If you caught wind of Arizona’s Godhunter via either of their 2014 releases — the full-length City of Dust (review here) or the GH/OST:S split with the newly-signed to Metal Blade outfit Secrets of the Sky (review here) — then cheers, but neither of those is going to do much to give you a context for comprehending the new Battleground Records/The Compound 7″ collaboration with Miami’s Amigo the Devil, The Outer Dark, except perhaps to demonstrate that just about anything is fair game when it comes to the Tucson six-piece, be it hardcore-infused sludge chaos or post-metallic droning malevolence.

The Outer Dark, it’s worth noting, toys with neither, and instead, Godhunter & Amigo the Devil offer two slices of downer neofolk, doomed in spirit, of weighted emotionality, but subdued and brooding rather than aggressive. A sense of atmosphere proves consistent with some of what showed up on the prior split, but essentially, Godhunter are working in a new form, as Danny Kiranos, aka Amigo the Devil, steps in on vocals to add Americana-style dramatics to “Weeping Willow” and the B-side cover of Nirvana‘s “Something in the Way,” which, being of a certain age, I recall hearing after the finish of 1991’s Nevermind, its moody minimalism just waiting to have all kinds of adolescent importance cast onto it as only the best pop can withstand.

Godhunter & Amigo the Devil have given that cut its due, and next to “Weeping Willow,” the context is completely different. The original composition shifts into classic murder balladry, with Kiranos topping Godhunter‘s arrangement in harmonized layers that add to the full-sounding instrumental backing’s pervasive sadness, a violent turn coming in the second half that, even if you’ve heard Godhunter at their most raging, I doubt you’ll find lacking in heaviness.

Ahead of the Feb. 13 release of The Outer Dark, I have the pleasure of hosting today a premiere for the video of “Weeping Willow.” Put together by the esteemed Frank Huang, its dark Western themes sit well alongside Godhunter & Amigo the Devil‘s own, one atmosphere enhancing the other in a morose symbiosis. More release info follows the video below. Enjoy:

Godhunter & Amigo the Devil, “Weeping Willow” official video

Behind the early 2014 release of their debut album, City Of Dust, and the more recent GH/0ST:S split LP with Oakland’s Secrets Of The Sky, Tucson-based GODHUNTER will now release a collaborative 7” single with AMIGO THE DEVIL, entitled The Outer Dark.

With GODHUNTER’s generally crushing sludge/crust-influenced hardcore grooves here supplying a much more ethereal, organic country/folk influence, the two-song single The Outer Dark 7” sees the quintet joined by one Danny Kiranos, also known as AMIGO THE DEVIL, who supplies his charismatic soulful Americana-based murderfolk vocals. “Weeping Willow” is the A-side track from the collaborative 7″, while the B-side features a cover of Nirvana’s “Something In The Way.” The record was recorded in multiple sessions during the Summer of 2014 at Arcane Digital Studios in Chandler, Arizona, and was produced, mixed and mastered by Ryan Butler.

The Outer Dark will see release through a union of GODHUNTER-co-owned Battleground Records and Earsplit’s label, The Compound in February 2015.

The “Weeping Willow” video was created by Frank Huang @ Pit Full Of Shit.

Lyrics, vocals and Theremin solo by AMIGO THE DEVIL. All music and instrumentation by GODHUNTER.

Godhunter on Thee Facebooks

Amigo the Devil on Thee Facebooks

The Compound website

Battleground Records on Thee Facebooks

I only find it easier to like Godhunter as time goes on. The Arizona five-piece came out of the gate plenty pissed off, and their 2014 full-length, City of Dust (review here) was only angrier with its socially conscious tales of life in the band’s native Tucson, but it’s their will toward pushing themselves outside of their comfort zone that continues to impress. Their recent split with Secrets of the Sky, Gh/0st:s (review here), found them branching into atmospheric melancholia, and it would seem their upcoming collaborative single with Miami’s Amigo the Devil will continue their stylistic expansion with another fascinating turn.

That 7″, dubbed The Outer Dark because Cormac McCarthy, is set to release on Black Friday, which is Nov. 28, and will be out via Battleground Records and The Compound. Godhunter also head out on tour tomorrow with Sorxe for a run that rounds out at the Southwest Terror Fest. The PR wire tells it like this:

GODHUNTER & AMIGO THE DEVIL Present Collaborative 7-Inch EP For Black Friday

GODHUNTER’s West Coast Tour With Sorxe Begins This Week

As Tucson’s GODHUNTER takes their confrontational auditory demolition back out on the road this week for a twelve-city West Coast run with Sorxe, the band announces yet another new set of recordings destined to see release this Fall.

