Posted in Whathaveyou on May 18th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
I’ll go to this. Hey, Stoned Jesus and Somali Yacht Club — you got room for one more in the van? Mind if I tag along? It’s been nearly a year since the last time I caught a gig — snuck one outdoor show in last summer, I did — so I’m as due as anybody, and while there’s stuff I miss about live music I miss and stuff I don’t — the music and nearly everything else, respectively — 12 dates on the road plus a four-day break for sightseeing seems like just the kind of thing to cure what ails. Also that’s happening in Australia and New Zealand. I’ll go. Is there a grant application I can fill out somewhere?
Gonna go out on a limb and guess that’s a hard “no,” but hey, it’s worth a shot. These dates were first scheduled for now-ish, and if you’re in that part of the world and have tickets already, hold onto ’em (or, you know, don’t delete the email or whatever) because they’re still good for the rebooked shows. All are presented through Your Mate Bookings and check out Wo Fest making an appearance near the end of the tour. You have to appreciate that.
Info snagged from social media:
Stoned Jesus and Somali Yacht Club – Australia & New Zealand Tour
World renowned Stoner Doom trio “Stoned Jesus”; will finally make their way to Australia and New Zealand in Nov. 2021 and they are bringing their Psychedelic Pals “Somali Yacht Club” with them.
Stoned Jesus is just one of those bands, if you know Stoner Rock, well you know Stoned Jesus. The trio from Kyiv created their sound in 2009 and have released four albums and multiple EPs, singles and splits since; making them one of the most popular bands in the European underground rock/metal scenes to date. Bringing together their Sabbath-esque groove and modern doom tones; the trio make mountains out of their riffs and are responsible for the ever-growing community of stoner rock and doom metal. The single “I’m the mountain” released in 2012 quickly became one of the most respected songs in underground rock around the globe.
The Stoner Doom trio then went on to headline and play some of the biggest festivals across Europe including Desertfest (Berlin, Belgium and London) along with which has now landed them on this much anticipated tour leg of their tenth anniversary tour of Australia and New Zealand. Celebrating their little jubilee, the Ukranian trio will play a unique setlist with both classic cuts and tracks from their most recent Prog-influenced critically acclaimed “Pilgrims” album.
Somali Yacht Club have been making waves for a few years right across Europe via their beautiful blend of Post/Psychedelic Doom Rock and Shoegaze; and just after three albums they have penetrated the world market with their latest offering “The Sea” clicking over to 1.1 million views on youtube.
The Ukranian trio have shared the stage and toured with some of the most respected Stoner/Psych Rocks bands in the world including My Sleeping Karma, Naxatras, Colour Haze, Elder, Wo Fat and Sasquatch; hitting the best of the best festivals Keep it low, Streetmode, Stoned from the Underground and Desertfest (Berlin)
The two groups will hit Scarborough, Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane, Sydney, Wollongong, Canberra, Auckland (NZ), Wellington (NZ) and headline this years WO FEST 2020 at The Bendigo Hotel in Collingwood and Armageddoom 6 at Civic Hotel in Inglewood.
Friday 5/11/2021 Indian Ocean Hotel, Scarborough Saturday 6/11/2021 Lucy’s Love Shack, Perth ARMAGEDDOOM 6 Monday 8/11/2021 Whammy Bar, Auckland Tuesday 9/11/2021 Valhalla, Wellington Thursday 11/11/2021 The Flamin’ Galah, Brisbane Friday 12/11/2021 The Vanguard, Newtown Saturday 13/11/2021 Baroque Room, Katoomba Wednesday 17/11/2021 La La La’s, Wollongong Thursday 18/11/2021 TBA, Canberra Friday 19/11/2021 Evelyn Hotel, Fitzroy Saturday 20/11/2021 Bendigo Hotel, Collingwood WO FEST Sunday 21/11/2021 Crown and Anchor, Adelaide
All tickets currently held are 100% valid for the new dates and if you have moved in the meantime, we can arrange a ticket transfer to your new local venue (Get in touch via email yourmatebookings@gmail.com)
Oh, hello there. Don’t mind me. I’m just here, reviewing another 10 records today. I did it yesterday too. I’ll do it again tomorrow. No big deal. It’s Quarterly Review time. You know how it goes.
Crazy day yesterday, crazy day today, but I’m in that mode where I kind of feel like I can make this go as long as I want. Next Monday? Why not? Other than the fact that I have something else slated, I can’t think of a reason. Fortunately, having something else slated is enough of one. Ha. Let’s go.
Quarterly Review #31-40:
DVNE, Etemen Ænka
It’s like Scotland’s DVNE threw all of modern heavy metal into a blender and hit “cohesive.” Etemen Ænka‘s lofty ambitions are matched indeed by the cohesion of the band’s craft, the professionalism of their presentation, and the scope of their second album’s 10 component tracks, whether that’s in the use of synth throughout “Towers” or the dreamy post-rock aside in “Omega Severer,” the massive riffing used as a tool not a crutch in “Court of the Matriarch,” closer “Satuya” and elsewhere, and even the interlude-y pieces “Weighing of the Heart,” “Adraeden” and the folkish “Asphodel” that leads into the finale. DVNE have made themselves into the band you wish Isis became. Also the band you wish Mastodon became. And probably six or seven others. And while Etemen Ænka is certainly not without prog-styled indulgence, there is no taking away from the significant accomplishment these songs represent for them as a group putting out their first release on Metal Blade. It’ll be too clean for some ears, but the tradeoff for that is the abiding sense of poise with which DVNE deliver the songs. This will be on my year-end list, and I won’t be the only one.
