision with players from A Life Once Lost, With the Dead with members of Cathedral and Ramesses coming together for the first time, Kind drawing its lineup from the likes of Roadsaw, Milligram, Rozamov and Elder, and even groups like Sunder, who previously released an album together under the moniker The Socks before abandoning that project in favor of the current one, as well as Sacri Monti, with a member from Radio Moscow in tow, Cigale, who had two members from Sungrazer, Stars that Move which sprang from Starchild, and Death Alley with members of Mühr, Gewapend Beton and The Devil’s Blood showcased how one band flows out of another and out of another, and so on.

That Death Alley debut had charm worthy of its title — which was also my favorite of the year — and showed the potential of that band to set up a real stylistic range going forward. I hope they continue to expand, get a little weird and freaked out and keep that core of songwriting and forward drive that makes Black Magick Boogieland so propulsive. For new bands, Cigale‘s self-titled was beautiful, but would later become tinged with tragedy following the death of guitarist/vocalist Rutger Smeets earlier this year. Not to mention friends and family, his is a significant loss for European psychedelia as a whole, and while that was inarguably one of the low points of 2015, the album itself remains a gorgeous statement.

Young acts like Fogg, Demon Head, Bison Machine, Sunder, Cloud Catcher and even Sacri Monti showcased varied takes on classic heavy, some more into boogie and jams and some looking for something a little rougher edged. Cloud Catcher‘s progressive take was a particularly pleasant surprise, while Sunder‘s psychedelia teemed with melody and a cohesive presence born out of what could’ve been unhinged otherwise. Between these, the heavy riffing of The Devil and the Almighty Blues and Serial Hawk, the formative fuzz of Chiefs, the resonant doom of Khemmis and the righteous traditionalism of Crypt Sermon, the notion of genres and subgenres as an ever-expanding universe seemed to be playing out on a weekly basis.

This, invariably, leads to new extremes, which in turn brings me to CHRCH. Like Foehammer, whose EP is in honorable mentions, the Unanswered Hymns long-player from CHRCH was a bright spot especially for how little light it seemed to let escape its abyssal grasp. They’re an easy bet for a band to catch on because they’ve garnered a formidable response already, but what sticks out to me most about them is the sense of pushing established parameters into fresh territory. What they’ll do in the months and years to come of course remains to be seen — they could break up tomorrow; it happens — but where a group like Primitive Man are almost singularly based on extremity of pummel and brutality (not to take away from them), CHRCH have the space in their sound for a multi-faceted progression, and that’s a huge part of what made Unanswered Hymns so encouraging.

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I know there were many more debut LPs than these released this year, and even more debuts that were EPs and demos of note and things like that. The reason I single out debut albums for a list is because it’s among the most pivotal offerings a band can make. You’ll never get to release a second debut record. Some bands never live theirs down, some never attain quite the same level again and struggle with it for decades. Either way, it’s no small thing to get a group together and bring it to the point of putting out a first long-player, and that accomplishment in itself, regardless of the results, is worth highlighting.

No doubt I’ve left a few excellent offerings out. I hope you’ll let me know in the comments what debut albums landed hardest with you in 2015. In any case, thanks for reading.

 

Click Here to Download

 

[mp3player width=480 height=200 config=fmp_jw_widget_config.xml playlist=aot55.xml]

Before we get to all the tracks and this and that, I have to say, this double-size year-end podcast was an absolute pleasure to put together. Fun. Actual fun. I don’t know if it was the preponderance of excellent songs to work from that came out in 2015 or what, but I had a really good time making my way through the near-four-hour run, and I hope you feel that way too as you listen.

It should go without mentioning, but I’ll give the disclaimer anyway that this is in no way, shape or form a complete rundown of everything awesome produced this year. My own Top 10 has bands on it who aren’t represented here, so if you don’t see something you think belongs in the mix below — looking at you, Baroness fans — please keep in mind that it’s not my intent to offer anything more than a partial summary. Otherwise, I’d have to make it a year long.

