Posted in Questionnaire on May 22nd, 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: Mike Lang of Seismic
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How do you define what you do and how did you come to do it?
We call ourselves instrumental doom from Philadelphia. Being an instrumental band is a major piece of our identity and it affects how we think about songwriting and how we each approach playing in this band. We base a lot of what we do in doom, but we draw on other influences like sludge, hardcore, post-rock, stoner, drone, and progressive music from across the spectrum of music and find ways to incorporate those into our sound.
Ken Miller (Bass), Anthony Mariano (Guitar), and I, (Mike Lang – Drums) started jamming in 2018. Initially, we had thought about searching for a vocalist, but we’d all seen too many otherwise-promising bands ruined by bad vocals. We made the decision early on to be instrumental and have ultimately enjoyed the challenge of placing the instruments themselves front and center. As we were working on our first EP, which we released during the pandemic, we realized that in order achieve the layers we were recording in the studio onstage, we would need another guitarist. For this, we enlisted Tommy McEwan, Ken’s former bandmate from Eaten Alive (RIP).
For the past year-and-a-half, we’ve been busy writing and recording our upcoming full-length. More progressive and broader in scope than our first EP, it centers around a half-hour-long song called “The Time Machine”. We started playing with ideas that would be the seed of “The Time Machine” in some of our initial practices and really developed it out in detail during long writing sessions during the pandemic. We recorded a demo of it, which we released in January.
Describe your first musical memory.
All of us in Seismic are life-long musicians and concertgoers, so I’m sure we’d each have our own answer to this question. I’ll cite the Ufomammut show at Johnny Brenda’s as our first collective musical memory though, as it was the first time that Anthony, Ken and I were all in the same place at the same time. Separately, we were discussing plans to start a band and at the show we solidified those plans. Of course, Ufomammut put on a fantastic, deafening show full of expansive psychedelic spacescapes.
Describe your best musical memory to date.
As a band, our best musical memory would be our recent “The Time Machine” demo release show.
When we were writing our first EP, there were parts and ideas that surpassed our vision for the first release and got shelved. We revisited those parts after releasing the EP and spent the better part of the last three years developing them into a long-form composition. It was a long and involved process.
We decided to demo the song before committing it to the full-length that we’re currently working on. We recorded the drums at Coffee Haus Studio in Freehold, NJ, where we recorded our first EP, and recorded all the guitars and bass at Anthony’s home studio. Anthony did all the mixing and mastering.
Ken created some great art for the song and put a lot into making a cool physical release. We invited some excellent local bands we’re friends with to play and really celebrated the culmination of years of work by debuting the entire half-hour long song live that night. I think we were all proud of it and thought it was one of the best shows any of us had played.
Where do you feel artistic progression leads?
I think it’s much less about leading to a specific destination than the lifelong journey that artistic progression offers. There’s always another hill to climb or place to push yourself. I like that this is a band that enjoys the process. We challenge each other to grow, to think about parts differently, and to improve. We’re constantly sharing new music with each other, discussing guitar pedals, giving feedback on each other’s sound. With each new set of songs that we write, we can see how far we’ve come and that’s exciting to me, even if I’m not sure where we’re ultimately going.
How do you define success?
Everything we create, we create for us. We’re not seeking outside approval or looking for greater acceptance. If we’re writing music that excites us; that we enjoy listening to, that’s success. Of course, hearing that music we’ve created connects with someone else is even more fulfilling. Hearing that someone else noticed and appreciated a little detail or maybe even thought about our music in a way that we hadn’t is always exciting. We don’t take this for granted. We consider it a privilege to be able to share the music that we create. We are fortunate to have the platform we do and to have an amazing music community here in Philadelphia that supports and inspires us.
What is something you have seen that you wish you hadn’t?
Ken and I are huge Eagles fans (Go Birds!), so we wish we hadn’t seen Jalen Hurts fumbling the ball and the Chiefs returning it for a touchdown in the second quarter of the Super Bowl this year.
Describe something you haven’t created yet that you’d like to create.
Our songs primarily emerge organically from jamming in practice. Sometimes a song manifests from a series of riffs that flow well together and things solidify really quickly. Other times songs are constructed over months and the process can be more painstaking, or we may keep experimenting with ideas long after a song’s structure is established. Either way, we’re always trying to make sure that we’re expanding our horizons and doing new things. We don’t necessarily know what that may sound like, so just continuing to create is our goal.
What do you believe is the most essential function of art?
It’s a release. It’s expression. When it’s good, it leads to some form of enlightenment.
Something non-musical that you’re looking forward to?
