Posted in Whathaveyou on December 2nd, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Who’s up for a potentially-life-changing weekend in the desert? Well, me, for one. Barring a magic invite, I don’t imagine I’ll be there to see the inaugural Mojave Experience Festival when it takes place over two days next March, but looking at the lineup I fail to see how you wouldn’t want to. Look at that Friday bill. They call it a pre-party. Look at that Saturday bill! How many nights in your life are you going to be treated to a succession of acts like that?
It was pretty clear out of the gate — Dead Meadow and Earthless were the first two bands announced — that Mojave Experience meant business this first time out. I don’t know if this is a one-time thing or if there are intentions toward an annual happening, but either way, the assembled lineup crosses generations and stylistic borders, fostering an immediate sense of identity that’s tied to the history of the Californian desert underground with the likes of Mario Lalli, John Garcia, Gary Arce, Nick Oliveri and The Freeks involved, but that is already looking to reach beyond those geographic and aesthetic confines as well, whether that’s the doom of L.A.’s Early Moods or the acidblasting psych of Philly’s Ecstatic Vision. SoftSun and Borracho. Acid King and Hippie Death Cult. I could just go on saying names until I’ve said them all. None of them suck.
The dust has settled… and the full lineup is here. Two days !
FRIDAY • Mojave Gold (Pre-Party) Rubber Snake Charmers feat. Sean Wheeler The Freeks Arthur Seay & The RiffKillers Borracho Insomniac SoftSun
SATURDAY • Joshua Tree Lake (Main Event) Earthless Dead Meadow John Garcia Acid King Yawning Man Hippie Death Cult Nick Oliveri’s Death Acoustic Ecstatic Vision Howling Giant Early Moods
Single-day Riff Rider Passes drop Dec 5 — Friday or Saturday, your choice. Two-day bundles already gone.
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 11th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Uh, so Mario Lalli and Sean Wheeler are taking Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers to Japan for a round of six shows from Jan. 28 through Feb. 2. They start in Okayama and finish in Tokyo.
Badass, right? Of course. Lalli doing a bit of desert ambassadorship is always good news, and Wheeler‘s beat-poet frontmanning makes a welcome complement in the Rubber Snake Charmers context. But check out the part in the blue text where it says they’re improvising, and that they’ll be collaborating with local musicians to round out the lineup of the band. I don’t know the whos and wheres on that, if it’s going to be the same lineup all the time or if they’ll just roll into Kanazawa the third night of the tour and hope a drummer shows up, but for a project that’s so much about exploration and improvising their way forward, a tour like this seems ideal. You’re basically guaranteed something different every night.
In addition to this, Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers — in some incarnation — have also been confirmed for the first-ever Mojave Experience Festival in Joshua Tree, CA, in March, and Desertfest London 2026 in May, so safe to say the project will keep busy at least through the early going of the New Year. Their live-recorded 2024 album, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities (review here), will hopefully get a follow-up from all this traveling and activity, and if that happens on a night in Japan when Lalli and Wheeler are clicking with the cats from Blasting Rod with whom they’ve never shared a stage before and maybe it all just becomes a special, once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing, so much the better.
Saw the dates on socials and here they are:
Desert rock veterans Sean Wheeler & Mario Lalli are heading to Japan for a series of improvised performances, collaborating with musicians from Japan, including the psychedelic rock trio @blastingrod !
RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS JAPAN 2026 Jan 28 Pepperland, Okayama Jan 29 Sengoku Daitouryo, Osaka Jan 30 Music Base Extreme, Kanazawa Jan 31 Brazil Coffee, Nagoya Feb 1 El Puente, Yokohama Feb 2 Fever, Tokyo
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 6th, 2025 by JJ Koczan
Business as usual here, by which I mean Desertfest London is coming in hot with the latest round of names for the 2026 lineup, with Clutch headlining on a UK exclusive, plus Gnome, Mario Lalli, Blackwater Holylight, friggin’ 16, Howling Giant, Waxy, and a host of others — names I’ve heard, names I’ve not — joining the bill. Some homework to do — who are Ian? who are Meatdripper? — and still more reveals to come, you can see on the poster below it’s getting pretty crowded.
