Like a salve for troubled times, Grayceon dig in at an unprecedented level. Some 20 years after the San Francisco, California, trio’s founding — their lineup, with cellist/vocalist Jackie Perez Gratz, guitarist Max Doyle and drummer Zack Farwell, has been stable all the while, and each member is an essential facet of the band’s persona — and five years after their last LP, 2020’s Mothers Weavers Vultures (review here), they offer Then the Darkness (on Translation Loss and the band’s own We Can Records).
At 81 minutes and 11 tracks, it is pointedly all-in; nearly twice as long as the album before it, and a cascade through sounds alternately beautiful and harsh as Grayceon bring together thrash, doom, avant-heavy progressivism of craft and melodic arrangements that, even considering the accomplishments of Mothers Weavers Vultures, doesn’t let you get through “Velvet ’79” before realizing they’ve hit another echelon in songwriting.
That they managed to fit it on a double-vinyl is impressive enough. That they managed to compose the record without collapsing under material’s own weight is more so. Consuming one of the total four sides is “Mahsa,” which is 20 minutes long, the longest the band have ever written — taking the title from “We Can,” the 17-minute epic from 2011’s evergreen All We Destroy (review here, discussed here) — and which more importantly stakes its place in the conversation of violence against women.
It is named for Mahsa (Jina) Amini, who was killed in Iran in 2022 because all gods are the provenance of evil men, and makes a refrain of the name of the movement that sprung up in the wake of her murder: “Woman, life, freedom.” Simple enough concepts in a complex world, and a song that is both expressive and mournful, wishing for a better times in the lines, “When you find me, you’ll know I am the sun,” and, with the power to give life and to nurture the boys who will one day grow up and kill more women, the lyrics ask, “What more do you want from us?,” and rightly so.
But “Mahsa,” while a quarter of the runtime, isn’t the only broad-reaching fare on offer here. Following a succession of four shorter cuts at the open, “Mahsa” gives over to the title-track, a fluid, just-over-three-minutes-long instrumental breather. On the vinyl, “Then the Darkness” is the start of side C, but for those listening in a linear format — CD/digital — it’s also a needed breather between “Mahsa” and “Forever Teeth,” which is the second of the two extended pieces at 13 minutes.
And like some of Mothers Weavers Vultures, the lyrics take on parenting and relationships, in this case about lying to your children, which I’m fairly sure everyone does at some point and all souls are damned for it, etc. Sorry, sometimes you need to say that wasn’t an ice cream place you just drove past, and the moral implications are a reasonable trade in the moment. The words “love” and “lies,” and in the payoff — which is emotional as much as aural — rather than screams, the vocals soar, almost arguing, accusing, “You/You lied first/You did/And I don’t think I’ll forgive you even a little bit,” and resolving in the penitent, “Maybe we deserve to never, never sleep again.” It’s a whole different kind of brutal.
The two longest pieces are of course standouts, and their positioning on Then the Darkness is a signal the band knew that going into making the album, but even “Three Points of Light,” which is fourth of the first-four right ahead of “Mahsa,” and thus at risk of being swallowed by it, and the shortest inclusion other than the title-track, makes an impression as the cello complements the guitar and the drums solidify and ground the twisting procession.
“Velvet ’79,” immediately before, is a nodder, smoothing out some of the darker atmosphere and crunch of “One Third” with its aggro finish, and the slow-start-into-burst “Thousand Year Storm,” using some of the last record’s environmentalist theme (that wasn’t the only thing going on there, and it’s not the only thing going on here either) to shift into the present moment. That continuity becomes the foundation for an exploration of multiple ideas, from the lights in the sky of “Three Points of Light” to the “what’s done is done is done” of “Forever Teeth,”
Meanwhile, on the other side of “Forever Teeth,” almost hidden behind the wall created by the longer songs, are four more tracks, in “Song of the Snake,” which builds tension through its midsection blastbeats before opening back up and calls for ceasefire in the doing, “Holding Lines,” on which the cello leads the breakdown, the penultimate “Untitled,” which flows sweetly and with soothing caution through its first half, picks up a bit of crush in the second, and recedes instrumentally to let “Come to the End” burst in like a moment of clarity and carry them to a consuming finish, layering clean and screamed vocals with an effective-but-not-overblown culmination leading into the last fade.
With engineering and a mix/master from Jack Shirley and a recording process of about seven months, Then the Darkness acknowledges the frenzy of the current era — this wretched, ongoing decade — and the utter lack of light on the horizon thereof by daring hope musically and lyrically, seeming to find its way as it goes. This humanity is at the core of the sound, and is the essence of what Grayceon offer at this point.
Over their two decades, they’ve never been a gung-ho, tour-for-eight-months kind of project, but whether it’s two years or five between full-lengths — the half-decade preceding is the longest stretch of their career; something which the glut of material would seem to account for — their songwriting has never stopped growing, and they’re in a position with Then the Darkness that a given track can express an idea, the next one can move on to something else, and neither is out of place for what the other is doing.
Then the Darkness is not a minor undertaking, of course, but more than the runtime, the heft of their sound and the spaces they create give it substance beyond the temporal. It doesn’t sound like a record made for this year so much as a letter to the years to come, and its resonance is a gift of craft and perspective.
Day three marks the halfway point of this Quarterly Review, unless I decide to sneak in an extra day next Monday. We’ll see on that, but things are moving pretty well so far, so I might just be content to take the win and start slating the next one. Always a choice to be made there.
I hope you’ve found something that hits you thus far, and if not, check the below, because there’s a pretty wide variety of styles under the ‘heavy underground’ umbrella here. Hope one or a few or everything clicks.
We proceed.
Quarterly Review #21-30:
Randall Huth, Torched and Coasting
Though he’s probably best known at this point for playing bass in Pissed Jeans for the last 17 years, Pennsylvania’s Randall Huth once-upon-the-aughts played guitar and handled vocals in still-missed pastoral heavy rockers Pearls and Brass, and the new solo EP under his own name will likely be more than enough to trigger nostalgia in remembering that. Torched and Coasting is somewhere between an EP and a follow-up to Huth‘s 2007 solo album as Randall of Nazareth on Drag City, and the self-released tape is clear in its intention, conveying sketches like the finger-plucked movements of “Emptied/Rarified” and “Bursting Smile” and 15-minute closer plunge “Torched and Coasting,” which tube-screams late so stick with it, alongside the drone-meets-zither “The Blind Whale,” and more terrestrial, guitar-and-vocals pieces like opener “Lost in Your Eyes” and the penultimate “Beats Dying,” which — you guessed it — is about getting old. Huth‘s echoing and soft delivery, wit in the lyrics and humble acoustic presentation make that a highlight, but this years-in-the-making offering walks more than a single expressive path. More songs, whatever ‘songs’ means, please. Thanks.