Beginning with its longest track (immediate points) in the 11-minute “Rekviem,” Yarost’ I Proshchenie is the third full-length from St. Petersburg’s Wowod, and its sudden surge from ‘unfold’ to ‘onslaught’ is a legitimate blindside. They hypnotize you then push you down a flight of stairs as death growls, echoing guitar lines and steady post-metallic drum and bass hold the line rhythmically. This sense of disconnect, ultimately, leads to a place of soaring melody and wash, but that feeling of moving from one place to another is very much the core of what Wowod do throughout the rest of the album that follows. “Tanec Yarosti” is a sub-three-minute blaster, while “Proshschenie” lumbers and crashes through its first half en route to a lush soundscape in its second, rounding out side A. I don’t care what genre “Zhazhda” is, it rules, and launches side B with rampaging momentum, leading to the slow, semi-industrial drag of “Chornaya Zemlya,” the harsh thrust of “Zov Tysyachi Nozhey” and, finally, dizzyingly, the six-minute closer “Top’,” which echoes cavernous and could just as easily have been called “Bottom.” Beautiful brutality.
The chaos of last year is writ large in the late-2020 Endless Render EP from Brooklyn-based solo industrial outfit Trace Amount. The project headed by Brandon Gallagher (ex-Old Wounds) engages with harsh noise and heavy beatmaking, injecting short pieces like “Pop Up Morgues” with a duly dystopian atmosphere. Billy Rymer (The Dillinger Escape Plan, etc.) guests on drums for opener “Processed Violence (in 480P)” and the mminute-long “Seance Stimulant,” but it’s in the procession of the final three tracks — the aforementioned “Pop Up Morgues,” as well as “S.U.R.V.I.V.A.L.” and “Easter Sunday” — that Gallagher makes his most vivid portrayals. His work is evocative and resonant in its isolated feel, opaque like staring into an uncertain future but not without some semblance of hope in its resolution. Or maybe that’s the dream and the dance-party decay of “Dreaming in Displacement” is the reality. One way or the other, I’m looking forward to what Trace Amount does when it comes to a debut album.
French instrumentalists Fuzzcrafter issued C-D in October 2020 as a clear answer/complement to 2016’s A-B, even unto its Jo Riou cover art, which replaces the desert-and-fuzz-pedal of the first offering with a forest-and-pedal here. The six works that make up the 41-minute affair are likewise grown, able to affect a sense of lushness around the leading-the-way riffage in extended cuts “C2” (13:13) and the psychedelic back half of “D2” (13:18), working in funk-via-prog basslines (see also the wah guitar starting “D1” for more funk) over solid drums without getting any more lost than they want to be in any particular movement. In those songs and elsewhere, Fuzzcrafter make no attempt to hide the fact that they’re a riff-based band, but the acoustic side-finales in “C3” (which also features Rhodes piano) and “D3,” though shorter, reinforce both the structural symmetry of the mirrored sides as a whole and a feeling of breadth that is injected elsewhere in likewise organic fashion. They’re not changing the world and they’re not trying to, but there’s a mark being left here sound-wise and it’s enough to wonder what might be in store for the inevitable E-F.
Pine Ridge‘s second album, Can’t Deny, finds the Russian four/five-piece working in textures of keys and organ for a bluesier feel to tracks like the post-intro opening title-cut and the classic feeling later “Genesis.” Songwriting is straightforward, vocals gritty but well attended with backing arrangements, and the take on “Wayfaring Stranger” that ends the record’s first half conjures enough of a revivalist spirit to add to the atmosphere overall. The four tracks that follow — “Genesis,” “Runaway,” “Sons of Nothing” and “Those Days” — featured as well on 2019’s Sons of Nothing EP, but are consistent in groove and “Sons of Nothing” proves well placed to serve as an energetic apex of Can’t Deny ahead of “Those Days,” which starts quiet before bursting to life with last-minute electricity. A clear production emphasizes hooks and craft, and though I’ll grant I don’t know much about Siberia’s heavy rock scene, Pine Ridge ably work within the tenets of style while offering marked quality of songwriting and performance. That’s enough to ask from anywhere.
Plain in its love for Sabbath-minded riffing and heavy Americana roll, “Bowls of Wrath” opens the three-song Dec. 2020 debut EP, Behold a Pale Horse, from Indiana-based solo-project Watchman, and the impression is immediate. With well-mixed cascades of organ and steadily nodding guitar, bass, drums and distorted, howling vocals, there is both a lack of pretense and an individualized take on genre happening at once. The EP works longest to shortest, with “Wormwood” building up from sparse guitar to far-back groove using negative space in the sound to bolster “Planet Caravan”-ish watery verses and emphasize the relative largesse of the track preceding as well as “The Second Death,” which follows. That closer is a quick four minutes that’s slow in tempo, but the lead-line cast overtop the mega-fuzzed central riff is effective in creating a current to carry the listener from one bank of the lake of fire to the other. In 15 minutes, multi-instrumentalist/vocalist/producer Roy Waterford serves notice of intention for a forthcoming debut LP to be titled Doom of Babylon, and it is notice worth heeding.
