Fu Manchu have never been shy about their punker origins, but so far as I know, this 2010 release of Virulence‘s If This Isn’t a Dream… 1985-1989 (review here), is the earliest document of it. Southern Lord released the 20-track collection, has trimmed it down for the digital version to If This Isn’t a Dream on its own, the 1988 recording featuring eight songs which are presented here as two side-long tracks. On the original CD version, live cuts and demos followed, so it was a bit more comprehensive. But what’s streaming above is enough to get the point across, so if you hear it and must know more, know that more is there to be known.

Some 40 years later, the crunch and SoCal hardcore-inspired aggro vibes are both quaint and of continued relevance. “Dead Weight” leads off and is one of just two songs to feature here in more than one version, alongside “Wrapped Up,” which follows. What’s funny about that is you think, “Whoa, this is pretty raw,” listening to them the first time — “Dead Weight” is a four-and-a-half-minute shove but twists into this angular riff in its back half like something prescient of Neurosis‘ Souls at Zero, while “Wrapped Up” builds on that churn to hone a downtrodden lumber — and they come back around on what sounds like a cleaned-up version of a microcassette, and blah blah context happens. But any way you go, from raw to rawer to the 52-second live take on Void‘s “My Rules” — just about rawest — the Reagan-era teen angst retains the force of its delivery, and although Fu Manchu would become a different kind of band, some of those origins and some of their signature tonality can be heard in If This Isn’t a Dream.

The band, Virulence, was the lineup of guitarist Scott Hill, bassist Greg McCaughey, and drummer Ruben Romano — who would go on to found Fu Manchu (at some point, Mark Abshire got in there too) — with Ken Pucci on vocals. Awkward. I’m not sure who came aboard when, but the question also arises of how far you need to go back, like does it need to count when they’re fifth graders? It’s fair to call Virulence of their era, if by that you mean a few years behind what C.O.C. were doing on the other side of the country and what SST Records had pumped out earlier in the decade from Black Flag, Bl’Ast, and the willfully slow Saint Vitus. The latter of course would go on to define no small part of the course of American doom, and Virulence would seem to have internalized a malleability of tempo as well, as shifts throughout the nine-minute “The Curse” — which caps If This Isn’t a Dream-proper — or the shove nestling into a groove that is “Spilling it Out” earlier on demonstrate. There won’t be a ton of surprises for those who’ve made the plunge into Southern California’s hardcore of the day, but if you’re a fan of the style, Virulence‘s material retains more than just academic value as context for (most of; again, ouch) the members’ next group.

But I have to admit that if the question is whether or not I’d be writing about If This Isn’t a Dream… 1985-1989 had 80 percent of the band not gone on to become one of the most crucial heavy rock acts of their or any other generation, I would probably have to say no. That’s not to rag on it at all, I’ve just never been that into hardcore, much to my social deficit (the hardcore kids always seemed to be having so much fun; I just couldn’t get there). So for me, what I dig into when it comes to If This Isn’t a Dream is the barebones sound, the unbridled bootleg scathe in a live track like “Empty Head,” or the sense of space that ends up in the closing demo “Fatal Crash.” Would you call that crossover? Is it metal? Is it punk? Arthouse hardcore? You could ask the same questions about “No Fun” (not a Stooges cover) here and taking into account the plod of “Blank Stare” and the feedback-and-thud intro in which the entire first half of the seven-minute “Kindergarten” is mired, the answer isn’t so clearly one thing or the other.

If this was a demo or a first-EP-on-Bandcamp or whatever it might be coming my way in 2026, the rough, dated recording sound aside, there’s just about no way I wouldn’t say there was potential in the mix of sounds taking place. No, I’m not saying I’d be like, “Oh, this band is gonna ditch the singer and become Fu Manchu.” That’s not it. But, taking the If This Isn’t a Dream tracks specifically — the first eight songs of the total 20-track/79-minute CD complete with liner notes which would’ve been so helpful writing this that are in storage with the rest of most of my collection; so much plastic, just sitting there — it’s not hard to hear how Virulence might have moved forward on their own course toward something else.

Consider a couple of the names dropped above; Neurosis and Corrosion of Conformity. Both of those bands started out in a place not entirely dissimilar from Virulence and went in different directions, each defining a respective genre between post-metal and Southern heavy rock. Fu Manchu‘s contributions to fuzz would likewise serve as an influence that continues to spread, and maybe that turn or evolution would have happened had they kept the original name as well, but it’s moot at this point. In 1990, Fu Manchu would release their first 7″ — reissued by the band’s At the Dojo label in 2015 as a 10″ — and begin their own, ongoing progression.

Maybe it’s a fan-piece. Being a fan, I’m okay with that. Even if you just chase down (or push play above) on the first eight songs, If This Isn’t a Dream… 1985-1989 speaks both to the time in which it was made and what some of these players would do in years subsequent. Fu Manchu are still punks. Turns out you only ever grow up so much.

Happy New Year 2026. Thanks for reading.

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Hey. Happy New Year 2026. Thanks for reading. Ha.

I’m going to a hockey game with The Patient Mrs. and The Pecan this afternoon, so I’m going to do my best to keep it brief. Kind of an off week this week, but I still posted every day but yesterday. The Pecan has been sleeping until like 9AM, which has allowed for some morning productivity, and I only had Hungarian class twice this week, so that was more time to write as well.

But the hockey game. The New York Sirens play at the Prudential Center in Newark and we’ve been a handful of times now (they also went the day I was in the studio with Solace; I think this will be their third game of the year and my second; we also went at least twice last season) and it’s always fun. The PWHL is building, still adding teams and such — there are four new ones this year — so it’s not super-crowded and it’s not overwhelming to park and it’s a thing you can just go and do and The Pecan is apparently starting to get into it and was pissed when they lost the last game, which feels developmentally appropriate. It’ll be a good time, but I don’t want to be writing this from my seat in the arena, so I’ll wrap it up early.

Next week I’m doing a — wait for it — Suplecs premiere! Yes, I’m stupid stoked and yes I’m going to review the album like two months early. Also look out for poll results basically as soon as I hound Slevin to compile them and then manage to put together a list — so next Friday? All jokes aside, give me some time. I’ll get there as soon as I can.

Quick Zelda update: I quit Majora’s Mask. By far the most fun I had playing it was when I read the guide and The Patient Mrs. handled the controller, and I’d be glad to go through the rest of the game that way, but I honestly don’t think she has time or interest, and I’m not looking to set up a dynamic where I’m waiting for her to play and she’s, I don’t know, paying bills and answering work emails or something entirely more useful, or just dicking around on her phone, reading on her iPad, whatever the case may be. Her time is plenty obligated. I’m not looking to add to that, so Majora’s Mask is out. I’m not saying never, but with that glitch that would’ve made me have to redo the Snowfall dungeon, and maybe Woodfall as well, I just wasn’t that interested. The masks and changing into a Goron, Deku or Zora all had control issues, and of all the Zelda games I’ve dug into at this point, it was the least engaging. It was like they took all the joy out of Ocarina of Time, both in story and gameplay.

