Posted in Questionnaire on October 23rd, 2023 by JJ Koczan
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Milosz Gassan from Morne
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
Well, I’d say that I let out my passion for creating something, music or writing lyrics or doing anything around that territory. I let something that is inside out. Guess how I grew up and how my parents raised me and sparked all those interests led me to where I am and what I do.
Describe your first musical memory.
Can’t really remember exactly. There was always music in our house. My parents always listened to something. I’d say bands like Genesis, Pink Floyd come to mind. I wasn’t necessarily aware of it but it’s still somewhere in my head. Generally music is something that was always part of my day as a kid.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
My first distortion pedal. My dad bought me an electric guitar when I was 9 or 10 after seeing me rocking out around our house with an acoustic guitar for a couple of years. I had no idea how to make my electric guitar to make “that” sound until my neighbor gave me this piece of shit handmade distortion pedal. I could then figure out how to make my own noise. It pretty much changed my life.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
I try to move forward as fast as I can so I don’t have to look back and remember any of that.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
To a lot of frustration that sometimes leads to satisfaction. Always a bumpy road with a lot of twists and turns but I wouldn’t want it any other way.
How do you define success?
Happiness. No matter how high or how low in your life you are, being happy is a success.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
My friends passing away at young age. It’s devastating.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
More Morne albums.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
Uncompromised education. Nothing more nothing less. It lets you think and it lets you learn.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
Sharing more quality time with my family and my friends. Also getting a little bit more sleep would be good.
Posted in Whathaveyou on October 11th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
About a month ago, maybe two, I was fortunate to get an email from Metal Blade asking if I was interested in writing a bio for the new album from Boston atmospheric doomers, titled Engraved With Pain, and it was an easy yes. Heralded critically for their individualism and merging of different styles, I’d count them as undervalued considering their sound is malleable enough to fit on bills with a metal band like Gojira (a random name with precious little to do with Morne stylistically — any range of bleak proggers bubbled up from the heavy underground, sludge, death metal, industrial, on and on. And the record is four tracks long, utterly consuming, which is shown even in the small sample offered by the first single “Wretched Empire,” streaming below.
So I wrote the thing, duh. And it’s here though I’m posting it mostly to be archived here — it’s nice to keep things in a place — and if you want to skip it and go right to the song, no offense taken.
Here’s the art and info, including the bio I wrote (paragraphs two to four), and the single. Expect multi-tiered crush. Bask in it.
Off you go:
Morne: Boston Post-Metal Practitioners to Release “Engraved with Pain” Full-Length November 3rd via Metal Blade Records
“Wretched Empire” Video / Single Now Playing + Pre-orders Available
Boston-based post-metal practitioners and recent Metal Blade Records signees MORNE will unleash their devastating Engraved With Pain full-length on November 3rd, today unveiling the record’s first single, artwork, and pre-orders.
The stylistic pyroclasm of MORNE’s bleak, extreme but reachable metal did not happen overnight. Since their 2009 debut album, Untold Wait, the quartet has made simple categorizations like “doom” or even “metal” laughable, and their latest and fifth full-length, fittingly titled Engraved With Pain, refines their attack to a level toward which even 2018’s To The Night Unknown could only hint.
Engraved With Pain is a moment of grim triumph, as rooted in Celtic Frost as in Ministry, still somehow extrapolated from the gods Black Sabbath and characteristic of no one so much as themselves. Spacious, crushing, darkly thoughtful enough to be progressive but never so indulgent as to lose sight of its core message, the offering was recorded with legendary producer Kurt Ballou at GodCity Studio in Salem, Massachusetts.
Playing out across four chapters in forty-minutes, the album sees the veteran outfit crafting rhythmic tension and lung-squeezing atmospheres as Polish-born guitarist/vocalist Miłosz Gassan emits layered guttural shouts that speak to inner and outer crises. Engraved With Pain makes its title believable, and from its eponymous opener through “Memories Like Stone,” “Wretched Empire,” and “Fire And Dust,” it carries humanity individually and collectively through the realities of its decline.
“‘Wretched Empire’ is the first song off of our new album to be published bringing the wait to its end,” Gassan notes of the band’s first single, as well as their first ever video. “Barebone, stripped down riffs and a cold look at today’s reality, lyrically it’s my take on the current situation in the world: How divided everything is and how people are prone to being misled. How we forget our history; history that happened not that long ago. I never comment on my lyrics but maybe in this case it’s needed. I call humanity a ‘wretched empire.’ It’s not an optimistic song. I hope people will enjoy it and find something for themselves in this single and the whole album as well.”
Engraved With Pain will be released on CD, LP, and digital formats. Find pre-orders at: metalblade.com/morne
Photo by Hillarie Jason
MORNE: Milosz Gassan – Guitar, Vocals Paul Rajpal – Guitar Morgan Coe – Bass Billy Knockenhauer – Drums
Posted in Reviews on October 6th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Last day, this one. And probably a good thing so that I can go back to doing just about anything else beyond (incredibly) basic motor function and feeling like I need to start the next day’s QR writeups. I’m already thinking of maybe a week in December and a week or two in January, just to try to keep up with stuff, but I’m of two minds about it.
Does the Quarterly Review actually help anyone find music? It helps me, I know, because it’s 50 records that I’m basically forcing myself to dig into, and that exposes me to more and more and more all the time, and gives me an outlet for stuff I wouldn’t otherwise have mental or temporal space to cover, so I know I get something out of it. Do you?