Bomg‘s Peregrination isn’t necessarily extreme the way one thinks of death or black metal as extreme styles of heavy metal, but is extreme just the same in terms of pushing to the outer limits of the aesthetics involved. The album’s four track, “Electron” (38:12), “Perpetuum” (39:10), “Paradigm” (37:17) and “Emanation” (37:49), could each consume a full 12″ LP on their own, and presented digitally one into the next, they are a tremendous, willfully unmanageable two-and-a-half-hour deep-dive into raw blowout dark psychedelic doom. The harsh rumble and noise in “Perpetuum” some 28 minutes on sounds as though the Ukrainian outfit have climbed the mountains of madness, and there is precious little clarity to be found in “Paradigm” or “Emanation” subsequent as they continue to hammer the spike of their manifestations deeper into the consciousness of the listener. From “Electron” onward, the self-recording Kyiv trio embark on this overwhelming journey into the unknown, and they don’t so much invite you along as unveil the devastating consequences of having made the trip. Righteously off-putting.
As much as something can fly under the radar and be a Nuclear Blast release, I’m more surprised by the hype I haven’t heard surrounding White Void‘s debut album, Anti. Pulling together influences from progressive European-style heavy rock, classic metal, cult organ, New Wave melodies and a generally against-grain individualism, it is striking in its execution and the clear purpose behind what it’s doing. It’s metal and it’s not. It’s rock and it’s pop and it’s heavy and it’s light and floating. And its songs have substance as well as style. With Borknagar‘s Lars Nedland as the founding principal of the project, the potential in Anti‘s eight component tracks is huge, and if one winds up thinking of this as post-black metal, it’s a staggeringly complex iteration of it to which this and any other description I’ve seen does little justice. It’s going to get called “prog” a lot because of the considered nature of its composition, but that’s barely scratching the surface of what’s happening here.
Leeds, UK, four-piece Day of the Jackal bring straight-ahead hard rock songwriting and performance with an edge of classic heavy. There’s a Guns ‘n’ Roses reference in “Belief in a Lie” if you’re up for catching it, and later cuts like “Riskin’ it All” and “‘Til the Devil” have like-minded dudes-just-hit-on-your-girlfriend-and-you’re-standing-right-there vibes. They’re a rock band and they know it, and while I was a little bummed out “Rotten to the Core” wasn’t an Overkill cover, the 10 songs of love and death that pervade this debut long-player are notably hooky from “On Your Own” to “Deadfall” and “Rock ‘n’ Roll Deathride,” which casually inhabits biker riffing with no less ease of movement than the band would seem to do anything else. Production by James “Atko” Atkinson of Gentlemans Pistols highlights the clarity of the performance rather than giving a rawer glimpse at who Day of the Jackal might be on stage, but there’s plenty of vitality to go around in any case, and it’s headed your way from the moment you start the record.
Following their 2018 debut, Ashen Blood (review here), Denver heavy lifters Green Druid give due breadth to their closing take on Portishead‘s “Threads,” but the truth is that cover is set up by the prior five tracks of huge-sounding riffery, basking in the varying glories of stoner doom throughout opener “The Forest Dark” while keeping an eye toward atmospheric reach all the while. It is not just nod and crush, in other words, in Green Druid‘s arsenal throughout At the Maw of Ruin, and indeed, “End of Men” and “Haunted Memories” bridge sludge and black metal screaming as “A Throne Abandoned” offers surprising emotional urgency over its ready plod, and the long spoken section in “Desert of Fury/Ocean of Despair” eventually gives way not only to the most weighted slamming on offer, but a stretch of noise to lead into the closer. All along the way, Green Druid mark themselves out as a more complex outfit than their first record showed them to be, and their reach shows no sign of stopping here either.
Posted in Reviews on March 31st, 2021 by JJ Koczan
Third day, and you know what that means. Today we hit and pass the halfway mark of this Quarterly Review. I won’t say it hasn’t been work, but it seems like every time I do one of these lately I continue to be astounded by how much easier writing about good stuff makes it. I must’ve done a real clunker like two years ago or something. Can’t think of one, but wow, it’s way more fun when the tunes are killer.
To that end we start with Dopelord today, haha. Have fun digging through if you do.
