Posted in Whathaveyou on January 26th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Cheers to Swedish hard ‘n’ heavies Deville on the new video for ‘Serpent Days’ from their 2022 album, Heavy Lies the Crown (review here), but double-cheers to the band on marking the 20th anniversary of their inception in 2024. Two decades of riding around the Continent (and beyond) for gigs continues this very evening, as the band undertake a weekender to start off this special year. They’ve got other shows booked through the next few months that you can see listed below as well.
And of course there’s the video too. Since their start, Deville have never stopped progressing, and as their sound has grown sharper and more aggressive in the delivery, their songwriting has grown correspondingly tight, and their niche is more their own now than it’s ever been. After 20 years, that doesn’t strike me as a terrible place to end up.
From the PR wire:
DEVILLE 20 Years and New Video!
“Serpent Days” Official Video is out from today. Taken from the 2022 album “Heavy Lies the Crown”.
And also!!
Celebrating 20 years as a band in 2024, an anniversary album containing some of the most played songs, some new tracks and surprises will be released. After touring Europe and Australia in 2023 the band will start of the new year with some shows in Sweden and around.
In 2004 in Malmö, faith united four musicians to form Deville, a heavy rock band with infectious energy. Armed with their authentic fusion of rock, metal and stoner, they got their first release out in 2006 and started to tour. Since 2004, they released five albums, played more than 500 shows and festivals all over Europe, Australia and the United States and shared the stage with great acts as Red Fang, Fu Manchu, Sepultura, Torche, Mustasch and many more.
UPCOMING SHOWS
01/26/24 DRAMMEN(NO) AT KOMETEN
01/27/24 ÖREBRO AT BJÖRNES PUB
02/16/24 HÖGANÄS AT GARAGE BAR
02/17/24 MOTALA AT BOMBER BAR
03/15/24 STOCKHOLM AT GAMLA ENSKEDE BRYGGERI
03/16/24 HOUSE OF BLUES AT BORLÄNGE
04/19/24 TBA AT GOTHENBURG
04/20/24 TRANÅS AT PLAN B
Deville: Andreas Bengtsson – Vocals, Guitars Michael Ödegården– Drums Andreas Wulkan – Lead Guitar,Vocals Martin Nobel – Bass
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 25th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Emitting psych-revelry vibes in transluscent shades from Rolling Stones, Samsara Blues Experiment and the sunny acid folk of Tao and the Drones of Praise, Malmö weirdos Nepal Death offer “She Demon (The Exorcism of the Rakshasi)” as the follow-up single to the video they did for “Sister Nirvana” (posted here), which surfaced this Fall. And like that track, the new one marries classic pop ideologies with mushroomy oddball psych, a traditionalism based on shirking tradition, at least aesthetically, in favor of something more freeing. It wants you to sing along. Maybe you will or maybe not.
So let’s have a dream gig with Nepal Death and fellow outsider-art Swedes Toad Venom, shall we? Could add some cosmic strangeness from the UK in Codex Serafini if you want. Good bill, though I don’t know that it would or wouldn’t ever happen. In any case, a pocket of strangeness tucked away in the recesses of genre is welcome, and Nepal Death answer that call with a duly individualized sound. As to an album, I won’t speculate except to remind that we live in a universe of infinite possibility. Something perhaps to keep in mind as you listen.
From the PR wire:
The Musical Collective of Nepal Death now unleash their latest sonic story upon the world. “She Demon (The Exorcism of the Rakshasi)” will take you on a mind-bending trip spanning over nine glorious minutes.
The song echoes the rhythms of The Rolling Stones’ ”Sympathy for the Devil” and the vibes of Primal Scream’s “Movin’ on Up”. Feel the trippy seventies, featuring psychedelic guitars, infectious basslines, drum grooves, magical flute melodies, bells, singing bowls and massive choirs. The lyrics draw inspiration from Hindu legends of the Rakshasi-demons wielding supernatural powers for evil acts. Picture fierce beings with flaming red eyes and hair, savoring the scent of human flesh.
“Embark on a cosmic odyssey with ‘She Demon’ – Our tribute to ’70s psychedelia, blending the eerie with the energetic. Picture fierce Rakshasi demons and join us in this nine-minute sonic journey featuring amazing guest artists. It’s more than a song; it’s a direct line to the cosmic vibrations of fierce demons!” – says the band.