Honest answers are welcome in the comments. If it’s a no, that helps me as well.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
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AAWKS & Aiwass, The Eastern Scrolls
Late on their 2022 self-titled debut (review here), Canadian upstart heavy fuzzers AAWKS took a decisive plunge into greater tonal densities, and “1831,” which is their side-consuming 14:30 contribution to the The Eastern Scrolls split LP with Arizona mostly-solo-project Aiwass, feels built directly off that impulse. It is, in other words, very heavy. Cosmically spaced with harsher vocals early that remind of stonerkings Sons of Otis and only more blowout from there as they roll forth into slog, noise, a stop, ambient guitar and string melodies and drum thud behind vocals, subdued psych atmosphere and backmasked sampling near the finish. Aiwass, led by multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Blake Carrera and now on the cusp of releasing a second full-length, The Falling (review here), give the 13:00 “The Unholy Books” a stately, post-metallic presence, as much about the existential affirmations and the melody applied to the lyrics as it moves into the drumless midsection as either the earlier Grayceon-esque pulled notes of guitar (thinking specifically “War’s End” from 2011’s All We Destroy, but there the melody is cello) into it or the engrossing heft that emerges late in the piece, though it does bookend with a guitar comedown. Reportedly based around the life of theosophy co-founder and cult figure Madame Helena Blavatsky, it can either be embraced on that level or taken on simply as a showcase of two up and coming bands, each with their own complementary sound. However you want to go, it’s easily among the best splits I’ve heard in 2023.
The lines between projects are blurring for Surya Kris Peters, otherwise known as Chris Peters, currently based in Brazil where he has the solo-project Fuzz Sagrado following on from his time in the now-defunct German trio Samsara Blues Experiment. Strange New World is part of a busy 2023/busy last few years for Peters, who in 2023 alone has issued a live album from his former band (review here) and a second self-recorded studio LP from Fuzz Sagrado, titled Luz e Sombra (review here). And in Fuzz Sagrado, Peters has returned to the guitar as a central instrument after a few years of putting his focus on keys and synths with Surya Kris Peters as the appointed outlet for it. Well, the Fuzz Sagrado had some keys and the 11-song/52-minute Strange New World wants nothing for guitar either as Peters reveals a headbanger youth in the let-loose guitar of “False Prophet,” offers soothing and textured vibes of a synthesized beat in “Sleep Meditation in Times of War” (Europe still pretty clearly in mind) and the acoustic/electric blend that’s expanded upon in “Nada Brahma Nada.” Active runs of synth, bouncing from note to note with an almost zither-esque feel in “A Beautiful Exile (Pt. 1)” and the later “A Beautiful Exile (Part 2)” set a theme that parts of other pieces follow, but in the drones of “Past Interference” and the ’80s New Wave prog of the bonus track “Slightly Too Late,” Peters reminds that the heart of the project is in exploration, and so it is still very much its own thing.
A covers record can be a unique opportunity for an artist to convey something about themselves to fans, and while I consider Evert Snyman‘s 12-track/38-minute classic pop-rock excursion All Killer Filler to be worth it for his take on Smashing Pumpkins‘ “Zero” alone, there is no mistaking the show of persona in the choice to open with The Stooges‘ iconic “Search and Destroy” and back it cheekily with silly bounce of Paul McCartney‘s almost tragically catchy “Temporary Secretary.” That pairing alone is informative if you’re looking to learn something about the South African-based songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, vocalist and producer. See also “The Piña Colada Song.” The ’90s feature mightily, as they would, with tunes by Pixies, Blur, Frank Black, The Breeders and Mark Lanegan (also the aforementioned Smashing Pumpkins), but whether it’s the fuzz of The Breeders’ 1:45 “I Just Wanna Get Along,” the sincere acoustic take on The Beatles “I Will” — which might as well be a second McCartney solo cut, but whatever; you’ll note Frank Black and Pixies appearing separately as well — or the gospel edge brought to Tom Waits‘ “Jesus Gonna Be Here,” Snyman internalizes this material, almost builds it from the ground up, loyal in some ways and not in others, but resonant in its respect for the source material without trying to copy, say, Foo Fighters, note for note on “The Colour and the Shape.” If it’s filler en route to Snyman‘s next original collection, fine. Dude takes on Mark Lanegan without it sounding like a put on. Mark Lanegan himself could barely do that.
Virginian heavy doom rockers Book of Wyrms have proved readily in the past that they don’t need all that long to set up a vibe, and the standalone single “Storm Warning” reinforces that position with four-plus minutes of solid delivery of craft. Vocalist/synthesist Sarah Moore Lindsey, bassist Jay “Jake” Lindsey and drummer Kyle Lewis and guitarist Bobby Hufnell (also Druglord) — the latter two would seem to have switched instruments since last year’s single “Sodapop Glacier” (premiered here) — but whatever is actually being played by whoever, the song is a structurally concise but atmospheric groover, with a riff twisting around the hook and the keyboard lending dimension to the mix as it rests beneath the guitar and bass. They released their third album, Occult New Age (review here), in 2021, so they’re by no means late on a follow-up, and I don’t know either when this song was recorded — before, after or during that process — but it’s a sharp-sounding track from a band whose style has grown only more theirs with time. I have high expectations for Book of Wyrms‘ next record — I had high expectations for the last one, which were met — and especially taken together, “Storm Warning” and “Sodapop Glacier” show both the malleable nature of the band’s aesthetic, the range that has grown in their sound and the live performance that is at their collective core.
