Posted in Whathaveyou on July 31st, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Cali heavy psych rockers Nebula were announced for Desertfest Belgium in April, so the prospect of their heading to Europe this Fall was right there almost from the start of 2023, but it’s worth noting that as this tour is revealed in its totality, this is the third month out of this year that the long-running trio founded by guitarist/vocalist Eddie Glass will spend on the road. They did Europe in Spring only after traipsing across the US in the company of New Jersey’s The Atomic Bitchwax, and as they continue to support 2022’s Transmission From Mothership Earth (review here) and ply their wares in unhinged trippy punker scuzz fuzz, they show no signs of stopping. They did similar runs for most of 2022. Off you go.
Goes without saying that you should help if you can. The dates follow here, as seen on the PR wire:
Heavy psychedelic rock legends NEBULA announce extensive European fall tour; more festival appearances confirmed!
Legendary Californian heavy psych rockers NEBULA return to Europe this fall with an extensive tour including appearances at Desertfest Belgium, Up In Smoke Festival and Heavy Psych Sounds Fest.
Fired up by their two-month spring tour, the godfathers of modern heavy psychedelia NEBULA are set to take over Europe again this September and October, with no less than 30 shows across the old continent! The trio fronted by guitar legend Eddie Glass will keep supporting their 2022 album “Transmission From Mothership Earth” (Heavy Psych Sounds Records). Prepare to embark on a groove-drenched cruise…
NEBULA EUROPEAN TOUR 2023 28/09 It Bologna – Freakout 29/09 It Savona – Raindogs 30/09 Ch Pratteln – Up In Smoke Festival 03/10 Es Leon – Babylon 04/10 Pt Porto – Woodstock 69 05/10 Pt Lisbon – Rca Club 06/10 Es Jerez De La Frontiera – La Guarida Del Angel 07/10 Es Tabernas – Desert Rock Fest 08/10 Es Madrid – Wurlitzer Ballroom 09/10 Es – Bilbao – Kafe Antzokia 10/10 Fr Capbreton – Le Circus 11/10 Fr Nantes – Cold Crash 12/10 UK London – Oslo 13/10 UK Bournemouth – Bear Cave 14/10 UK Sheffield – Record Junkie 15/10 UK Glasgow – Ivory Blacks 16/10 UK Bradford – The Underground 17/10 UK Tba 18/10 ***Open Slot*** 19/10 ***Open Slot*** 20/10 Be Antwerp – Desertfest Belgium 21/10 De Frankfurt – Tba 22/10 De Münster – Rare Guitar 23/10 Nl Den Haag – Paard 24/10 ***Open Slot*** 25/10 NL Apeldoorn – Gigant 26/10 ***Open Slot*** 27/10 De Dresden – Heavy Psych Sounds Fest 28/10 De Berlin – Heavy Psych Sounds Fest
Posted in Whathaveyou on January 18th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
If you’ve never seen Nebula, or even if you have, you should think long and hard about showing up for this one. Eddie Glass is a singular ripper on heavy rock guitar for his generation, someone who can look like he’s making himself a sandwich while bridging styles from Stooges to Hendrix, desert stoned and, oh yeah, singing at the same time. Tom Davies on bass and Mike Amster have it on lockdown in the rhythm section, and that power trio format lets Glass go for it as apparently only he can. If you think of bands with turn-of-the-century-era origins (never mind that dude was in Fu Manchu before that), Glass isn’t the only great guitarist — base a genre’s songwriting modus on riffs and you might attract a few — but there’s no one else who does what he does the way he does it. Especially if you’ve never seen them, you owe it to yourself to do so.
Last year’s Transmission From Mothership Earth (review here) is a cause worth supporting, and you’ll note that as Nebula do so in Europe for the second time following another US stint — in the noteworthy company of The Atomic Bitchwax, no less — after they play Esbjerg Fuzztival, there’s a Heavy Psych Sounds Fest listed with no further info. Could well be there’s another fest TBA by the label, maybe in Dresden, where they’ve been before, or somewhere else entirely. Either way, Nebula will be in Europe for a month, and before they go they’ll do HPS Fest in California (info here) as well.