She Demon is written and performed by Nepal Death, featuring guest artists Pontus Torstensson (Exorcist GBG/Tentakel), Lisa Isaksson (Second Oracle/Me And My Kites), and Anders Kjellberg (Fontän/Tross).
Recorded at Studio Katakomb, Kali Kitchen Studios and Konrad Tönz Klangwerk. Released by Kali Psyche Records. Mixed and mastered by Mikael Andersson at Soundport Music. Artwork painted by enigmatic psychedelic performance artist Zephyr Wycorn.
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 16th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Much to Nepal Death‘s credit, they definitely own up to the “Gimme Shelter” influence in their new single “Sister Nirvana,” which arrives complete with backing singers and that everyone-on-board hook. Also to the Swedish outfit’s credit, they earn it. And they pitch the video as hippie horror, which I guess is fair, but I get way more of the dancing at the show than thee kitsch, but so it goes. I’m sure everyone gets slaughtered in there somewhere.
The band’s self-titled debut came out in 2021 and they have other, short-release odds and ends, EPs and singles. I don’t know if “Sister Nirvana” is heralding a follow-up or what, but it’s out now as things are at the places you can buy digital media — I didn’t find Bandcamp, if that’s your thing — so if you dig it, there’s more you can do which I feel like isn’t always the case in the age of preorders and so on.
Anyway, maybe you check out the track and dig it, or maybe you don’t. Costs you like 30 seconds either way and the video is well done. If you’d ask for more you’re on the wrong genre.
From the PR wire:
DEATH, DECADENCE, AND DISCO BALLS! NEPAL DEATH`S »SISTER NIRVANA!« – 1972 PSYCH ROCK B-MOVIE HIPPIE DANCE HORROR!
ABOUT NEPAL DEATH
Nepal Death is like a transcendent 1972 VW bus voyage along The Hippie Trail. This Swedish musical collective is painting a vibrant auditory tapestry reminiscent of the era of free love, all set against the mysterious backdrop of death goddess Kali Ma. Their music beckons listeners to c ontemplate the metamorphosis (or end) that await them beyond the ultimate destination of Kathmandu.
ABOUT »SISTER NIRVANA«
The music video pays homage to B-movie horror stories from the seventies, featuring captivating dance sequences and a gripping storyline. Directed by filmmaker Emil Dorbell and penned by Nepal Death’s frontman, Anders Hallberg, the video was shot on location in an old strippers’ joint featuring real actors and a horde of evil groovy cultists.
The song is a pulsating empowering psychedelic rock anthem aiming for cosmic dancefloors in all dimensions. Like a marriage of the vibes from The Rolling Stones’ »Gimme Shelter«, and the aura of The Soundtrack of Our Lives or even early Tame Impala. The track encapsulates the essence of the trippy seventies, featuring psych guitars, backward sitars, infectious basslines and a rhythmic drum groove. All interwoven with massive organ and magical flute melodies.
RELEASE DATE AND AVAILABILITY
»Sister Nirvana« will make its grand debut on all major streaming platforms starting NOW! The music video will premiere exclusively on the Nepal Death YouTube and Facebook pages.
[Click play above to stream the premiere of Moon Coven’s Sun King. It’s out Friday, Aug. 25, on Ripple Music.]
Swedish four-piece Moon Coven return with their fourth full-length, Sun King, collecting nine songs and 46 minutes of material that continues the band’s progression into the niche between niches. Their third album, 2021’s Slumber Wood (review here), brought them to Ripple Music after their 2016 self-titled (review here) came out on Transubstans, and found them solidifying their approach between classic heavy grooves and psychedelic or jammy impulses. Sun King isn’t a complete departure from this method, but in the fuzzy tone of “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote” and “Behold the Serpent,” or the centerpiece “Below the Black Grow” with its plotted guitar leads later on, “Guilded Apple” coming across with a rock that seems just to want to skate and is way more San Diego than Malmö, and the closer “The Lost Color” feedbacking into its heavy garage thrust, Moon Coven — David Regn Leban (guitar/vocals, also cover art, production, mix), Axel Ganhammar (guitar), Pontus Ekberg (bass) and Fredrik Dahlqvist (drums), plus Joona Hassinen, who mastered — put their focus on songwriting and let the rest shake out as it will.