North Carolinian four-piece HolyRoller make their label-debut on Ripple Music with the eight-song Rat King, which puts modern heavy in a blender such that an early piece like “Crunch Riff Supreme” finds its place in sludge rock and heralds screamy things to come but by the time they’ve gotten to “Buried Alone” at the presumed outset of side B, the flow has more in common with Pallbearer than Weedeater or Sleep, who are another key underlying influence. But the emphasis there should be on ‘underlying’ as HolyRoller step beyond the bands that inspired them in fostering progressive songwriting throughout these 35 minutes, with a richly flexible sound — “Heave Ho” sounds like slower Howling Giant, “Forbidden Things” like Spaceslug — and a push into the ether in “Radiating Sacred Light” before they round out with the Clutch-y bounce of “Drift Into the Sun” to highlight the individuality in where they take their approach. The organic production helps it feel like they’re really digging in, but also they are.
Worried ‘Bout Madame is the third long-player from Polish heavy post-rock/psych-gaze outfit Black Mynah, and it would seem to be the first since founding vocalist, bassist and baritone guitarist Joanna Kucharska assembled a full-band lineup around herself and drummer Paweł Rucki, who also appeared on 2020’s II. Vocalist/synthesist Aleksandra Joryn and guitarist Marcin Lawendowski join the stylistically subversive proceedings here, with the garage jangle of “Colleen” at the outset pushed into the frenetic shuffle and hard distortion of “Damaged Goods” ahead of the sweet post-punk verse of “Float,” which has its own grungey volatility. The tonal weight thrown around in closer “Looking at You, Kid,” — not to mention the vocal layering — isn’t unprecedented on the album that comes before it, but “Blue Moon” is more about catching up with the insistence of its snare drum and “The Rite” has its own thing going too with the quieter creeper swing and satisfying wash that pays it off. It won’t be for everybody, but who the hell ever wanted to be?
Last heard from with their before-times 2019 split LP with Un, English death-doom churners Coltsblood make a welcome return with the four-song Obscured Into Nebulous Dusk, their third album overall, first for Translation Loss Records and first in eight years. The years have not been wasted in the sound of bassist/vocalist John McNulty (also keys), guitarist Jemma McNulty and drummer Jay Plested, who foster a ‘beauty in darkness’ sensibility on opener/longest track (immediate points) “Until the Eidolon Falls” before the outright slaughter of “Waning of the Wolf Moon” pushes death metal tempo off a cliff of feedback and raw scathe. “Transcending the Immortal Gateway” makes its presence felt with the mournful lead line topping its later reaches, and “Obscured into Nebulous Dusk” bids farewell in a not-dissimilar fashion, but the particularly agonized vocals prior are a distinguishing feature. Time would seem to have done little to dull the band’s overarching extremity, and so much the better for that.
The two-years-later follow-up to Indianapolis doom rockers Void King‘s 2023 long-player, The Hidden Hymnal (review here), the seven-song The Hidden Hymnal: Chapter II indeed seems to dig into its own kind of storytelling. The proceedings make for a rousing flow, with the two longest tracks, “The Birth of All Things” (8:49) and “A Union of Expired Souls” (9:34) paired at the outset for a duly epic opening statement. I don’t know if they’re a vinyl side on their own or not, but their separation from the rest of the LP is underscored by the remaining three tracks being sandwiched by a “Prologue” and “Epilogue,” so that the burly progressive metal and heavy rock of “Attrition,” “Convalescence” and “Expiration” feel like their own mini-album on the second side. If this wraps up the The Hidden Hymnal cycle for Void King, then the structural nuance here is fair enough, but the real story of the record is the progression of the band itself, which is ongoing.
Harnessing stoner metal largesse, doomed thematics and an aggro posture for the delivery that adds to the gnashing feel of the material overall, Bifter‘s debut album, First Impressions of Hell, is a torrential, ferocious offering that hits you on multiple levels before you even realize what’s happened. Interludes, the album intro “Enter Hell” and “Lover’s Quarrel,” the sample in “Mercy” and the post-script “Time to Kill” after “Ball of Burning Snakes” and the seven-minute “Belly of the Beast” give an atmospheric feel, but part of what makes “Doom Shroom” and “March of the Imp” so effective is their directness, so First Impressions of Hell, among the impressions made, can count face-punch in its number. The foundation is metal, but the affect is a party, and however weighted the material gets throughout the 36 minutes of its 12 tracks, Bifter are consistently able to convey a feeling of movement and forward momentum along with all their destructive intent.
Write off Poland’s Fish Basket at your own peril. Yeah, they’ve got the cartoonish art and the silly vibe and the sense of rampant chicanery of sound and nonsense, but check out the proggy push of “Robots” on Fish Basket and His Second Album and the way they suddenly pull the plug on the whole thing and drop to deep-breathing, or the shouts worked into opener “NA-HU-HA-NE” and the birdsong in the psych-drifting “Farewells and Returns,” gorgeous as it is before it looses a bit of crush and winds up in classic heavy psych to end. These and myriad other moments throughout — the folkish strum of “Imaginarium” from some unknown tradition, maybe the band’s own, brought to the head of a linear build with a comedown to finish — work on the Frank Zappa model of progressive rock, which is to say that while shenanigans abound, the trio have the technical chops to back up everything they’re doing, and whether it’s the fuzzblaster of “Cardboard Racer” or the sub-nine-minute meander of “Stray in Chill,” Fish Basket carry the listener from one end of the album to another with deceptive ease. Warning: it might be genius.
Calgary-based trio Woodhawk — guitarist/vocalist Turner Midzain, bassist/vocalist Mike Badmington and drummer Kevin Nelson — offer a sharply-constructed, professional-grade nine songs across the 53 minutes of their third full-length, the encouragingly-titled Love Finds a Way. The organ adds a classic feel to “Strangers Ever After” early in the going, and the fullness and clarity of the surrounding production only increases the trust in the band’s songwriting, which isn’t without aesthetic ambitions despite the straightforward tack, cuts like “Truth Be Told,” “White Crosses” and the dares-to-shimmy-in-the-middle title-track have as solid an underpinning of groove as one could ever reasonably ask. The melody over top in the vocals and guitar shines through accordingly. They’re plenty dug-in, of course, and any record that’s going to push past the 50-minute mark in 2025 better have some perspective to offer, but Woodhawk do. I don’t know if it’ll be enough to save the world, but at least somebody out there is putting love out front with their riffage, duly engaging as that is.