Following on from their declarative 2022 debut, Mile High Downer Rock (review here), Denver trio Burning Sister — bassist/vocalist Steve Miller (also synth), guitarist Nathan Rorabaugh and drummer Alison Salutz — bring four originals and the Mudhoney cover “When Tomorrow Comes” (premiered here) together as Get Your Head Right, a 29-minute EP, beginning with the hypnotic nod groove and biting leads of “Fadeout” (also released as a single) and the slower, heavy psych F-U-Z-Z of “Barbiturate Lizard,” the keyboard-inclusive languid roll of which, even after the pace picks up, tells me how right I was to dig that album. The centerpiece title-track is faster and a little more forward tonally, more grounded, but carries over the vocal echo and finds itself in noisier crashes and chugs before giving over to the 7:58 “Looking Through Me,” which continues the relatively terrestrial vibe over until the wall falls off the spaceship in the middle of the track and everyone gets sucked into the vacuum — don’t worry, the synthesizer mourns us after — just before the noted cover quietly takes hold to close out with spacious heavygaze cavern echo that swells all the way up to become a blowout in the vein of the original. It’s a story that’s been told before, of a band actively growing, coming into their sound, figuring out who they are from one initial release to the next. Burning Sister haven’t finished that process yet, but I like where this seems to be headed. Namely into psych-fuzz oblivion and cosmic dust. So yeah, right on.
Informed by Pallbearer, Warning, or perhaps others in the sphere of emotive doom, UK troupe Gévaudan scale up from 2019’s Iter (review here) with the single-song, 43:11 Umbra, their second album. Impressive enough for its sheer ambition, the execution on the extended titular piece is both complex and organic, parts flowing naturally from one to the other around lumbering rhythms for the first 13 minutes or so before a crashout to a quick fade brings the next movement of quiet and droning psychedelia. They dwell for a time in a subtle-then-not-subtle build before exploding back to full-bore tone at 18:50 and carrying through a succession of epic, dramatic ebbs and flows, such that when the keyboard surges to the forefront of the mix in seeming battle with the pulled notes of guitar, the ensuing roll/march is a realization. They do break to quiet again, this time piano and voice, and doom mournfully into a fade that, at the end of a 43-minute song tells you the band could’ve probably kept going had they so desired. So much the better. Between this and Iter, Gévaudan have made a for-real-life statement about who they are as a band and their progressive ambitions. Do not make the mistake of thinking they’re done evolving.
In some of the harsher vocals and thrashy riffing of Cult of Oblivion‘s opening title-track, Massachusetts’ Oxblood Forge remind a bit of some of the earliest Shadows Fall‘s definitively New Englander take on hardcore-informed metal. The Boston-based double-guitar five-piece speed up the telltale chug of “Children of the Grave” on “Upon the Altar” and find raw sludge scathe on “Cleanse With Fire” ahead of finishing off the four-song/18-minute EP with the rush into “Mask of Satan,” which echoes the thrash of “Cult of Oblivion” itself and finds vocalist Ken McKay pushing his voice higher in clean register than one can recall on prior releases, their most recent LP being 2021’s Decimator (review here). But that record was produced for a different kind of impact than Cult of Oblivion, and the aggression driving the new material is enhanced by the roughness of its presentation. These guys have been at it a while now, and clearly they’re not in it for trends, or to be some huge band touring for seven months at a clip. But their love of heavy metal is evident in everything they do, and it comes through here in every blow to the head they mete out.
The titular rhythmic counting in Austrian heavy-prog quirk rockers High Brian‘s Five, Six, Seven (on StoneFree Records, of course) doesn’t take long to arrive, finding its way into second cut “Is it True” after the mild careening of “All There Is” opens their third full-length, and that’s maybe eight minutes into the 40-minute record, but it doesn’t get less gleefully weird from there as the band take off into the bassy meditation of “The End” before tossing out angular headspinner riffs in succession and rolling through what feels like a history of krautrock’s willful anti-normality written into the apocalypse it would seemingly have to be. “The End” is the longest track at 8:50, and it presumably closes side A, which means side B is when it’s time to party as the triplet chug of “The Omni” reinforces the energetic start of “All There Is” with madcap fervor and “Stone Came Up” can’t decide whether it’s raw-toned biker rock or spaced out lysergic idolatry, so it decides to become an open jam complete people talking “in the crowd.” This leaves the penultimate “Our First Car” to deliver one last shove into the art-rock volatility of closer “Oil Into the Fire,” where High Brian play one more round of can-you-follow-where-this-is-going before ending with a gentle cymbal wash like nothing ever happened. Note, to the best of my knowledge, there are not bongos on every track, as the cover art heralds. But perhaps spiritually. Spiritual bongos.
Shimmering, gorgeous and richly informed in melody and rhythm by South American folk, Búho Ermitaño‘s Implosiones revels in pastoralia in opener “Herbie” before “Expolosiones” takes off past its midpoint into heavy post-rock float and progressive urgency that in itself is more dynamic than many bands even still is only a small fraction of the encompassing range of sounds at work throughout these seven songs. ’60s psych twists into the guitar solo in the back half of “Explosiones” before space rock key/synth wash finishes — yes, it’s like that — and only then does the serene guitar and, birdsong and synth-drone of “Preludio” announce the arrival of centerpiece “Ingravita,” which begins acoustic and even as it climbs all the way up to its crescendo maintains its peaceful undercurrent so that when it returns at the end it seems to be home again at the finish. The subsequent “Buarabino” is more about physical movement in its rhythm, cumbia roots perhaps showing through, but leaves the ground for its second half of multidirectional resonances offered like ’70s prog that tells you it’s from another planet. But no, cosmic as they get in the keys of “Entre los Cerros,” Búho Ermitaño are of and for the Earth — you can hear it in every groove and sun-on-water guitar melody — and when the bowl chimes to start finale “Renacer,” the procession that ensues en route to the final drone is an affirmation both of the course they’ve taken in sound and whatever it is in your life that’s led you to hear it. Records like this never get hype. They should. They are loved nonetheless.