In the case of the sunny cultism of “Seeing Stone,” that shake is palpable, Moon Coven coming off the Fu Manchu-style riffery and blown-out Fuzz-in-the-woods vocals of “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote” with a more straight-ahead shove in one of Sun King‘s standout hooks and a cut that, along with side B’s “The Yawning Wild” at 4:24, is one of the shorter inclusions at 4:32, sounding like potential Euro tour partners for their labelmates in Sun Voyager as they careen and crash and ion-drive their way through good-time cosmism and heavy vibes for heavy times. And I don’t know if Leban is looking for production clients, but with as full and dense and professional (for what it is) as Sun King sounds, he’s going to have them lining up soon enough if he doesn’t already.
Yeah, the bridge from Black Sabbath‘s “Children of the Grave” is recognizable after the midpoint in “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote” and something about the swing and holding-on-by-a-thread looseness of the penultimate interlude “Death Shine Light on Life,” maybe the lead guitar tone, brings to mind All Them Witches, but beyond these and other superficial comparison points — a riff here reminding of another riff there, and so on — Moon Coven‘s purposes are more intricate than they’ve ever been. The quiet opening of “Behold the Serpent” and the doomly unfolding of its crash-laced nod riff sprawling out give over to a march of a verse with a deceptively complex melody in its low-end fuzz complementing the vocals, a second voice layer kicking in for the chorus/title-line before they shift back to the verse.
These structures are traditional, and stylistically at least, one might call Moon Coven traditional as well, but while they’re obviously schooled on the aesthetic foundations from which they’re operating, at this point they’re also coming on a decade’s remove from their first LP, 2014’s Amanita Kingdom, and that they’d be mature in terms of craft as they are shouldn’t be a surprise. Part of why it is one is because they still sound like a young band.
To listen to “Sun King,” the song itself, its fuzzy cosmic biker boogie is executed with suitable, palpable live energy — which it needs; credit again to Leban as producer as well as player — and it moves into and through its bass-and-drums-hold-the-rhythm-while-the-guitars-line-up-for-slow-Thin-Lizzy-style-soloing, the magic of the two guitars working together highlighted briefly before a sudden and righteous return of the chorus. It is not impatient, nor wanting urgency, and its last lyric, “The turning of the tide if coming/Let’s behead the king,” feels like it’s speaking to real-world concerns through metaphor — though actually Louis XIV of France, aka the Sun King, died of gangrene — in a way that is neither overbearing in stating the obvious message that economic disparity is a bad thing, nor shying away from making the comment at all.
Like a lot of what Moon Coven do, it is a question of finding the place on the balance from which one might manipulate multiple sides. A bassy highlight in its early going, “Below the Black Grow” has a languid fuzzy rollout in its verses and a solo section answering back to the title-track in how it winds into the chorus and makes its way through to finish with a return of that easygoing-feeling fuzz, almost Brant Bjorkian for its just-right tempo and abidingly cool vibe. “Guilded Apple” tucks a dream-shimmer solo away in its second half as its ending, but its six minutes are more defined by thrust and the smoothness of the shuffle happening amid the momentum carrying Moon Coven into “The Yawning Wild,” which is all about the fuzz and the winding lead that cuts through it. They have the riff, they know they have the riff, you know they have the riff, so here it is. And when you have that kind of riff, you don’t need anything else. That they realized it is further evidence to support their maturity, but it’s not really in argument.
Feedback caps “The Yawning Wild,” as one would hope, and the instrumental “Death Shine Light on Life” picks up with a subtle push thanks largely to the drums, which assure that the spacey guitar that might just otherwise lie down and relax a while keeps moving toward “The Lost Color.” The finale echoes some of the Californian twist of “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote” or “Seeing Stone,” but has its own gritted-out intention before its solo closes like “Guilded Apple” earlier on; an ending that one might call understated if not for the song in question. “The Lost Color” certainly has a crescendo, but its payoff is for itself rather than the whole of Sun King, and maybe that’s a fitting representation of the record too, since it’s the songs that have led the way all along.