Pathways is a single-song, just-under-14-minute EP from Milwaukee’s Liminal Spirit, the darkly progressive apparent-solo-project of Jerry Hauppa, who embodies a number of characters in the narrative throughout. Presented on a quick turnaround from the band’s late-2024 self-titled debut LP, the one-tracker nonetheless reaffirms the ambitions of the album before it, while also reinforcing the idea of Liminal Spirit as a still-growing, still-discovering-its-sound outfit. The vocals here, intended to embody multiple archetypal characters like The Patriarch, The Child, The Artisan, The Elder and The Apprentice, come through a vocoder-type treatment, and so where multiple points of view might otherwise be fleshed out and conveyed, the voice remains singular. This is the tradeoff for the intimacy of solo creativity, but one gets the sense from “Pathways” and the self-titled that Liminal Spirit is just beginning to explore the stylistic territory the band will ultimately cover.
To follow their 2023 self-titled debut EP (on Addicted Label), Moscow-based doom rocker four-piece Clarity Vision present “Deep Ocean” (or, in Cyrillic:
“Глубокий океан”), a six-minute standalone single that soon makes its way via cymbal-wash from its beginning waves and quiet guitar into a procession of stately classic doom metal, big on swing and bigger on impact. The kind of riff that would make Leif Edling smile. Galina Shpakovskaya‘s voice is suited to the movement of the riffs, floating over with melodic echo but keeping a mystique that reminds of mid-period The Wounded Kings, when all was dark and mystery. Guitarist Alexey Roslyakov, bassist Alexey Roslyakov and drummer Mikhail Markelov hold the march steady for the duration, and although I’ve never come close to knowing even the slightest bit of Russian, Clarity Vision remind that we all speak the same language when it comes to being completely and utterly doomed.
Five years after providing the harsh solace of Mothers Weavers Vultures (review here) in the midst of a hellish plague winter, San Francisco’s Grayceon will move forward July 25 with Then the Darkness, their sixth full-length. To be released through Translation Loss on vinyl and their own imprint, We Can Records (DL), I swear to you I’m not going to review the album in this post — I’m not ready and it’s stupid early — but what I’ll tell you is that its 11-song/81-minute run is absolutely all-in.
Whether you’re dug into the 20-minute “Mahsa” or the 13-minute “Forever Teeth,” which as a parent I definitely read as a song about lying to your kids for your own convenience/quality of life and feeling horrible about it — been there — the melodic roll and bite of “One Third” or the stately cello blastthrash and big-riff nod of “Song of the Snake,” Then the Darkness does not shy from being a tour de force of elements that have made this band so special all along. Cellist Jackie Perez Gratz has never sounded more soulful on vocals than in “Forever Teeth,” and the unabashedly sweet, folkish tinge brought to the penultimate “Untitled” feels like an adjustment to the balance of extremity and atmosphere that Grayceon have always managed to strike.
Of course, rhythms are fluid and change on a dime, with guitarist Max Doyle and drummer Zack Farwell as taut as ever whether a part is galloping at a sprint or subdued, ambient and gorgeous as many are. This would be expected of a Grayceon record by now, as the band marks 20 years since their inception as a group, but their intricate, individual and moving craft satisfies and is encompassing on a level all its own. It’s not a minor undertaking and it’s not supposed to be.
“Thousand Year Storm,” with the video by Gratz‘s bandmate in Brume, Jordan Perkins-Lewis, premiering below, is the opening track, and by no means does it speak for the entirety of the record, but it will give you a basic idea of some of the sounds they’re going for this time around in addition to making an enticing first impression for songs like “3 Points of Light” or the instrumental title-track that separates “Mahsa” and “Forever Teeth.” As a fan of the band, I appreciate the chance to host it.
Album info follows the quotes and cover below. Please enjoy:
Grayceon, “Thousand Year Storm” video premiere
“Thousand Year Storm is about breaking — crying out first in pain, then slowly coming to terms, and finally letting go. Like the rest of Then The Darkness, these songs sit in the aftermath — after the damage is done, when all you can do is try to make sense of what’s left and figure out how to keep going.” – Jackie Perez Gratz
“Death is always hard to deal with, but there can also be a comfort to it. The end is often a release of pain and struggle.” – Zack Farwell
Translation Loss Records is proud to announce Then the Darkness, the sprawling and gorgeous sixth full length from Bay-area progressive rockers, Grayceon.
Having meticulously plied their brand of expansive, progressive post metal since 2005, Grayceon have established themselves as a singular entity in the Bay Area scene and beyond. On full length album number six, Grayceon continue to mutate their unique sound and delve even further into the sonic abyss, creating a record of immense vision and gripping emotional peaks and valleys, one that’ll undoubtedly prove to be a cornerstone in their rich, storied history.
Then the Darkness presents Grayceon at their most haunting and visceral. On its eleven tracks, the non-traditional ‘power-trio’ composed of cellist/vocalist Jackie Perez Gratz (Giant Squid, Amber Asylum, etc.), guitarist Max Doyle and drummer Zack Farwell, create labyrinthine yet extremely memorable metallic compositions. Cello and guitar interplay and weave seamlessly to create boundless riffs and rhythms that bore into your psyche, leaving you humming its off-kilter melodies for the rest of the day. Perez Gratz’s vocals act as a guide through the maze of grief and other emotions; anguished shouts and screams give way to folkish singing and are capped off by moments of soaring vocal power. Then the Darkness was masterfully engineered, mixed and mastered by Jack Shirley (Deafheaven, etc.), whose natural and roomy production truly brings this powerful album to life.
Album Details: Engineered, mixed and mastered at The Atomic Garden by Jack Shirley from December 2023 to June 2024. Album art/design/photography: General LLC Band photo: Jackie Perez Gratz Video by Jordan Perkins-Lewis, San Francisco, CA.
Tracklist: 1. Thousand Year Storm 2. One Third 3. Velvet ‘79 4. 3 Points of Light 5. Mahsa 6. Then the Darkness 7. Forever Teeth 8. Song of the Snake 9. Holding Lines 10. Untitled 11. Come to the End
GRACEYON is: Max Doyle (he/him) – guitar Jackie Perez Gratz (she/her) – cello, voice Zack Farwell (he/him) – drums
Posted in Whathaveyou on March 31st, 2025 by JJ Koczan
The above photo of Denver’s Oryx was taken at the release show this past January for the band’s latest album, Primordial Sky (review here), and quite simply, it’s what it’s all about. Even before you get to Tommy Davis holding his guitar aloft in triumph, look at the sheer victory on each of their faces. Perhaps most obviously bassist Joshua Kauffman, but definitely there for Tommy and drummer Abigail Davis as well. Sweaty, tired, having very clearly just laid waste to a hometown gig in celebration of their best and farthest reaching work to-date. Fuck. Ing. A.