I did a full run through A Link to the Past as consolation. Could not tell you the last time I played that without cheat codes, actually getting the pieces of heart from around the world and fully upgrading the Master Sword, etc. It was wonderful. A pain in the ass in parts, but I had put a mod on it so the dialogue was a bit different and some of the art, and crucially, I could turn while dashing, and that was a big quality-of-life boon short of invincibility or infinite hearts. I died 12 times total before beating Ganon, and immediately started A Link Between Worlds, with another of the same kind of graphics mods I’ve been using. It’s set in the same world and is in some ways a sequel, so it seemed fitting. I got the Master Sword yesterday, after doing the first three dungeons, got a bunch of heart pieces, played octorok baseball, and so on. I hit a dead end trying to get a heart piece and admitted defeat last night, tried to set up The Wind Waker again since at some point I apparently deleted the game I had played through twice (which sucks), and got it running only to have it lag beyond the point where I could ignore it and play anyway.

What sucks about that is knowing that my hardware is the problem, but I don’t have $5,000 for a gaming laptop, which somehow is what it would take to run an emulated game that came out on a handheld system 13 years ago. I don’t get that, but I don’t get anything, so there you go.

I also tried to install a Tears of the Kingdom Xmas mod, with a special holiday story and quests and such, but it didn’t work. I put a message in the modder’s Discord and they said they found the problem and were going to work on it over the next couple days. I hope that comes together as I think it would be fun to watch The Pecan play it, let alone play it myself thereafter. Fingers crossed.

Alright, that’s it. Thanks if you’ve added your list to the year-end poll. If not, please do while there’s still time. Sunday I’ll close it? Something like that.

Otherwise, have fun, be safe, hydrate and I’ll see you back here on Monday for more of these shenanigans.

FRM.

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If you had ‘new Toadliquor record’ on your card for Unlikely Bingo, congratulations. The probably-Californian anonymous sludge rockers’ 2003 compact disc, The Hortator’s Lament, which was released through Southern Lord, was my apparently-way-late-to-the-party introduction to the band, whose Back in the Hole will be out in a couple weeks and whose penchant for things lurching-of-groove and caustic apparently remains intact if the album opener “First Crush” is anything to go by. Do you think they named it after the riff? I think maybe they did. I also think maybe they’re howling into the void there a little bit. I dig that.

Expect oldschool disillusion and the kind of sludge that makes you miserable because it is in fact itself miserable. Not about being cool, trendy weed-worship, blah blah check out my Orange stacks. This is raw aughts-era fuckery, when no one had any money, no one cared and all was intoxicants. It was hell on earth and the war went on forever. We’re still there. “First Crush” sounds pretty right for this moment in this wreck of a world.

To the PR wire, then:

Southern Lord to Release Toadliquor’s First New Music in 25 Years

Back in the Hole is out February 23, 2024. // Stream the album opener “First Crush” now.

Eternally shrouded in complete mystery and anonymity, the entity calling themselves Toadliquor has returned with its first recorded offerings in over 25 years. Back In The Hole will be released by Southern Lord on February 23, 2024.

Violently bleeding out into the early-90s with their lone LP Feel My Hate – The Power Is The Weight – R.I.P. Cain, Toadliquor followed that with a few comp tracks and a single before completely disappearing into the ether.

Southern Lord compiled most known recordings in 2003 on the Hortators Lament compact disc. Then, on the occasion of the label’s 20th anniversary in 2018, Southern Lord released these recordings plus one newly-received cryptic distress signal from deep space on the limited edition 2xLP set Cease & Decease.

Now, in 2024, Toadliquor return to continue their decades-long onslaught of desolation, despair and damaged vocal cords with Back in the Hole. Seven prize picks for the communal trough. Strap in and feed.

Look for Back in the Hole to be available on LP and digital formats only on February 23, 2024 (pre-order on Bandcamp here or from Southern Lord here). For fans with a penchant for pain, misery, and destruction!

Back in the Hole, track listing:

First Crush
Recained
Entry Level Position
In Gold
Basement
Open Through Funeral
Back in the Hole

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Toadliquor, Back in the Hole (2024)

Reissue of Goatsnake‘s debut album? Fair enough. I’m not sure if 1999’s I (discussed here) should ever be allowed to drop out of print, but if it has, I’m definitely not about to blame Southern Lord for giving it another pressing. And t-shirts too for those who like to dress the part. Of doom.

The record itself is one you kind of have to throw up your hands with. Like, “well yeah, I guess is one of the best heavy rock albums ever made,” and sure enough, it is. Goatsnake came back to release Black Age Blues (review here) and didn’t get nearly the love they deserved for that one, which pretty much continues the thread of their entire career. They were always a cult band. Still are. They’re also on my see-live bucket list, as I’ve never had the pleasure.

But I’ll tell you, if I’m walking down the street, and you’re coming the other way wearing a Goatsnake t-shirt, I know we’re already friends. They’re that kind of band.

Info and preorder link from the PR wire:

SOUTHERN LORD ANNOUNCES THE VINYL RELEASE OF GOATSNAKE’S DEBUT ALBUM, 1, AVAILABLE ON VINYL ON 29TH AUGUST

(ORIGINALLY RELEASED IN 1999 ON CD/LP BY MAN’S RUIN)

PRE-ORDERS AVAILABLE ONLINE NOW: https://southernlordeurope.com/store/goatsnake-1/ and https://goatsnakesl.bandcamp.com/merch

Formed in 1996, Goatsnake was an ultra-heavy, blues-doom powerhouse consisting of guitarist Greg Anderson (Engine Kid), vocalist Pete Stahl (Scream, Wool) and the mega rhythm section of Greg Rogers (drums), Guy Pinhas (bass) from underground heavy legends The Obsessed. The band’s tenure has ebbed and flowed for over two decades, leaving behind a legacy of legendary live shows and classic albums and EP’s.

Goatsnake’s classic debut album— appropriately entitled 1 (one)— was originally released by Man’s Ruin Records in 1999 on CD and LP formats. The album featured 8 songs that gracefully combined monolithic, Sabbath-y riffs with soulful vocals to create a monumental introduction to the band, and a style that would be influential for years to come. Southern Lord went on to re-release 1 on double LP format with Goatsnake’s Dog Days EP + bonus tracks as its B-side in 2004, which is long out of print on vinyl (available on CD/Digital).