Octonaut, Intergalactic Tales of a Wandering Cephalopod
In concept or manifestation, one would not call Octonaut‘s 54-minute shenanigans-prone debut album Intergalactic Tales of a Wandering Cephalopod a minor undertaking. On any level one might want to approach it — taking on the two-minute feedbackscape of “…—…” (up on your morse code?) or the 11-minute tale-teller-complete-with-digression-about-black-holes “Octonaut” or any of their fun-with-fuzz-and-prog-metal-and-psychedelia points in between — it is a lot, and there is a lot going on, but it’s also wonderfully brazen. It’s completely over the top and knows it. It doesn’t want to behave. It doesn’t want to just be another stoner band. It’s throwing everything out in the open and seeing what works, and as Octonaut move forward, ideally, they’ll take the lessons of a song like the mellow linear builder “Hypnotic Jungle” or nine-minute capper “Rainbow Muffler Camel” (like they’re throwing darts at words) with its intermittent manic fits and the somehow inevitable finish of blown-out static noise. As much stoner as it is prog, it’s also not really either, but this is good news because there are few better places for an act so clearly bent on individualism as Octonaut are to begin than in between genres. One hopes they dwell there for the duration.
Begun with the seething, dying-to-get-heavy acoustic swamp blues tension of “The Strong Place,” Massachusetts-based sludge-plus metallers Ichabod released their sixth full-length, Merrimack (discussed here, review here) in 2014. One more time for those in the back: 2014.
That’s pre-Trump, pre-covid, pre-AI, before the war in Ukraine. Shit, it’s even before Lemmy died. I’m not saying it was a golden age — it wasn’t — but yeah. I was living in Massachusetts, having moved north the year before from my beloved Garden State — that’s New Jersey, for anyone outside the US or not familiar with state nicknames; it’s also my beloved Fuck-Off State’ — worked from home and was getting settled after moving again from one town around my wife’s work to East Bridgewater, where we’d spend, I guess the next five years or so. I was glad I got to see Ichabod a few times in that span.
Am I nostalgic for it? Not really. I love being anywhere with my wife, and it was nice to go into Boston and have friends there every now and again, but we were otherwise fairly isolated with our nearest family two-plus hours south in Connecticut. Once we had the baby, the course came into focus and we started to think for real about heading back down south to the Mid-Atlantic, but I distinctly recall putting on Ichabod‘s Merrimack a lot during that time. That record is so Massachusetts. In everything. In its title, in the sharpness of its production, the purity of its autumnal, New England-style intensity in its heaviest moments and vocalist John Fadden‘s clean/harsh vocal swaps. It was beautiful and the weather was punishing and the people were as proud and dug into being from there as people are everywhere. It was a great many things, just not my home.
With the distance of the over four years since we moved into the house in NJ where we are now, and in no small part because we made money when we sold the condo and we didn’t move into that house that had the underground gas leak our lawyer found (which was incredible of her), there are things I miss, and part of the appeal of this nine-years-later multimedia indulge is that wistfulness, since I have to wonder if maybe Ichabod themselves — Fadden on vocals, founding guitarist Dave Iverson, guitarist Jason Adam, bassist Greg Dellaria, and drummer Phil MacKay; the latter made the video — is precisely that. The song and record are about remembering the place you’re from, especially the opener “The Strong Place,” which is mashed up here with the song that follows on Merrimack, “Two Brothers Rock.”
It’s a real place, of course. Ichabod interpret it and tell a story through a sort of psychedelic sludge metal that I haven’t heard from anybody else in the last nine years — and I’ve heard a fair amount of sludge, psych and not, in that time — and the video takes performance photos and video from an age before camera phones were pro gear, and still represents the band, album and song(s) fluidly. Some of the mountains in the clip look too pointy to be the Blue Hills and the sleepy, ancient and eroded, rolling Appalachians of New England, but it works to capture the idea of a storm to match the later volume surge in “Two Brothers Rock,” and serves as a visual reminder of “Squall,” which is track three.
And if they wanted to do a video for that nine years after the fact, or get a whole visual album together to celebrate the 10th anniversary next year, I’m here for it. Thematic or conceptual LPs are rarely so memorable on a song level while still proving so expansive and tumultuous.
So please, enjoy:
Ichabod, “The Strong Place/Two Brothers Rock” official video
The first two songs from the Merrimack album, performed by Ichabod.
New produced video for the opening act of our 2014 concept album MERRIMACK by Ichabod. Produced and edited by Phil MacKay.
Written by Ichabod & John Fadden. Recorded at Amps vs Ohms by Glen Smith. 2014 Rootsucker Records.
Posted in Reviews on August 9th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
It’s not that expectations weren’t high for Close Encounters. By virtue of their lineup’s pedigree, Kind‘s output has been anticipated since before their first release, and their two albums to-date, 2015’s Rocket Science (review here) and 2020’s Mental Nudge (review here), set and lived up to a high standard for craft and melody, gleefully, mischievously kicking ass all the while since first getting together a decade ago.
I won’t take away from either of the first two records. They’re both some of the most essential heavy rock that’s come out of Boston, Massachusetts, in the last eight years. Rocket Science showed that the chemical formula resulting from the combined elements of vocalist/synthesist Craig Riggs (also drums in Sasquatch, Roadsaw frontman, etc.), guitarist/synthesist Darryl Shepard (so many bands and more all the time; he’s also a brilliant conceptualist standup comedian), bassist Tom Corino of newer-school sludge metallers Rozamov, and drummer Matt Couto (ex-Elder, also Aural Hallucinations) could function as a group rather than just players culled from elsewhere, and Mental Nudge reaffirmed it.
Where Close Encounters — because it’s the thirdKind record; get it? — goes further is in extending a sense of progression to the individual sound of Kind. That is, with these nine songs and 48 minutes, Kind and returning producer Alec Rodriguez (who recorded at Mad Oak in Spring 2022 and also mixed) refine the identity of Kind as their own band, identifiable in their melodicism, psych-leaning groove and tonality, and not even through opener “Burn Scar” (premiered here) before they’re trying new ideas, crushing in tone and spacious in breadth, vocals delivered in layers as they draw the listener deeper into the album’s unfolding.