And speaking of ‘farthest reaching,’ just as Primordial Sky explores new and genre-defiant ground for the band, so too will their travels take them to places yet-unflattened by their volume, tonal density and cathartic take on extreme sludge, likewise spacious and crushing. They’ll go to Japan for the first time in July for a stint of six shows rounding out with two nights in Tokyo. It’s nothing but a feelgood story as far as I’m concerned. Good band puts out killer record and a couple months later does something they’ve apparently been angling toward for years.
You know how on the news they always try to leave off with a story about some neighborhood squirrel who saved a family from a house fire or the cat that traveled 1,500 miles to reunite with its family? Well, something like this is my version of that. Apart perhaps from the music itself — and I’d argue resonant catharsis counteracts depressive aspects; perhaps unsuccessfully depending on the listener — there’s no downer here. It’s only awesome. It feels good to be happy for Oryx, so whether you’ll go to Japan or you’re already there and whether you’ll see them or not, my recommendation is be glad for the band. For most acts from the US, it’s the trip of a lifetime and they’re about to make it. Couldn’t be radder.
From socials:
ORYX – Japanese Tour
Proud to announce our first shows ever in Japan performing ‘Primordial Sky’ this summer. Lineup details to come for each show. We can’t wait! 💥
ORYX JAPAN TOUR 2025 7月1日（火）- 大阪 – HOKAGE 7月2日（水）- 名古屋 – HUCK FINN 7月3日（木）- 京都 – SOCRATES 7月4日（金）- 横浜 – EL PUENTE 7月5日（土）- 東京 – PIT BAR 7月6日 (日) – 東京 – MOD 7/1 (TUE) – OSAKA 大阪 – HOKAGE 7/2 (WED) – NAGOYA 名古屋 – HUCK FINN 7/3 (THU) – KYOTO 京都 – SOCRATES 7/4 (FRI) – YOKOHAMA 横浜 – EL PUENTE 7/5 (SAT) – TOKYO 東京 – PIT BAR 7/6 (SUN) – TOKYO 東京 – MOD
ORYX is: Thomas Davis – all guitars, vocals, synth Abigail Davis – drums Joshua Kauffman – bass
Posted in Reviews on October 21st, 2024 by JJ Koczan
This is the last day of the Fall 2024 Quarterly Review. Day 11 of 10, as it were. Bonus-extra, as we say at home. 10 more releases of various kinds to underscore the point of the infinite creative sphere. Before we dive in, I want to make a note about the header above. It’s the same one I used a couple times during the pandemic, with the four horseman of the apocalypse riding, and I put it in place of the AI art I’d been using because that seems to be a trigger for so many people.
In my head, I did that to avoid the conversation, to avoid dealing with someone who might be like, “Ugh, AI art” and then a conversation that deteriorates in the way of people talking at each other on the internet. This saves me the trouble. I’ll note the irony that swiping an old etching out of the public domain and slapping an Obelisk logo on it is arguably less creative than feeding a prompt into a generative whathaveyou, but at least this way I don’t have to hear the underground’s moral panic that AI is coming for stoner rock.
Quarterly Review #101-110:
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Chat Pile, Cool World
Chat Pile are two-for-two on living up to the hype in my mind as Cool World follows the band’s 2022 debut, God’s Country (review here), with a darker, more metal take on that record’s trauma-poetic and nihilistic noise rock. Some of the bassy jabs in songs like “Camcorder” and “Frownland” remind of Korn circa their self-titled, but I’m not sure Chat Pile were born when that record came out, and that harder, fuller-sounding impact comes in a context with “Tape” following “Camcorder” in bringing together Meshuggah and post-punk, so take it as you will. Based in Oklahoma City, Chat Pile are officially A Big Deal With Dudes™, but in a style that’s not exactly known for reinvention — i.e. noise rock — they are legitimately a breath of air that would be ‘fresh’ if it weren’t so desolate and remains innovative regardless. There’s gonna be a lot of mediocre riffs and shitty poetry written in an attempt to capture a fraction of what this record does.
I guess the anonymous project Neon Nightamre — who sound and aesthetic-wise are straight-up October Rust-and-later Type O Negative; the reason the album caught my eye was the framing of the letters around the corners — have gotten some harsh response to their debut, Faded Dream. Critic-type dudes pearl-clutching a band’s open unoriginality. Because to be sure, beyond dedicating the album to Peter Steele — and maybe they did, I haven’t seen the full artwork — Neon Nightmare could hardly do more in naked homage to the semi-goth Brooklyn legends and their distinctive Beatles/Sabbath worship. But I mean, that’s the point. It’s not like this band is saying they’re the first ones doing any of this, and in a world where AI could scrape every Type O record and pump out some half-assed interpretation in five minutes, isn’t something that attempts to demonstrate actual human love for the source material as it builds on it worth at least acknowledging as creative? I like Type O Negative a lot. The existence of Neon Nightmare doesn’t lessen that at all, and there are individual flashes of style in “Lost Silver” — the keyboard line feels like an easter egg from “Anesthesia”; I wondered if the title was in honor of Josh Silver — and the guitar work of “She’s Drowning” that make me even more curious to see where this goes.
Brooklyn-based instrumentalist five-piece Astrometer present their full-length debut after releasing their first demo, Incubation (review here), in 2022. The double-guitar pairing of Carmine Laietta V and Drew Mack and the drumming of Jeff Stieber at times will put you in mind of their collective past playing together in Hull, but the keys of Jon Ehlers (Bangladeafy) and the basswork of Sam Brodsky (Meek is Murder) assure that the newer collective have a persona and direction of their own, so that while the soaring solo in “Power Vulture” or the crashes of “Blood Wedding” might ring familiar, the context has shifted, so that those crashes come accompanied by sax and there’s room for a song like “Conglobulations” with its quirk, rush and crunching bounce to feel cosmic with the keyboard, and that blend of crush and reach extends into the march of closer “Do I Know How to Party…” which feels like a preface for things to come in its progressive punch.
An annual check-in from universe-and-chill molten and mellow heavy psych explorers Acid Rooster. It’s only been a year since the band unfurled Flowers and Dead Souls, but Hall of Mirrors offers another chance to be hypnotized by the band’s consuming fluidity, the 39-minute four-songer coming across as focused on listener immersion in no small part as a result of Acid Rooster‘s own. That is, it’s not like you’re swimming around the bassline and residual synth and guitar effects noise in the middle of the 14-minute “Chandelier Arp” and the band are standing calm and dry back on the beach. No way. They’re right in it. I don’t know if they were closed-eyes entranced while the recording was taking place, but if you want a definition of ‘dug in,’ Hall of Mirrors has four, and Acid Rooster‘s capacity for conveying purpose as they plunge into a jam-born piece like “Confidence of Ignorance” sets them apart from much of Europe’s psychedelic underground in establishing a meditative atmosphere. They are unafraid of the serene, and not boring. This is an achievement.