Thanks for listening if you get the chance to do so, and if there’s something here you haven’t yet checked out, I hope you dig it. The flow is pretty easy front to back, but we get into some more extreme stuff in the third hour for a bit before going grand with Elder and the “Digestive Raga” from Øresund Space Collective, which seemed an appropriate way to end off giving everyone a chance to process what’s just been heard. Please enjoy.

Track details follow:

First Hour:
0:00:00 Acid King, “Red River” from Middle of Nowhere, Center of Everywhere
0:08:24 Clutch, “Firebirds” from Psychic Warfare
0:11:23 Bloodcow, “Crystals and Lasers” from Crystals and Lasers
0:14:28 Stoned Jesus, “Rituals of the Sun” from The Harvest
0:21:25 Ufomammut, “Plouton” from Ecate
0:24:33 Geezer, “So Tired” from The Second Coming of Heavy: Chapter One Split w/ Borracho
0:32:36 Wizard Eye, “Thunderbird Divine” from Wizard Eye
0:37:40 Mondo Drag, “Crystal Visions Open Eye” from Mondo Drag
0:42:08 Fogg, “Seasons” from High Testament
0:48:26 Goatsnake, “Grandpa Jones” from Black Age Blues
0:53:02 Snail, “Thou Art That” from Feral

Second Hour:
1:03:17 Sergio Ch., “Las Piedras” from 1974
1:06:40 All Them Witches, “Blood and Sand – Milk and Endless Waters” from Dying Surfer Meets His Maker
1:13:54 Death Hawks, “Ripe Fruits” from Sun Future Moon
1:18:45 Colour Haze, “Call” from To the Highest Gods We Know
1:26:46 Kadavar, “Last Living Dinosaur” from Berlin
1:30:50 Spidergawd, “Fixing to Die Blues” from Spidergawd II
1:35:02 The Machine, “Dry End” from Offblast!
1:38:01 The Midnight Ghost Train, “Straight to the North” from Cold was the Ground
1:42:00 Kind, “Pastrami Blaster” from Rocket Science
1:48:29 Valley, “Dream Shooter, Golden!” from Sunburst
1:54:22 Graveyard, “From a Hole in the Wall” from Innocence and Decadence
1:58:09 Demon Head, “Book of Changes” from Ride the Wilderness

Third Hour:
2:02:50 Egypt, “Endless Flight” from Endless Flight
2:12:29 Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, “Empires of Dust” from Brothers of the Sonic Cloth
2:20:09 With the Dead, “I am Your Virus” from With the Dead
2:25:45 Ahab, “Red Foam (The Great Storm)” from The Boats of the Glen Carrig
2:32:08 Kings Destroy, “Mr. O” from Kings Destroy
2:36:37 Sun and Sail Club, “Dresden Firebird Freakout” from The Great White Dope
2:38:33 Sunder, “Wings of the Sun” from Sunder
2:42:41 Weedpecker, “Into the Woods” from Weedpecker II
2:50:50 Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats, “Pusher Man” from The Night Creeper
2:56:26 Eggnogg, “Slugworth” from Sludgy Erna Bastard split w/ Borracho

Fourth Hour:
3:02:48 Golden Void, “Astral Plane” from Berkana
3:09:34 Elder, “Lore” from Lore
3:25:24 Øresund Space Collective, “Digestive Raga” from Different Creatures

Total running time: 3:55:26

 

Thank you for listening.

Download audiObelisk Transmission 055

 

I didn’t get to do this list last year — at least not that I can find — but especially as vinyl continues to grow as the dominant media for underground and/or heavy genres, it seems more and more necessary to highlight quality cover art as a focal point. This is, of course, not an exhaustive list. There were way more than 10 badass album covers, and I’m hoping you’ll add your favorites to the comments on this post, but these were some of the ones and some of the artists who most caught my eye. A few of the names are familiar — one artist also appeared on the 2013 list — and the work of some was new to me, but all made striking impressions one way or another in a range of styles, and I hope you’ll agree.