An accomplished creative process wrought with discernible care, attention and a mind toward continued growth, Moon Coven‘s Sun King signals that the four-piece have no interest in settling into easy categorization or resting on past laurels. It is an immersive but not numbing listening experience, and moves with sneaky grace derived from the band’s collective persona. Perhaps most of all, it rocks, and maybe that’s enough to ask of it.
Posted in Whathaveyou on June 30th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Swedish jammers CB3 have lined up a string of dates outside their home country for later this summer and early Fall. Starting Aug. 5 at Krach am Bach, they’ll play mostly in Germany — which I hear is how it goes — but will also support Earthless in Copenhagen, so that’s a bonus as the band supports their stellar-in-theme-and-realization 2022 release, Exploration (review here), and begins to hint at new music to come.
In April, CB3 — Charlotta’s Burning Trio, led by guitarist/vocalist Charlotta Andersson — announced bassist Pelle Lindsjö had left the band. They added Simon, either on bass and synth or just synth alongside Andersson‘s guitar and Natanael Solmonsson‘s drums, and these will be the group’s first shows in this incarnation. Hopefully someone gets good video.
The dates follow as posted on social media:
CB3 – European Tour 2023
This year we celebrate 10 years as a band/project. 10 years of experiments and exploration of music, soundscapes, improvisation and the riff.
To celebrate 10 years we will go on tour in Europe. We’re excited bring our new line-up with our incredible synth-player, bringing a big sound as we continue our space adventure for more years to come!
For 5 years of adventure we say thank you to Pelle, who has decided to move in another direction. We’ve been blessed to have you with us and wish you all the best moving forward. With that we say Welcome aboard to Simon! (#128512#) Looking forward towards Exploration part.2 and sharing some new sounds with you all!
Tourdates: 05.08 Krach am Bach Beleen DE 20.08 Spillestedet Stenegade Copenhagen DK w/ Earthless 19.09 C-Keller Weimar DE 20.09 Club VEB Hildesheim DE 21.09 TBA 22.09 Studentenclub Eberswalde DE 23.09 Schaubude Kiel DE
Thomas Moe Ellefsrud of hypnotistdesign has made this fantastic tourposter.
Shows mainly booked by Friedemann Jackalope – Artist Needs Management . Grateful for this collaboration.
We thank Kulturrådet in Sweden for making this tour possible.
Posted in Whathaveyou on June 26th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Looking for some good tonal dirt? Hit up the video at the bottom of this post for Moon Coven‘s new single “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote.” It’s the opening track of the Malmö, Sweden, four-piece’s new album, Sun King, which is out Aug. 25 through Ripple Music. The clip was recorded live in the studio, so it might be a bit rawer than the final version on the LP, but considering Moon Coven‘s work to-date, probably not that much rawer. The band were last heard from in 2021 with their third full-length, Slumber Wood (review here), and some of the intention they note below to shake up their style can be heard in the trippy echo of screaming slide guitar over the groove they ride to the song’s finish. I guess if you’ve got ‘moon’ in the name of your band, putting ‘sun’ in the album title is a decent way to let people know you’re trying something different.
This will be the band’s second offering as a four-piece, and they’ve always had an out-there edge to their sound, so if that’s where they’re headed this time around I’ll look forward to hearing it. The below came down the PR wire:
Swedish heavy psychedelic rockers MOON COVEN return with new album “Sun King” on Ripple Music this summer; debut single and preorder available!
Malmö-based heavy psychedelic merchants MOON COVEN return this August 25th with their fourth studio album “Sun King” on Ripple Music, and unveil a powerful live video for their new single “Wicked Words in Gold They Wrote”!
Two years after unleashing their juggernaut third record and Ripple Music debut “Slumber Wood” upon the world, MOON COVEN are now ready to shift the Earth’s axis and mesmerize the masses once again with a fresh set of tunes in the sheerest tradition of modern heavy psychedelia: “Sun King”. Entirely recorded and produced by the band, their fourth studio album is a generous and compelling 9-track propelled by a renewed synergy: fueled up with fuzz for days, the band keeps their myth-laden doom ethos strong while enhancing their garage-psych facet for a spirited saga full of riffic plot twists.