Giants Dawrfs and Black Holes, Echo on Death of Narcissus
Five years on from their start, Germany’s Giants Dwarfs and Black Holes present Echo on Death of Narcissus as their third full-length and the follow-up to 2023’s In a Sandbox Full of Suns (review here) as the four-piece bring in new guitarist Caio Puttini Chaves alongside vocalist Christiane Thomaßen, guitarist Tomasz Riedel (also bass and keys) and drummer Carsten Freckmann for a five-track collection that has another album’s worth of knows-what-it’s-about behind it. Opener “Again,” long enough at eight minutes to be a bookend with the finale “Take Me Down” (13:23) but not so long as to undercut that expanse, leads into three competent showings of classic progressive/psychedelic rock, casual in the flow between “Soul Trip” and the foreboding strums of centerpiece “Flowers of Evil” ahead of the also-languid “December Bloom.” And when they get there, “Take Me Down” has a jammy breadth all its own that shimmers in the back half soloing, which kind of devolves at the end, but resounds all the more as organic for that.
Oryx‘s Primordial Sky threads a stylistic needle across its four songs. Delivered through Translation Loss, the 41-minute follow-up to the Denver trio’s 2021 offering, Lamenting a Dead World (discussed here), is no less extreme than one would expect, but to listen to 13-minute opener/longest track (immediate points), 13-minute capper “Look Upon the Earth,” or either of the seven-minute cuts between, it’s plain to both hear and see that there’s more to Oryx atmospherically than onslaught, however low guitarist Thomas Davis (also synth) pushes his growls amid the lurching grooves of bassist Joshua Kauffman and drummer Abigail Davis. This is something that five records and more than a decade on from their start their listeners know well, but as they refine their processes, even the outright sharp-toothed consumption of “Ephemeral” has some element of outreach.
Heads up on this record for those who dig the mellower end of heavy psych, plus intricacy of arrangement, which is a number in which I very much count myself. By that I mean don’t be surprised when Sunface‘s Cloud Castles shows up on my year-end list. It’s less outwardly traditionalist than some of the heavy rock coming out of Norway at this point in history, but showcasing a richer underground only makes Cloud Castles more vital in my mind, and as even a shorter song like “Thunder Era” includes an open-enough sensibility to let a shoegazier sway enter the proceedings in “Violet Ponds” without seeming incongruous for the post-All Them Witches bluesy sway that underlies it. Innovative for the percussion in “Tall Trees” alone, Sunface are weighted in tone but able to move in a way that feels like their own, and to convey that movement without upsetting the full-album flow across the 10 songs and 44 minutes with radical changes in meter, while at the same time not dwelling too long in any single stretch or atmosphere.
While consistent with their two prior LPs in the general modus of unmitigated aural heft and oppressive, extreme sludge, Fórn declare themselves on broader aesthetic ground in incorporating electronic elements courtesy of guitarist Joey Gonzalez and Andrew Nault, as well as newcomer synthesist Lane Shi Otayonii, whose clean vocals also provide a sense of space to 11-minute post-intro plunge “Soul Shadow.” If it’s the difference between all-crush and mostly-crush, that’s not nothing, and “Anamnesis” can be that much noisier for the band’s exploring a more encompassing sound. Live drums are handled in a guest capacity by Ilsa‘s Josh Brettell, and that band’s Orion Peter also sits in alongside Fórn‘s Chris Pinto and Otayonii, and with Danny Boyd on guitar and Brian Barbaruolo on bass, the sound is duly massive, tectonic and three-dimensional; the work of a band following a linear progression toward new ideas and balancing that against the devastation laid forth in their songs. Repercussions of the Self does not want for challenge directed toward the listener, but the crux is catharsis more than navelgazing, and the intensity here is no less crucial to Fórn‘s post-metallic scene-setting than it has been to this point in their tenure. Good band actively making themselves better.
Big-riffed heavy fuzz rock from Northern Ireland as the Belfast-based self-releasing-for-now four-piece of vocalist/synthesist Fionnuala McGlinchy, guitarist Tom Finney, bassist Michael McFarlane and drummer Ciaran O’Kane touch on vibes reminiscent of some of Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard‘s synth-fused sci-fi doom roil while keeping the material more earthbound in terms of tone and structure, so that the seven-minute “The Abstract” isn’t quite all-in on living up to the title, plenty liquefied, but still aware of itself and where it’s going. This mitigated terrestrialism — think Middle of Nowhere-era Acid King — is the source of a balance to which Negative Space, the band’s second album, is able to reshape as required by a given song — “Burning Gaze” has its far-out elements, they’re there for a reason — and thereby portray a range of moods rather than dwelling in the same emotional or atmospheric space for the duration. Bookending intro “As Above” and the closer “So Below” further the impression of the album as a single work/journey to undertake, and indeed that seems to be how the character of “The Forest,” “Delirium” and the rest of the material flourishes.
Romanian instrumentalist heavy psych purveyors Methadone Skies sent word of the follow-up to 2021’s Retrofuture Caveman (review here) last month and said that the six-songer Spectres at Dawn was the heaviest work they’d done in their now-six-album tenure. Well they’re right. Taking cues from Russian Circles and various others in the post-heavy sphere, guitarists Alexandru Wehry and Casian Stanciu, bassist Mihai Guta and drummer Flavius Retea (also keyboards, of increasing prominence in the sound), are still able to dive into a passage and carry across a feeling of openness and expanse, but on “Mano Cornetto” here that becomes just part of a surprisingly stately rush of space metal, and 10-minute closer “Use the Excessive Force” seems to be laying out its intention right there in the title. Whether the ensuing blastbeats are, in fact, excessive, will be up to the individual listener, but either way, Methadone Skies have done their diligence in letting listeners know where they’re headed, and Spectres at Dawn embodies that forwardness of ethic on multiple levels.
Posted in Whathaveyou on August 29th, 2024 by JJ Koczan
Seven minutes of deathly splendor in Oryx‘s new single “Myopic.” The Denver trio founded by the partnered team of guitarist/vocalist Thomas Davis and drummer Abigail Davis and now completed by bassist Joshua Kauffman are set to release their four-song long-player, Primordial Sky, this Fall through Translation Loss. That same label released the band’s last outing, Lamenting a Dead World (discussed here), and if you heard that record and reasonably wondered where on earth one might possibly go from there, the answer “Myopic” seems to provide is ‘deeper.’