Though I’m going to miss DesertFest NYC for it, I’m still excited about a trip I have planned to go hiking in the Dolomites this fall. Tommy is looking forward to better weather for cycling and days of soldering electronics. Anthony and Ken are both artists. Anthony started taking graduate painting classes, and is experimenting with oil paint. Ken is a life-long painter, specializing in dark art and works in graphic design. He recently launched his website (www.violentvisual.com) and is accepting commissions. Hire him to do your next album cover.
Posted in Reviews on April 14th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
If you work in an office, or you ever have, or you’ve ever spoken to someone who has or does or whatever — which is everybody, is what I’m saying — then you’ll probably have a good idea of why I cringe at saying “happy Friday” as though the end of a workweek’s slog is a holiday even with the next week peering just over the horizon beyond the next 48 hours of not-your-boss time. Nonetheless, we’re at the end of this week, hitting 50 records covered in this Quarterly Review, and while I’ll spend a decent portion of the upcoming weekend working on wrapping it up on Monday and Tuesday, I’m grateful for the ability to breathe a bit in doing that more than I have throughout this week.
I’ll say as much in closing out the week as well, but thanks for reading. As always, I hope you enjoy.
Quarterly Review #41-50:
Black Helium, UM
It’s just too cool for the planet. Earth needs to step up its game if it wants to be able handle what London’s Black Helium are dishing out across their five-song third record, UM, from the sprawl and heavy hippie rock of “Another Heaven” to the utter doom that rises to prominence in that 12-minute-ish cut and the oblivion-bound boogie, blowout, and bonfire that is 15:47 closer “The Keys to Red Skeleton’s House (Open the Door)” on the other end, never mind the u-shaped kosmiche march of “I Saw God,” the shorter, stranger, organ-led centerpiece “Dungeon Head” or the motorik “Summer of Hair” that’s so teeth-grindingly tense by the time it’s done you can feel it in your toes. These are but glimpses of the substance that comprises the 45-minute out-there-out-there-out-there stretch of UM, which by the way is also a party? And you’re invited? I think? Yeah, you can go, but the rest of these fools gotta get right if they want to hang with the likes of “I Saw God,” because Black Helium do it weird for the weirdos and the planet might be round but that duddn’t mean it’s not also square. Good thing Black Helium remembered to bring the launch codes. Fire it up. We’re outta here and off to better, trippier, meltier places. Fortunately they’re able to steer the ship as well as set its controls to the heart of the sun.
A demo recording of a single, 29-minute track that’s slated to appear on Seismic‘s debut full-length based around the works of H.G. Wells sometime later this year — yeah, it’s safe to say there’s a bit of context that goes along with understanding where the Philadelphia instrumentalist trio/live-foursome are coming from on “The Time Machine.” Nonetheless, the reach of the song itself — which moves from its hypnotic beginning at about five minutes in to a solo-topped stretch that then gives over to thud-thud-thud pounding heft before embarking on an adventure 30,000 leagues under the drone, only to rise and riff again, doom. the. fuck. on., and recede to minimalist meditation before resolving in mystique-bent distortion and lumber — is significant, and more than enough to stand on its own considering that in this apparently-demo version, its sound is grippingly full. As to what else might be in store for the above-mentioned LP or when it might land, I have no idea and won’t speculate — I’m just going by what they say about it — but I know enough at this point in my life to understand that when a band comes along and hits you with a half-hour sledgehammering to the frontal cortex as a sign of things to come, it’s going to be worth keeping track of what they do next. If you haven’t heard “The Time Machine” yet, consider this a heads up to their heads up.
Something of an awaited first long-player from Chicago’s These Beasts, who crush the Sanford Parker-produced Cares, Wills, Wants with modern edge and fluidity moving between heavier rock and sludge metal, the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Chris Roo, bassist/vocalist Todd Fabian and drummer Keith Anderson scratching a similar itch in intensity and aggression as did L.A. sludgecore pummelers -(16)- late last year, but with their own shimmer in the guitar on “Nervous Fingers,” post-Baroness melody in “Cocaine Footprints,” and tonal heft worthy of Floor on the likes of “Blind Eyes” and the more purely caustic noise rock of “Ten Dollars and Zero Effort.” “Code Name” dizzies at the outset, while “Trap Door” closes and tops out at over seven minutes, perhaps taking its title from the moment when, as it enters its final minute, the bottom drops out and the listener is eaten alive. Beautifully destructive, it’s also somehow what I wish post-hardcore had been in the 2000s, ripping and gnarling on “Southpaw” while still having space among the righteously maddening, Neurot-tribal percussion work to welcome former Pelican guitarist Dallas Thomas for a guest spot. Next wave of artsy Chicago heavy noise? Sign me up. And I don’t know if that’s Roo or Fabian with the harsh scream, but it’s a good one. You can hear the mucus trying to save the throat from itself. Vocal cords, right down the trap door.