About new album “Sun King”, the band comments: “In some ways, Sun King was a fresh start for us. After one member had to leave the band and after three stoner/doom albums, we wanted to try other styles as well. To keep producing interesting music, we had to expand our horizons a bit. In our opinion, Sun King is our most diverse album. It’s fun and playful sometimes and dark and powerful other times. The only aims we had was to keep the songwriting fun and creative while not feeling too limited. Also we recorded everything ourselves, which meant the recording process became more creative. We had unlimited time to explore without thinking about loss of money.”
“Sun King” was recorded and mixed by David Regn Leban, and mastered by Joona Hassinen. The artwork was created by David Regn Leban. It will be released on August 25th in various vinyl editions, as well as on CD and digital through Ripple Music.
TRACKLIST: 1. Wicked Words In Gold They Wrote 2. Seeing Stone 3. Sun King 4. Behold The Serpent 5. Below The Black Grow 6. The Yawning Wild 7. Death Shine Light On Life 8. The Lost Color 9. Guilded Apple
MOON COVEN is David Regn Leban – guitar and vocals Axel Ganhammar – guitar Fredrik Dahlqvist – drums Pontus Ekberg – bass
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 31st, 2023 by JJ Koczan
As regards travel fantasies, Australia is the ultimate dream, as far as I’m concerned. I’d love to see China, Japan, Nepal, India, everywhere, Egypt, Argentina, Brazil, on and on, but Australia is about as far away from where I’m starting out as you can get and still be on the same globe. Swedish heavybringers Deville will head that way in June to catch slots at the Riff Mountain and Spliffs ‘n’ Riffs festivals with headlining dates besides. The increasingly forceful four-piece released their Heavy Lies the Crown (review here) album last Fall through Sixteentimes Music, stomping hard on the line between heavy rock and metal as has been their wont across their last several outings.
They go as veterans, and though the tour was originally slated for 2020, which would’ve seen them support 2018’s Pigs With Gods (review here), they’re that much firmer in their purposes for the time differential, and it’s easy to imagine their Scandinavian grooves will be well met by the Australian winter.
And since I mentioned it at the start, I did look up flights to Australia for these two weeks — not inviting myself or anything, just curious — and, well, if I ever happen into a spare two grand and three days of travel time, I’m sure I’ll keep you posted. Good for Deville making the (somewhat shorter but still significant) trip in the meantime.
Beats Cartel sent the following down the PR wire:
SWEDISH RIFF LORDS DEVILLE MAKE FIRST TRIP TO AUSTRALIA
Swedish riff lords Deville make their first trip to Australia this June after Covid halted their plans in 2020, today having again announced plans for an extensive national tour on the back of multiple festival appearances and their latest album release “Heavy Lies the Crown”.
Born in 2004, Deville have developed through a haze of Rock, Stoner and Metal sounds, creating something unique which has seen them support the likes of Red Fang, Sepultura, Torche, Fu Manchu, Truckfighters and tour the US, UK and Europe many times over, playing the world’s best venues and festivals.
With albums signed to Heavy Psych Sounds, Buzzville Records, Small Stone Records and Sweden’s Fuzzorama Records, the band have given almost 20 years of service to Rock’n’Roll, a feat rarely realised in today’s music business. This tour will celebrate the upcoming milestone.
June 2023 sees the Swedes travel to Australia for their first ever tour of the country after Covid shut down their 2021 Australian tour post-announce. Presented by Beats Cartel, the tour racks up nine dates in six states/territories and will see the band appear alongside some of Australia’s best talent plus the new Riff Mountain Festival in Brisbane and a double header at WA’s Spliffs’n’Riffs.
Lead singer Andreas Bengtsson says of the upcoming tour “Touring Australia for the first time is of course a huge thing for us and doing it when the band is turning 20 years old makes it even better. We’re thrilled to share the stage during this run with some of our favourite Australian bands. This will be a good one, hope to see you all at a show.”
Catch Deville this Winter, making their way across the country coast to coast for what will be a fun and energetic display of European hard Rock. Tickets are onsale now throughwww.beatscartel.com/showtickets.