Clutch are the last of the headliners to be revealed, and sure to be a draw for oldschool heads alongside Green Lung, Hermano and The Sword, whoever else counts. They’re always, always, always fun live, so no doubt they’ll deliver. Tickets are on sale and linked below:
Are you ready? Our third and final 2026 headliners are here – some of you may have guessed it from our teasers — please welcome the mighty Clutch to Desertfest 2026!
It certainly has been a longtime coming but we are thrilled to announce these supernovas are *finally* bringing their legendary high-energy live show to the Desertfest London stage – their only UK show in 2026.
And that’s not all we have to share — we warmly welcome:
↠ Antwerp powertrio Gnome
↠ LA (via PDX) ethereal heavy psyche dreamers Blackwater Holylight
↠ The Godfather of Desert Rock, Mario Lalli, returning with The Rubber Snake Charmers, to take us on a shaman’s journey through the desert landscape of imagination.
↠ Swedish quintet Hällas, bringing their cinematic storytelling, and epic fantasy-themed Adventure Rock.
↠ California sludge pioneers 16 The Band – playing their first UK show in over a decade – their first time at DF London.
Feast your eyes on the 24 new artists who have joined are 2026 line up! 💥 CLUTCH GNOME BLACKWATER HOLYLIGHT MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS Hällas 16 Howling Giant khost Cwfen Harrowed Coffin Mulch The Grey Red Eyed Cult DROMOS LIQUID SHIT Waxy Midhaven Meatdripper IAN SMOULDERING TOMB Praetorian Den Der Hale SUPERSEED INSTAR SLING
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 22nd, 2025 by JJ Koczan
I mean, yeah, you probably could put on a festival centered around desert rock in the California desert and not invite Mario Lalli to be a part of it, if you wanted to do it wrong. Fortunately for those who’ll attend, next March’s inaugural Mojave Experience Festival will indeed include Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, who bring their avant-dezzpsych and poetic undulations of sound and form to the proceedings alongside the previously announced likes of John Garcia, Acid King, Dead Meadow and Earthless. If you’re keeping track, that makes Mojave Experience five-for-five in my book. I know — nobody’s keeping track. But still.
Joining the ultra-desert representation in this round are Philadelphia psychblasters Ecstatic Vision, who bring an element of chaos to any stage they take. They’re the first non-Californian act to be announced for the festival, and while I don’t know their tour plans if they even have any, it will have been nearly four years since 2022’s Elusive Mojo (review here) by the time March 2026 comes around, the prospect of a West Coast tour heralding a studio return from them is enticing to say the least. As ever, I know nothing, so don’t go being like, “that bozo from The Obelisk said you have a new record” on their Instagram or whatever. Would add to the fun though.
From socials:
Mario Lalli & The Rubber Snake Charmers
Born from the wild pulse of the California desert, Mario Lalli & The Rubber Snake Charmers is less a “band” and more a living ritual — an ever-shifting collective of players led by the godfather of desert rock himself, Mario Lalli (Yawning Man, Fatso Jetson). Known for his hypnotic bass lines and free-flowing improvisation, Lalli steers the Charmers through sprawling, psychedelic jams that blur the line between song and trance. Each performance is unique, unfolding like a mirage under the desert sun — heavy, meditative, and unpredictable.
Drawing on over four decades of underground legend, Lalli and his collaborators channel the spirit of the generator parties that birthed a global movement. Their music is a communion of rhythm and atmosphere — drone, groove, riff, and release — with raw, poetic incantations from desert icon Sean Wheeler adding grit and mysticism to the sonic storm.