Comprised of Cucho Segura on guitar and vocals, Sara Gdm on bass and drummer Rafa Pacheco, Ajeeb are the first band from the Canary Islands to be written about here, and their second album — issued through no fewer than 10 record labels, some of which are linked below — is the 11-song/42-minute Refractions, reminding in heavy fashion that the roots of grunge were in noisy punk all along. There’s some kick behind songs like “Far Enough” and “Mold,” and the later “Stuck for Decades” reminds of grainy festival videos where moshing was just people running into each other — whereas on “Mustard Surfing” someone might get punched in the head — but the listening experience goes deeper the further in you get, with side B offering a more dug-in take with the even-more-grunge “Slow-Vakia” building on “Oh Well” two songs earlier and leading into the low-end shovefest “Stuck for Decades,” which you think is going to let you breathe and then doesn’t, the noisier “Double Somersault” and closer/longest song “Tail Chasing” (5:13) taking the blink-and-it’s-over quiet part in “Amnesia” and building it out over a dynamic finish. The more you listen, the more you’re gonna hear, of course, but on the most basic level, the adaptable nature of their sound results in a markedly individual take. It’s the kind of thing 10 labels might want to release.
One might be tempted to think of Porto-based funeral doomers OAK as a side-project for guitarist/vocalist Guilherme Henriques, bassist Lucas Ferrand and drummer Pedro Soares, the first two of whom play currently and the latter formerly of also-on-Season–of–Mist extreme metallers Gaerea, but that does nothing to take away from the substance of the single-song full-length Disintegrate, which plies its heft in emotionality, ambience and tone alike. Throughout 44 minutes, the three-piece run an album’s worth of a gamut in terms of tempo, volume, ebbs and flows, staying grim all the while but allowing for the existence of beauty in that darkness, no less at some of the most willfully grueling moments. The rise and fall around 20 minutes in, going from double-kick-infused metallurgy to minimal standalone guitar and rebuilding toward death-growl-topped nod some six minutes later, is worth the price of admission alone, but the tortured ending, with flourish either of lead guitar or keys behind the shouted layers before moving into tremolo payoff and the quieter contemplation that post-scripts, shouldn’t be missed either. Like any offering of such extremity, Disintegrate won’t be for everyone, but it makes even the air you breathe feel heavier as it draws you into the melancholic shade it casts.
“Are we cursed?” “Is this living?” “Are we dying?” These are the questions asked after the on-rhythm sampled orgasmic moaning abates on the slow-undulating title-track of Ultra Void‘s Mother of Doom. Billed as an EP, the five-songer skirts the line of full-length consideration at 31 minutes — all the more for its molten flow as punctuated by the programmed drums — and finds the Brooklynite outfit revamped as a solo-project for Jihef Garnero, who moves from that leadoff to let the big riff do most of the talking in the stoned-metal “Sic Mundus Creatus Est” and the raw self-jam of the nine-minute “Måntår,” which holds back its vocals for later and is duly hypnotic for it. Shorter and more rocking, “Squares & Circles” maintains the weirdo vibe just the same, and at just three and a half minutes, “Special K” closes out in similar fashion with perhaps more swing in the rhythm. With those last two songs offsetting the down-the-life-drain spirit of the first three, Mother of Doom seems experimental in its construction — Garnero feeling his way into this new incarnation of the band and perhaps also recording and mixing himself in this context — but the disillusion comes through as organic, and whether we’re living or dying (spoiler: dying), that gives these songs the decisive “ugh” with which they seem to view the world around them.
Italian trio Aktopasa — also stylized as Akṭōpasa, if you’re in a fancy mood — seem to revel in the breakout moments on their second long-player and Argonauta label debut, Journey to the Pink Planet, as heard in the crescendo nod and boogie, respectively, of post-intro opener “Calima” (10:27) and closer “Foreign Lane” (10:45), the album’s two longest tracks and purposefully-placed bookends around the other songs. Elsewhere, the Venice-based almost-entirely-instrumentalists drift early in “It’s Not the Reason” — which actually features the record’s only vocals near its own end, contributed by Mattia Filippetto — and tick boxes around the tenets of heavy psychedelic microgenre, from the post-Colour Haze floating intimacy at the start of “Agarthi” to the fuzzy and fluid jam that branches out from it and the subsequent “Sirdarja” with its tabla and either sitar or guitar-as-sitar outset and warm-toned, semi-improv-sounding jazzier conclusion. From “Alif” (the intro) into “Calima” and “Lunar Eclipse,” the intent is to hypnotize and carry the listener through, and Aktopasa do so effectively, giving the chemistry between guitarist Lorenzo Barutta, bassist Silvio Tozzato and drummer Marco Sebastiano Alessi a suitably natural showcase and finding peace in the process, at least sonically-speaking, that’s then fleshed out over the remainder. A record to breathe with.