Beats Cartel Presents 2023 Deville (SWE) Australian Tour Thu Jun 15 ADELAIDE Crown and Anchor Fri Jun 16 MELBOURNE Stay Gold Sat Jun 17 BRISBANE The Back Room for RIFF MOUNTAIN FESTIVAL Sun Jun 18 GOLD COAST Mo’s Desert Clubhouse Wed Jun 21 CANBERRA The Basement Thu Jun 22 PORT MACQUARIE Finnians Irish Tavern Fri Jun 23 SYDNEY House of Music and Booze Sat Jun 24 SCARBOROUGH Indian Ocean Hotel for SPLIFFS’N’RIFFS Sun Jun 25 FREMANTLE Port Beach Brewery for SPLIFFS’N’RIFFS
Deville: Andreas Bengtsson – Vocals, Guitars Michael Ödegården– Drums Andreas Wulkan – Lead Guitar,Vocals Martin Nobel – Bass
Posted in Reviews on September 28th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
I’m in it. The only reason I even know what day it is is because I keep notes and I set up the back end of these posts ahead of time. They tell me what number I’m on. As for the rest, it’s blinders and music, all all all. Go. Go. Go. I honestly don’t even know why I still write these intro paragraphs. I just do. You know the deal, right? 10 records yesterday, 10 today, 10 more tomorrow. At some point it ends. At some point it begins again. Presumably before then I’ll figure out what day it is.
Quarterly Review #71-80:
James Romig & Mike Scheidt, The Complexity of Distance
James Romig is a Pulitzer-finalist composer, and Mike Scheidt is the founding guitarist/vocalist of YOB. I refuse to cut-and-paste-pretend at understanding all the theory put into the purported ’13:14:15′ ratio of beat cycles throughout The Complexity of Distance — or, say, just about any of it — but the resulting piece is about 57 minutes of Scheidt‘s guitar work, as recorded by Billy Barnett (YOB‘s regular producer). It is presented as a single track, and with the (obviously intentional) chord progressions in Romig‘s piece, “The Complexity of Distance” is a huge drone. If you ever wanted to hear Scheidt do earlier-style Earth guitar work — yes, duh — then this might satisfy that curiosity. There’s high-culture intersecting with low here in a way that takes Scheidt out of it creatively — that is to say, Romig did the composing — but I won’t take away from the work in concept or performance, or even the result. Hell, I’ll listen to Mike Scheidt riff around for 57 minutes. It’ll be the best 57 minutes of my god damned day. Perhaps that’s not universal, but I don’t think Romig‘s looking for radio hits. Whether you approach it on that theory level or as a sonic meditation, the depths welcome you. I’d take another Scheidt solo record someday too, though. Just saying.
Copenhagen’s Mythic Sunship turned Light/Flux around so quick after 2021’s Wildfire (review here) they didn’t even have time to take a new promo photo. There is no question the Danish five-piece have been on a tear for a few years now, and their ascent into the psych-jazz fusion ether continues with Light/Flux, marrying its gotta-happen-right-this-second urgency to a patience in the actual unfolding of songs like the sax’ed out “Aurora” and the more guitar-led “Blood Moon” at the outset — light — with the cosmic triumphalist horn and crashes of “Decomposition” leading off side B and moving into the hey-where’d-you-come-from boogie of “Tempest,” presumably flux. Each half of the record ends with a standout, as “Equinox” follows “Blood Moon” with a more space rock-feeling takeoff pulse, right up to the synth sweep that starts at about 2:50, and “First Frost” gives high and low float gracefully over steady toms like different dreams happening at the same time and then merging in purpose as the not-overblown crescendo locks in. May their momentum carry them ever forward if they’re going to produce at this level.
