Treviso, Italy’s OJM are set to release Live at Rocket Club, recorded in Landshut, Germany, on Feb. 19. It has been a while — nearly 13 years — since the band’s last live offering, but to be fair, it’s been a while since their last anything. Late 2015’s 18 was a compilation in honor of the band reaching adulthood, but their fourth and latest studio album, Volcano (review here), came out in 2010 through drummer Max Ear‘s much-respected Go Down Records, and apart from sporadic shows, they’ve been largely absent as the post-social media generation of listenership has ascended ‘down the front’ of the heavy underground, blissfully unaware that a record like OJM‘s 2002 debut, Heavy (discussed here), helped set the stage for the booming scene that exists in Italy today.

Is Live at Rocket Club going to correct that history and provide much-needed context for current-wave heavy rock? Nah. That’d be asking an awful lot of a live record. It does, however, show the band in top form, and for those who either snagged Volcano a decade-plus ago or have investigated since, it shows the rawer edge OJM bring to the material live. I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing the band — founded by Max Ear and vocalist David Martin, here rounded out by guitarist Andrew Pozzy and keyboardist/vocalist Stefano Pasky — in-person, but they sure enough sound like a good time, punkish in spirit with an edge of ’70s Detroit prot0-aggression as they cut into material mostly drawn from Volcano but going back further with “Sixties” and “Give Me Your Money” from 2006’s Under the Thunder and “Desert,” which closed 2003’s The Light Album but here is nearly twice as long at 11:19 and benefits much from the inclusion of Pasky in the lineup. One can only say the same of “Hush,” the Deep Purple cover that serves as the capstone to the 40-minute set. Because if you’re going to have an organ, use it.

Cuts like “Welcome” and “Venus” (originally “Venus God”) that begin the show and the later “Wolf” and jammier “Ocean Hearts” have plenty of room of keys as well, despite the urgency of the earlier songs. “Venus,” which premieres below, runs at a decent sprint, playing up the boogie aspect of the rhythm and the attitude-laced vocals that top it. Though the instrumental “Welcome” precedes it, as on Volcano, think of it as the beginning of the gig and I think you’ll get a sense of what they’re going for in showing it off ahead of the release. Like most of what surrounds — certainly like the fellow Volcano track “I’ll Be Long,” which follows in like-minded punkish and catchy form — it’s a high-energy riffer that asks only that you take the two and a half minutes required to follow along. No pretense, no BS, just good time heavy rock and roll.

And if it sends you over to OJM‘s Bandcamp where you check out their studio records, all the better.

A few words from the band about the single and album preorder links and all that good stuff follow here, courtesy of the PR wire.

Enjoy:

OJM, “Venus” official track premiere

OJM on “Venus”:

“Venus” has been the most important single of our 2010 album Volcano. Because of its great and overwhelming energy, we have chosen it as opening track for the concert at the Rocket Club. This version is very different from the one recorded in the studio, thanks to the addition of the Hammond organ and the brazen garage-punk attitude that characterizes us on stage. To be listened to at full volume!

OJM’s “Live At Rocket Club” out on February 19th 2021.

Coloured LP: https://www.godownrecords.com/product-page/ojm-live-at-rocket-club-LPx
LP: https://www.godownrecords.com/product-page/ojm-live-at-rocket-club-LP
Digital: https://backl.ink/144268169

OJM has been one of the first Italian bands dedicated to stoner-rock, so much that its first EP goes back to 20 years ago. The band from Treviso (north of Italy) has been able to evolve and improve. Both musicians and style changed over the years and moved to the seventies garage and the heavy-psych, which are superbly represented in the last album Volcano dated 2010. Ten years passed since then and the band never officially split up. We can talk about a long hibernation which is alternated to awakenings heated by terrific live performances: the best way to enjoy its music! All the different formations that have followed over the years, turn around the two founding members, the drummer Max Ear and the vocalist David Martin, who are the beating hearts of a creature able to give us truly unforgettable emotions! Live At Rocket Club photographs the band in one of the best ever moment of its artistic life.

Live At Rocket Club will be printed in 300 copies (only vinyl) thanks to the cooperation between Go Down Records and Vincebus Eruptum Recordings and it is a summa of the great show of OJM at the Rocket Club in Landshut, Germany. 

LINE-UP
David Martin | vocals
Max Ear | drums
Andrew Pozzy | guitar
Stefano Pasky | vocals, bass piano, organ

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