There’s heavy metal somewhere factored into the sound of Philadelphia’s Troll Teeth, but where it resides changes. The band — who here work as a four-piece for the first time — unveil their Underground Vol. 1 EP with four songs, and each one has a different take. In “Cher Ami,” the question is what would’ve happened if Queens of the Stone Age were in the NWOBHM. In “Expired,” it’s whether or not the howling of the two guitars will actually melt the chug that offsets it. It doesn’t, but it comes close to overwhelming in the process. On “Broken Toy” it’s can something be desert rock because of the drums alone, and in the six-minute closer “Garden of Pillars” it’s Alice in Chains with a (more) doomly reimagining and greater melodic reach in vocals as compared to the other three songs, but filled out with a metallic shred that I guess is a luxury of having two guitars on a record when you haven’t done so before. Blink and you’ll miss its 17-minute runtime, but Troll Teeth have four LPs out through Electric Talon, including 2022’s Hanged, Drawn, & Quartered, so there’s plenty more to dig into should you be so inclined. Still, if the idea behind Underground Vol. 1 was to scope out whether the band works as constructed here, the concept is proven. Yes, it works. Now go write more songs.
Lead track “Jukai” hasn’t exploded yet before Finis Hominis‘ Sordidum Est EP has unveiled the caustic nature of its bite in scathing feedback, and what ensues from there gives little letup in the oppressive, extreme sludge brutality, which makes even the minute-long “Cavum Nigrum” sample-topped drone interlude claustrophobic, never mind the assault that takes place — fast first, then slow, then crying, then slow, then dead — on nine-minute capper “Lorem Ipsum.” The bass hum that begins centerpiece “Improportionatus” is a thread throughout that 7:58 piece, the foundation on which the rest of the song resides, the indecipherable-even-if-they-were-in-English growls and throat-tearing shouts perfectly suited to the heft of the nastiness surrounding. “Jukai” has some swing in the middle but hearing it is still like trying to inhale concrete, and “Sinne Floribus” is even meaner and rawer, the Brazilian trio resolving in a devastating and noise-caked, visceral regardless of pace or crash, united in its alienated feel and aural punishment. And it’s their first EP! Jesus. Unless they’re actually as unhinged as they at times sound — possible, but difficult — I wouldn’t at all expect it to be their last. A band like this doesn’t happen unless the people behind it feel like it needs to, and most likely it does.
With its title maybe referring to the communion among players and the music they’re making in the moment of its own heavy psych jams, Losing Time Finding Space is the second studio full-length from Belfast instrumentalist unit Space Shepherds. The improvised-sounding troupe seem to have a lineup no less fluid than the material they unfurl, but the keyboard in “Ending the Beginning (Pt. 1)” gives a cinematic ambience to the midsection, and the fact that they even included an intro and interlude — both under two minutes long — next to tracks the shortest of which is 12:57 shows a sense of humor and personality to go along with all that out-there cosmic exploratory seeking. Together comprising a title-track, “Losing Time…” (17:34) and “…Finding Space” (13:27) are unsurprisingly an album unto themselves, and being split like “Ending the Beginning” speaks perhaps of a 2LP edition to come, or at very least is emblematic of the mindset with which they’re approaching their work. That is to say, as they move forward with these kinds of mellow-lysergic jams, they’re not unmindful either of the listener’s involvement in the experience or the prospect of realizing them in the physical as well as digital realms. For now, an hour’s worth of longform psychedelic immersion will do nicely, thank you very much.
Posted in Reviews on September 28th, 2017 by JJ Koczan
Day two of the Quarterly Review and feeling groovy so far. Managed to survive yesterday thanks in no small part to good music and good coffee, and looking at what’s coming up in today’s batch, I don’t expect the situation will be much different — though the styles will. I try to keep in mind as I put these weeks together to change up what’s in each round, so it’s not just all psych records, or all doom, or heavy rock or whatever else. This way I’m not burning myself out on anything particular and I hopefully don’t wind up saying the same things about albums that maybe only share vague genre aspects in common — riffs, etc. — in the same way. Essentially trying to trick my brain into being creative. Sometimes it even works. Let’s see how it fares today.