On August 29th, 2022, Southern Lord will release 1 as a standalone LP. Vinyl (colour + black formats) will feature the 8 original tracks as they initially appeared on CD as a permanent essential vinyl classic of the Southern Lord vinyl back catalogue.

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Goatsnake, I (2022 Reissue)

You’ll have to forgive me, what the hell day is it? The url says this is day eight, so I guess that’s Wednesday. Fine. That’s as good as any. It’s all just 10 more records to my brain at this point, and that’s fine. I’ve got it all lined up. As of me writing this, I still haven’t heard about my busted-ass laptop that went in for repair last Saturday, and that’s a bummer, but I’m hoping that any minute now the phone is going to show the call coming in and I’ll just keep staring at it until that happens and I’m sure that will be awesome for my already brutalized productivity.

My backup laptop — because yes, I have one and will gladly argue with you that it’s necessary citing this week as an example — is a cheapie Chromebook. The nicest thing I can say about it is it’s red. The meanest thing I can say about it is that I had to change the search button to a caps lock and even that doesn’t respond fast enough to my typing, so I’m constantly capitalizing the wrong letters. If you don’t think that’s infuriating, congratulations on whatever existence has allowed you to live this long without ever needing to use a keyboard. “Hello computer,” and all that.

Enough kvetching. Too much to do.

Quarterly Review #71-80:

Amenra, De Doorn

I’ve made no secret over the last however long of not being the biggest Amenra fan in the universe. Honestly, it’s not even about the Belgian band themseves — live, they’re undeniable — but the plaudits around them are no less suffocating than their crushing riffs at their heaviest moments. Still, as De Doorn marks their first offering through Relapse Records, finds them departing from their Mass numbered series of albums and working in their native Flemish for the first time, and brings Caro Tanghe of Oathbreaker into the songs to offer melodic counterpoint to Colin H. van Eeckhout‘s nothing-if-not-identifiable screams, the invitations to get on board are manifold. This is a band with rules. They have set their own rules, and even in pushing outside them as they do here, much of their ideology and sonic persona is maintained. Part of that identity is being forward thinking, and that surfaces on De Doorn in parts ambient and quiet, but there’s always a part of me that feels like Amenra are playing it safe, even as they’re working within parameters they’ve helped define for a generation of European post-metal working directly in their wake. The post-apocalyptic breadth they harness in these tracks will only continue to win them converts. Maybe I’ll be one of them. That would be fun. It’s nice to belong, you know?

Amenra on Facebook

Relapse Records website

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Liquid Sound Company, Psychoactive Songs for the Psoul

A quarter-century after their founding, Arlington, Texas, heavy psych rockers Liquid Sound Company still burn and melt along the lysergic path of classic ’60s acid rock, beefier in tone but no less purposeful in their drift on Psychoactive Songs for the Psoul. They’re turning into custard on “Blacklight Corridor” and they can tell you don’t understand on “Who Put All of Those Things in Your Hair?,” and all the while their psych rock digs deeper into the cosmic pulse, founding guitarist John Perez (also Solitude Aeturnus) unable to resist bringing a bit of shred to “And to Your Left… Neptune” — unless that’s Mark Cook‘s warr guitar — even as “Mahayuga” answers back to the Middle Eastern inflection of “Blacklight Corridor” earlier on. Capping with the mellow jam “Laila Was Here,” Psychoactive Songs for the Psoul is a loving paean to the resonant energies of expanded minds and flowing effects, but “Cosmic Liquid Love” is still a heavy rollout, and even the shimmering “I Feel You” is informed by that underlying sense of heft. Nonetheless, it’s an acid invitation worth the RSVP.

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Iceburn, Asclepius

Flying snakes, crawling birds, two tracks each over 17 minutes long, the first Iceburn release in 20 years is an all-in affair from the outset. As someone coming to the band via Gentry Densley‘s work in Eagle Twin, there are recognizable elements in tone, themes and vocals, but with fellow founders Joseph “Chubba” Smith on drums and James Holder on guitar, as well as bassist Cache Tolman (who’s Johnny Comelately since he originally joined in 1991, I guess), the atmosphere conjured by the four-piece is consuming and spacious in its own way, and their willingness to go where the song guides them on side A’s “Healing the Ouroboros,” right up to the long-fading drone end after so much lumbering skronk and incantations before, and side B’s “Dahlia Rides the Firebird,” with its pervasive soloing, gallop and veer into earth-as-cosmos terradelia, the return of Iceburn — if in fact that’s what this is — makes its own ceremony across Asclepius, sounding newly inspired rather than like a rehash.

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Southern Lord Recordings website

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Gods & Punks, The Sounds of the Universe

As regards ambition, Gods & Punks‘ fourth LP, The Sounds of the Universe, wants for nothing. The Rio De Janeiro heavy psych rockers herein wrap what they’ve dubbed their ‘Voyager’ series, culminating the work they’ve done since their first EP — album opener “Eye in the Sky” is a remake — while tying together the progressive, heavy and cosmic aspects of their sound in a single collection of songs. In context, it’s a fair amount to take in, but a track like “Black Apples” has a riffy standout appeal regardless of its place in the band’s canon, and whether it’s the classic punch of “The TUSK” or the suitably patient expansion of “Universe,” the five-piece don’t neglect songwriting for narrative purpose. That is to say, whether or not you’ve heard 2019’s And the Celestial Ascension (discussed here) or any of their other prior material, you’re still likely to be pulled in by “Gravity” and “Dimensionaut” and the rest of what surrounds. The only question is where do they go from here? What’s outside the universe?

Gods & Punks on Facebok

Abraxas on Facebook

Forbidden Place Records website

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Vouna, Atropos

Released (appropriately) by Profound Lore, Vouna‘s second full-length Atropos is a work of marked depth and unforced grandeur. After nine-minute opener “Highest Mountain” establishes to emotional/aural tone, Atropos is comprised mostly of three extended pieces in “Vanish” (15:34), “Grey Sky” (14:08) and closer “What Once Was” (15:11) with the two-minute “What Once Was (Reprise)” leading into the final duo. “Vanish” finds Vouna — aka Olympia, Washington-based Yianna Bekris — bringing in textures of harp and violin to answer the lap steel and harp on “Highest Mountain,” and features a harsh guest vocal from Wolves in the Throne Room‘s Nathan Weaver, but it’s in the consuming wash at the finish of “Grey Sky” and in the melodic vocal layers cutting through as the first half of “What Once Was” culminates ahead of the break into mournful doom and synth that Vouna most shines, bridging styles in a way so organic as to be utterly consuming and keeping resonance as the most sought target, right unto the piano line that tops the last crescend, answering back the very beginning of “Highest Mountain.” Not a record that comes along every day.