No need to delay. Let’s dive in:

Ordered alphabetically by artist

Ruby the Hatchet, Valley of the Snake

Cover by Adam Burke. Artist website here.

Formerly (or at least sort-of-formerly) of Fellwoods and currently also playing in Pushy, Adam Burke‘s style has become essential to the aesthetics of doom and heavy rock. His work for bands like Ice Dragon, Mystery Ship, Pastor, Mos Generator and a slew of others — including me — never fails to impress with its deep colors, natural tones and, in many cases, a sense of underlying threat. So it is with Ruby the Hatchet‘s Tee Pee Records label debut, Valley of the Snake (review here). Burke presents the title literally as a winding serpent in the sky becomes a river leading to a waterfall, the colors of a sun either rising or setting giving a glimpse of the otherworldly while the earth below is presented in darker browns and the jagged rocks in the foreground. There were a few candidates for Burke this year, but this one continues to stun.

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Elder, Lore

Cover by Adrian Dexter. Artist website here.

A record that, for many, defines 2015 in a major way, Elder‘s Lore (review here) is not the first collaboration between the Massachusetts trio and artist Adrian Dexter, but the results this time around are particularly satisfying. And since we’re talking about vinyl, the creativity in the gatefold design and the other pieces Dexter contributed to the album proves no less impressive than the progressive turn Elder took in their songwriting — a fitting match in scope and execution. Released by Armageddon Shop and Stickman Records, Lore has pushed Elder into a different echelon entirely, and this will not be the final year-end-type list on which it appears around here, but Dexter‘s work, detail, subtlety and use of color for the cover simply had to be seen to be believed.

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Kings Destroy, Kings Destroy

Cover by Josh Graham. Artist website here.

Though he’s perhaps best known for his work doing live visuals over a stretch of years for Neurosis, Brooklyn-based Josh Graham‘s list of cover art accomplishments also include Soundgarden, KENmode, Vattnet Viskar and his own projects, A Storm of Light, Battle of Mice and Red Sparowes. With the cover for the self-titled third album from fellow New Yorkers Kings Destroy (review here), he seemed to encapsulate everything the War Crime Recordings release was driving toward with its urban crunch, aggression, and the feeling that all of this is a part of something larger and barely understood. Is it a bowl? Part of some ritual offering? Is it a drain? The expertly manipulated photography takes landmarks from the city and turns them into something as beautiful as it is malevolent, and Kings Destroy lived up to that standard on the album itself.

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Snail, Feral

Cover by Seldon Hunt. Artist website here.

Every bit worthy of the frame it has. Going back to pieces for Neurosis, Isis, Made out of Babies and more, Seldon Hunt‘s work is always widely varied, covering a range of styles and media. His piece for Feral (review here), a pivotal fourth album by West Coast heavy psych rockers Snail (released by Small Stone), seems to play off the single-word title in portraying a threatening vision of nature. At the bottom, we see human skulls as giant snails, weird glowing dogs and a deer with yellow eyes and snakes entwined in its antlers survey the landscape of huge mushrooms and sparse grass. Behind, two tangled trees add to the sense of foreboding, and a sky that runs from black to red speaks to a night that doesn’t look like it’s about to end anytime soon. Is this Hunt‘s vision of nature’s revenge? Either way, it’s engrossing in its three-dimensionality.

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Valkyrie, Shadows

Cover by Jeremy Hush. Artist website here.