Whether in a dusty dive, a windswept canyon, or beneath the stars of Joshua Tree, The Rubber Snake Charmers embody the living heart of the desert sound — heavy, spiritual, and endlessly evolving. It’s not nostalgia; it’s the continuation of a tradition that never needed permission to exist.
Ecstatic Vision
Ecstatic Vision are Philadelphia’s high-voltage shamans of heavy psych — channeling the raw spirit of Hawkwind, Amon Düül II, and Detroit’s proto-punk underground into an ecstatic, world-driven eruption of sound. Since emerging in 2013, the band has carved a singular path through the modern psych scene, releasing a string of feral, hallucinatory records and earning a reputation for live shows that unfold like trance-fueled eruptions of energy and sound.
After signing to Relapse Records on the strength of their early demos, Sonic Praise (2015) established Ecstatic Vision as torchbearers of primal, high-energy psychedelia — a blur of fuzz, sax, and trance-inducing groove. Their subsequent releases — Raw Rock Fury, Under the Influence, For the Masses, and most recently Elusive Mojo (Heavy Psych Sounds) — have only pushed the band further into uncharted territory, fusing Detroit rock grit, krautrock pulse, and global rhythm into a feverish brew.
With appearances at Roadburn, Hellfest, Desertfest, Levitation, and the legendary Duna Jam, Ecstatic Vision continue to embody the reckless, transcendental edge of heavy music. Their latest era is a full-force revival — heavier, hungrier, and more unhinged than ever — where molten grooves, scorching saxophones, and trance-inducing jams blur the line between the cosmic and the carnal.
Come ready. Come raw. The Mojave Experience isn’t here to entertain you — it’s here to change you.
Posted in Whathaveyou on April 8th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
This is one of the best lineups I’ve seen for a US-based heavy fest in the 15-plus years I’ve been running this site. I don’t know what else to say about it, honestly. For the fact that Ripplefest Texas is bringing Dozer over alone, let alone any of the other Euro acts involved who have, say, been to North America in the last 20-plus years, it’s astonishing. And not just bigger bands like Dozer and Truckfighters or Mars Red Sky and Belzebong, but Domkraft and Kal-El, bands you know if you’re into this thing but that haven’t been around as long and aren’t as ‘huge’ in the whatever sense that applies in underground music.
And it’s not like they’re skimping on within-US geography either. Of course the desert is well represented, and Texas has a significant presence as it invariably would, but with Gozu and Leather Lung headed out from Boston, Borracho traveling from D.C., Temple of the Fuzz Witch from Michigan, Robots of the Ancient World from Portland, Oregon, and so on, they’ve got all the corners and between pretty well covered. La Chinga coming from Canada. Demons My Friends giving Mexico a nod. It is extensive.
And quality. I don’t know that I’ll be there to see it, but I’d imagine that for most who get to be, it’ll be the stuff of legend. Congrats to Ryan Garney and Lick of My Spoon for bringing it into the world, and safe travels to all involved:
Here it is! The lineup for RippleFest Texas and the amazing art by Simon Berndt @1horsetown 🤘🔥❤️
We still have a few surprises left but this roster is stacked! Don’t miss your chance to see the world’s best heavy music at the largest family reunion of the year. Plus this is the ONLY premier festival that has absolutely ZERO OVERLAPPING so you can see every second of every band! Get your tickets now and we will see you in September!