After the release of their debut album, City Of Dust and the more recent GH/0ST:S split LP with Oakland’s Secrets Of The Sky both released this year, GODHUNTER now announcesa collaborative EP with Miami-based AMIGO THE DEVIL. While all of GODHUNTER’s 2014 releases have shown their generally crushing sludge/crust-influenced hardcore grooves giving way to more ethereal, organic rock influences, expanding the use of keys and acoustic instruments, the newly completed collaboration presents an incredible new sound completely. The charismatic murderfolk of AMIGO THE DEVIL, currently calling Miami, Florida home, features the soulful vocals and Americana-based anthems of one Danny Kiranos, who here unites with GODHUNTER, who provides virtually all instrumentation on these two incredibly accessible, somber and beautiful yet ominous tracks. The collaboration, The Outer Dark, includes one original tune, “Weeping Willow,” paired with an awesome cover of Nirvana’s “Something In The Way” on the B-side.

As with City Of Dust and GH/0ST:S, The Outer Dark will see release through a union of GODHUNTER-co-owned Battleground Records and Earsplit’s label The Compound, who will release the album on 7″ vinyl on Black Friday, November 28th. Preorders audio from the release and more will be released in the near future. Nearly all of GODHUNTER’s prior releases are available via The Compound HERE.

Later this month, both bands will perform at Southwest Terror Fest III: The Western Front — the massive Tucson-based musical gathering co-created by members of GODHUNTER among others — with GODHUNTER performing at the Rialto Theatre on Saturday, October 17th with Eagle Twin, Pelican and Goatsnake, and AMIGO THE DEVIL performing sporadically and randomly at both The Rialto Theatre and the nearby The District Tavern over the entire four-day event. Leading up to the fest, GODHUNTER will torch the West Coast alongside Phoenix-based Sorxe, the tour beginning this Thursday, October 2nd. Both bands will perform at the two-day Lucifest II with Demon Lung, Reproacher, Secrets of the Sky and others, and will join the likes of Graves At Sea and more along the way before closing the tour down at SWTF.

GODHUNTER Tour Dates:
10/02/2014 The Hive – Flagstaff, AZ w/ Sorxe
10/03-04/2014 Mojo’s Music Venue – Odgen, UT @ Lucifest II w/ Sorxe, Secrets of the Sky, more
10/05/2014 Lion’s Lair – Denver, CO w/ Sorxe
10/06/2014 TBA – Casper, WY w/ Sorxe
10/07/2014 The Shredder – Boise, ID w/ Sorxe
10/08/2014 The Hop – Spokane, WA w/ Sorxe
10/09/2014 The Shakedown – Bellingham, WA w/ Sorxe
10/10/2014 Victory Lounge – Seattle, WA w/ Sorxe
10/11/2014 The Know – Portland, OR w/ Graves At Sea, Sorxe
10/12/2014 Hemlock Tavern – San Francisco, CA w/ Sorxe, Secrets Of The Sky
10/13/2014 Black Flame Collective – San Bernadino, CA w/ Sorxe
10/17/2014 Rialto Theatre – Tucson, AZ @ SWTF III w/ Goatsnake, Pelican, Eagle Twin

AMIGO THE DEVIL Live:
10/16-19/2014 Southwest Terror Fest – Tucson, AZ

http://dirtweedmetal.com
http://godhunter.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/godhuntertucson666
https://www.facebook.com/battlegroundrecords
http://www.thecompoundrecs.com
https://thecompound.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/TheCompoundRecs
http://www.earsplitdistro.com

Godhunter & Secrets of the Sky, Gh/0st:s Split (2014)

So you’ve got Lae, a post-punk/post-rock troupe from Montreal who were onto some cool stuff in their time in the ’90s — when they were called Lae-Tseu — but who never put an album out at the time. They get back together to record, and tap avant noise rock genius Steve Austin of Today is the Day to engineer, and then Austin winds up fronting the band as well. I fail to see how that’s not the absolute best-case scenario for all parties involved.

The resulting long-player — Lae‘s first, remember — will be out in the coming months on Battleground Records/The Compound. It seems like the material that comprises the album is stuff that the band had written during their first run, so it should be interesting to hear how it sounds both with a modern production and with Austin at the helm, whose work is both beyond time and utterly his own.

To the PR wire!

LAE: Debut LP By Montreal Psychedelic Post-Rock Act To See Release Via The Compound/Battleground

Bringing a decade-and-a-half of silence to an end, Montreal-based quartet, LAE, is eager to release the band’s official debut full-length release, and the entire reincarnation of the band.

Performing under their original moniker, LAE-TSEU, the band evolved out of the mid-’90s post-rock/post-hardcore scene, seeking to distance themselves from the established conventions of rock music as well as the trappings of the various alternative subgenres. Not without irony, trace elements of many of those persist in their sound, itself a peculiarly familiar presence, as varied as it is satisfying. Nods to the likes of Three Mile Pilot, Swans, Sonic Youth, Unwound and Slint will surely not go unnoticed, but LAE’s total is far greater than the sum of its influences. Scathing, desperate and heartbreaking vocal sentiments set against richly layered backdrops, amplified and acoustic, melodic and deafening.