The pattern continues through rolling highlight cut “Favorite One,” which joins closer “Pacino” as the only other inclusion on Close Encounters to hit seven minutes. That’s a shift in approach from Mental Nudge, which worked back and forth between longer and shorter tracks, but the band want nothing for flow either way. “Favorite One” finds Riggs delving into a fairly spot on Jerry Cantrell-circa-Facelift-style hook, backed by the synchronicity of Couto‘s snare and the punch of Corino‘s bass, and a drifting vocal melody after Shepard‘s solo that reminds of Snail, but is recontextualized to suit Kind‘s purposes of structured exploration.
The point of “Black Yesterday” seems to be to capture a sense of vastness, as evidenced by the reverb soaking the midsection before it hands off to Shepard for a particularly fuzzed lead section, but it’s also the last part of a three-song opening salvo that builds up the momentum that will carry Kind through the remining six pieces. “Snag” is a big help in that regard, with a stripped-back runtime — at 3:58, it is one of three Kind pieces to clock in under four minutes; the still-to-come “Power Grab” is the shortest song they’ve written at 2:56 — and a chorus that stands up well to being leaned on as it is, heavy and atmospheric, with the vocals seeming to sort of surf the riff as the band move into the crescendo hook and subsequent ending section, some ‘additional percussion’ credited to Riggs marking the change.
‘Just a rock song’ — in quotes because I’m someone whose life has been changed and in many ways shaped by rock songs — on paper, “Snag” is given space, character and dimension through the guitar and bass tones, the mix, and the echo treatment on the drums and vocals. This is emblematic of Kind‘s approach generally, but captured with particular efficiency and accessibility. They follow it with the centerpiece, named “Massive” presumably in honor of Corino‘s bassline, and swinging with a thickened strut that is at once classic heavy rock and a stylistic signature from Couto. Marked by vital nod, “Massive” sits well between “Snag” and “Power Grab,” both of which are faster and the latter of which is Close Encounters‘ most fervent push.
I’m not sure where the vinyl sides split, but if either “Massive” (seems more likely timing-wise) or “Power Grab” starts side B, then fair enough as it leads into the last section of the record, which begins explosive as “Of the Ages” bursts to life from its standalone-riffed intro. Quick into the verse, quick into the chorus, it follows suit from “Snag” and even “Massive” in terms of structural traditionalism, and so does “What It Is to Be Free,” but each has its own persona, with “Of the Ages” seeing itself out with a multi-stage solo atop its swaying lumber, and “What It Is to Be Free” finding an especially brash groove and a guitar melody in its intro that meets bombast with due swagger. It is not the sort of tune Kind would or maybe could have written together in 2015, but they sure make it sound easy now (and for all I know the song was written in 2015).
“Pacino” rounds out with what seems to be shimmy in surplus — no complaints — and a tension resulting that’s balanced through complementary twists led by Shepard on guitar and a stretch in the second half of more forward push. The key word is ‘push,’ though. Shepard takes a lead before Riggs returns with a last verse and chorus, and as it comes apart, “Pacino” spends not quite its full last minute in a lightbath of melodic psych drone carved out of residual comedown noise. Where much of Close Encounters up to that point has been about movement between parts, the flow within and between songs, and expansion on Kind‘s prior modus of craft and performance, “Pacino” dwells more in that boogie, riding the central chug for the vast majority of the proceedings and wrapping the album so that still kinetic in nature, but changed in shape and underlying makeup.
And while it’s a sidestep from some of the other material, it is consistent in both sound and atmosphere and well within their style, so not awkward or out of place. It’s like the rest of Close Encounters: the work of a band who have built their identity from the ground up, who know who they are, and who are working actively to evolve their processes and sound. I said when it was announced that Close Encounters is the best offering from Kind. It is. It weaves smoothly through complex changes and is soothing even at its heaviest, accomplishing a rare malleability of stylistic balance. More than anything though, it is Kind, and it broadens the scope of what that means.
Posted in Whathaveyou on July 31st, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Following up on a video for the track “Blankets” that was unveiled in June with the first word of Blood Lightning‘s self-titled debut, Ripple Music has confirmed an Oct. 20 release for that album. The metal-leaning heavy project from members of — yes I’m doing the list; it’s a fun list — Gozu, We’re all Gonna Die, Sam Black Church and Worshipper (among others) got their start as a live one-off and, whoops, I guess somebody started writing songs. Then recording them. They’ve been trickling out singles since late 2021 with “The Dying Starts,” and that track will open the album, so that’s two out of five originals already public. A not-insubstantial sampling for a record that’s still the better part of three months out. And yeah, I’d be up for hearing them take on Black Sabbath‘s “Disturbing the Priest.” Of course.
Blood Lightning join a busy Fall for Ripple. In addition to the new LP from Blood Lightning‘s fellow Bostonians Kind out Aug. 11, recent announcements have been made for albums from Moon Coven (Aug. 25), Fire Down Below (Sept. 8), Dead Feathers (Sept. 22), La Chinga (Oct. 6) and Appalooza, who share Blood Lightning‘s release date of Oct. 20. It’s to the label’s credit that none of these releases steps too hard on the toes of the others sound-wise, and if you don’t think we’re living in a guilded age for heavy music, well, think about a leading label putting out stuff basically every other week from now until mid-Fall with more maybe to come before the end of the year, and then get back to me.
The PR wire has it like this:
Boston heavy metal supergroup BLOOD LIGHTNING to release debut album on Ripple Music this fall; watch new video “Blankets” now!
Boston-based heavy metal supergroup BLOOD LIGHTNING (with members of GOZU, Sam Black Church, Worshipper, We’re All Gonna Die) team up with US powerhouse Ripple Music for the release of their self-titled debut this October 13th. Watch their brand new video for “Blankets” now!