Valkyrie‘s third full-length, first for Relapse Records and first in seven years, Shadows (review here), was a classic guitar rock fan’s dream come true. Brothers Jake and Pete Adams led the band through cascading solos, memorable songs and unpretentious vibes. The cover art by Jeremy Hush stood out to me particularly for the violence of its depiction. We see smaller blackbirds using spears or arrows to attack a hawk, and three on one is hardly a fair fight, even with a bird of prey, as a skull looks on from nearby grass. What I don’t know, ultimately, is whose side we’re on — ravens are hardly a traditional harbinger of good fortune — but somehow not knowing that only makes the piece more evocative, and from the detail and use of empty space in its parchment-style background to the struggle it portrays, Hush‘s work certainly grabbed attention.

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Ahab, The Boats of the Glen Carrig

Cover by Sebastian Jerke. Artist website here.

A Germany-based painter who’s done art for Desertfest Berlin, Colour Haze, as well as the Freak Valley and Keep it Low festivals, Sebastian Jerke contributed several artworks to Napalm Records this year. He’ll continue that thread in 2016 with Greenleaf likely among others, but in 2015, his pieces for My Sleeping Karma and Ahab especially stood out, and the latter most of all. The funeral doomers don’t to anything on a scale less than grand, and Jerke‘s cover for The Boats of the Glen Carrig (review here) offered scope to match. Its sea monsters have breathtaking color and detail, and are familiar and alien at the same time, the central figure’s human-esque hand drawing a crowd either awed or looking to feast. This was one you could stare at over and over again and still always find something new.

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Acid King, Middle of Nowhere, Center of Everywhere

Cover by Tim Lehi. Artist website here.

I actually saw when Acid King unveiled the cover for their first album in a decade, Middle of Nowhere, Center of Everywhere (review here), that there were some people giving them shit for the artwork out front. Don’t get me wrong, everyone’s entitled to their opinion, and if you ever wanted to find a bunch of conflicting ones look no further than the internet, but excuse me — it’s a wizard (Hell, that might be Gandalf), riding a tiger, in outer space. If there’s any part of that that isn’t frickin’ awesome, I’m not sure what it might be. What directive tattoo artist Tim Lehi was given going into the project, which would eventually surface on Svart Records, I don’t know, but it’s hard for me to listen to the far-no-farther out riffs of “Center of Everywhere” and not at very least want to be that wizard. Riding that tiger. In outer space. I’ll defend this one all day if necessary.

—

Serial Hawk, Searching for Light

Cover by Samantha Muljat and Sara Winkle. Artist websites here and here.

If I had gotten to do this list in 2014, Samantha Muljat could have easily appeared on it for her manipulated landscape that adorned Earth‘s Primitive and Deadly. For Serial Hawk‘s debut album, Searching for Light (review here), she’s partnered with Sara Winkle, whose work ranges from commercial design and album covers to animation and more. What the two offer in their work for Serial Hawk is a blend of the real and the unreal. We don’t see the face of the photographed subject, but she leads our eye toward the white circle, which, on a horizon could be the sun, but here seems to have descended to the field, landed there toward some unknown purpose. The tall grasses seem to fade into a wash of lighter green, but note the angle of the arm on the right side and the legs toward the center is nearly identical and seems to be working opposite the windblown direction of the field surrounding. Like the piece as a whole, it’s as much natural as unnatural.

—

Various Artists, Electric Ladyland [Redux]

Cover by David Paul Seymour. Artist website here.

My notes for this list contain no fewer than three separate entries for Minneapolis artist David Paul Seymour. There’s one for Chiefs‘ Tomorrow’s Over (review here), and one for Wo Fat‘s Live Juju (review here), but when it came time to pick just one, nothing stood out like Magnetic Eye Records‘ Electric Ladyland [Redux] (review here). The full-gatefold spread is my favorite album cover of the year — and a good deal of this year’s covers were by Seymour, who has become nigh on ubiquitous in heavy and psychedelic rock — and for Jimi Hendrix, who’s been portrayed so many times it would be impossible to count, to show up in an original way in an original setting, it showed creativity on a scale fitting to the logistics of the compilation itself, which pulled together groups from around the world in due homage to Hendrix‘s 70th birthday. Its colors, its shading, its strange mercurial pool and waterfall — it’s just perfect for what it was intended to do.