Deeper and perhaps more open. I won’t count on the single to speak for the entirety of the album even if it’s a quarter of the tracklisting, but as immersive as “Myopic” is, it’s also spacious and fluid. The crashes before its post-midsection acoustic break come across as particularly fervent, but they’re no less accounted for in terms of scope than the strum that follows and serves as the foundation for the onslaught that follows. Shit is heavy, kids. If you prefer your records noncorporeal, the digital release is Oct. 18. Vinyl hounds wait until Nov. 22, but surely that will come with additional anticipation and self-congratulations at defying the instant gratification of our age, and what feels better than that kind of self-appointed moral superiority? I won’t tell you how to hear it, or even to hear it — I’m not your boss — but the arguments in favor of doing so are myriad, and the stunning John Harris cover art begs to be held.
I have more to say on this one, and I’ll hope the time between now and Oct./Nov. provides a chance to do so. Either way, here’s the info for the album and the all-crucial preorder link, courtesy of the PR wire:
Denver doom/sludge masterminds Oryx announce Primordial Sky, the bands fourth studio album, for release on October 18, 2024 (digital) via Translation Loss Records.
Primordial Sky shows the trio, comprised of husband-and-wife duo Thomas (guitars & vocals) and Abigail (drummer) Davis, joined by bassist Joshua Kauffman – embracing a powerful statement of sonic devastation. Amidst a mood of profound contemplation, the lyrics delve into subjects capturing the struggle of mortality and existence. With a penchant for creating an oppressive atmosphere, Primordial Sky delivers slow-burning behemoths that ascend to staggering crescendos. Oryx is the sonic embodiment of desolation, a monolithic wall of sound that demands to be experienced at full volume.
About the track and the album release, vocalist & guitarist Thomas Davis shares:
“Lyrically, “Myopic” is a requiem portraying a state of conflict with the human condition amidst a deep-seated psychosis that demands immediate gratification, simultaneously speeding towards an extinction event of our own creation. Writing this song involved a multi-faceted approach, incorporating bass and guitar harmonies, an acoustic interlude, and pummeling drums. This song is one of Primordial Sky’s most aggressive and energetic tracks, while still featuring the intricate layering embodied throughout the rest of the album. Primordial Sky is ORYX’s pinnacle offering to date, showcasing each member’s best work and a surgical collective approach to exploring deeply expressive songwriting. Writing and recording these songs has been an immensely cathartic journey, one that we are eager to share with the world.”
Primordial Sky features stunning album artwork by world renowned Sci-Fi/NASA artist, John Harris.
The album will be released digitally worldwide on October 18, 2024 and on vinyl November 22, 2024. Three limited edition vinyl variants will be avail via Translation Loss Records.
Bone White with Splatter Edition (Limited to 100 copies)
Custom Three Color Merge with Splatter Edition (Limited to 100 copies)
Track Listing: 1. Primordial Sky 2. Myopic 3. Ephemeral 4. Look Upon The Earth
Recording Details: Recorded in January 2024 at Archive Recordings in Salt Lake City, UT. Recorded, Mixed, and Mastered by Wes Johnson. Promo photo by Mitch Kline.
ORYX is: Thomas Davis – all guitars, vocals, synth Abigail Davis – drums Joshua Kauffman – bass
Posted in Whathaveyou on February 16th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
This’ll do nicely, thanks. Portland, Oregon’s Usnea have signed to Translation Loss to issue their first full-length in six years, Bathed in Light, and have newly unveiled the first single therefrom to mark the occasion of the announcement and the launching of preorders. I don’t know how long the record has been in the works, but you can see video of the opening title-track below that was filmed in March 2020 — it was the only thing that happened that month — so at least partially for the last three years. Fair enough.
They’re not strangers to touring, hit Europe in 2016 and 2017, etc., supporting their last outing, and it doesn’t seem unreasonable to think they’ll go abroad again, perhaps for summer or fall festival season, though honestly there aren’t really even seasons anymore. It’s just festivals all the time. So much the better. Whether they’ll tour the States as well has yet to be answered but the album is out May 11, so there’s time for those answers. In any case, after a gap twice as long as their prior longest, theirs is a welcome return.
The PR wire has art, details, links and narrative:
USNEA SIGN TO TRANSLATION LOSS RECORDS, ANNOUNCE LONG-AWAITED NEW FULL LENGTH, DROP SINGLE + PREORDER
Pacific Northwest doom outfit Usnea announce the highly anticipated new full length titled, “Bathed In Light”. Now signed to Translation Loss Records of Philadelphia, the band will deliver a massive new offering showing them at their most ambitious. Usnea have embraced a sound that reaches far beyond the realms of the bands previous offerings – with expansive, and dynamic ferocity. “Bathed In Light” features 6 new tracks incorporating death-rock and post-punk influences with monumental textures of synthesizers and undulating waves of doom.
About the album, vocalist and guitarist Justin Cory shares:
“It has been a brutal 6 years making this record with one of our members developing a serious chronic illness, me breaking my wrist in a motorcycle wreck, and the impacts of a global pandemic. Our previous material was already inspired by the continued decline of our global society but that has only accelerated since our last record, 2017’s ‘Portals Into Futility’.”
Usnea arose from the murky forests of Portland, OR in late 2011 from the cerebral minds of Justin Cory (Guitar & Vocals), Johnny Lovingood (Guitar), Zeke Rogers (Drums), and Joel Williams (Bass & Vocals). The quartet has proven to be a seismic level force of destructive creativity with a massive yet meditative sound, masterfully crafted songwriting, and a clear yet non-derivative influence from doom legends such as Disembowelment, My Dying Bride, Evoken, and YOB.
In February of 2013 they released their eponymous debut record on Roger’s own label Orca Wolf Records. Following a 7″ EP split with Germany’s Ruins, USNEA signed to Relapse Records and released ‘Random Cosmic Violence’ in November 2014. The record’s immense presence instantly elevated USNEA to the forefront of the blossoming American doom scene. Stereogum referred to ‘Random Cosmic Violence’ as having a “Floydian vastness that both balances and amplifies the overwhelming, crushing heaviness. Like the night sky itself, it’s full of terror and awe and ice and fire. It is a massive, monumental thing.” Usnea toured the U.S. and Europe in support of the record alongside veteran acts like Ufomammut and Inverloch and performances at notable festivals including Maryland Deathfest, Roadburn, Psycho Las Vegas, Northwest Terror Fest, Up In Smoke, and Blow Up Fest.
Today, along with the announcement of “Bathed In Light”, Usnea have unveiled a new single from the album titled, “From Soot and Pyre”. The massive and chest pounding track, laced with just the right about of groove, is streaming now. About the single, vocalist and guitarists Justin Cory shares:
“‘From Soot and Pyre’ aims its rage at the wreckage that human life has visited upon our Earth through capitalism, climate change, resource extraction, and war. It was especially poignant to us here in the PNW when the forests were burning all around us in 2020 and 2021 and the air was literally poisonous. On a lighter note, Johnny wrote some seriously infectious sludge riffs for this one and as the song evolved I got very excited about adding some swirling John Carpenter-meets-Goblin analog synth lines at the end. This song is one of our shortest but it seems to really devastate audiences live in spite of that brevity.”