Quarterly Review #21-30:
Dopelord, Reality Dagger
They put it in a 12″, and that’s cool, but in addition to the fact that it’s about 22 minutes long, something about Reality Dagger, the latest EP from Poland’s Dopelord, strikes me as being really 10″ worthy. I know 10″ is the bastard son of vinyl pressings — doesn’t fit with your LPs and doesn’t fit with your 7″s. They’re a nuisance. Do they get their own shelf? Mixed in throughout? Well, however you organize them, I think a limited 10″ of Reality Dagger would be perfect, because from the melodies strewn throughout “Dark Coils” and the wildly catchy “Your Blood” — maybe the most complex vocal arrangement I’ve yet heard from the band — to the ultra-sludge interplay with screams on the 10-minute closing title-track, it sounds to me like standing out from the crowd is exactly what Dopelord want to do. They want to be that band that doesn’t fit your preconceptions of stoner-doom, or sludge, or modern heavy largesse in the post-Monolord vein. Why not match that admirable drive in format? Oh hell, you know what? I’ll just by the CD and have done with it. One of the best EPs I’ve heard this year.
Don’t be surprised when you see Kozmik Artifactz, Nasoni Records, or some other respected probably-European purveyor of heavy coming through with an announcement they’ve picked up Scorched Oak. The Dortmund, Germany, trio seem to have taken the last few years to figure out where they were headed — they pared down from a five-piece, for example — and their rolling tides of fuzz on late-2020’s debut LP Withering Earth bears the fruit of those efforts. Aesthetically and structurally sound, it’s able to touch on heavy blues, metal and drifting psychedelia all within the span of a seven-minute track like “Swamp,” and in its five-songs running shortest to longest, it effectively draws the listener deeper into the world the band are creating through dual vocals, patient craft and spacious production. If I was a label, I’d sign them for the bass tone on 14-minute closer “Desert” alone, never mind any of the other natural phenomena they portray throughout the record, which is perhaps grim in theme but nonetheless brimming with potential. Some cool riffs on this dying planet.
A scorching set culled from two nights of performances in their native Nashville, what’s essentially serving as Kings of the Fucking Sea‘s debut long-player, In Concert, is a paean to raw psychedelic power trio worship. High order ripper groove pervades “Witch Mountain” and the wasn’t-yet-named “Hiding No More” — which was introduced tentatively as “Death Dealer,” which the following track is actually titled. Disorienting? Shit yeah it is. And shove all the poignancy of making a live album in Feb. 2020 ahead of the pandemic blah blah. That’s not what’s happening here. This is all about blow-the-door-so-we-can-escape psychedelic pull and thrust. One gets the sense that Kings of the Fucking Sea are more in control than they let on, but they play it fast and loose and slow and loose throughout In Concert and by the time the mellower jam in “I Walk Alone” opens up to the garage-style wash of crash cymbal ahead of closer “The Nile Song,” the swirling fuckall that ensues is rampant with noise-coated fire. A show that might make you look up from your phone. So cool it might be jazz. I gotta think about it.
They bill themselves as ‘Mantarraya – power trío,’ and guitarist/vocalist Herman Robles Montero, drummer/maybe-harmonica-ist Kelvin Sifuentes Pérez and bassist/vocalist Enzo Silva Agurto certainly live up to that standard on their late-2020 self-titled debut full-length. The vibe is classic heavy ’70s through and through, and the Peruvian three-piece roll and boogie through the 11 assembled tracks with fervent bluesy swing on “En el Fondo” and no shortage of shuffle throughout the nine-minute “120 Años (Color),” which comes paired with the trippier “Almendrados” in what seems like a purposeful nod to the more out-there among the out there, bringing things back around to finish swinging and bouncing on the eponymous closer. I’ll take the classic boogie as it comes, and Mantarraya do it well, basking in a natural but not too purposefully so sense of underproduction while getting their point across in encouraging-first-record fashion. At over an hour long, it’s too much for a single LP, but plenty of time for them to get their bearings as they begin their creative journey.
At the risk of repeating myself, someone’s gonna sign Häxmästaren. You can just tell. The Swedish five-piece’s second album, Sol i Exil (“sun in exile,” in English), is a mélange of heavy rock and classic doom influences, blurring the lines between microgenres en route to an individual approach that’s still accessible enough in a riffer like “Millennium Phenomenon” or “Dödskult Ritual” to be immediately familiar and telegraph to the converted where the band are coming from. Vocalist Niklas Ekwall — any relation to Magnus from The Quill? — mixes in some screams and growls to his melodic style, further broadening the palette and adding an edge of extremity to “Children of the Mountain,” while “Growing Horns” and the capper title-track vibe out with with a more classic feel, whatever gutturalisms happen along the way, the latter feeling like a bonus for being in Swedish. In the ever-fertile creative ground that is Gothenburg, it should be no surprise to find a band like this flourishing, but fortunately Sol i Exil doesn’t have to be a surprise to kick ass.
Launching with the nine-minute instrumental “Benares” is a telling way for Kyiv’s Shiva the Destructor to begin their debut LP, since it immediately sets listener immersion as their priority. The five-track/44-minute album isn’t short on it, either, and with the band’s progressive, meditative psychedelic style, each song unfolds in its own way and in its own time, drawn together through warmth of tone and periods of heft and spaciousness on “Hydronaut” and a bit of playful bounce on “Summer of Love” (someone in this band likes reggae) and a Middle Eastern turn on “Ishtar” before “Nirvana Beach” seems to use the lyrics to describe what’s happening in the music itself before cutting off suddenly at the end. Vocals stand alone or in harmony and the double-guitar four-piece bask in a sunshine-coated sound that’s inviting and hypnotic in kind, offering turns enough to keep their audience following along and undulations that are duly a clarion to the ‘others’ referenced in the title. It’s like a call to prayer for weirdo psych heads. I’ll take that and hope for more to come.