What a fascinating direction the progression of Sweden’s Deville has taken these 15 years after Come Heavy Sleep. Heavy Lies the Crown finds the Swedish journeymen aligned to Sixteentimes Music for the follow-up to 2018’s Pigs With Gods (review here), and is through its eight tracks in a dense-toned, impact-minded 33 minutes with nary a second to spare in cuts like “Killing Time” and “Unlike You” and “A Devil Around Your Neck.” Their push and aggressive edge reminds of turn-of-the-century Swedish heavy rockers like Mustasch or Mother Misery, and even in “Hands Tied” and “Serpent Days” — the two longest cuts on Heavy Lies the Crown, appearing in succession on side A — they maintain an energy level fostered by propulsive drums and a rampant drive toward immediacy rather than flourish, but neither does the material feel rushed or unconsidered right up to the final surprising bit of spaciousness in “Pray for More,” which loosens up the throttle a bit while still holding onto an underlying chug, some last progressive angularity perhaps to hint at another stage to come. One way or the other, in craft and delivery, Deville remain reliable without necessarily being predictable, which is a rare balance to strike, particularly for a band who’ve never made the same record twice.
Guitarist/vocalist Bill Jenkins and bassist Matthew Kahn hail from Kingsnake (begat by Sugar Daddie in days of yore), drummer Michael Scarpone played in Wizard Eye, and guitarist Christopher Wojcik made a splash a few years back in King Bison, so yes, dudes have been around. Accordingly, Superdeluxe know off the bat where their grooves are headed on this five-song self-titled EP, with centerpiece “Earth” nodding toward a somewhat inevitable Clutch influence — thinking “Red Horse Rainbow” specifically — and seeming to acknowledge lyrically this as the project’s beginning point in “Popular Mechanix,” driving somewhat in the vein of Freedom Hawk but comfortably paced as “Destructo Facto” and “Severed Hand” are at the outset of the 19-minute run. “Ride” finishes out with a lead line coursing over its central figure before a stop brings the chorus, swing and swagger and a classic take on that riff — Sabbath‘s “Hole in the Sky,” Goatsnake‘s “Trower”; everybody deserves a crack at it at least once — familiar and weighted, but raw enough in the production to still essentially be a demo. Nonetheless, veteran players, new venture, fun to be had and hopefully more to come.
Based in Berlin and featuring bassist Cozza, formerly of Melbourne, Australia’s Riff Fist, alongside guitarist Moseph and drummer 666tin, Esel are an instrumentalist three-piece making their full-length debut with the live-recorded and self-produced Asinus. An eight-tracker spanning 38 minutes, it’s rough around the edges in terms of sound, but that only seems to suit the fuzz in both the guitar and bass, adding a current of noise alongside the low end being pushed through both as well as the thud of 666tin‘s toms and kick. They play fast, they play slow, they roll the wheel rather than reinvent it, but there’s charm here amid the doomier “Donkey Business” — they’ve got a lot of ‘ass’ stuff going on, including the opener “Ass” and the fact that their moniker translates from German as “donkey” — and the sprawling into maddening crashes “A Biss” later on, which precedes the minute-long finale “The Esel Way Out.” Want to guess what it is? Did you guess noise and feedback? If you did, your prize is to go back to the start and hear the crow-call letters of the band’s name and the initial slow nod of “Ass” all over again. I’m going to do my best not to make a pun about getting into it, but, well, I’ve already failed.
With riffs to spare and spacious vibes besides, London instrumentalists Blue Tree Monitor offer Cryptids, working in a vein that feels specifically born out of their hometown’s current sphere of heavy. Across the sprawl of “Siberian Sand” at the beginning of the five-song/38-minute debut album, one can hear shades of some of the Desertscene-style riffing for which Steak has been an ambassador, and certainly there’s no shortage of psych and noise around to draw from either, as the cacophonous finish manifests. But big is the idea as much as broad, and sample-topped centerpiece “Sasquatch” (also the longest cut at 8:41) is a fine example of how to do both, complete with fuzzy largesse and a succession of duly plodding-through-the-woods riffs. “Antlion” feels laid back in the guitar but contrasts with the drums, and the closer “Seven” is more straight-ahead heavy rock riffing until its second half gets a little more into noise rock before its final hits, so maybe the book isn’t entirely closed on where they’ll go sound-wise, but so much the better for listening to something with multifaceted potential in the present. To put it another way, they sound like a new band feeling their way forward through their songs, and that’s precisely what one would hope for as they move forward from here.