After earning a solid regional fanbase and foundation, the band was dissolved in 2001, without having released an official album. Their regional peer acts would go on to receive massive attention just after LAE’s premature and unexpected demise, and it would seem that the band had missed the boat completely as these other hometown acts entered the international spotlight. Yet, perhaps there is more than one boat…

Having reformed with a diehard goal of finally bringing their unfortunately unsung anthems to fruition with more passion and dedication than ever before, LAE excitedly returns to active duty with their impending debut full-length LP coming together for release in late 2014. In mid-2013, LAE’s current lineup — bassist, Ronald Jean-Gilles, drummer Serge Nakauchi Pelletier, and guitarists Stephane Desgroseilliers and Marc Lucas Ablasou — set out to record their debut LP, Break The Clasp, bringing their anthems from two decades ago to new life, completely re-envisioned with incredible musicianship and finesse. To capture these anthems with the appropriately beautiful yet tortured tones, the band sanctioned the talents of producer Steve Austin of Today Is The Day, flying him along with some major pieces of recording equipment from his Austin Enterprises out to Montreal for the recording sessions. Yet, once the recording sessions were underway,Austin instantly became intertwined in the recording process full-on, in the end supplying lead vocals to the entire Break The Clasp LP. An incredible array of musical experimentation seamlessly coalescing into a more than fifty-minute-long, mesmerizingly psychedelic yet anguished style of post-rock, LAE’s mammoth sound is unlike anything else one can imagine; incredibly beautiful yet inescapably depressing.

Late this year, Break The Clasp will finally see its long-awaited dawn through a collaborative release between DIY labels The Compound and Battleground Records, on all digital formats as well as deluxe digitpak CD and deluxe 2xLP formats. The otherworldly cover art crafted by LAE’s longtime cohort Sonny Kay is viewable HERE.

Stay tuned for the official street date as well as samples of the album and more to be released in the coming weeks. LAE will also take to the highways of North America in support of Break The Clasp before the end of the year as well.

http://laetseu.com
https://www.facebook.com/pages/LAE-Band/614579391922975
http://www.thecompoundrecs.com
http://www.facebook.com/thecompoundrecs
http://www.earsplitdistro.com
https://www.facebook.com/battlegroundrecords

Lae-Tseu, “A Chair in Hawaii”

After releasing the CD last month through The Compound and their own Battleground Records, Tucson, Arizona, sludge freethinkers are set to have their debut full-length, City of Dust (streamed here), show up on vinyl May 1. The destructive six-piece will tour a week with Secrets of the Sky starting June 6 at this year’s Doom in June fest in Las Vegas, and the LP will be limited to 300 copies with a handy bunch of extras which the PR wire is happy to detail below.

This is also the first I’m seeing of the Doom in June lineup, which looks right on with Ides of Gemini, Novembers Doom, Demon Lung, Acid Witch, Godhunter, Secrets of the Sky and Christian Mistress. That’s a heavy goddamn show.

Specificity is key:

GODHUNTER: Tour With Secrets Of The Sky Confirmed

Preorders For Deluxe LP Version Of City Of Dust Available

Following the triumphant CD/digital release of GODHUNTER’s dynamic debut full-length, City Of Dust, today the deluxe vinyl edition of the album have been posted, in addition to the band’s next bout of widespread touring in support of the album.

Having been released through a union of Earsplit’s label, The Compound, and GODHUNTER’s Battleground Records, the two DIY factions will release City Of Dust in a deluxe vinyl run, which is currently being manufactured. The record will be available in a run of 300 copies on clear 180-gram vinyl with red splatters analogous with the desert rose cover artwork, all poly-bagged with a black sleeve and full-color 12×24 lyric/liner sheet and full-color jacket. Preorders for the impending vinyl adaptation of the album have been posted; all pre-street date orders placed via Earsplit Distro will see the LP shipped with a free copy of City Of Dust on CD and will ship by May 1st. Preorder placement for the vinyl as well as and an arsenal of additional GODHUNTER merch can all be located HERE.

Late this Spring, GODHUNTER will take off on a wild west US trek with Oakland’s progressive doom metal sextet, Secrets Of The Sky. On June 6th and 7th the bands will rendezvous at the annual Doom In June Fest in Las Vegas, both set to perform amidst the lineup including Novembers Doom, Christian Mistress, Acid Witch, Ides of Gemini, Demon Lung and more. From there they’ll co-headline a course through Oakland, San Luis Obispo, Glendale, Palm Desert, Tucson and Phoenix.