The first and only lyric in “Heal” — the opening track of Sydney, Australia, trio Amammoth‘s debut album, The Fire Above — is the word “marijuana.” It doesn’t get any less stoned from there. Riffs come in massive waves, and even as “The Sun” digs into a bit of sludge, the largesse and crash remains thoroughly weedian, with the lumbering “Shadows” closing out the first half of the LP with particularly Sleep-y nod. Rawer shouted vocals also recall earlier Sleep, but something in Amammoth‘s sound hints toward a more metallic background than just pure Sabbath worship, and “Rise” brings that forward even as it pushes into slow-wah psychedelics, letting “Blade Runner” mirror “The Sun” in its sludgy push before closer “Walk Towards What Blinds You (Blood Bong)” introduces some backing vocals that fit surprisingly well even they kind of feel like a goof on the part of the band. Amammoth, as a word, would seem to be something not-mammoth. In sound, Amammoth are the opposite.
With emotional stakes sufficiently high throughout, MCMXIII is urgent enough to be post-hardcore, but there’s an underpinning of progressive heavy rock even in the mellower stretch of the eight-minute “Dogfight” that complements the noisier and more angular aspects on display elsewhere. Opener “Post Blue Collar Blues” sets the plotline for the newcomer Dayton, Ohio, four-piece, with thoughtful lyrics and a cerebral-but-not-dead-of-spirit instrumental style made full and spacious through the production. Melodies flesh out in “Cripple John” and “Old Face on the Wall,” brooding and surging in children-of-the-’90s fashion, but I hear a bit of Wovenhand in that finale as well — though maybe the one doesn’t exclude the other — so clearly Nineteen Thirteen are just beginning this obviously-passion-fueled exploration of sound aesthetic with these songs, but the debut EP they comprise cuts a wide swath with marked confidence and deceptive memorability. A new turn on Rust Belt heavy.
Hey, you process trauma from living through the last year your way and Genova, Italy’s Ikitan will process it theirs. In their case, that means the writing, recording and self-release of their 20-minute single-song EP, Twenty-Twenty, a sprawling work of instrumentalist heavy post-rock rife with spacious, airy lead guitar and a solid rhythmic foundation. Movements occur in waves and layers, but there is a definite thread being woven throughout the outing from one part to the next, held together alternately by the bass or drums or even guitar, though it’s the latter that seems to be leading those changes as well. The shifts are fluid in any case, and Ikitan grow Twenty-Twenty‘s lone, titular piece to a satisfyingly heft as they move through, harnessing atmosphere as well as weight even before they lower volume for stretches in the second half. There’s a quick surge at the end, but “Twenty-Twenty” is more about journey than destination, and Ikitan make the voyage enticing.
Loops, far-out spaces and a generally experimentalist feel ooze outward like Icelandic lava from Bodkin, the five-song debut LP from UK-based solo-outfit Smote. The gentleman behind the flow is Newcastle upon Tyne’s Daniel Foggin, and this is one of three releases he has out so far in 2021, along with a prior drone collaboration tape with Forest Mourning and a subsequent EP made of two tracks at around 15 minutes each. Clearly a project that can be done indoors during pandemic lockdown, Smote‘s material is wide-ranging just the same, bringing Eastern multi-instrumentalism and traditionalist UK psych together on “Fohrt” and “Moninna,” which would border on folk but for all that buzz in the background. The 11-minute “Motte” is a highlight of acid ritualizing, but the droning title-track that rounds out makes each crash count all the more for the spaces that separate them. I dig this a lot, between you and me. I get vibes like Lamp of the Universe here in terms of sonic ambition and resultant presence. That’s not a comparison I make lightly, and this is a project I will be following.
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 8th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
Ukrainian heavy psychedelic rockers Shiva the Destructor are giving a nine-minute preview of their upcoming debut album, Find the Others, in the new single “Hydronaut.” Following on from the prior-unveiled “Nirvana Beach,” it finds the Kyiv four-piece running out of songs to post in advance, so it’s probably a good thing the record’s out on March 26. You’ll find the track at the bottom of the post, and if and when you put it on, be ready to spend the entirety of its run with it. There’s a warm-toned, welcoming vibe that’s a little bit reminiscent of defunct Kyiv troupe Ethereal Riffian, but maybe more born of post-Elder progressive heavy and My Sleeping Karma‘s penchant for getting lost in the groove. But whatever else you take awawy from that meandering-ass last sentence, take the word “vibe,” because that and the melody are what it’s all about.
Haven’t heard the record yet, but it’s easy enough to dig “Hydronaut” and “Nirvana Beach,” so by all means, yes, do that.
The PR wire awaits you:
Rodion Tsirka on “Hydronaut”:
It all started with a dense swampy riff that I came up with on April 20, 2016. I wanted to post a video on my YouTube channel that day, so I washed the dishes thoroughly, picked up a downtuned guitar and started playing. Right off the bat, the main riff came out.