Quarterly Review #11-20:
Spotlights, Seismic
After touring hard with the likes of Melvins, Deftones and Refused, heavy post-rockers Spotlights mark their first release on Ipecac Recordings with their second album, Seismic, which finds the core duo of Mario and Sarah Quintero working with producer Aaron Harris (Isis) to follow-up 2016’s Tidals with 65 minutes/11 tracks of weighted atmospherics and far-spanning melodic textures as shown on emotive heft-bringers like “Ghost of a Glowing Forest.” Heavygaze, I suppose, is the genre tag that’s emerged, but with the opening title-track, the chugging “Learn to Breathe” and the later percussive turns of “A Southern Death,” there’s as much focus on crush as on ambience, though as Seismic makes its way through the pair of eight-minute tracks “Hollow Bones” (wonder if they know the 30 Rock reference they’re making) and “Hang us All” before the minimal subdued drones and melodic effects swirls of closer “The Hope of a Storm,” Spotlights succeed in finding a middle ground that offers plenty of both. In its moments of intensity and its range, Seismic builds cohesion from ether and immediately benefits from the purposeful growth the Quinteros have clearly undertaken over the past year by hitting the road with the dedication they have.
Bay Area rockers War Cloud don’t get too fancy on their self-titled debut, which they make via Ripple Music as the follow-up to their 2016 single Vulture City (discussed here), but as they prove quickly in the dual-guitar Thin Lizzyisms of opener “Give’r” and the later post-Motörhead/Peter Pan Speedrock careening of “Speed Demon,” neither do they necessarily need to. Comprised of guitarists Alex Wein (also vocals) and Tony Campos, bassist Sean Nishi and drummer Joaquin Ridgell, War Cloud offer 31 minutes of brisk, unpretentious asskickery, riffs trading channels at the outset of “Hurricane” as it makes ready to settle into its proto-thrashing rocker groove, and the mood of the release as a whole engaging as much through its reimagining 20-year-old Metallica as a heavy rock band there as on the more grandly riff-led “Divide and Conquer.” Structures are straightforward, and not one of the eight tracks tops five minutes, but they’re more than enough for War Cloud find their place between metal form and heavy rock tone, and cuts like “Chopper Wired” and brazenly charged closer “Vulture City” nail the core message of the band’s arrival.
Rubble Road ain’t hurtin’ nobody. The Orlando-based double-guitar four-piece take two prior singles and put them together with four new tracks as their 29-minute/six-song debut EP, The Clowns Have Spoken, and thereby bring forth straightforward heavy rock that seems to be finding its personality in tone but nonetheless has a strong structural foundation underlying that holds up the material and “The Judge” tosses in a bit of metallic gallop to go with the forward-directed heavy rock proffered on the prior “Galactic Fugitives” and “Gospel (Get it Together).” I won’t say much for the politics of “Truck Stop Hooker,” which caps with the line, “Your mother gives great helmet, baby,” but “Wizard Staff” and “Do it Yourself” broaden the dynamic of the release overall. They’ve got some growing to do, but again, there’s an efficiency in their songwriting that comes through these songs, and as an initial showcase/demo, The Clowns Have Spoken shows Rubble Road with the potential to continue to grow.
You might check out the self-titled debut from Austin, Texas, duo Monte Luna. You might even pick up the digipak or tape version. You might listen to extended tracks like “Nameless City” (12:53) and “6,000 Year March” (17:42) and be like, “Yeah, cool riffs dudes.” You might even then chase down the The Hound EP that guitarist/vocalist/bassist James Clarke and drummer/synthesist Phil Hook put out last year. At some point though, you’re going to put Monte Luna’s Monte Luna on your shelf and leave it there. Fair enough. However – and I’m not going to say when; could be sooner, could be later — then you’re going to find yourself remembering its massive, 71-minute sprawl of riffs, its doomed-out grooves, shouts, screams, growls and the way its builds become so utterly immersive, and you’re going to put Monte Luna on again. And that’s the moment when it will really hit you. It might take some time, and part of that is no doubt that there’s simply a lot of record to wade through, but whether it’s the rumbling start of “Nightmare Frontier” (14:26), the cacophonous stomp of “Inverted Mountain” (12:04) or the righteous crash of “The End of Beginning” (9:42), Monte Luna will have earned that deeper look, and if you allow them to make that deeper impression with their self-titled, they almost certainly will.