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Kind, Rocket Science

Cover by Alexander von Wieding. Artist website here.

He’s split his time these last several years with his one-man band incarnation Larman Clamor, but Hamburg’s Alexander von Wieding continues to find time for copious design work for the likes of Brant Bjork, Karma to Burn, Enos and more. This year, in addition to a logo for a forthcoming The Obelisk t-shirt, he also did a cover for a split between Larman Clamor and Blackwolfgoat, whose Darryl Shepard also plays guitar in Kind, so to have him also illustrate that project’s Ripple debut, Rocket Science (review here), only seems fair. I’ll make no pretense of being anything other than a fan of von Wieding‘s work, and he’s in his element with Rocket Science, line drawing a spacescape with a crashed ship manned by what appears to be a frustrated chicken and rabbit (“Rabbit Astronaut” is one of the song titles). A lizard looks on and sticks a forked tongue out at the scene, and as mountains and planets loom behind, von Wieding reinforces a charm in his work that has drawn bands and labels his way for the better part of the last decade.

—

Like I said at the outset, there were far too many covers for me to call this list comprehensive — right off the top of my head: Sunder, Groan, Mos Generator/Stubb, Monolord (that solo figure walking into the lake continues to haunt), Baroness, High on Fire, Graveyard, Monster Magnet, The Machine, Eggnogg/Borracho, Ecstatic Vision, Uncle Acid, on and on — but these were just some that particularly resonated with me. If you feel like something was criminally ignored — maybe I missed it — please let me know in the comments.

And thanks for reading.

The beginnings of Kind were about two years ago as guitarist Darryl Shepard (The Scimitar, Milligram, Hackman, Blackwolfgoat, etc.) and drummer Matt Couto (Elder) first got together to jam out loose ideas. Already it was a project worthy of attention, but as they added bassist Tom Corino of Rozamov and vocalist Craig Riggs of Roadsaw and Kind really began to take shape, it was clear something noteworthy was in the making. Their first studio release is Rocket Science, on Ripple Music, and it finds many song ideas feeling sketched out from those initial jams, structures carved in open, heavy and psychedelic spaces cast out through a range of effects in the layers of guitar and vocals.

There isn’t one member of the four-piece who doesn’t deliver a standout performance throughout the included eight tracks/49 minutes, whether that’s Corino‘s rumble pushing side A closer “Hordeolum” into highlight territory, or Riggs‘ self-harmonies on the catchy “Rabbit Astronaut,” which in less creative hands would be a Kyuss clone, or Couto‘s swing underscoring the movement in the righteously-titled “Pastrami Blaster” as Shepard prepares to mount another noise wash of layered soloing, but the prevailing impression the album makes is more about the effectiveness of the whole unit working together than any individual component involved. Likewise, Rocket Science works best taken in its complete, front-to-back run, its sonic expanse cast from opener “German for Lucy” (streamed here) to the nine-minute finale “The Angry Undertaker” and captured with considerable depth of mix by Alec Rodriguez at New Alliance Studios in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Immersive is a word I toss out a lot — and appropriately so — for heavy psychedelia, but there are times on Rocket Science when even Kind seem to be engrossed in the swirl they’re making. “German for Lucy” is one such instance, setting a pattern that several other tracks will follow in moving from initial verses and choruses into more open, jamming fare. Riggs, who’s known for more straightforward, hook-based work, doesn’t quite go full-shaman, but meets these spaces head-on with echoing repetitions and soulful belts directed upward from under the guitar and bass.