Tier 2 tickets are almost sold out and the price increases on Monday so get your tickets now:
DOZER TRUCKFIGHTERS BONGZILLA MARS RED SKY BELZEBONG DOMKRAFT LEGIONS OF DOOM FATSO JETSON GOZU HOWLING GIANT THE HEAVY EYES HIGH DESERT QUEEN KAL-EL 20 WATT TOMBSTONE THE OTOLITH TEMPLE OF THE FUZZ WITCH LEATHER LUNG THUNDER HORSE HASHTRONAUT BONE CHURCH BORRACHO SUN CROW CRYSTAL SPIDERS TIA CARRERA ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD MR. PLOW LA CHINGA FOSTERMOTHER BLUE HERON TEMPTRESS FORMULA 400 DEMONS MY FRIENDS VERMILION WHISKEY VIOLET RISING HUDU AKIL BUZZ ELECTRO SHADOW OF JUPITER
GRAND FINALE w/ MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS “Desert Jam Session”
Plus the best light show in the business by @themadalchemistliquidliteshow
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers hit Australia in the company of Stöner in Fall 2022, and their debut full-length, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, was recorded on Sunday, Nov. 5 at Mo’s Desert Clubhouse. The show was featured on a streaming series called ‘Desert TV’ the audio issued on notably-limited cassette through Northern Haze before the band — spearheaded of course by namesake Mario Lalli, of Fatso Jetson, Yawning Man, etc. — signed on to release it March 29 through Heavy Psych Sounds. There are differences from the set video/live tape to the four-song/38-minute Folklore — some editing to let it flow as an album and shape songs, the mix/master from Mathias Schneeberger, etc. — and the result is an engrossing, sometimes lush, sometimes spacious, exploration of desert psychedelics. Lalli himself holds down bass in place of Nick Oliveri, who’d have been on the tour as part of Stöner but for visa issues as frontman/lead-poet Sean Wheeler informs at one point while introducing the band, and Brant Bjork and Ryan Güt, both also of Stöner, rounded out the lineup on guitar and drums, respectively.
I was lucky enough to see the semi-conjoined outfits together in Sept. 2022 (review here) before they headed Down Under, and the setup was much the same. That night, it was Lalli, Wheeler and all three members of Stöner on stage to jam, hypnotize, reach into the ether and give Wheeler‘s desert-punk bohème proclamations the textural setting they deserve. The Rubber Snake Charmers took the stage first and Stöner closed out. Super-casual. And the who-knows-where-we-might-end-up-but-let’s-go approach of the project that was so vivid that night in Jersey resonates in the loose sway and swing throughout Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, which transitions mid-jam between “Creosote Breeze” and “Swamp Cooler Reality” (note the video for the latter premiering below), mid-lyric between “Other Desert Cities” and “The Devil Waits for Me,” and puts its side flip between two standalone spoken lines from Wheeler. Clearly the intention is that the album should be taken as a whole — said the dude premiering a single track; I take what I can get — and it has more than enough fluidity between its two sides to support that experience. You can get lost in it, and I’m not about to tell you that you shouldn’t.
Some crowd noise at the outset of “Creosote Breeze” places you in the room, but a humming e-bow guitar and underlying drone silence most of the conversation. Güt gives a quick cymbal wash and they shift to a meditative riff laid out by Lalli as their true launch point. What unfurls from there does so with a chemistry that shouldn’t shock anyone familiar with the players involved — Bjork and Lalli‘s storied history in the Californian desert scene, Güt‘s near-decade drumming with Bjork between Stöner and Bjork‘s solo band, and Wheeler‘s long involvement with the Palm Springs weirdo underground in fronting Throw Rag, and so on — but they’re not so much riding pedigree here as they are pushing themselves outward, and that’s the whole point. This record, this amorphous band, wouldn’t exist without the creative passion that so clearly fuels it. The chance to tap something not yet known and see what you can make. That first riff in “Creosote Breeze” is almost surprising with a kind of brooding vibe, but they open it up cosmic and are funky long before the eight-plus minutes allotted to the track are done.