Watch Blood Lightning’s fire it up on new “Blankets” video Single available now on all digital streaming services
Formed in December 2020, Blood Lightning brings together the talents of vocalist Jim Healey (We’re All Gonna Die), guitarist Doug Sherman (GOZU), bassist Bob Maloney (Worshipper) and drummer J.R. Roach (Sam Black Church). What began as a 2019 Halloween show playing the entire Black Sabbath “Born Again” album just for fun has culminated in the release of original material by four veterans of the Boston metal/hardcore community.
Blood Lightning was formed with one thing in mind: get back to the real essence of heavy metal. No pretense. No subgenres to fit into. Only badass, straightforward, hard-hitting heavy metal with a nod to old school NWOBHM with contemporary firepower. They teamed up with award-winning producer and engineer Benny Grotto (Rolling Stones, Aerosmith), and mastering legend Alan Douches (Motörhead, Mastodon, High On Fire) to record five original songs and one Black Sabbath cover over the course of 2021 and 2022.
They were also honored to be nominated in 2021 and 2022 for Metal Artist of the Year by the Boston Music Awards. The band recently signed with acclaimed Stoner/Doom/Metal label, Ripple Music, and is excited to take the next step in that partnership to bring some new music to the masses.
BLOOD LIGHTNING “Blood Lightning” Out October 20th on Ripple Music
TRACKLIST: 1. The Dying Starts 2. Hitting The Wall 3. Bananaconda 4. Face Eater 5. Blankets 6. Disturbing The Priest
BLOOD LIGHTNING is Jim Healey – Vocals Doug Sherman – Guitars Bob Maloney – Bass J.R. Roach – Drums
Welcome to day two of the Summer 2023 Quarterly Review. Yesterday was a genuine hoot — I didn’t realize I had packed it so full of bands’ debut albums, and not repeating myself in noting that in the reviews was a challenge — but blah blah words words later we’re back at it today for round two of seven total.
As I write this, my house is newly emerged from an early morning tornado warning and sundry severe weather alerts, flooding, wind, etc., with that. In my weather head-canon, tornados don’t happen here — because they never used to — but one hit like two towns over a week or so ago, so I guess anything’s possible. My greater concern would be flooding or downed trees or branches damaging the house. I laughed with The Patient Mrs. that of course a tornado would come right after we did the kitchen floor and put the sink back.
We got The Pecan up to experience and be normalized into this brave new world of climate horror. We didn’t go to the basement, but it probably won’t be the last time we talk about whether or not we need to do so. Yes, planet Earth will take care of itself. It will do this by removing the problematic infection over a sustained period of time. Only trouble is humans are the infection.
So anyway, happy Tuesday. Let’s talk about some records.
Quarterly Review #11-20:
Bell Witch, Future’s Shadow Part 1: The Clandestine Gate
Cumbersome in its title and duly stately as it unfurls 83 minutes of Billy Anderson-recorded slow-motion death-doom soul destroy/rebuild, Future’s Shadow Part 1: The Clandestine Gate is not the first longform single-song work from Seattle’s Bell Witch, but the core duo of drummer/vocalist Jesse Shreibman and bassist/vocalist Dylan Desmond found their path on 2017’s landmark Mirror Reaper (review here) and have set themselves to the work of expanding on that already encompassing scope. Moving from its organ intro through willfully lurching, chant-topped initial verses, the piece breaks circa 24 minutes to minimalist near-silence, building itself back up until it seems to blossom fully at around 45 minutes in, but it breaks to organ, rises again, and ultimately seems to not so much to collapse as to be let go into its last eight minutes of melancholy standalone bass. Knowing this is only the first part of a trilogy makes Future’s Shadow Part 1: The Clandestine Gate feel even huger and more opaque, but while its unrelenting atmospheric bleakness will be listenable for a small percentage of the general populace, there’s no question Bell Witch are continuing to push the limits of what they do. Loud or quiet, they are consuming. One should expect no less in the next installment.
Some records are self-titled because the band can’t think of a name. Plainride‘s Plainride is more declarative. Self-released ahead of a Ripple Music issue to accord with timing as the German trio did a Spring support stint with Corrosion of Conformity, the 10-song outing engages with funk, blues rock, metal, prog and on and on and on, and feels specifically geared toward waking up any and all who hear it. The horns blasting in “Fire in the Sky” are a clear signal of that, though one should also allow for the mellowing of “Wanderer,” the interlude “You Wanna…” the acoustic noodler “Siebengebirge,” or the ballady closer “The Lilies” as a corresponding display of dynamic. But the energy is there in “Hello, Operator,” “Ritual” — which reminds of Gozu in its soulful vocals — and through the longer “Shepherd” and the subsequent regrounding in the penultimate “Hour of the Mûmakil,” and it is that kick-in-the-pants sensibility that most defines Plainride as a realization on the part of the band. They sound driven, hungry, expansive and professional, and they greet their audience with a full-on “welcome to the show” mindset, then proceed to try to shake loose the rules of genre from within. Not a minor ambition, but Plainride succeed in letting craft lead the charge in their battle against mediocrity. They don’t universally hit their marks — not that rock and roll ever did or necessarily should — but they take actual chances here and are all the more invigorating for that.
Massachusetts doomers Benthic Realm offer their awaited first full-length with Vessel, and the hour-long 2LP is broad and crushing enough to justify the wait. It’s been five years since 2018’s We Will Not Bow (review here), and the three-piece of bassist Maureen Murphy (ex-Second Grave, ex-Curse the Son, etc.), guitarist/vocalist Krista Van Guilder (ex-Second Grave, ex-Warhorse) and drummer Dan Blomquist (also Conclave) conjure worthy expanse with a metallic foundation, Van Guilder likewise effective in a deathly scream and melodic delivery as “Traitors Among Us” quickly affirms, and the band shifting smoothly between the lurch of “Summon the Tide” and speedier processions like “Course Correct,” the title-track or the penultimate “What Lies Beneath,” the album ultimately more defined by mood and the epic nature of Benthic Realm‘s craft than a showcase of tempo on either side. That is, regardless of pace, they deliver with force throughout the album, and while it might be a couple years delayed, it stands readily among the best debuts of 2023.