On May 1, using the “range hood” method and having returned to the uptuned Shiva-tuning, I got out of my head almost all other parts of the future track. The method is that I record the main riff using a looper, leave it in the living room to play the loop, go to the kitchen, turn on the range hood fan at a speed at which I can barely hear the riff, and wash the dishes. After these five to ten minutes, melodies “derivative” of the main riff start playing in my head. The next step is to let myself simmer in those for a little, then come back to the living room, quickly turn off the looper and take the guitar just in time to figure out everything still playing in my head. In a way, the range hood fan works like a subway ride after a rehearsal — it has its own sonic range that can be relied on as a support on which something similar to what’s stuck in my head after a rehearsal starts to play.
So, there was this initial dense swampy guitar riff, and then a swampy dense bass riff emerged from it, layered by a light guitar intro. Actually, the whole track is a result of mixing something dense and swampy with something light and airy.
Then, with the guys, the verses were developed where the harmony moved somewhere and not always stayed in one place, as it often happened with my riffs back then, and the lyrics were written.
My initial idea was much thicker and slower, but together we made a song that significantly expanded the range of emotions it initially covered.
Progressive heavy psych group Shiva the Destructor plays sprawling, spiraling rock music that is superbly crafted for maximum atmospheric flow. Hailing from Kyiv, Ukraine, the formidable four-piece is a band of true compositional ambition. Shiva the Destructor will release the new full-length LP, ‘Find the Others’, on March 26 via Robustfellow Productions.
1.) Benares 2.) Hydronaut 3.) Summer of Love 4.) Ishtar 5.) Nirvana Beach
Shiva the Destructor features Andrii Pryimak (guitar, vocals, backing vocals, keyboards), Rodion Tsikra (guitar, vocals), Andrew Sernyak (bass, backing vocals) and Kostiantyn Kalachikov (drums), who replaced Marco Sharyi, the band’s original drummer and ideological co-creator who performed and composed lyrics on ‘Find the Others’.
Last month, Stoned Jesus played. On a stage. With people there. Some people, anyway. The show, held in their hometown of Kyiv, Ukraine, was of course set up for social distancing, and in addition to that new territory, it also marked the first time the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Igor Sidorenko, Serhij Sljussar and drummer Dmytro Zinchenko performed acoustically. It was reportedly taped for posterity and videos will likely surface at some point later or sooner. As it is, the photos the band has posted on social media make it look all the more like the special night it must’ve been.
Count Stoned Jesus among the multitudes with ‘best laid plans’ for 2020. Among other tours they had in the works for Europe, South America, etc., they were to have made their US debut at the second Desertfest New York and tour around that — an initial incursion to American soil that would have only furthered their status as one of Europe’s leading purveyors of heavy rock. Instead, a live stream of a show at Green Theatre from 2019, pro-shot, pro-audio, pro-edit, was aired for fans missing seeing them on stage — or those like myself, who’ve yet to be so fortunate — and unlike other come-and-gone livestreams, the band and Napalm Records have been kind enough to keep it available for the public. I’ve included it here, if only because it’s worth watching.
It’s hard to do interviews these days and not talk about what could’ve been in an alternate reality 2020, but Sidorenko is a personable cat. In addition to the November show and the livestream, he chatted about songwriting, the deeply personal relationship he has to the songs on the band’s most recent LP, 2018’s Pilgrims (review here), the enduring legacy of 2012’s Seven Thunders Roar (review here), the reissue of their debut album, 2010’s First Communion (complete with product placement!), his love of Elephant Tree‘s latest record and much more. Of special note is the section where he discusses the direction of the next Stoned Jesus full-length, for which writing is in progress, and the idea of songwriting as an end unto itself in a multimedia-driven age. Also his foray into stand-up, at which one imagines he’s quite good.
It was a fun conversation. I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for reading and watching:
Stoned Jesus Interview with Igor Sidorenko, Dec. 11, 2020
Stoned Jesus‘ Pilgrims and the reissue of First Communion are out now and you can still watch the Green Theatre live show below.
Posted in Whathaveyou on September 2nd, 2020 by JJ Koczan
It was just back in April that I found out about Stoned Jesus guitarist/vocalist Igor Sydorenko‘s side/solo-project Voida and managed to close out a week with Colour Me Darkness (discussed here), which was originally released in 2011. I know, late to the party as ever. Nothing new there. Sydorenko has checked in to send along word that there’s a new Voida release on the way this very Friday in order to take advantage of the Bandcamp no-fee day for September, and it’s been titled Dekada seemingly in honor of just how long it’s been since the first time the project really put together a batch of songs with vocals.
I don’t know about you, but I’m way curious to hear what an 18-minute piece from Sydorenko sounds like. We don’t know yet, but if you’re impatient like me, you’ll find “Drunk on the Blood of Ghosts” below. Voida isn’t Stoned Jesus, so if you’re thinking you’re going to get huge riffs and “I’m the Mountain” or whatever, you’re probably way off the mark, but still, I wonder what he’s doing with that kind of extended space at his disposal. At least it won’t be all that long before we find out. Today’s what, Wednesday? It’s hard to even know anymore sometimes. Like on Wednesdays, apparently. Also Tuesdays. Whatever.