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Profound Lore website

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Heathen Rites, Heritage

One gets the sense in listening that for Mikael Monks, the Burning Saviours founder working under the moniker of Heathen Rites for the first time, the idea of Heritage for which the album is titled is as much about doom itself as the Scandinavian folk elements that surface in “Gleipner” or in the brief, bird-song and mountain-echo-laced finish “Kulning,” not to mention the Judas Priest-style triumphalism of the penultimate “The Sons of the North” just before. Classic doom is writ large across Heritage, from the bassline of “Autumn” tapping into “Heaven and Hell” to the flowing culmination of “Midnight Sun” and the soaring guitar apex in “Here Comes the Night.” In the US, many of these ideas of “northern” heritage, runes, or even heathenism have been coopted as expressions of white supremacy. It’s worth remembering that for some people it’s actually culture. Monks pairs that with his chosen culture — i.e. doom — in intriguing ways here that one hopes he’ll continue to explore.

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Svart Records website

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Unimother 27, Presente Incoerente

Some things in life you just have to accept that you’re never going to fully understand. The mostly-solo-project Unimother 27 from Italy’s Piero Ranalli is one of those things. Ranalli has been riding his own wavelength in krautrock and classic progressive stylizations mixed with psychedelic freakout weirdness going on 15 years now, experimenting all the while, and you don’t have to fully comprehend the hey-man-is-this-jazz bass bouncing under “L’incontro tra Phallos e Mater Coelestis” to just roll with it, so just roll with it and know that wherever you’re heading, there’s a plan at work, even if the plan is to not have a plan. Mr. Fist‘s drums tether the synth and drifting initial guitar of “Abraxas…il Dio Difficile da Conoscere” and serve a function as much necessary as grooving, but one way or the other, you’re headed to “Systema Munditotius,” where forward and backward are the same thing and the only trajectory discernible is “out there.” So go. Just go. You won’t regret it.

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Pineal Gland Lab website

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Oxblood Forge, Decimator

Not, not, not a coincidence that Massachusetts four-piece Oxblood Forge — vocalist Ken Mackay, guitarist Robb Lioy, bassist Greg Dellaria and drummer/keyboardist Erik Fraünfeltër — include an Angel Witch cover on their third long-player, Decimator, as even before they get around to the penultimate “Sorcerers,” the NWOBHM is a defining influence throughout the proceedings, be it the “hey hey hey!” chanting of “Mortal Salience” or the death riders owning the night on opener “Into the Abyss” or the sheer Maidenry met with doom tinge on “Screams From Silence.” Mackay‘s voice, high in the mix, adds a tinge of grit, but Decimator isn’t trying to get one over on anyone. This blue collar worship for classic metal presented in a manner that could only be as full-on as it is for it to work at all. No irony, no khakis, no bullshit.

Oxblood Forge on Facebook

Oxblood Forge on Bandcamp

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Wall, Vol. 2

They keep this up, they’re going to have a real band on their hands. Desert Storm/The Grand Mal bandmates and twin brothers Ryan Cole (guitar/bass) and Elliot Cole (drums) began Wall as a largely-instrumental quarantine project in 2020, issuing a self-titled EP (review here) on APF Records. Vol. 2 follows on the quick with five more cuts of unbridled groove, including a take on Karma to Burn‘s “Nineteen” that, if it needs to be said, serves as homage to Will Mecum, who passed away earlier this year. That song fits right in with a cruncher like “Avalanche” or “Speed Freak,” or even “The Tusk,” which also boasts a bit of layered guitar harmonies, feeling out new ground there and in the acousti-handclap-blues of “Falling From the Edge of Nowhere.” The fact that Wall have live dates booked — alongside The Grand Mal, no less — speaks further to their real-bandness, but Vol. 2 hardly leaves any doubt as it is.

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APF Records website

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Boozewa, Deb

The second self-recorded outing from Pennsylvania trio Boozewa, Deb, offers two songs to follow-up on Feb. 2021’s First Contact (review here) demo, keeping an abidingly raw, we-did-this-at-home feel — this time they sent the results to Tad Doyle for mastering — while pushing their sound demonstrably forward with “Deb” bringing bassist Jessica Baker to the fore vocally alongside drummer Mike Cummings. Guitarist Rylan Caspar contributes in that regard as well, and the results are admirably grunge-coated heavy rock and roll that let enough clarity through to establish a hook, while the shorter “Now. Stop.” edges toward a bit more lumber in its groove, at least until they punk it out with some shouts at the finish. Splitting hairs? You betcha. Maybe they’re just writing songs. The results are there waiting to be dug either way.

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Boozewa on Bandcamp

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We proceed onward, into this ever-growing swath of typos, lineup corrections made after posting, and riffs — more riffs! — that is the Quarterly Review. Today is Day Four and I’m feeling good. Not to say there isn’t some manner of exhaustion, but the music has been killer — today is particularly awesome — and that makes life much, much, much better as I’ve already said. I hope you’ve found one or two or 10 records so far that you’ve really dug. I know I’ve added a few to my best of 2021 list, including stuff right here. So yeah, we roll on.

Quarterly Review #31-40:

Spelljammer, Abyssal Trip

To envision an expanse, and to crush it. Stockholm three-piece Spelljammer return five years after Ancient of Days (review here), with an all-the-more-massive second long-player through RidingEasy, turning their front-cover astronaut around to face the audience head on and offering 43 minutes/six tracks of encompassing largesse, topping 10 minutes in the title-track and “Silent Rift,” both on side B with the interlude “Peregrine” between them, after the three side A rollers, “Bellwether,” “Lake” and “Among the Holy” have tripped out outward and downward into an atmospheric plunge that is a joy to take feeling specifically geared as an invite to the converted. We are here, come worship with us. Also get crushed. Spelljammer records may not happen all the time, but you won’t be through “Bellwether” before you’re saying it was worth the wait.

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RidingEasy Records website

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The Black Heart Death Cult, Sonic Mantras

A deceptively graceful second LP from Melbourne’s The Black Heart Death Cult, Sonic Mantras pulls together an eight-song/45-minute run that unfolds bookended by “Goodbye Gatwick Blues” (8:59) and “Sonic Dhoom” (9:47) and in between ebbs and flows across shorter pieces that maximize their flow in whether shoegazing, heavygazing, blissing out, or whatever we’re calling it this week on “The Sun Inside” and “One Way Through,” or finding their way to a particularly deadened meadow on “Trees,” or tripping the light hypnotic on “Dark Waves” just ahead of the closer. “Cold Fields” churns urgently in its 2:28 but remains spacious, and everywhere The Black Heart Death Cult go, they remain liquefied in their sound, like a seemingly amorphous thing that nonetheless manages to hold its shape despite outside conditions. Whatever form they take, then, they are themselves, and Sonic Mantras emphasizes how yet-underappreciated they are in emerging from the ever-busy Aussie underground.