Cervus follow 2022’s impressive single “Cycles” (posted here) with the three-song EP Shifting Sands, and the Amsterdam heavy psych unit use the occasion to continue to build a range around their mellow-grooving foundation. Beginning quiet and languid and exploratory on “Nirvana Dunes,” which bursts to voluminous life after its midpoint but retains its fluidity, the five-piece of guitarists Jan Woudenberg and Dennis de Bruin, bassist Tom Mourik, keyboardist/guitarist Ton van Rijswijk and drummer Rogier Henkelman saving extra push for middle cut “Tempest,” reminding some of how The Machine are able to turn from heavy jams to more structured riffy shove. That track, shorter at 3:43, is a delightful bit of raucousness that answers the more straightforward fare on 2021’s Ignis EP while setting up a direct transition into “Eternal Shadow,” which builds walls of organ-laced fuzz roll that go out and don’t come back, ending the 16-minute outing in such a way as to make it feel more like a mini-album. They touch no ground here that feels uncertain for them, but that’s only a positive sign as they perhaps work toward making their debut LP. Whether that’s coming or not, Shifting Sands is no less engaging a mini-trip for its brevity.
On their third album, Where’s the Ground?, Portuguese experimentalists Unsafe Space Garden tackle heavy existentialist questions as only those truly willing to embrace the absurd could hope to do. From the almost-Jackson 5 casual saunter of “Grown-Ups!” — and by the way, all titles are punctuated and stylized all-caps — to the willfully overwhelming prog-metal play of “Pum Pum Pum Pum Ta Ta” later on, Unsafe Space Garden find and frame emotional and psychological breakthroughs through the ridiculous misery of human existence while also managing to remind of what a band can truly accomplish when they’re willing to throw genre expectations out the window. With shades throughout of punk, prog, indie, sludge, pop new and old, post-rock, jazz, and on and on, they are admirably individual, and unwilling to be anything other than who they are stylistically at the risk of derailing their own work, which — again, admirably — they don’t. Switching between English and Portuguese lyrics, they challenge the audience to approach with an open mind and sympathy for one another since once we were all just kids picking our noses on the same ground. Where’s the ground now? I’m not 100 percent, but I think it might be everywhere if we’re ready to see it, to be on it. Supreme weirdo manifestation; a little manic in vibe, but not without hope.
Guitarist/vocalist Henning Schmerer reportedly self-recorded and mixed and played all instruments himself for Neon Burton‘s third full-length, Take a Ride. The band was a trio circa 2021’s Mighty Mondeo, and might still be one, but with programmed drums behind him, Schmerer digs in alone across these space-themed six songs/46 minutes. The material keeps the central duality of Neon Burton‘s work to-date in pairing airy heavy psychedelia with bouts of denser riffing, rougher-edged verses and choruses offsetting the entrancing jams, resulting in a sound that draws a line between the two but is able to move between them freely. “Mother Ship” starts the record quiet but grows across its seven minutes to Truckfighters-esque fuzzy swing, and “I Run,” which follows, unveils the harder-landing aspect of the band’s character. The transitions are unforced and feel like a natural dynamic in the material, but even the jammiest parts would have to be thought out beforehand to be recorded with just one person, so perhaps Take a Ride‘s most standout achievement — see also: tone, melody, groove — is in overcoming the solo nature of its making to sound as much like a full band as it does in the 10-minute “Orbit” or the crescendo of “Disconnect” that rumbles into the sample-topped ambient-plus-funky meander at the start of instrumental closer “Wormhole,” which dares a bit of proggier-leaning chug on the way to its thickened, nodding culmination.
Though pedigreed in a Maryland doom scene that deeply prides itself on traditionalism, Laurel, MD, trio Thousand Vision Mist mark out a progressive path forward with their second full-length, Depths of Oblivion, the eight songs/35 minutes of which seem to owe as much to avant metal as to doom and/or heavy rock. Opener “Sands of Time” imagines what might’ve been if Virus had been raised in the Chesapeake Watershed, while “Citadel of Green” relishes its organically ’70s-style groove with an intricacy of interpretation so as to let Thousand Vision Mist come across as respectful of the past but not hindered by it creatively. Comprised of guitarist/vocalist Danny Kenyon (ex-Life Beyond, Indestroy, etc.), bassist/backing vocalist Tony Comulada (War Injun, Outside Truth, etc.) and drummer Chris Sebastian (ex-Retribution), the band delves into the pastoral on “Love, the Destroyer” and the sunshine-till-the-fuzz-hits-then-still-awesome “Thunderbird Blue,” while “Battle for Yesterday” filters grunge nostalgia through their own complexity and capper “Reversal of Misfortune” moves from its initial riffiness — perhaps in conversation with “We Flew Too High” at the start of what would be side B — into sharper shred with an unshakable rhythmic foundation beneath. I didn’t know what to expect so long after 2018’s Journey to Ascension and the Loss of Tomorrow (review here), which was impressive, but there’s no level on which Thousand Vision Mist haven’t outdone themselves with Depths of Oblivion.