Art and announcement follow:
Voida is a singer-songwriter/art rock one-man-endeavour of Igor Sydorenko (Stoned Jesus). Releasing a full-length album, four EPs and a collection of early drone ambient soundscapes in between 2009 and 2014, the project was shelved so its creator would concentrate more on his main band. Last year, after the long break, Igor as Voida opened for Michael Gira (Swans) in Kyiv, UA and the idea of a career-spanning rarities compilation was born. Named DEKADA, it celebrates ten years since the first song-oriented Voida release and arrives September 4th via voida.bandcamp.com exclusively.
1. 1425 (8’49”) 2. Drunk On The Blood Of Ghosts (5’49”) 3. April (8’11”) 4. Deep In The Heart Of Nowhere (18’04”) 5. Rope (3’50”)
Posted in Features on April 30th, 2020 by JJ Koczan
The statistics of COVID-19 change with every news cycle, and with growing numbers, stay-at-home isolation and a near-universal disruption to society on a global scale, it is ever more important to consider the human aspect of this coronavirus. Amid the sad surrealism of living through social distancing, quarantines and bans on gatherings of groups of any size, creative professionals — artists, musicians, promoters, club owners, techs, producers, and more — are seeing an effect like nothing witnessed in the last century, and as humanity as a whole deals with this calamity, some perspective on who, what, where, when and how we’re all getting through is a needed reminder of why we’re doing so in the first place.
Thus, Days of Rona, in some attempt to help document the state of things as they are now, both so help can be asked for and given where needed, and so that when this is over it can be remembered.
Thanks to all who participate. To read all the Days of Rona coverage, click here. — JJ Koczan
Days of Rona: Bomg (Kyiv, Ukraine)
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How are you dealing with this crisis as a band? Have you had to rework plans at all? How is everyone’s health so far?
As anybody does, staying at home, trying to keep the distance, everything is on pause. Now there is no point in scheduling anything, up to what time? Who knows… We haven’t scheduled events in the nearest month or two, so nothing much to rework, but it seems like all summer live shows that were being discussed are gone for now. Heath-wise we’ve been okay so far. No way to test it though, only people with severe symptoms are being tested right now.
What are the quarantine/isolation rules where you are?
The rules are basically the same as in many countries: state of emergency, social distancing orders, essential businesses are only allowed etc. However, you can use means of personal transportation, not without occasional document checking.
How have you seen the virus affecting the community around you and in music?
It’s a bummer to see bands canceling tours and whatnot: EHG were in Kyiv and they had to leave the same day a show was scheduled, how unfortunate is that? Hope they’re doing well. As for the community, many people on the streets seem not to care about the situation, which raises concerns about the next month. Pharmacies have almost none of the masks, hand sanitizer – all of it gets hoarded the minute the pharmacy opens. All means of municipal transportation are for essential workers only, the borders are closed. Overall the country lacks funding and medical infrastructure, so without these measures, everything may go south very quickly. The thing is steadily spreading across the country. It’s a mess, but relatively normal in terms of reaction and measures.
What is the one thing you want people to know about your situation, either as a band, or personally, or anything?
I hope that this situation will be solved, and the opportunity to live to the full extent, travel, play live music, meet friends and family will be restored and appreciated on whole another level. Stay healthy. And don’t let the fear sink in – it is the worst disease.
I’ll readily admit that I had never heard Voida‘s Colour Me Darkness until yesterday. That was kind of the point. On thee social medias, I put out a request for something mellow with which to end the week. I wasn’t feeling anything too aggro, more subdued, and there were some really cool suggestions that came back. This one came courtesy of Igor Sidorenko of Kyiv-based Stoned Jesus and I followed the link immediately because, well, when The Mountain speaks, you listen. So I listened. It wasn’t until I actually looked at the Bandcamp though that I realized Voida was his own project — respect the hustle — with contributions of mellotron/organ from Alexey Klabukov of Vespero and some added sax from bnk of Selma. Right on. Igor also warned, via GIF, that it was depressing, and fair enough. While second cut “Erased” opens up to flourish of mellotron melody and is one of the three out of total six tracks that features drums, the roots of Voida are very much in acoustic songwriting, and there are plenty of moments — the opening of “No Sanctuary for the Sinking Ship,” and, to an extent, the opening title-cut — that hinge on guitar-and-voice minimalism.