Newcomer five-piece High Reeper telegraph Sabbathian heavy rocker intent with their self-released, self-titled debut album. The Delaware-based lineup of Zach Thomas, Napz Mosley, Andrew Price, Pat Daly and Shane Trimble make no bones about their roots in opener “Die Slow,” and as the stoner-swinging “High Reeper,” the doom-swaggering “Reeper Deadly Reeper” and the yo-check-out-this-bassline nodder “Weed and Speed” play out in the record’s midsection, it seems increasingly likely that, sooner or later, some imprint or other will pick up High Reeper for a wider release. As the band demonstrates through the stomping “Soul Taker” and the seeming mission statement “Black Leather (Chose Us)” ahead of closer “Friend of Death,” which breaks its six minutes in half between Judas Priest thrust and an instrumental finish that calls to mind “Heaven and Hell,” they’ve got a keen ear for updating classic elements, and though formative, their first outing is cleverly memorable and an immediately resonant display of songcraft. Now we know High Reeper can engage these stylistic components — the test will be how they develop them into something individualized going forward.
Frozen Planet….1969, From the Centre of a Parallel Universe
From the Centre of a Parallel Universe is the second long-player of 2017 from Sydney/Canberra’s Frozen Planet….1969. It arrives on CD through Pepper Shaker and LP via Headspin with five tracks/43 minutes of improv-style psych jams following suit from the prior Electric Smokehouse (review here) and helps to bring the band’s funk-infused, spacious dynamic all the more into focus. Also out of focus. Like, blurry vision-style. They range far and wide and keep the proceedings delightfully weird in the three extended pieces “Celestial Gambler,” “Through Hell’s Kaleidoscope, Parts I & II” and “Ancient Wings Taking Flight” – all north of 11 minutes – and with “Signals (Channelling…)” and “The Lady and the Archer” leading the way into each LP side, Frozen Planet….1969 take the time to assure they’re bringing their listeners along with them on their potent journey into the cosmically far out. The must-hear bass tone in “Ancient Wings Taking Flight” is but one of many reasons to dig in, but whatever it takes, From the Centre of a Parallel Universe’s invitation to get lost is not one to be missed.
Chicago’s history with instrumentalist post-metal goes back as far as the notion of the subgenre itself with acts like Pelican and Russian Circles providing aesthetic-defining landmarks over the last 15-plus years even as a group like Bongripper embraces darker, more lumbering fare. The four-piece Zaius, who make their full-length debut with Of Adoration on Prosthetic Records after two self-released EPs in 2013 and 2011, position themselves more toward the shimmering airiness of the former rather than the latter’s raw lumber, but there’s heft to be found in the expanses of “Sheepdog” and “Seirenes” all the same, and the second half of “Echelon” and closer “Colin” tighten up some of the ethereality of pieces like opener “Phaneron” and the driftingly progressive “Reformer” or the penultimate, patient rollout of “Anicca” to hone a sense of balance that feels as emotionally driven as it is cerebral in its construction. Hard for a band like Zaius to stand themselves out at this point given the swath of acts working in a similar style in and out of the Windy City, but in its textural approach and held-steady flow, Of Adoration satisfies.
Portuguese post-doomers Process of Guilt hit the 15-year mark with the release of their fourth album, Black Earth (on Division/Bleak Recordings), and with a mix by Brooklyn noise-rock specialist Andrew Schneider, a mastering job by Collin Jordan in Chicago and striking cover art by growler/guitarist Hugo Santos with images by Pedro Almeida, the sense of atmosphere is thick and the mood is aggressive throughout. Santos, along with guitarist Nuno David, bassist Custódio Rato and drummer Gonçalo Correia chug and flow through a linear 42 minutes and five tracks on the suitably darkened offering, touching on progressive nuance but not letting cerebral underpinnings take away from the onslaught feel of “Feral Ground” or the tension mounted early in the 11-minute penultimate title-track, which uses feedback as a weapon throughout no less capably than the subsequent closer “Hoax” affects immediately with its nodding tonal wash. Taken as a whole, Black Earth finds Process of Guilt exploring depths of their sound as much as with it, and the directions they go feel as much inward as out.
The challenge for an outfit like Stockholm’s Sundus Abdulghani & Trunk, whose self-titled debut arrives via respected purveyor Kozmik Artifactz, lies separating themselves from the shadow of fellow Swedes Blues Pills, whose semi-psych heavy-blues-rocking first album has cast a wide influence that can be heard here as well as in any number of other bands currently kicking around the Euro underground proffering as balance of soul and heavy rock as songs like “It Ain’t Love (But Close Enough)” and “Like Water” do here. Where Sundus Abdulghani & Trunk most succeed in doing this is in the harmonies of “Black Magic Man,” which brings to mind classic acid folk while holding to a heavy blues vibe, but there are other moments throughout when individuality flourishes as well. The attitude is laid on a bit thick in “Them Dames,” but the hooks of “Sister Sorrow,” “She Knows,” “The Devil’s Got a Hold on You” and “Stay” and the burgeoning sense of arrangements complementing Abdulghani’s vocals do well in helping cast an identity one hopes will continue to develop.