Dates follow:
NEBULA – Transmission From Mothership Earth Tour
We’re hitting the road!!! US in March with The Atomic Bitchwax then back to EUROPE the end of April. Dates below with more TBA…
1/21 Las Vegas, NV – Planet Desert Rock Weekend- VRR Presents: Nebula/Salem’s Bend/High Desert Queen/Sonolith – Saturday on January 21st LAS VEGAS – The Usual Place
US 2023 w/ The Atomic Bitchwax
SUN 3/5 CO SPRINGS, CO – VULTURES** MON 3/6 OMAHA, NE – REVERB LOUNGE** TUE 3/7 ST PAUL, MN – TURF CLUB** WED 3/8 CHICAGO, IL – REGGIE”S THU 3/9 COLUMBUS, OH – ACE OF CUPS FRI 3/10 YOUNGSTOWN, OH – WESTSIDE BOWL SAT 3/11 NEW HAVEN, CT – THE STATE HOUSE SUN 3/12 BROOKLYN, NY – SAINT VITUS MON 3/13 PHILADELPHIA, PA – KUNG FU NECKTIE WED 3/15 ATLANTA, GA – 529 BAR THU 3/16 NEW ORLEANS, LA – SANTOS FRI 3/17 LAFAYETTE, LA – FREETOWN BOOM BOOM ROOM SAT 3/18 AUSTIN, TX – VALHALLA SUN 3/19 SAN ANTONIO, TX – PAPER TIGER THU 3/23 MESA, AZ – THE UNDERGROUND FRI 3/24 SAN DIEGO, CA – BRICK BY BRICK SAT 3/25 JOSHUA TREE – HEAVY PSYCH SOUNDS FESTIVAL SUN 3/26 SAN FRANCISCO, CA -HEAVY PSYCH SOUNDS FESTIVAL WED 3/29 SEATTLE, WA – EL CORAZON FRI 3/31 SALT LAKE CITY, UT – ACES HIGH SAT 4/1 DENVER, CO – GLOBE HALL
MORE DATES TBA
nebula only**
Europe 2023
WE 26/04 FR CHAMBERY – BRIN DE ZINC TH 27/04 CH GENEVE – L’USINE FR 28/04 CH ALTDORF – VOGELGESANG SA 29/04 IT BOLOGNA – HPS FEST SU 30/04 IT TORINO – HPS FEST MO 01/05 IT ZERO BRANCO – ALTROQUANDO TU 02/05 IT BOLZANO – SUDWERK WE 03/05 AT INNSBRUCK – PMK TH 04/05 AT WIEN – ARENA FR 05/05 AT GRAZ – EXPLOSIV SA 06/05 AT EBENSEE – KINO MO 08/05 CH ZURICH – DYNAMO WE 10/05 NL ALKMAAR – CLUB VICTORIE TH 11/05 NL ROTTERDAM – BAROEG FR 12/05 NL HENGELO – METROPOOL SA 13/05 NL GRONINGEN – VERA SU 14/05 NL EINDHOVEN – EFFENAAR TU 16/05 DK ODENSE – KANSAS CITY WE 17/05 SE LINKÖPING – PLATENS BAR TH 18/05 SE GOTHENBURG – MUSIKENS HUS FR 19/05 DK SØBORG GLADSAXE – RICHTER SA 20/05 DE OLDENBURG – MTS SU 21/05 DE COLOGNE – SONIC BALLROOM MO 22/05 DE HILDBURGHAUSEN – CLUB MOLLE FR 26/05 DK ESBJERG – FUZZTIVAL SA 27/05 HPS FEST
MORE SHOWS TBA
NEBULA is: Eddie Glass – guitars/vocals Tom Davies – bass/backing vocals Michael Amster – drums
Posted in Reviews on August 5th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Don’t tell anybody, but I think Nebula might be on… the drugs. All of them, to be precise.
At least three tracks out of the total eight on the band’s seventh album, Transmission From Mothership Earth, essentially about getting and being very, very high, beginning with opener “Highwired,” the chorus of which runs, “Stay high/Never die/Highwired/Stay high.” First, I’m not sure that, medically speaking, it’s true that if you stay high all the time you’re immortal, but I’m no doctor and Nebula have been at this a while so I won’t argue. Still, between “Highwired,” “Wilted Flowers” and the dead-giveaway “I Got So High,” the point gets across. Nebula‘s second post-reunion full-length is self-recorded self-oblivion, the rawest they’ve ever sounded in some ways and the most expansive in others — looking at you, “Melt Your Head” — a gritty reboot for stoner rock cast in their own addled image.