“Buried In Light” will be released on two limited edition vinyl variants, CD, and across digital platforms. The album features brand new and extraordinary artwork by Justin Cory of Usnea.
Track Listing: 1. Bathed In Light 2. The Compleated Sage 3. To The Deathless 4. From Soot and Pyre 5. Premeditatio Malorum 6. Uncanny Valley
Album Details: Recorded & Engineered by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studios, Oakland, CA in March 2022.
Mastered by Adam Gonsalves at Telegraph Mastering Portland, OR.
Album artwork by Justin Cory. Promo Photo by Amyrose Ahlstrom.
Usnea is: Justin Cory – Vocals, guitar, synthesizer, artwork Johnny Lovingood – Guitar Joel Williams – Vocals, Bass Zeke Rogers – Drums
Posted in Reviews on September 27th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Here we go again as we get closer to 100 records covered in this expanded Fall 2022 Quarterly Review. It’s been a pretty interesting ride so far, and as I’ve dug in I know for sure I’ve added a few names (and titles) to my year-end lists for albums, debuts, and so on. Today keeps the thread going with a good spread of styles and some very, very heavy stuff. If you haven’t found anything in the bunch yet — first I’d tell you to go back and check again, because, really? nothing in 60 records? — but after that, hey, maybe today’s your day.
Here’s hoping.
Quarterly Review #61-70:
Spirit Adrift, 20 Centuries Gone
The second short release in two years from trad metal forerunners Spirit Adrift, 20 Centuries Gone pairs two new originals in “Sorcerer’s Fate” and “Mass Formation Psychosis” — songs for our times written as fantasy narrative — with six covers, of Type O Negative‘s “Everything Dies,” Pantera‘s “Hollow,” Metallica‘s “Escape,” Thin Lizzy‘s “Waiting for an Alibi,” ZZ Top‘s “Nasty Dogs and Funky Kings” and Lynyrd Skynyrd‘s “Poison Whiskey.” The covers find them demonstrating a bit of malleability — founding guitarist/vocalist does well with Phil Lynott‘s and Peter Steele‘s inflections while still sounding like himself — and it’s always a novelty to hear a band purposefully showcase their influences like this, but “Sorcerer’s Fate” and “Mass Formation Psychosis” are the real draw. The former nods atop a Candlemassian chug and sweeping chorus before spending much of its second half instrumental, and “Mass Formation Psychosis” resolves in burly riffing, but only after a poised rollout of classic doom, slower, sleeker in its groove, with acoustic strum layered in amid the distortion and keyboard. Two quick reaffirmations of the band’s metallic flourishing and, indeed, a greater movement happening partially in their wake. And then the covers, which are admirably more than filler in terms of arrangement. Something of a holdover, maybe, but by no means lacking substance.
Just because it’s so bludgeoning doesn’t necessarily mean that’s all it is. The melodic stretch of “Forbidden World of Light” and delve into progressive black metal after the nakedly Crowbarian sludge of “A Path Beyond Grief,” the clean vocal-topped atmospheric heft of “What Must Be Done” and the choral feel of centerpiece “Carried,” even the way “Of Shadow and Sanguine” seems to purposefully thrash (also some more black metal there) amid its bouts of deathcore and sludge lumbering — all of these come together to make Northless‘ fourth long-player, A Path Beyond Grief, an experience that’s still perhaps defined by its intensity and concrete tonality, its aggression, but that is not necessarily beholden to those. Even the quiet intro “Nihil Sanctum Vitae” — a seeming complement to the nine-minute bring-it-all-together closer “Nothing That Lives Will Last” — seems intended to tell the listener there’s more happening here than it might at first seem. As someone who still misses Swarm of the Lotus, some of the culmination in that finale is enough to move the blood in my wretched body, but while born in part of hardcore, Northless are deep into their own style throughout these seven songs, and the resultant smashy smashy is able to adjust its own elemental balance while remaining ferociously executed. Except, you know, when it’s not. Because it’s not just one thing.
Comprised of five songs running a tidy 20 minutes, each brought together through ambience as well as the fact that their titles are all three letters long — “Aer,” “Hyd,” “Orb,” “Wiz,” “Rue” — AER is the debut EP from German instrumentalists Lightrain, who would seek entry into the contemplative and evocative sphere of acts like Toundra or We Lost the Sea as they offer headed-out post-rock float and heavy psychedelic vibe. “Hyd” is a focal point, both for its eight-minute runtime (nothing else is half that long) and the general spaciousness, plus a bit of riffy shove in the middle, with which it fills that, but the ultra-mellow “Aer” and drumless wash of “Wiz” feed into an overarching flow that speaks to greater intentions on the part of the band vis a vis a first album. “Rue” is progressive without being overthought, and “Orb” feels born of a jam without necessarily being that jam, finding sure footing on ground that for many would be uncertain. If this is the beginning point of a longer-term evolution on the part of the band, so much the better, but even taken as a standalone, without consideration for the potential of what it might lead to, the LP-style fluidity that takes hold across AER puts the lie to its 20 minutes being somehow minor.
Cleanly produced and leaning toward sleaze at times in a way that feels purposefully drawn from ’80s glam metal, the second offering from Poland’s 1965 — they might as well have called themselves 1542 for as much as they have to do sound-wise with what was going on that year — is the 12-song/52-minute Panther, which wants your nuclear love on “Nuclear Love,” wants to rock on “Let’s Rock,” and would be more than happy to do whatever it wants on “Anything We Want.” Okay, so maybe guitarist, vocalist and principal songwriter Michał Rogalski isn’t going to take home gold at the Subtlety Olympics, but the Warsaw-based outfit — him plus Marco Caponi on bass/backing vocals and Tomasz Rudnicki on drums/backing vocals, as well as an array of lead guitarists guesting — know the rock they want to make, and they make it. Songs are tight and well performed, heavy enough in tone to have a presence but fleet-footed in their turns from verse to chorus and the many trad-metal-derived leads. Given the lyrics of the title-track, I’m not sure positioning oneself as an actual predatory creature as a metaphor for seduction has been fully thought through, but you don’t see me out here writing lyrics in Polish either, so take it with that grain of salt if you feel the need or it helps. For my money I’ll take the still-over-the-top “So Many Times” and the sharp start-stops of “All My Heroes Are Dead,” but there’s certainly no lack of others to choose from.