Schneeberger is credited with keys, and as the band settles into a roll before the guitar steps back circa 6:40 to let Wheeler start his next spoken recitation — he weaves back and forth between singing and spoken word, and it’s not always perfect and that’s why it works — they seem indeed to be dubbed in as part of the molten wash, but that feels fair enough for Folklore From the Other Desert Cities being based on a live set and presented as the band’s debut album. It’s not supposed to be easy to categorize outside of itself. You might say that’s how ‘desert rock’ happened in the first place; it wasn’t already another thing. “Creosote Breeze” entrances and “Swamp Cooler Reality,” mid-groove at its outset, finds its own way to build on that movement. Standout lines from Wheeler give impressionistic visions in rhythm as Bjork clicks on the wah and the drive gets accordingly funkier. They’ll mellow out a few minutes later, as one would expect, but that’s fleshed out with synth or other effects and some self-gathering-style meander comes together around the bass and drums to an open but satisfying finish of its own, “Other Desert Cities” kicking in either immediately or after the platter flip, depending how you’re listening.
But the vibe is set and the this-night incarnation of Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers carry it through to the finish of “The Devil Waits for Me,” Wheeler steering them into a desert-themed take on the blues classic “In the Pines” that allows for no sleep whatsoever. The longer-form trip they’re on in terms of the whole set has plenty of space for that kind of thing, but it’s not like they’re doing a cover or something — it’s the immediate pursuit of inspiration and the moment captured in the recording. A thing that happened that day. A short while later, in “The Devil Waits for Me,” they seem to purposefully submerge in volume, fuzz and the underlying earthy groove, but not before the whole Gold Coast crowd gets invited back to L.A. for what one assumes would be a party worth the requisite travel.
If you didn’t see them on the tour that produced Folklore From the Other Desert Cities, the recording represents well the untethered spirit that seems to be at heart in Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers and expands on it in how the material is delivered structurally and sonically. At the same time it’s their debut, it’s also right in its moment, and by it’s very nature, whatever Lalli and not-necessarily-the-same-company do next will likewise stand on its own. What one wonders is if how much Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers appreciate that they themselves are part of the folklore they’re portraying, even in this new form and modus, just by getting together and weirding out. Hasn’t that always been the idea?
Enjoy the video for “Swamp Cooler Reality” below, followed by more info from the PR wire:
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, “Swamp Cooler Reality” premiere
The first release from this band of pioneering Desert rock musicians captures the band and its purest form exercising the desert born ethic and approach of rock improvisation, psychedelic and flowing, heavy and explorative.
Tracklisting: 1. Creosote Breeze 2. Swamp Cooler Reality 3. Other Desert Cities 4. The Devil Waits For Me
Recorded live at Mo’s Desert Clubhouse, Gold Coast Australia by Guy Cooper and mixed and mastered by Mathias Schneeberger at Donner & Blitzen Studios, California. The band’s first release features BRANT BJORK, SEAN WHEELER, RYAN GUT and MARIO LALLI, capturing the band in a engaging special performance in Gold Coast Australia.
The album will be issued on March 29th on vinyl, CD and digital via Heavy Psych Sounds. Enjoy!
MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS is: Mario Lalli – bass and vocal Sean Wheeler – vocals and poetry Brant Bjork – Guitar Ryan Güt – Drums Mathias Schneeberger – keys
Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, Folklore From the Other Desert Cities (2024)
Posted in Whathaveyou on December 26th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Announced last week as signing to Heavy Psych Sounds with intention toward a debut album, Mario Lalli and the Rubber Snake Charmers, will release Folklore From the Other Desert Cities on March 19 as their recorded debut. The four-jam outing was recorded in Gold Coast, Australia, as part of a video stream for Desert.TV that you can see below, and was originally pressed to a limited-to-50-copies cassette called Forgetting Out Loud by Northern Haze Records.
I’m pretty sure ‘Other Desert Cities’ is what it says on some highway sign or other — the 101? the 10? — but the bottom line here that you’re getting a couple of Californian desert rock’s most primo ambassadors caught in the act pursuing their integral diplomatic function. And if you’d be like, ‘well how come they’re releasing a thing under a different name when it was already out and why would I buy it when I can stream it and and and…,” relax. They’re releasing a thing under a different name because it’s worth releasing and they wanted to give it what they felt would be a representative package for CD/LP distribution in more than 50 copies — that’s not a rag on Northern Haze at all; those tapes are beautiful and I could spend hundreds of Canadian dollars on that site if only I had them — and you should buy it even though you can stream it because that’s how everybody keeps getting to do what they do. You gotta put the coin in the hat.