Signature components are present and accounted for in the 38-minute Transmission, including Eddie Glass‘ shredder soloing and anti-lucidity vocal drawl, riffs born of garage rock, space rock, or just outright punk grown their hair out and stopped bathing and decided to live outside for a while. There is an underlying meticulousness here, of course, and the thing you need to know is that Nebula — Glass, bassist/vocalist Tom Davies and desert rock’s house drummer Mike Amster (also of Mondo Generator, ex-Blaak Heat Shujaa, Abrams, etc.) — are masters of making depth sound easy and lackadaisical. Part of that comes from Glass‘ vocal style, which conveys classic SoCal slacker slouch fuckall, and part of it is tonality, which allows both Glass and Davies to draw the listener in with hypnotic effects swirls over rhythm tracks and, as on the seven-minute side B leadoff “Warzone Speedwolf,” to lace their jams with enough chemical lysergics to make the entire world forget its trauma. Nebula for world peace? You couldn’t possibly tell me it would be the strangest thing that ever happened.
But the point, somewhat obscured by the haze, the shoulder-shove, the melting of heads and whatnot, is that even if a track like the full-on freakout “Melt Your Head” sounds like they’re just throwing whatever onto the recording, that’s a purposeful decision Nebula are making. And 25 years on from the band’s founding, they’re able to create an atmosphere of smoke swirling around the room while still casting a memorable impression underneath. “Transmission From Mothership Earth” follows the opener and toys with fuzz and surf and grunge and is all the swagger you could ask after 2019’s Holy Shit (review here), and “Wilted Flowers” takes Stooges and MC5 attitude through a meat grinder of ranging, foggy acid fluidity, giving classic Monster Magnet a run for its money in hook and buzzing space triumph. And the aforementioned hook of “Highwired,” by the way, is not only emblematic of the ethos of the album as a whole, but a standout for its catchiness that earns its place up front.
Likewise, “Warzone Speedwolf” follows “Melt Your Head” with a headphone-ready expansion of intent that signals further shifts ahead on side B, but it almost feels like a formality given the mastery with which Nebula deliver their material and the in-their-element nature of their work throughout this record. And the chaos in “Melt Your Head” feels genuine, pushed forward through “Warzone Speedwolf” and into the more straightforward “I Got So High” — “I went to the doctor/To see what he could give to me…” telling the tale of pill popping en route to the chorus of the repeated line, “I got so high tonight,” delivered by Davies as he steps into the lead vocal role backed by Glass. That turn is unexpected and another showcase both of the trio doing whatever the hell they want and of their making it work with the record surrounding. “I Got So High” is almost tragically catchy, and its sub-five minutes still allow for plenty of all-go layered soloing in the second half, channels going this way and that until the space clears and they turn back to the chorus in traditional fashion before “Existential Blues” starts out with its bassline and buzz and effects, slower rolling, languid, drugged, clawing at the last strains of consciousness.
It is a blues song, to be sure, and the more you’re able to listen through the crust, the more you’ll hear it. Davies‘ bassline and Amster‘s drumming hold together a steady flow as Glass‘ guitar runs forward and backward all at once, creating a wash of fuzz and a sense of going everywhere at the same time that trips out the earthy groove beneath. As with the whole of Transmission From Mothership Earth, one shouldn’t fail to consider the artistry at work. There’s so much inwardly directed obliteration happening throughout this record, and plenty still to come on the purposefully-flaunting-grammar “The Four Horseman” — which references Morricone Spaghetti Westernism andJefferson Airplane‘s “Somebody to Love,” because of course — but like the trumpet or trumpet sounds on the finale, like the detail of the mix on “Existential Blues” or “Melt Your Head” or “Wilted Flowers,” like the hooks, like the solos, like the sometimes urgent sometimes laid back groove throughout, this is who Nebula are.