Conceived by guitarist/vocalist Andrew Spiers, bassist/vocalist Steve Hobson and drummer Damien McKeown, Banbridge trio Owlcrusher conjure three extended, slicing slabs of black-singed sludge extremity on their self-titled Seeing Red Records debut, and it’s enough to make one wonder just what the fuck is going on in Northern Ireland to inspire such outright bleakness. Beginning with the 16-minute “Feeble Preacher” (also the longest inclusion here; immediate points), Owlcrusher’s Owlcrusher lumbers excruciatingly forth with screams and growls cutting through a tonality geared for max-volume consumption, though it remains to be seen who is consuming whom as “Feeble Preacher” gives way to the likewise scorched eponymous “Owlcrusher” (11:30) and 15-minute closer “Spoiler,” the last of which brings the only real moment of letup on the album after about nine minutes in, and even that takes the form of an interlude of Khanate-style minimalist ambience before the rolling megacrush resumes and plods to a somehow-even-heavier finish. Clearly a band pushing themselves toward the superlative, Owlcrusher get there much faster than their crawling tones would have you believe. Madness.
Posted in Whathaveyou on July 13th, 2017 by JJ Koczan
As massive as the response has been to Brooklyn post-heavy rockers Spotlights, it’s not like the band aren’t putting their work in. To wit, take a gander at the list of tour dates for which the NYCers are accompanying the Melvins — the tour began July 5 — and tremble as they no doubt are with concern as to when they’ll next be able to do laundry. An Oct. 6 release through Ipecac Recordings has been set for their second album, Seismic, and as they herald its arrival on stages across North America — can Europe be far off? — basically from now until release day, they’re also marking the beginning of preorders by streaming the new track “Learn to Breathe.” Let’s hope they do.
From the PR wire:
SPOTLIGHTS RELEASE NEW ALBUM, SEISMIC, ON OCT. 6 VIA IPECAC RECORDINGS
Spotlights, the Brooklyn-based husband and wife outfit of Mario and Sarah Quintero, release their Ipecac Recordings’ debut, Seismic, on Oct. 6.
“Seismic came out of a reaction to the current state of humanity and the inevitable consequences we will have on this earth and ourselves,” explains Mario. “There’s an odd sense of beauty that comes with destruction, and we tried to capture that musically on this album.” Seismic was produced by Aaron Harris (Isis/Palms) and recorded this spring in Los Angeles. Pre-orders for the 11-track album are available now: (http://smarturl.it/Spotlights).
Spotlights’ previous release, Tidals, earned the band a wide sweep of accolades. The word-of-mouth about the intoxicating album led to the band being handpicked to join Deftones and Refused for their Summer 2016 tour.
The pair, who primarily tour as a three-piece, will join the Melvins for an extensive, 12-week North American tour, launching this evening at the Casbah in San Diego. The full routing is listed below.