Here’s the info and the video, which, duh, is groovin’. Have fun:
Heavy Psych Sounds to announce MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS – ‘Folklore From The Other Desert Cities’ !!!
New super-band featuring desert rock legends Mario Lalli, Brant Bjork, Sean Wheeler and Ryan Güt !!!
The first release from this band of pioneering Desert rock musicians captures the band and its purest form exercising the desert born ethic and approach of rock improvisation, psychedelic and flowing, heavy and explorative.
The foundation of Mario Lalli’s grooving heavy bass lines and meditative themes with a intuitive guitar work with Brant Bjork and percussion of Ryan Güt set the scene for Sean Wheeler’s poems and songs capturing the dark and beautiful stories and images of life in the Mojave desert of Southern California.
Tracklisting:
1. Creosote Breeze 2. Swamp Cooler Reality 3. Other Desert Cities 4. The Devil Waits For Me
Recorded live at Mo’s Desert Clubhouse, Gold Coast Australia by Guy Cooper and mixed and mastered by Mathias Schneeberger at Donner & Blitzen Studios, California. The band’s first release features BRANT BJORK, SEAN WHEELER, RYAN GUT and MARIO LALLI, capturing the band in a engaging special performance in Gold Coast Australia.
MARIO LALLI & THE RUBBER SNAKE CHARMERS is: Mario Lalli – bass and vocal Sean Wheeler – vocals and poetry Brant Bjork – Guitar Ryan Güt – Drums Mathias Schneeberger – keys
Posted in Whathaveyou on May 18th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
I don’t feel the need to even really say anything here. The lineup speaks for itself. And those who go to this year’s RippleFest Texas will also speak of it, for years, probably in a similar way people now talk about having been at this or that Emissions From the Monolith when that was going on in Ohio. The stuff of legend, in other words. Yeah, you can put on a fest and try to make it cool and fun, or you can do something like this and make it the highlight of everybody who attends’ year.
Kudos to Lick of My Spoon Productions and Ripple Music on a job well done. This will be something special. Bands have been leaked out one at a time at intermittent daily intervals, but the final lineup is out as of today, and it’s stunning. A blend of generations, a reach from on end of the country to the other, and a swath of the heavy underground all rallied in one place for a few days, pre- and after-parties included. Fucking a. If you’re attending, count yourself lucky.
As seen on socials:
Here it is! The full lineup for RippleFest Texas #3! This will be one for the ages with a stacked lineup and lots of special treats in between. Get your tickets now!
Amazing art by @1horsetown
* playing the Pre-Party + playing the Afterparty
King Buffalo, Acid King, Brant Bjork Trio, Sasquatch, Wo-Fat, Fatso Jetson, Mondo Generator, Unida, The Well+, The Atomic Bitchwax, Telekinetic Yeti*, Duel, Forming the Void, Hippie Death Cult, High Desert Queen*, Avon, War Cloud, Rubber Snake Charmers, Spirit Mother+, Kind, Nick Oliveri, Thunder Horse, Royal Sons+, Restless Spirit*, (Big) Pig, Fostermother, Dead Feathers+, Rainbows Are Free, Warlung*, Sun Voyager, Red Mesa, Dunes, Tia Carrera+, Mr. Plow, The Heroine*, Michael Rudolph Cummings, The Absurd+, GoodEye*, Red Beard Wall, God Damn Good Time Band+
Plus a “Legends of the Desert and Friends” jam session to close out Saturday night!
And as always, the visuals by The Mad Alchemist Liquid Light Show
All-Access passes are SOLD OUT! All we have left are 2 Day Passes and Pre/Afterparty tickets available. Many more bands to be announced! Get your tickets now before the full lineup is revealed and the ticket price goes up!