At the same time, Colour Me Darkness, in that same “No Sanctuary for the Sinking Ship” no less, also explores a particularly Floydian melancholia, giving the entire affair a more contemplative feel. Sidorenko weaves in a sense of structure throughout. “Colour Me Darkness” establishes its hook in its verses and there’s a sense of drama thanks to the mellotron that gives a sense of build to “Erased,” even as the song takes on a full-band vibe, with bass and drums layered in beneath the electric guitar solo that, while not scorching, still provides a tie to Sidorenko‘s work in his main outfit. Still, some of the stylistic difference is part of what makes Colour Me Darkness engaging, particularly as a first/second/third listen, etc. The emotive crux of “The Last Date” serves as an example of something that, in a form that was outwardly heavier in tone, would be nearly impossible. Surrounded by his own acoustic strum and Klabukov‘s flowing keys, Sidorenko‘s voice lets loose in a way that weighted distortion would simply swallow up, and the backdrop enhances the sincerity of the lyrics. That song caps with backward guitar transitioning into “The First Snow,” and the connection is purposeful as the two songs comprise the ‘Disintegration Duology.’ It’s no stretch to hear a lonely spirit in a recording of solo voice and acoustic guitar, but the rougher edge in Sidorenko‘s voice, the way he reaches for some of the notes, the dryness (that is, sans-reverb) of the vocal recording — all of this feeds into a central idea of organic expression that, once again, is the root from which Colour Me Darkness stems.
And it does stem. “Erased” gave some tease, but Voida‘s drums return on both “The First Snow” and 14-minute closer “Poison in the Wells.” The penultimate track shifts into tambourine-laced psych-folk, with sitar-esque guitar drone and all, before its quiet conclusion rounds out the duology and, one assumes, the disintegration, with a sense more of acceptance than misery. Meanwhile, the finale is essentially an album unto itself, as its runtime spans not just a significant portion of Colour Me Darkness‘ 44-minute stretch, but it moves from hypnotic and moody Scott Kelly-style strum-and-woe into multi-layered vocals on a linear path that eventually takes it into a launch at 7:25 that puts it in atmospheric territory not unlike Paradise Lost or even Judgement-era Anathema in a spacious, progressive and surprising finish. Mellotron returns, the drums and bass march out in dirge fashion, and yes, there’s still an acoustic guitar at the base of it that’s the last thing to go, plucking the notes that started the song off on its encompassing path, but so much is put forth in “Poison in the Wells” that it’s easy to gloss over such subtleties in the wake of what’s just passed. Such is all the more fodder for repeat listens.
Voida issued a series of four seasonally-named EPs between 2010 and 2014, but Colour Me Darkness, which came out in 2011, was the project’s lone full-length, and since 2014’s Autumn EP, it would appear to have been put to rest. Perhaps that’s due to the shifting priorities of Sidorenko himself, with Stoned Jesus hitting the road ever harder after releasing their second album, 2012’s Seven Thunders Roar (review here), resulting in an even busier schedule for 2015’s The Harvest (review here) and their eventual pickup by Napalm Records ahead of 2018’s Pilgrims (review here), their ascent fueled not only by the hit-the-algorithm internet word of mouth, but through their own continued efforts in terms of touring and progressing in terms of sound. Last year, Stoned Jesus began to mark their 10th anniversary with a series of tours, dividing Europe into different territories and covering them one by one. Their first US appearance is currently still slated for Desertfest New York in Sept. 2020, but like everythig else in New York, it is a question as to whether or not this will take place.
Either way, the point here was that I wanted to hear something new to me, and here was a solo-project by someone whose work I’ve respected for the better part of a decade — Stoned Jesus made their debut in 2010 with First Communion, which I picked up in 2011 and dug — that I’d never heard. These are hard times. I know that. We all know it. Human beings aren’t made to sit still. We’re made to go, even if it’s just from one place to another to serve our capitalist overlords. But while we’re forced to stop that process, it’s important to remember that there are still ways to encounter new things, new ideas, both that are coming out now and that we might have missed. People are still making art, and people still have made art forever, and I don’t care who you are, there’s no way you’ve seen it all. If we’re all stuck, at least we can unstick our minds a little, and maybe when the plague lockdown is over, we’ll all come out a little better for it.
As always, I hope you enjoy. Thanks for reading.
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Week’s over, right? Next week, I intend to wrap up the Days of Rona series. Last posts. It’s starting to feel like data-entry on my part and that’s a bit of a drag. Not really what my day needs. Plus I was kind of disappointed at the lack of response from women or anyone who wasn’t a dude with a beard, but I guess that’s heavy rock at this point. So it goes.
I asked The Patient Mrs. if she wanted to do one. I don’t know if she’s going to or not. She’s pretty busy these days.
Beyond that, Monday I’m reviewing the Elder record, Tuesday I’m reviewing High Priestess (finally!) and there are some other premieres set for this and that along the way too. Cool stuff to come.
Regular news is also starting to trickle in again, which is good. I wouldn’t say it’s “back to normal,” as far as that standard goes — not a lot of tour announcements — but there are things to talk about that aren’t directly related to COVID-19, and, if nothing else, I could use a break. If we all wind up in lockdown until June or July, August, October, three years from now, whenever, I reserve the right to start the series back up.
It’ll probably be all the same people answering. Ha. At least I’ll have pics to go with.
I noted such on Thee Facebooks, but today’s probably the busiest release day 2020 has seen, with new stuff from Elephant Tree, Elder, Wight, 1000mods, Soldati, King Witch, Gaffa Ghandi, Lord Fowl and a ton of others out. Obviously no one knew there’d be a pandemic on when they were doing their scheduling, so whatever you can do to support these people vis a vis buying records, it’s something you might consider doing. Because more art.
Have a great and safe weekend. Thanks again for reading.