Seismic track listing: 1. Seismic 2. Learn To Breathe 3. The Size of the Planet 4. Ghost of a Glowing Forest 5. Under the Earth 6. A Southern Death 7. The Opening 8. What Is This, Where Are We 9. Hollow Bones 10. Hang Us All 11. The Hope of a Storm
Tour dates (all dates with the Melvins): July 13 Seattle, WA The Showbox July 14 Vancouver, BC Venue Nightclub July 17 Edmonton, AB Union Hall July 18 Calgary, AB The Marquee July 19 Regina, SK The Exchange * July 20 Winnipeg, MB Pyramid Cabaret July 21 Fargo, ND The Aquarium July 22 Minneapolis, MN Grumpy’s Bash July 24 Milwaukee, WI Turner Hall Ballroom July 25 Chicago, IL The Metro July 26 Grand Rapids, MI The Pyramid Scheme July 27 Detroit, MI El Club July 28 Cleveland, OH Grog Shop July 29 Columbus, OH A&R Music Bar July 31 Pittsburgh, PA Rex Theater August 1 Syracuse, NY The Westcott Theater August 2 Boston, MA Paradise Rock Club August 3 New York, NY Irving Plaza August 4 Philadelphia, PA Union Transfer August 5 Asbury Park, NJ The Stone Pony August 6 Baltimore, MD Ottobar August 7 Harrisburg, VA The Golden Pony * August 8 Richmond, VA The Broadberry August 9 Carrboro, NC Cat’s Cradle August 10 Knoxville, TN The Concourse August 11 Louisville, KY Headliner’s Music Hall August 12 St. Louis, MO The Ready Room August 13 Lawrence, KS The Bottleneck August 15 Englewood, CO Gothic Theatre August 17 Salt Lake City, UT Urban Lounge August 20 San Jose, CA The Ritz August 21 Santa Cruz, CA The Catalyst August 22 Los Angeles, CA The Echo September 5 Phoenix, AZ Crescent Ballroom September 6 Tucson, AZ 191 Toole September 8 Austin, TX The Mohawk September 9 Dallas, TX Tree’s September 10 San Antonio, TX Paper Tiger September 11 Houston, TX Warehouse Live (Studio) September 13 New Orleans, LA One Eyed Jack’s September 14 Pensacola, FL Vinyl Music Hall September 15 Jacksonville, FL Jack Rabbit’s September 16 Tampa, FL The Orpheum September 17 Ft. Lauderdale, FL The Culture Room September 18 Orlando, FL The Social September 20 Athens, GA 40 Watt Club September 21 Atlanta, GA The Masquerade (Hell Stage) September 22 Nashville, TN 3rd & Lindsley September 23 Memphis, TN Hi-Tone September 25 Madison, WI High Noon Saloon September 26 Rock Island, IL Rock Island Brewing Co. September 27 Des Moines, IA Wooly’s September 28 Omaha, NE The Waiting Room September 30 Ft. Collins, CO Aggie Theatre October 2 Albuquerque, NM The Launchpad October 3 Flagstaff, AZ The Green Room * Spotlights only
Posted in On Wax on November 8th, 2013 by JJ Koczan
For cosmic sonic destruction, accept no substitutes. Now with over 20 years under their collective stonerly belt, Toronto’s Sons of Otis are a band like none other in tone and in ethic. You’re not going to get a new album out of them every year, but when a platter from the trio does arrive, you know it for the fact that the earth itself seems to be breathing and your hand leaves trails when you wave it in front of your face. The three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Ken “Ox” Baluke, bassist Frank Sargeant and drummer Ryan Aubin signed to Small Stone in time to release 2005’s X after bouncing from Man’s Ruin to The Music Cartel, and followed X with Exiled in 2009. Their latest outing, Seismic(review here), was released last year.
It’s the unfuckwithable tonality and burnout lurch of the latter that arrives on my turntable this afternoon. Pressed in three colors — 150 black, 175 purple swirl, 175 lime green swirl — with matte finish on the Alexander von Wieding cover art, the LP is a bastard of low end. Baluke and Sargeant have never compromised on their dense wall of fuzz and Seismic is no exception. As Baluke echo-gurgles “Here I go again” at the beginning of opener “Far from Fine,” it’s easy to imagine he’s talking about blowing out the tubes of his amp as much as whatever foible the lyrics might go on to describe. At 50 minutes, Sons of Otis push the limits of the format, but with the side split after “Guilt,” side B of Seismicmakes for an especially spaced-out hypnosis, starting with the nine-minute swirl of “PK,” with its layers of wah and echo and Aubin‘s steady march forward leading to the Mountain cover “Never in My Life” and another eight-plus minutes of aptly named “Cosmic Jam.”
This stands somewhat in contrast to the bluesier and more song-based side A, which has its vibe cast in resin by “Far from Fine” and the complementary “Lessons,” with “Alone” and “Guilt” also making significant statements of riff and zoneout. That divide and semi-split personality for Seismic was something that only came to mind in the abstract on CD, but with the vinyl, it genuinely seems to have been an intentional decision on the part of the band. I don’t know if they knew Seismic would get an LP release or if they just wanted to give a sense of sides anyway, but it works well leading to the meandering closing jam on Funkadelic‘s “Mommy What’s a Funkadelic?” guitar progression, which Sargeant holds down on bass with Aubin while Baluke goes on an effects freakout that is many things, among them pretty funky. All the more so upon its return from the titular cosmos at the album’s finale.
It was and still is pretty easy to get lost in the CD version of Seismic — I’d list that among the album’s assets — but even the simple act of having to flip the record makes it a different level of listening experience, and with the inherent perceivable warmth of vinyl to go with the deep fuzz Sons of Otis emit, it’s that much warmer. I’ll admit, I was a little surprised when the low end didn’t vibrate my turntable into oblivion, or at very least bounce the needle around, but the fact that it didn’t only makes it easier to turn back to side A and go again. Fuzz on.