Both sides follow a pattern of opening and closing big with two shorter and generally more grounded songs between, and “Fast Number One” and “Rabbit Astronaut” are indeed more structured-feeling, but even as the latter winds through Shepard‘s fuzzy lead at the halfway point, it keeps to the atmosphere and vibe of “Germany for Lucy,” and as Kind weave into, through and around psychedelia, they do so fluidly and without sacrificing either the momentum or the liquid feel of the album, as a whole. That doesn’t seem like it’s saying much, but think of it as jumping back and forth from the cosmos to the desert and the scope might be a little clearer. I have to think the experience of these players is a factor both in letting them know where they want to be at any given moment and how they want to get there, but in both the shorter cuts and in the more cavernous “Hordeolum,” the reaches of which are some of the album’s most expansive, there’s still an air of exploration to the groove that speaks to Rocket Science being the beginning of a progression rather than functioning in already established parameters.

Launching side B, “Pastrami Blaster” is both the record’s best title and some of its finest tone from Shepard and Corino, who run concurrent through surges and breaks in the early verses and come together again after the guitar solo for a finish that feels like it could easily have gone another eight minutes or so. Only so much room on a record, I guess. “Siberia” is a swingfest from the outset and one of Riggs‘ most resonant melodies, a more laid back feel suiting Kind remarkably well even unto Couto‘s between-measure fills in the chorus, which finds the guitar stepping behind the bass and vocals, calling to mind what Vista Chino did on some of 2013’s Peace without sounding like anything other than itself as the lines, “I can hear Siberia calling me/Calling my name,” are repeated to end out.

In the early going, it doesn’t seem like the penultimate “Grogan” has much to offer that cuts like “Rabbit Astronaut” or “Fast Number One” didn’t already accomplish, but the rhythm that emerges and cycles through the first half is smooth and the choral layers that come to the fore in the ending jam are memorable enough to let it avoid being tagged as filler, though “The Angry Undertaker” makes more of an impact. Where several of Kind‘s inclusions have started out with a structure and launched outward from there — “Grogan,” for example, or “German for Lucy,” which has a definitive split just before the three-minute mark — the closer starts out dreamy and lysergic and only becomes more so as it rolls on. The longest song at 9:14, it’s also the most patient, building tension over its first couple minutes until it thrusts forward at about 3:10 and doesn’t look back from there. Resulting is a consuming wash of deceptively crunching riffs, effects, groove and noise that gives Rocket Science the apex it’s due before coming apart one element at a time. In the last minute, however, the beginning riff returns and Riggs comes back to deliver the same lines that started the first verse, “You think everything’s peaceful/You think everything’s fine/So just close your eyes,” and they end softly on that note.

It’s a move reinforcing the position that Rocket Science represents the start of a collaborative progression rather than the capstone of a one-off songwriting splurge, but the question that only time can answer is how much of a band Kind can be over the longer term. Elder released a record in 2015, Rozamov will make their full-length debut in 2016, Shepard constantly has a range of projects in the works and even if Roadsaw aren’t active at the moment, Riggs has rebuilding Mad Oak Studios and a drummer position in White Dynomite to fill his days. What that means for Kind‘s prospects over the years I expect will have much to do with how Rocket Science is generally received, but from where I sit, it’s one of 2015’s most encouraging debut releases, and the potential these players show in working together is something that seems to be begging for further development. One hopes it gets it.

Kind, “German for Lucy”

Kind on Thee Facebooks

Kind at Ripple Music

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I put up a podcast last year on the day before Thanksgiving as well. At least I’m consistent. In the US, today is the biggest travel day of the year, and I continue to feel like there are few things better in this universe than hitting the road accompanied by good music. Whether you’re driving alone on your way to see family for the holiday, commuting to work (that one doesn’t necessarily have to be by car, I suppose), going to stand on line for some silly discount item or whatever it might be, I hope you find something here you consider worth bringing along for the trip.