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Kozmik Artifactz store

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Shogun, Tetra

Tetra is the third long-player from Milwaukee’s Shogun, and in addition to the 10-minute “Delta,” which marries blues gargle with YOB slow-gallop before jamming out across its 10-minute span, it brings straight-shooter fuzz rockers like “Gravitas,” the someone-in-this-band-listened-to-Megadeth-in-the-’90s-and-that’s-okay beginnings of “Buddha’s Palm/Aviary” and likewise crunch of “Axiom” later, but also the quiet classic progressive rock of “Gone Forever,” and the more patient coming together of psychedelia and harder-hitting movement on closer “Maximum Ray.” Somewhat undercut by a not-raw-but-not-bursting-with-life production, pieces like “Buddha’s Palm/Aviary,” which gives over to a sweeter stretch of guitar in its second movement, and “Vertex/Universal Pain Center,” which in its back end brings around that YOB influence again and puts it to good use, are outwardly complex enough to put the lie to the evenhandedness of the recording. There’s more going on in Tetra than it first seems, and the more you listen, the more you find.

Shogun on Facebook

Shogun on Bandcamp

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Nadja, Luminous Rot

Keeping up with Nadja has proven nigh on impossible over the better part of the last two decades, as the Berlin-by-way-of-Toronto duo have issued over 25 albums in 19 years, plus splits and live offerings and digital singles and oh my goodness I do believe I have the vapors that’s a lot of Nadja. For those of us who flit in and out like the dilletantes we ultimately are, Luminous Rot‘s aligning Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff with Southern Lord makes it an easy landmark, but really most of what the six-cut/48-minute long-player does is offer a reminder of the vital experimentalism the lazy are missing in the first place. The consuming, swelling drone of “Cuts on Your Hands,” blown-out sub-industrialism of “Starres,” hook of the title-track and careful-what-you-wish-for anchor riff of “Fruiting Bodies” — these and the noisily churning closer “Dark Inclusions” are a fervent argument in Nadja‘s favor as being more than a sometimes-check-in kind of band, and for immediately digging into the 43-minute single-song album Seemannsgarn, which they released earlier this year. So much space and nothing to lose.

Nadja on Facebook

Southern Lord Recordings website

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Shroud of Vulture, Upon a Throne of Jackals

Welcome to punishment as a primary consideration. Indianapolis death-doom four-piece hold back the truly crawling fare until “Perverted Reflection,” which is track three of the total seven on their debut full-length, Upon a Throne of Jackals, but by then the extremity has already shown its unrepentant face across the buried-alive “Final Spasms of the Drowned” and the oldschool death metal of “The Altar.” Centerpiece “Invert Every Throne” calls to mind Conan in its nod, but Shroud of Vulture are more about rawness than sheer largesse in tone, and their prone-to-blasting style gives them an edge there and in “Halo of Tarnished Light,” which follows. The closing pair of “Concealing Rabid Laughter” and “Stone Coffin of Existence” both top seven minutes and offset grueling tension with grueling release, but it’s the stench of decay that so much defines Upon a Throne of Jackals, as though somebody rebuilt Sunlight Studio brick for brick in Hoosier Country. Compelling and filthy in kind.

Shroud of Vulture on Facebook

Wise Blood Records website

Transylvanian Tapes on Bandcamp

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Towards Atlantis Lights, When the Ashes Devoured the Sun

Ultra-grueling, dramatic death-doom tragedies permeate the second full-length, When the Ashes Devoured the Sun, from UK-based four-piece Towards Atlantis Lights, with vocalist/keyboardist Kostas Panagiotou and guitarist Ivan Zara at the heart of the compositions while bassist Riccardo Veronese and drummer Ivano Olivieri assure the impact that coincides with the cavernous procession matches in scope. The follow-up to 2018’s Dust of Aeons (review here), this six-track collection fosters classicism and modern apocalyptic vibes alike, and whether raging or morose, its dirge atmosphere remains firm and uncompromised. Heavy lumber for heavy hearts. The kind of doom that doesn’t look up. That doesn’t mean it’s not massive in scope — it is, even more than the first record — just that nearly everything it sees is downward. If there’s hope, it is a vague thing, lost to periphery. So be it.

Towards Atlantis Lights on Facebook

Kostas Panagiotou on Bandcamp

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ASTRAL CONstruct, Tales of Cosmic Journeys

It has been said on multiple occasions that “space is the place.” The curiously-capitalized Colorado outfit ASTRAL CONstruct would seem to live by this ethic on their debut album, Tales of Cosmic Journeys, unfurling as they do eight flowing progressions of instrumental slow-CGI-of-the-planets pieces that are more plotted in their course than jams, but feel built from jams just the same. Raw in its production and mix, and mastered by Kent Stump of Wo Fat, there’s enough atmosphere to let the lead guitar breathe, certainly, and to sustain life in general even on “Jettisoned Adrift in the Space Debris,” and the image evoked by “Hand Against the Solar Winds” feels particularly inspired given that song’s languid roll. The record starts and ends in cryogenic sleep, and if upon waking we’re transported to another place and another time, who knows what wonders we might see along the way. ASTRAL CONstruct‘s exploration would seem to be just beginning here, but their “Cosmos Perspective” is engaging just the same.

ASTRAL CONstruct on Instagram

ASTRAL CONstruct on Bandcamp

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TarLung, Architect

Vienna-based sludgedrivers TarLung were last heard from with 2017’s Beyond the Black Pyramid (discussed here), and Architect continues the progression laid out there in melding vocal extremity and heavy-but-not-too-heavy-to-move riffing. It might seem like a fine line to draw, and it is, and that only makes songs like “Widow’s Bane” and “Horses of Plague” all the more nuanced as their deathly growls and severe atmospheres mesh with what in another context might just be stoner rock groove. Carcass circa the criminally undervalued Swansong, Six Feet Under. TarLung manage to find a place in stoner sludge that isn’t just Bongzilla worship, or Bongripper worship, or Bong worship. I’m not sure it’s worship at all, frankly, and I like that about it as the closing title-track slow-moshes my brain into goo.

TarLung on Facebook

TarLung on Bandcamp

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Wizzerd & Merlin, Turned to Stone Chapter III

Somewhere in the great mystical expanse between Kalispell, Montana, and Kansas City, Missouri, two practicioners of the riffly dark arts meet on a field of battle. Wizzerd come packing the 19-minute acoustic-into-heavy-prog-into-sitar-laced-jam-out “We Are,” as if to encompass that declaration in all its scope, while Merlin answer back with the organ-led “Merlin’s Bizarre Adventure” (21:51), all chug and lumber until it’s time for weirdo progressive fusion reggae and an ensuing Purple-tinged psych expansion. Who wins? I don’t know. Ripple Music in releasing it in the first place, I guess. Continuing the label’s influential split series(es), Turned to Stone Chapter III pushes well over the top in the purposes of both acts involved, and in that, it’s maybe less of a battle than two purveyors joining forces to weave some kind of Meteo down on the heads of all who might take them on. If you’ve think you’ve got the gift, they seem only too ready to test that out.