Founded and fronted by vocalist George Chamberlin (Ritual Earth), the named-for-a-Joy–Division-tune New Dawn Fades make their initial public offering with the three-songer Forever, which at 15 minutes long doesn’t come close to the title but makes its point well before it’s through all the same. In “True Till Death,” they update a vibe somewhere between C.O.C.‘s Blind and a less-Southern version of Nola-era Down, while “This Night Has Closed My Eyes” adds some Kyuss flair in Chamberlin‘s vocal and the concluding “New Moon” reinforces the argument with a four-minute parade of swing and chug, Sabbath-bred if not Sabbath-worshiping. If the band — whose lineup seems to have changed since this was recorded at least in the drums — are going to take on a full-length next, they’ll want to shake things up, maybe an interlude, etc., but as a short outing and even more as their first, they don’t necessarily need to shock with off-the-wall style. Instead, Forever portrays New Dawn Fades as having a clear grasp on what they want to do and the songwriting command to make it happen. Wherever they go from here, it’ll be worth keeping eyes and ears open.
According to the band, Aton Five‘s mostly-instrumental self-titled sophomore full-length was recorded between 2019 and 2022, and that three-year span would seem to have allowed for the Moscow-based four-piece to deep-dive into the five pieces that comprise it, so that the guitar and organ answering each other on “Danse Macabre” and the mathy angularity that underscores much of the second half of “Naked Void” exist as fully envisioned versions of themselves, even before you get to the 22-minute “Lethe,” which closes. With the soothing “Clepsydra” in its middle as the only track under eight minutes long, Aton Five have plenty of time to develop and build outward from the headspinning proffered by “Alienation” at the album’s start and in the bassy jabs and departure into and through clearheaded drift-metal (didn’t know it existed, but there it is), the work they’ve put into the material is obvious and no less multifaceted than are the songs, “Alienation” resolving in a combination of sweeps and sprints, each of which resonates with purpose. That one might say the same of each of the three parts that make up “Lethe” should signal the depth of consideration in the entirety of the release. I know there was a plague on, but maybe Aton Five benefitted as well from having the time to focus as they so plainly did. Whether you try to keep up with the turns or sit back and let the band go where they will, Aton Five, the album, feels like the kind of record that might’ve ended up somewhere other than where the band first thought it would, but is stronger for having made the journey to the finished product.
Giants Dwarfs and Black Holes, In a Sandbox Full of Suns
Their second LP behind 2020’s Everwill, the five-song In a Sandbox Full of Suns finds German four-piece Giants Dwarfs and Black Holes fully switched on in heavy jam fashion, cuts like “Love Story” and “In a Sandbox Full of Suns” — both of which top 11 minutes — fleshed out with improv-sounding guitar and vocals over ultra-fluid rhythms, blending classic heavy blues rock and prog with hints and only hints of vintage-ism and letting the variety in their approach show itself in the four-minute centerpiece “Dead Urban Desert” and the suitably cosmic atmosphere to which they depart in closer “Time and Space.” Leadoff “Coffee Style” is rife with attitude, but wahs itself into an Eastern-inflected lead progression after the midpoint and before turning back to the verse, holding its relaxed but not lazy feel all the while. It is a natural brand of psychedelia that results throughout — an enticing sound between sounds; the proverbial ‘not-lost wandering’ in musical form — as Giants Dwarfs and Black Holes don’t try to hypnotize with effects or synth, etc., but prove willing to take a walk into the unknown when the mood hits. It doesn’t always, but they make the most of their opportunities regardless, and if “Dead Urban Desert” is the exception, its placement as the centerpiece tells you it’s not there by accident.
Posted in Questionnaire on July 13th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
The Obelisk Questionnaire is a series of open questions intended to give the answerer an opportunity to explore these ideas and stories from their life as deeply as they choose. Answers can be short or long, and that reveals something in itself, but the most important factor is honesty.
Based on the Proust Questionnaire, the goal over time is to show a diverse range of perspectives as those who take part bring their own points of view to answering the same questions. To see all The Obelisk Questionnaire posts, click here.
Thank you for reading and thanks to all who participate.
The Obelisk Questionnaire: Scott O’Dowd from Cortez
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
First and foremost, I’m a music fan. I have a voracious appetite when it comes to music, I can never get enough. Ever since I was a little kid, I have been fascinated by music. I think that it has to do with how it makes me feel. I associate songs with different memories and feelings that I have experienced. Somewhere along the way, this love of music led me to want to play an instrument, which ended up being the guitar. Playing guitar sort of naturally led to writing songs. 35-40 years later, I’m still at it.
Describe your first musical memory.
I don’t have one specific memory per se. I have lots of memories of being, like four years old and hearing The Beatles and Beach Boys around the house. Also, lots of FM radio hits of the day. A few songs that I really remember being drawn to for whatever reason were “Dream Weaver” by Gary Wright, “Evil Woman” by ELO, and “Miracles” by Jefferson Starship.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
I don’t know if there is a ‘best’ musical memory, but a fun one is being on tour with our Belgian friends Solenoid, and our brothers in We’re All Gonna Die. We were pulling into a rest stop somewhere, we had all of the van windows open and were blasting ‘Balls To The Wall’ by Accept. It got to the part where it breaks down to just drums and bass, everyone spontaneously started singing the ‘Ah-ah- ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah’ chanting part at the top of their lungs. We all burst out into hysterical laughter afterwards.
When was a time when a firmly held belief was tested?
The belief that anything is guaranteed. Over the last year, I have been dealing with serious back issues, which at times have made it almost impossible for me to walk. Sometimes I wonder if the physical limits of my own body may force me to stop playing music. Which is an absolutely unbearable thought.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
True artistic progression will ultimately lead to the next set of challenges. Whether they be external or internal. I’d like to think that the ultimate end would be a sense of satisfaction and accomplishment, but I think there is always the drive to eclipse, or expand on the previous song, album, or performance.
How do you define success?
I define success as doing what you want, and being happy.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
My mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s disease. It is the most horrific thing I have ever had to endure.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
The next song.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
I think that the most essential function of art is to make you think. Whether it’s just getting your synapses firing, and experiencing different emotions, or really making you question things on a deeper level.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