The holidays are always a pretty stressful time — when isn’t? — so once it gets past the initial burst of heft from Tombstones, this one stays pretty mellow for the most part. Deville and Kind rock pretty hard, but once it moves into the Dirty Streets and Old Man Lizard and so on, it’s more nod than headbang, which is accurate to where my brain is at. Looking for something chill in the face of miles to cover and meals to consume. If you’re in the US, a very Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours, and if not, I hope you enjoy just the same.

Track details follow:

First Hour:
0:00:00 Isaak, “Fountainhead” from Sermonize
0:03:58 Tombstones, “Pyre of the Cloth” from Vargariis
0:13:30 Hound, “Over the Edge,” from Out of Space
0:17:44 Deville, “Mind on Hold” from Make it Belong to Us
0:21:17 Kind, “German for Lucy” from Rocket Science
0:28:26 Dirty Streets, “Save Me” from White Horse
0:31:55 Old Man Lizard, “Craniopagus Paraciticus” from Old Man Lizard
0:40:43 Across Tundras, “No Roads in any Direction” from Home Free
0:46:52 Niche, “On Down the Line” from Heading East
0:52:11 Wired Mind, “Road” from Mindstate: Dreamscape

Second Hour:
1:03:07 Seedy Jeezus, “Echoes in the Sky” from Echoes in the Sky
1:19:03 Dorre, “One Collapsed at the Altar” from One Collapsed at the Altar

Total running time: 1:49:21

 

Thank you for listening.

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I’m going to do my absolute very best to keep this brief, because there’s much more to say about Kind and their upcoming Ripple Music debut, Rocket Science, but there’s also a lot of time in which to say it. It’s out on December, and in addition to being the first track premiere from the new band, the first studio-recorded, non-demo audio to be made public, it’s also the first announcement of the album itself. So there’s time, is what I’m saying, and as much as I’d like to dive into the record headfirst, preorders aren’t even up yet.

Still, if one might have be reminded to cool one’s jets, it’s well justified. I recall hearing late in 2013 that guitarist Darryl Shepard (Milligram, Black Pyramid, etc.) was jamming with Elder drummer Matt Couto, and that wound up as the root of Kind. Tom Corino from Rozamov plays bass, and Craig Riggs of Roadsaw rounds out on vocals, and many of the songs on Rocket Science — dig that Alexander von Wieding cover art — are born out of those same jams. They’ve come a long way, having been developed over a series of local shows fit between the four-piece’s otherwise busy schedules (review here, here and here), but listening to “German for Lucy,” that raw vitality holds up.

If you know the members’ other groups, that still doesn’t really prepare you for what Kind bring to the table. “German for Lucy” opens the record, and immediately the listener is immersed in a heavy psychedelic vibe. Riggs‘ vocals are as much a part of the atmosphere as Shepard‘s effects-drenched guitar, pushed deep in the mix and set for maximum spaciousness. This really is just the beginning of what there is to say about this one, but if you want to get stoked, the stream works even better than my nerding out.

More to come. For now, stream and announcement follow. Enjoy:

KIND; A new doom project from Black Pyramid, Elder, Roadsaw and Rozamov

Formed in 2013 by Matt Couto (Elder), Darryl Shepard (Black Pyramid, The Scimitar) and Tom Corino (Rozamov) – after the trio spent time jamming together in-between day-to-day commitments – the doom supergroup KIND quickly cemented their formation with the addition of Roadsaw vocalist Craig Riggs.

Out of the mind-bending riffs and extended jam sessions, whole songs began to take shape through winter 2014 rehearsals down in Couto’s freezing cold basement, where the newly formed quartet began laying down ideas for their soon to be released debut, Rocket Science, which officially lands this December on Ripple Music.

Shows were soon booked to share the tunes with the curious. Further riffs materialized, new songs banged into shape, and yet more shows booked, so keen were the band to test their mettle and mixture of heavy metal, psych, Krautrock and straight-up classic rock and roll. With four songs recorded at Mad Oak Studios serving as the band’s demo, in the spring of 2015, KIND entered New Alliance Studios with engineer Alec Rodriguez to record their first full-length, Rocket Science.