GODHUNTER & SECRETS OF THE SKY Spring Tour:
6/06/2014 Cheyenne Saloon – Las Vegas, NV @ Doom In June
6/07/2014 Cheyenne Saloon – Las Vegas, NV @ Doom In June
6/08/2014 Stork Club – Oakland, CA
6/09/2014 Frankie Teardrops – San Luis Obispo, CA
6/10/2014 Billy O’s – Ventura, CA
6/11/2014 The Complex – Glendale, CA
6/12/2014 The Palms – Palm Desert, CA
6/13/2014 The District Tavern – Tucson, AZ

Bearing the underlying subtitle, A Conversation Between Hope and Despair, the fifty-minute dust storm of groove-laden, resin-coated sludge metal intensity City Of Dust delivers the most concise, diverse, and infectious hymns from the politically-motivated Tucson, Arizona-based outfit to date. Through a brutally honest outcry the album boasts thought-provoking, thematic tirades against the governmental members and parties the residents who embody GODHUNTER feel are directly responsible for a wide array of vital societal issues affecting their home region, including equal rights, a widespread water shortage, immigration and more.

http://dirtweedmetal.com
http://godhunter.bandcamp.com
https://www.facebook.com/godhuntertucson666
https://www.facebook.com/battlegroundrecords
http://www.thecompoundrecs.com
https://www.facebook.com/TheCompoundRecs
http://www.earsplitdistro.com

Godhunter, City of Dust (2014)

It should say something about the conceptual nature of Godhunter‘s approach that their lyric sheet comes with footnotes. Today, the Tuscon-based six-piece release their debut long-player, City of Dust, on CD via Battleground Records/The Compound. It’s an album that wears its aggression and political mentality likewise on its sleeve, and from the opening sample that, backed by feedback and effects, leads the way into the undulating, punishingly slow riff of “Despite All,” Godhunter show that they’re more than willing to manually drive these ideas into your brain if that’s what it’s going to take to get them there. Tackling issues within their native Arizona (“Rats in the Walls,” “Snake Oil Dealer”) and the Southwest in general (the closing “Plague Widow”), the eight component tracks of the 49-minute album come across with staggering intensity despite what’s usually a fairly grueling pace. It is as much a multi-chapter sludgecore manifesto as it is a collection of memorably-riffed songs.

Godhunter‘s hardcore roots shine through in their arrangements, and even with cellist/keyboardist/effects specialist Matthew Davis at work throughout, the riffs of “Despite All,” “Palace of Thorn” and the guitar-siren-infused “City of Dust” lumber in classic-if-thickened fashion. Elsewhere, guitarists David Rodgers (also vocals) and Jake Brazelton bring an almost Southern metal sensibility to the largesse of “Brushfires,” while bassist Ryan “Dick” Williamson and drummer Andy Kratzenberg lend further heft and punctuation to the steady roll, but the raw-throat of vocalist Charlie Touseull keeps City of Dust aligned to a tradition of socially conscious underground rage, lines like “No rescue for those already dead/Reason cast aside for myth instead,” from “Brushfires” showcasing the rhythmic push that accompanies such vitriol. If there’s an aberration from Godhunter‘s onslaught, it comes in “Shooting down the Sun” at the start of the second half of the tracklist, on which guest vocalist Carlos Arzate sings clean over mournful acoustic guitars and Davis‘ cello. It’s the shortest track on City of Dust at 4:44, but the gravitas it lends the surrounding material is put to solid and pummeling use.

The corresponding affirmation of Godhunter‘s brutality, then, would have to be the closer. “Plague Widow,” with gang-style backing vocals from Matt Martinez, Nate Garrett and Chthon Leemont, is a 10-minute sensory assault that compounds references to the Bible and The Tempest with keyboard atmospherics and an insistent repetitions over a marching riff that aren’t so much hypnotic as like being punched with music, cello and amp noise finally serving as City of Dust‘s leadout over the fading guitar, bass and drums. The line that Touseull and company leave on is “This is hell and all the devils are here,” and like the rest of City of Dust, it seems unlikely that’s happenstance. So thought-through is the album that it’s easy to forget it’s Godhunter‘s first — their prior release was late 2011’s Wolves EP (review here) — but if they’re to move forward from this as their starting point, they’ve presented a multifaceted and passionate foundation from which to progress. On any angle from which you might want to approach it, City of Dust is more than just a sludge record.

They’ve got it at their Bandcamp, but I’ve been given permission to stream the album here and I’m not about to say no. After the player, you’ll find the lyric sheet with track-by-track info on all the songs. Please enjoy.

[mp3player width=480 height=360 config=fmp_jw_widget_config.xml playlist=godhunter-city-of-dust.xml]

Godhunter‘s City of Dust is available now digitally through their Bandcamp page and on CD via Earsplit Distro‘s website. Here are the lyric sheets:

Godhunter on Thee Facebooks

Godhunter on Bandcamp

Godhunter at Earsplit Distro