Wizzerd on Facebook

Merlin on Facebook

Ripple Music website

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Seum, Winterized

“Life Grinder” begins with a sample: “I don’t know if you need all that bass,” and the answer, “Oh, you need all that bass.” That’s already after “Sea Sick Six” has revealed the Montreal-based trio’s sans-guitar extremist sludge roll, and the three-piece seem only too happy to keep up the theme. Vocals are harsh, biting, grating, purposeful in their fuckall, and the whole 28-minute affair of Winterized is cathartic aural violence, except perhaps the interlude “666,” which is a quiet moment between “Broken Bones” and “Black Snail Volcano,” which finally seems to just explode in its outright aggression, nod notwithstanding. A slowed down Ramones cover — reinventing “Pet Sematary” as “Red Sematary” — has a layer of spoken chanting vocals layered in and closes out, but the skin has been peeled so far back by then and Seum have doused so much salt onto the wounds that even Bongzilla might cringe. The low-end-only approach only makes it more punishing and more punk rock at the same time. Fucking mean.

Seum on Facebook

Seum on Bandcamp

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I’m not gonna claim to be O.G. Iceburn like I’ve been waiting 20 years for the Salt Lake City band to put out their next record or anything, but I dug both Ascend and Eagle Twin, and words like “recorded by Andy Patterson” tend to catch my eye, so when I listened to the teaser clip streaming below for one of the two presumably-side-long tracks that comprise Iceburn‘s Asclepius — due out June 25 on Southern Lord — and it turned out to be badass, I was duly pleased. And that’s about all I’ve got. Preorders are up now.

For those coming this way via the Eagle Twin or Ascend connections, you’ll find some carryover elements at work in what’s been posted from “Dahlia Rides the Firebird,” notably in the riffing and vocal style of Gentry Densley, but the atmosphere stretches way out here and, yeah, it’s a teaser so it should hopefully be taken as a sign of things to come. I wouldn’t expect two and a half minutes to encompass everything, but still.

From the PR wire:

ICEBURN RETURN WITH THEIR FIRST ALBUM IN OVER TWENTY YEARS

SOUTHERN LORD TO RELEASE ASCLEPIUS ON 25TH JUNE ON LP & DL FORMATS

PRE ORDER VIA BANDCAMP, SOUTHERN LORD & SOUTHERN LORD EUROPE

https://iceburnsl.bandcamp.com/
https://southernlord.com/band/iceburn/
https://southernlordeurope.com/band/iceburn/

Asclepius is the new album from the ever-evolving and adventurous collective Iceburn, who return with their first new material in twenty years, which Southern Lord shall release on 25th June on LP and digital formats.

Much like the mythical ouroboros that appear in their music, Iceburn have come full circle, as Gentry Densley comments, “Iceburn had always been about progressing and pushing the boundaries, pushing the music ahead of ourselves so we had to work to catch up. This new record comes from a place of rediscovery of who we are deep down, a place that with all it’s challenges and comforts, ultimately feels like home.”

He continues, “In recent years Iceburn basically became four friends hanging out and working on music. After all going in different directions for so many years we found ways to embrace our earliest influences and the foundations of our musical selves. We basically cycled back to the way we made music in our heyday, our salad days, and it felt right once again.”

The rawness of Asclepius harks back to the days of their early records (such as Hephaestus), and fuses elements of metal, jazz, psychedelia, and rock with a seamless flow, monolithic riffs, swirling harmonies, and a groove that are the cornerstones of their sound.

Asclepius comprises two long-form tracks, “Healing The Ouroboros” and “Dahlia Rides the Firebird”, the latter is based on an old traditional Greek tune. With some members majoring in classics/philosophy, music/composition and studying ethnomusicology – classic mythology has always been a key reference point for the themes of their music. That the new record is named after the god of healing and medicine and arriving at this moment in time is coincidence, as the band comments, “It felt like we needed healing even before this pandemic hit.”

The line-up on Asclepius represents the core of Iceburn through the early formative years. Iceburn, later the Iceburn Collective, initially existed from 1990 to 2001. Later reuniting in 2007 with this current lineup again at the core. The band’s initial output slowly evolved from hardcore and metal to free improvisation and noise, The 10 year arc saw the band following their own path and becoming more and more obscure as they got deeper into unknown musical worlds. By 2000 the cycle seemed complete and Iceburn did their final tour in Europe 2001. In 2007 this early core crew reunited to play a local anniversary show focused on the earliest material. Every few years since they would get together for another ‘reunion’ until that word became more of a joke, it was clear the band was back, getting together every week, and working on new material.

TRACK LIST:
1) Healing The Ouroboros
2) Dahlia Rides the Firebird

ICEBURN LINE UP:
Joseph ‘Chubba’ Smith – drums, founding member of Iceburn from 1990-’93 then 2007-present
James Holder – guitar, was also a founding member from ’90-’95 and ’07 to present
Cache Tolman – bass, ’91-97 off and on, and ’07 to present
Gentry Densley – guitar and vocals, 1990 to present

Asclepius was recorded and engineered by Andy Patterson (SubRosa, INVDRS, Insect Ark, and The Otolith) a collaborator also for Gentry’s other bands Eagle Twin and Ascend.

https://www.facebook.com/IceburnSLC
https://iceburnsl.bandcamp.com/
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Iceburn, ” Dahlia Rides the Firebird” teaser

My brain did that thing it does when news comes in about new Nadja. It went, ‘Oh hey, new Nadja, you should check that out.’ And so, I click’d on the ol’ linkeroo, and sure enough, the new Nadja‘s pretty darn good. The album and accompanying video share the title Luminous Rot, and the theme of making first contact with aliens — perhaps someone in Berlin has been watching The Next Generation? — comes with the probably-not-happenstance fact that this is apparently the first Nadja LP to have been mixed by someone other than the duo themselves. Considering the breadth of their discography, that’s significant.

Southern Lord will release Luminous Rot on May 21, and you can dive into the moody vibes of the title-track at the bottom of this post. Nadja remain as outside-genre as ever, it would seem, no matter who’s tweaking levels on the recording.

To the PR wire:

Nadja return with a new album, Luminous Rot, incoming on Southern Lord in May

Nadja return with a new album Luminous Rot, incoming on CD and DL formats via Southern Lord on 21st May, with the LP version arriving on 13th August.