Kind on Thee Facebooks

Ripple Music

I’ve only been to No Problemo twice, but my understanding of how it goes is as follows: The taqueria closes, tables are moved, a P.A. is positioned, lights are turned off, a show happens. Somewhere in there, Roadsaw/White Dynomite bassist Tim Catz arrives. Killer tunes over the speaker, two bands on the bill, you’ll no complaints from me. It’s a laid back vibe, and yeah, the gigs don’t exactly start “on time,” but with just two bands and a free show, I’m not about to argue. Last time I was there, Kind also played, as part of an early October 2014 weekender with The Golden Grass from Brooklyn (review here), so their set this past Saturday accompanied by local bruisers Gaskill has something of a follow-up feel to it, if only because they were in pretty much the exact place I saw them five months ago.

And what a difference five months can make! This was my third time seeing Kind overall, and in roughly half a year’s time, the four-piece of vocalist Craig Riggs (also Roadsaw), guitarist Darryl Shepard (also Black Pyramid, Blackwolfgoat, etc.), bassist Tom Corino (also Rozamov) and drummer Matt Couto (also Elder) have gone from amorphous psych jams to, well, songs constructed out of amorphous heavy psych jams. Admittedly, the vibe’s still pretty open, but Kind‘s material has continued solidifying, and like the last two times I caught them, Saturday night provided an encouraging update of the work in progress. They had a setlist and everything!

That’s not nothing, considering it puts Kind that much closer to making their studio debut, which last I heard was due later this year. Now, Elder are touring in support of their just-released Lore (review here), Black Pyramid are heading to Europe in Spring and have a new 7″ on the way, White Dynomite are supposed to have a release out sooner or later on Ripple Music and Rozamov are headed West in May to play Psycho California, so exactly when Kind might have the time to put together an album is beyond me, but everything I’ve seen them play — from a liquefied effects barrage back in August to the big-riff ending of “German for Lucy” this past weekend — has made me hope they get to it at some point. As much as they’re predestined to be considered one of those bands comprised of dudes from other bands, Kind‘s musical personality differs from anything its component players’ other groups offer. Using a wah pedal and vocal processor, Riggs turns his voice into a melodic drone after verses and choruses give way to exploratory jams, and the mesh between Shepard, Corino and Couto is palpable as they telegraph changes across the stage. Or in the case of No Problemo on Saturday, from where table six might be to where table eight was.

What’s become the core of their sound seems to be that blend between more straightforward parts — an indelible instinct for songwriting — and washes of noise. The end of the four-song set, “Angry Undertaker” found Shepard shredding away in a Dave Chandler-style free-for-all, detuning and resting his guitar against a Marshall cabinet that I’m pretty sure was Gaskill‘s while hand-stomping pedals from his knees before setting up a loop and taking a seat at the bench along the wall of the room. Behind his and Riggs‘ feedback and noise, Couto and Corino held down a fervent groove, gradually deconstructed but never totally unhinged. Between the former’s swing and the latter’s heft of tone, the foundation didn’t need much upkeep.

There were six songs on the setlist, and I’m sorry to say that “Pastrami Blaster” wasn’t aired, but along with “Angry Undertaker” and “German for Lucy,” opening duo “Grogan” and “Hordeolum” — which if I’m not mistaken I’ve heard parts of before, albeit in a different context — helped establish Kind‘s vibe that the band would soon, and gleefully, tear into pieces. Since the root of the band is in jamming, Shepard bridging the gap between his experiments in Blackwolfgoat and more heavy rock-minded projects, it’s welcome to see that side persist even as songs take definitive shape. The chaos they create suits them, and I doubt this will be the last time I remark on their growth as a band. Was good to check in. Hope to do so again soon.

Kind on Thee Facebooks

No Problemo Taqueria