Vigilant in conveying the Brooklynite unit’s progressive intentions, from the synthy-sounding freakout at the end of “Wavelength Synchronizer” to the angular beginning of “Conglobulations,” Incubation is the first two-songer offering from Astrometer, who boast in their ranks members of Hull, Meek is Murder and Bangladeafy. The marriage of sometimes manically tense riffing and a more open keyboard line overhead works well on the latter track, but one would at no point accuse Astrometer of not getting their point across, and with ready-for-a-7″ efficiency, since the whole thing takes just about seven and a half minutes out of your busy day. I’m fairly sure they’ve had some lineup jumbling since this was recorded — there may be up to three former members of Hull there now, and that’s a hoot also audible in the guitars — but notice is served in any case, and the way the ascending frenetic chug of the guitar gives way to the keyboard solo in “Wavelength Synchronizer” is almost enough on its own to let you know that there’s a plan at work. See also the melodic, almost post-rock-ish floating notes above the fray at the start of “Conglobulations.” I bought the download. I’d buy a tape. You guys got tapes? Shirts?
Somewhere between a solo-project and an actual band is Oldest Sea. Led by songwriter, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and recording engineer Sam Marandola — joined throughout the four tracks of debut EP Strange and Eternal by lead guitarist/drummer Andrew Marandola and on 10-minute closer “The Whales” by bassist Jay Mazzillo — the endeavor is atmospherically weighted and given a death-doom-ish severity through the echoing snare on “Consecration,” only after opener “Final Girl” swells in distortion and melody alike until receding for string-style ambience, which might be keyboard, might be guitar, might be cello, I don’t know. Marandola also performs as a solo folk artist and one can hear that in her approach to the penultimate “I’ll Take What’s Mine,” but in the focus on atmosphere here, as well as the patience of craft across differing methodologies in what’s still essentially an initial release — if nothing before it proves the argument, certainly “The Whales” does — one hears shades of the power SubRosa once wielded in bringing together mournful melody and doomed tradition to suit purposes drawing from American folk and post-metallic weight. At 25 minutes, I’m tempted to call it an album for its sheer substance. Instead I’ll hang back and just wait and get my hopes up for when that moment actually comes.
Based in Austria with roots in Canada, Spain and Sweden, Weddings are vocalist/guitarist Jay Brown, vocalist/drummer Elena Rodriguez and bassist Phil Nordling, and whether it’s the grunge turnaround on second cut “Hunter” or the later threatening-to-be-goth-rock of “Running Away” — paired well with “Talk is Cheap” — the trio are defined in no small part by the duet-style singing of Brown and Rodriguez. The truly fortunate part of listening to their sophomore LP, Book of Spells, is that they can also write a song. Opener “Hexenhaus” signals a willful depth of atmosphere that comes through on “Sleep” and the acoustic-led gorgeousness of “Tundra,” and so on, but they’re not shy about a hook either, as in “Greek Fire,” “Hunter,” “Running Away” and closer “Into the Night” demonstrate. Mood and texture are huge throughout Book of Spells, but the effect of the whole is duly entrancing, and the prevailing sense from their individual parts is that either Brown or Rodriguez could probably front the band on their own, but Weddings are a more powerful and entrancing listen for the work they do together throughout. Take a deep breath before you jump in here.
A classic rock spirit persists across the nine songs of The Heavy Crawls‘ sophomore full-length, Searching for the Sun, as the Kyiv-based trio of guitarist/vocalist/keyboardist Max Tovstyi, bassist/backing vocalist Serj Manernyi and drummer/backing vocalist Tobi Samuel offer nods to the likes of the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix, among others, with a healthy dose of their own fuzz to coincide. The organ-laced title-track sounds like it was recorded on a stage, if it wasn’t, and no matter where the trio end up — looking at you, Sabbath-riffed “Stoner Song” — the material is tied together through the unflinchingly organic nature of their presentation. They’re not hiding anything here. No tricks. No BS. They’re writing their own songs, to be sure, but whether it’s the funky “I Don’t Know” or the languid psych rollout of “Take Me Higher” (it picks up in the second half) that immediately follows, they put everything they’ve got right up front for the listener to take in, make of it what they will, and rock out accordingly, be it to the mellow “Out of My Head” or the stomping “Evil Side (Of Rock ‘n’ Roll) or the sweet, sweet guitar-solo-plus-organ culmination of “1,000 Problems.” Take your pick, really. You’re in good hands no matter what.