Nadja is a duo of multi-instrumentalist Aidan Baker and bassist Leah Buckareff—active since 2005—and making music which can be described as ambient doom, dreamsludge, or metalgaze. Nadja’s signature sound combines the atmospheric textures of shoegaze and ambient/electronic music with the heaviness, density, and volume of metal, noise, and industrial.

For the new album, Luminous Rot, the duo retain their overblown/ambient sound, and explore shorter and more tightly structured songs reflecting their interests not only in metal, but post-punk, cold-wave, shoegaze, and industrial.

Thematically, the album explores ideas of ‘first contact’ and the difficulties of recognising alien intelligence. This was in part inspired by reading such writers as Stanislaw Lem and Cixin Lui — in particular, theories on astro-physics, multi-dimensionality, and spatial geometry in “The Three Body Problem” — as well as Margaret Wertheim’s “A Field Guide To Hyperbolic Space,” about mathematician Daina Taimina’s work with crochet to illustrate hyperbolic space and geometry.

The album was recorded between their home studio, Broken Spine Studios, or Nadja’s live rehearsal studio, both in the district of Lichtenberg, Berlin.

Luminous Rot marks the first album mixed by someone else, who in this case was David Pajo. The band comment, “as big fans of Slint, we thought he might fore-front the more angular, post-punk elements of our music – the mix is quite different from our previous albums. But, as usual, we had James Plotkin (Khanate, OLD, etc) master the album as we trust his ears and aesthetic, as he’s mastered numerous records of ours.”

TRACK LIST:
1. Intro
2. Luminous Rot
3. Cuts On Your Hands
4. Starres
5. Fruiting Bodies
6. Dark Inclusions

Nadja is Leah Buckareff & Aidan Baker.

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Nadja, “Luminous Rot” official video

Hey all, we made it to the final day of the Winter 2020 Quarterly Review, so congrats to ‘us’ and by us I mean myself and anyone still reading, which is probably about two or three people. On my end today is completely manic in terms of real-life, offline logistics — much to do — but no way I’m letting one last batch of 10 reviews fall by the wayside, so rest assured, by the time this goes live, it’ll be complete, even though I’ve had to swap things out as some stuff has been locked into other coverage since I first slated it. Plenty around waiting to be written up. Perpetually, it would seem.

But before we dive in, thank you for reading if you’ve caught any part of this QR. I hope your 2020 is off to an excellent start and that finding new music to love is as much a part of your next 12 months as it can possibly be.

Quarterly Review #41-50:

Sunn O))), Pyroclasts

The narrative — because of course there’s a narrative; blessings and peace upon it — is that drone-metal progenitors Sunn O))), while in the studio recording earlier-2019’s Life Metal (review here) with Steve Albini, began each day doing a 12-minute improvised modal drone working in a different scale. They used a stopwatch to keep time. Thus the four tracks of Pyroclasts were born. They all hover around 11 minutes after editing, which settles neatly onto two vinyl sides, and it’s the rawer vision of Sunn O))), with just Greg Anderson and Stephen O’Malley‘s guitars, rather than some of the more elaborate arrangements which they’ve been known to undertake. That they’d put out two studio records in the same year is striking considering it had been four years since 2015’s Kannon (review here), but I think the truth of the matter is they had these tapes and decided they were worth preserving with a popular release. I wouldn’t say they were wrong, and the immersion here is a good reminder of the core appeal of Sunn O)))‘s conjured depths.

Sunn O))) on Bandcamp

Southern Lord Recordings website

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Crypt Sermon, The Ruins of Fading Light

Traditional doom rarely sounds as vital as it does in the hands of Crypt Sermon. The Philly five-piece return with The Ruins of Fading Light on Dark Descent Records as an awaited follow-up to 2015’s Out of the Garden (review here) and thereby bring forth classic metal with all the urgency of thrash and the poise of the NWOBHM. Frontman Brooks Wilson — also responsible for the album art — is in command here and with the firm backing of bassist Frank Chin and drummer Enrique Sagarnaga, guitarists Steve Jannson and James Lipczynski offer sharpened-axe riffs and solo scorch offset by passages of keyboard for an all the more epic vibe. The rolling “Christ is Dead” is pure Candlemass, but the galloping “The Snake Handler” might be the highlight of the 10-track/55-minute run, though that’s not to take away either from the Dehumanizer chug of “Key of Solomon” or the melodic reach of the closing title-track either. Take your pick, really. It’s all metal as fuck and glorious for that. If they don’t sell denim jackets, they should.

Crypt Sermon on Thee Facebooks

Dark Descent Records on Bandcamp

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The Neptune Power Federation, Memoirs of a Rat Queen

“Can you dig what the Imperial Priestess is laying down?” is the central question of Memoirs of a Rat Queen, the first album from Sydney, Australia’s The Neptune Power Federation to be released through Cruz Del Sur Music, and it arrives over an ELO “Don’t Bring Me Down”-style arena rock beat on leadoff “Can You Dig?” as an intro to the rest of the LP. Strange, epic, progressive, traditional, heavy and cascading rock and roll follows, as intricate as it is immediately catchy, and whether it’s “Watch Our Masters Bleed” or “I’ll Make a Man out of You,” the Imperial Priestess Screaming Loz Sutch and company make it easy to answer in the affirmative. Arrangements are willfully over the top as “Bound for Hell” and “The Reaper Comes for Thee” engage a heavy rocker take on heavy metal’s legacy, maddened laughter and all in the latter track, which closes, and the affect on the listener is nothing less than an absolute blast — a reminder of the empowering sound of early metal on a disaffected generation in the late ’70s and early ’80s and how that same fist-pump-against-the-world has become timeless. No doubt the costumes and all that make The Neptune Power Federation striking live, but as Memoirs of a Rat Queen readily steps forward to prove, the songs are there as well.

The Neptune Power Federation on Thee Facebooks

Cruz Del Sur Music on Bandcamp

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Chron Goblin, Here Before

Have Chron Goblin been here before? The title of their album speaks to a kind of creepy deja vu feeling, and that’s emblematic of the Canadian band’s move away from the party rock of their past offerings, their last LP having been Backwater (review here) 2015. Fortunately, while they seek out some new aesthetic ground, the 11 tracks of Here Before do maintain Chron Goblin‘s penchant for straight-ahead songcraft and unpretentious execution — and frankly, that wasn’t at all broken. Neither, perhaps was the let’s-get-drunk-and-bounce-around spirit of their prior work, but they sound more mature in a song like the six-minute “Ghost” and “Slipping Under” (premiered here) successfully melds the shift in presentation with the energy of their prior output. Maybe it’s still a party but we watch horror movies? I don’t know. They’ve still got “Giving in to Fun” early in the tracklisting — worth noting it follows the swaying “Oblivion” — so maybe I’m misreading the whole thing, or maybe it’s more complex than being entirely one thing or the other might allow for. Perish the thought. Either way, can’t mess with the songs.