Blacklab — also stylized BlackLab — are the Osaka, Japan-based duo of guitarist/vocalist Yuko Morino and drummer Chia Shiraishi, but if you’d enter into their second full-length, In a Bizarre Dream, expecting some rawness or lacking heft on account of their sans-bass configuration, you’re more likely to be bowled over by the sludgy tonality on display. “Cold Rain” — opener and longest track (immediate points) at 6:13 — and “Abyss Woods” are largely screamers, righteously harsh with riffs no less biting, and “Dark Clouds” does the job in half the time with a punkier onslaught leading to “Evil 1,” but “Evil 2” mellows out a bit, adjusts the balance toward clean singing and brooding in a way that the oh-hi-there guest vocal contribution from Laetitia Sadier of Stereolab (after whom Blacklab are partially named) on “Crows, Sparrows and Cats” shifts into a grungier modus. “Lost” and “In a Bizarre Dream,” the latter more of an interlude, keep the momentum going on the rock side, but somehow you just know they’re going to turn it around again, and they absolutely do, easing their way in with the largesse of “Monochrome Rainbow” before “Collapse” caps with a full-on onslaught that brings into full emphasis how much reach they have as a two-piece and just how successfully they make it all heavy.
I guess the only problem that might arise from recording your first two-songer with Steve Albini is that you’ve set an awfully high standard for, well, every subsequent offering your band ever makes in terms of production. There are traces of Karma to Burn-style chug on “Ectotherm,” the A-side accompanied by “Writhing Mass” on the two-songer that shares the same name, but Chicago imstrumental trio Sun King Ba are digging into more progressively-minded, less-stripped-down fare on both of these initial tracks. Still, impact and the vitality of the end result are loosely reminiscent, but the life on that guitar, bass and drums speaks volumes, and not just in favor of the recording itself. “Writhing Mass” crashes into tempo changes and resolves itself in being both big and loud, and the space in the cymbals alone as it comes to its noisy finish hints at future incursions to be made. Lest we forget that Chicago birthed Pelican and Bongripper, among others, for the benefit of instrumental heavy worldwide. Sun King Ba have a ways to go before they’re added to that list, but there is intention being signaled here for those with ears to hear it.
Despite the somewhat grim imagery on the cover art for Kenodromia‘s self-titled debut EP — a three-cut outing that marks a return to the band of vocalist Hilde Chruicshank after some stretch of absence during which they were known as Hideout — the Oslo, Norway, four-piece play heavy rock through and through on “Slandered,” “Corrupted” and “Bound,” with the bluesy fuzzer riffs and subtle psych flourishes of Eigil Nicolaisen‘s guitar backing Chruicshank‘s lyrics as bassist Michael Sindhu and drummer Trond Buvik underscore the “break free” moment in “Corrupted,” which feels well within its rights in terms of sociopolitical commentary ahead of the airier start of “Bound” after the relatively straightforward beginning that was “Slandered.” With the songs arranged shortest to longest, “Bound” is also the darkest in terms of atmosphere and features a more open verse, but the nod that defines the second half is huge, welcome and consuming even as it veers into a swaggering kind of guitar solo before coming back to finish. These players have been together one way or another for over 10 years, and knowing that, Kenodromia‘s overarching cohesion makes sense. Hopefully it’s not long before they turn attentions toward a first LP. They’re clearly ready.
Mezzoa are the San Diego three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Ignacio “El Falcone” Maldonado, bassist Q “Dust Devil” Pena (who according to their bio was created in the ‘Cholo Goth Universe,’ so yes, charm is a factor), and drummer Roy “Bam Bam” Belarmino, and the 13-track/45-minute Dunes of Mars is their second album behind 2017’s Astral Travel. They sound like a band who’ve been around for a bit, and indeed they have, playing in other bands and so on, but they’ve got their approach on lockdown and I don’t mean for the plague. The material here, whether it’s the Helmet-plus-melody riffing of “Tattoos and Halos” or the more languid roll of the seven-minute “Dunes of Mars” earlier on, is crisp and mature without sounding flat or staid creatively, and though they’re likened most to desert rock and one can hear that in the penultimate “Seized Up” a bit, there’s more density in the guitar and bass, and the immediacy of “Hyde” speaks of more urgent influences at work. That said, the nodding chill-and-chug of “Moya” is heavy whatever landscape you want to say birthed it, and with the movement into and out of psychedelic vibes, the land is something you’re just as likely to leave behind anyway. Hit me as a surprise. Don’t be shocked if you end up going back to check out the first record after.
Released through emergent Texas-based imprint Gravitoyd Heavy Music, Stone Nomads‘ Fields of Doom comprises six songs, five originals, and is accordingly somewhere between a debut full-length and an EP at half an hour long. The cover is a take on Saint Vitus‘ “Dragon Time,” and it rests well here as the closer behind the prior-released single “Soul Stealer,” as bassist Jude Sisk and guitarist Jon Cosky trade lead vocal duties while Dwayne Crosby furthers the underlying metallic impression on drums, pushing some double-kick gallop under the solo of “Fiery Sabbath” early on after the leadoff title-track lumbers and chugs and bell-tolls to its ending, heavy enough for heavy heads, aggro enough to suit your sneer, with maybe a bit of Type O Negative influence in the vocal. Huffing oldschool gasoline, Fields of Doom might prove too burled-out for some listeners, but the interlude “Winds of Barren Lands” and the vocal swaps mean that you’re never quite sure where they’re going to hit you next, even if you know the hit is coming, and even as “Soul Stealer” goes grandiose before giving way to the already-noted Vitus cover. And if you’re wondering, they nail the noise of the solo in that song, leaving no doubt that they know what they’re doing, with their own material or otherwise.
Drawing from various corners of punk, noise rock and heavy rock’s accessibility, Munich trio Blind Mess offer their third full-length in After the Storm, which is aptly-enough titled, considering. “Fight Fire with Fire” isn’t a cover, but the closing “What’s the Matter Man?” is, of Rollins Band, no less, and they arrive there after careening though a swath of tunes like “Twilight Zone,” “At the Gates” and “Save a Bullet,” which are as likely to be hardcore-born shove or desert-riffed melody, and in the last of those listed there, a little bit of both. To make matters more complicated, “Killing My Idols” leans into classic metal in its underlying riff as the vocals bark and its swing is heavy ’70s through and through. This aesthetic amalgam holds together in the toughguy march of “Sirens” as much as the garage-QOTSA rush of “Left to Do” and the dares-to-thrash finish of “Fight Fire with Fire” since the songs themselves are well composed and at 38 minutes they’re in no danger of overstaying their welcome. And when they get there, “What’s the Matter Man?” makes a friendly-ish-but-still-confrontational complemement to “Left to Do” back at the outset, as though to remind us that wherever they’ve gone over the course of the album between, it’s all been about rock and roll the whole time. So be it.