Chron Goblin on Thee Facebooks

Chron Goblin on Bandcamp

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Ethereal Riffian, Legends

Ukrainian heavy rockers Ethereal Riffian make a pointed sonic shift with their Legends album (on Robustfellow), keeping some of the grunge spirit in their melodies as the eight-minute “Moonflower” and closer “Ethereal Path” show, but in songs like “Unconquerable” and the early salvo of “Born Again,” “Dreamgazer” and “Legends” and even the second half of “Kosmic” and “Pain to Wisdom,” they let loose from some of the more meditative aspects of their past work with a fiery drive and a theme of enlightenment through political and social change. A kind of great awakening of the self. There’s still plenty of “ethereal” to go with all that “riffian” in the intro “Sage’s Alchemy,” or the first half of “Kosmic” or the CD bonus “Yeti’s Hide,” but no question the balance has tipped toward the straightforward, and the idea seems to be that the electrified feel is as much a part of the message as the message itself. The only trouble is that since putting Legends out, Ethereal Riffian called it quits to refocus their energies elsewhere in the universe. Are they really done? I’m skeptical, but if so, then at least they went out trying new things, which always seemed to be a specialty, and on a note of directly positive attitude.

Ethereal Riffian on Thee Facebooks

Robustfellow Productions on Bandcamp

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Parasol Caravan, Nemesis

A second long-player behind 2015’s Para Solem, the eight-song/35-minute Nemesis is not only made for vinyl, but it’s made for rockers. Specifically, heavy rockers. And it’s heavy rock, for heavy rockers. Based in Linz, Austria, the double-guitar four-piece Parasol Caravan have their sound and style on lockdown, and their work, while not really keeping any secrets in terms of where it’s coming from in its ’70s-via-’90s modern take, is brought to bear with a clarity that seems particularly derived from the European heavy rock tradition. Para Solem was longer and somewhat fuzzier in tone, but the stripped down approach of the title-track at the outset and its side B counterpart, “Serpent of Time” still unfold to a swath of ground covered, whether it’s in the subdued instrumental “Acceptance” or “Transition,” which follows the driving “Blackstar” and closes the LP with a bit of a progressive metal edge. Even that has its hook, though, and that’s ultimately the point.

Parasol Caravan on Thee Facebooks

Parasol Caravan on Bandcamp

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Golden Core, Fimbultýr

The title Fimbultýr translates to “mighty god” and is listed among the alternative names of Odin, which would seem to be who Oslo’s Golden Core have in mind in the leadoff title-track of their second album. Issued through Fysisk Format, it is not necessarily what one thinks of as “Viking metal” in the post-Amon Amarth or post-Enslaved context, but instead, the eight-song collection unfolds a biting modern sludge taking an edge of the earlier Mastodon lumber and bringing it to harshly-vocalized rollout. The 11-minute “Runatal” and only-seconds-shorter “Buslubben” are respective vocal points around which sides A and B of the release center, and each finds a way to give like emphasis to atmosphere and extremity, to stretch as well as pummel, and much to Golden Core‘s credit, they seem not only aware of the changes they’re presenting in their material, but in control of how and when they’re executed. The resulting linear flow of Fimbultýr, given the shifts within, isn’t to be understated as a victory on the part of the band.

Golden Core on Thee Facebooks

Fysisk Format on Bandcamp

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Black Smoke Omega, Harbinger

Harbinger may well be just that — a sign of things to come. The debut offering from Black Smoke Omega wraps progressive death-doom and gothic piano-led atmospherics around a thematic drawing from science-fiction, and while I’m not certain of the narrative being told by the Dortmund, Germany-based band, their method for telling it is fascinating. It’s not entirely seamless in its shifts, and it doesn’t seem like the band — seemingly spearheaded by multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Jack Nier, though Ashley James (The Antiquity) plays guitar on “A Man without a Heart” and Michael Tjanaka brings synth/piano to “Kainé” — want it to be, but there’s no denying that by the time “Falling Awake” seems to provide some melodic resolution to the often-slow-motion tumult prior, it’s doing so by bringing the different sides together. It’s a significant journey from the raw, barking shouts on “The Black Scrawl” and the lurching-into-chug-into-lurch of “The Man without a Heart” to get there, however. But this, too, seems to be on purpose. How it all might shake out feels like a question for the next release, but Black Smoke Omega seem poised here to leave heads spinning.

Black Smoke Omega on Thee Facebooks

Black Smoke Omega on Bandcamp

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Liquid Orbit, Game of Promises

While on the surface, Liquid Orbit might be on familiar enough ground with Game of Promises for anyone who has encountered the swath of up-and-comers working in the wake of Blues Pills, the Bremen, Germany, five-piece distinguish themselves through not just the keyboard work of Anders alongside Andree‘s guitar, Ralf‘s bass, Steve‘s drums and Sylvia‘s vocals, but also the shifts between funk, boogie, and edges of doom that play out in songs like “Shared Pain” and “Please Let Her Go,” as well as the title-track, which starts side B of the Nasoni Records-issued vinyl with a highlight guitar solo and an insistent snare tap beneath that works to bring movement to what’s still one of Game of Promises‘ shorter tracks at six and a half minutes, as opposed to the earlier eight-minute-toppers on side A or the psych-prog finale “Verlorene Karawane,” which translates in English to “lost caravan” and indeed basks in some Mideastern vibe and backward-effects vocal swirl. Bottom line, if you go into it thinking you know everything you’re getting, you’re probably selling it short.

Liquid Orbit on Thee Facebooks

Nasoni Records website

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Sun Below, Black Volume III

As the title hints, the name-your-price Black Volume III is the third EP release from Toronto’s Sun Below. All three have been issued over roughly a year’s span, and the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Jason Craig, drummer/backing vocalist Will Adams, bassist/backing vocalist Garrison Thordarson — who as far as I’m concerned wins this entire Quarterly Review when it comes to names; that’s an awesome name — and two have featured covers. On their debut, they took on “Dragonaut” by Sleep, and on Black Volume III, in following up the 12-minute nod-roller “Solar Burnout,” they thicken and further stonerize the catchy jaunt that is “Wires” by Red Fang. They’ve got, in other words, good taste. Black Volume III opens with “Green Visions” and thereby takes some righteous fart-fuzz for a walk both that and “Solar Burnout” show plenty of resi(n)dual Sleep influence, but honestly, it’s a self-releasing band with three dudes who sound like they’re having a really good time figuring out where they want to be in terms of sound after about a year from their first release, and if you ask anything else of Black Volume III than what it gives, you’re obviously lacking in context. Which is to say you’re fucking up. Don’t fuck up. Dig riffs instead.

Sun Below on Thee Facebooks

Sun Below on Bandcamp

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