The start of this review was a joke, because a lot of this record is about doing drugs, and it sounds like it. But to confuse art and artist(s) here is to dehumanize Nebula as players and songwriters, and it takes away from the actual accomplishment of Transmission From Mothership Earth, which is to push the group to places that even in their storied and widely influential career — one could easily argue that their label, Heavy Psych Sounds, which is the foremost purveyor of underground heavy in the world, wouldn’t exist without their influence on its founder, at least not in the shape it exists now — they haven’t been before. I do not know what Nebula‘s future holds, and anybody in the trio is doing more drugs than they want to be, I sincerely hope they get help if they need it. It’s easy to forget there are people behind these songs, because they’re otherworldly and there’s so much happening in them, and something they do very well is portray the escape-from-identity that a controlled substance might provide, if temporarily. But this is more than a drug album, and Nebula are more than drug band. A quarter-century after their start, they’re discovering new modes of expression, and the filthy revelry they conjure here suits them.
Posted in Whathaveyou on June 2nd, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Californian desert/heavy psychedelic rock legends Nebula have set a July 22 release for their new album, Transmission From Mothership Earth. Their second new studio offering for Heavy Psych Sounds behind 2019’s Holy Shit (review here), it features the returning trio of founding guitarist/vocalist Eddie Glass, longtime bassist/vocalist Tom Davies and drummer Michael Amster, and as discussed here earlier this year, it is the first Nebula album to have been made by the band out in the desert.
I expect tour dates, further track reveals, much hoopla to follow. Maybe I’ll even be able to get in on it if I’m lucky. The first single, “Highwired” is out today and streaming at the bottom of this post for your enjoyment. It sounds raw and the fuzz is real and in true Nebula fashion, they pack about seven minutes’ worth of song into four. Right on.
Cover art , preorder links and more follow, as per the PR wire:
NEBULA – Transmission From Mothership Earth
– brand new album of the californian heavy psych wizards –
Today we are stoked to start the presale of the NEBULA brand new album TRANSMISSION FROM MOTHERSHIP EARTH !!!
The release will see the light July 22nd on Heavy Psych Sounds !!! Desert Psychedelic Fuzzsters Nebula are back with an incredible new album!! 8 tracks of pure Fuzzness recorded by bass player Tom Davies and produced together with the mastermind Eddie Glass in the Mojave desert !
It’s the classic Nebula sound: walls of guitars, riffs that come from outer space, melodic vocals matched with desert grooves… you couldn’t ask for more.
The band spent the last 6 months in the studio alone recording and mixing this new Psychedelic Stoner Rock gem! Amazing artwork made by Robin Gnista. TRANSMISSION FROM MOTHERSHIP EARTH is coming out on Heavy Psych Sounds Records July 22nd as the official soundtrack of your summer!
ALBUM PRESALE: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/shop.htm#HPS243
USA PRESALE: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/shop-usa.htm
SAYS THE BAND: “Begin Transmission from the mothership… Future humans, it is the year 2022. Space is deep. We are stoned and beautiful. If you have marijuana, smoke all of it and drop some acid. Turn on, tune in, drop out.”
RELEASED IN 15 ULTRA LTD TEST PRESS VINYL 100 ULTRA LTD COLOR IN COLOR TRANSPARENT-BLUE-SPLATTER RED-BLACK VINYL 200 ULTRA LTD 3 COLOR STRIPED BLUE-RED-BLACK VINYL LTD AQUA BLUE VINYL BLACK VINYL DIGIPAK DIGITAL
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DISCOGRAPHY BUNDLE (black LP + digipak from the following releases + T-shirt (Branca design) + Shopper) Transmission From Mothership Earth Heavy Psych To The Center Let It Burn Dos Ep’s Atomic Ritual Apollo Live in the Mojave Desert Holy Shit Charged Demos Outtakes
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NEW ALBUM ULTRA LTD BUNDLE (Transmission From Mothership Earth + Heavy Psych REISSUE Ultra LTD LP’s + digipaks + T-shirt (Branca design) + Shopper)
RELEASE DATE: JULY 22nd
NEW INCREDIBLE MERCH: https://www.heavypsychsounds.com/merch.htm#nebula
TRACKLIST
Highwired – 4:08 Transmission From Mothership Earth – 4:07 Wilted Flowers – 5:15 Melt Your Head – 4:14 Warzone Speedwulf – 7:17 I Got So High – 4:45 Existential Blues – 5:20 The Four Horseman – 3:14
NEBULA is: Eddie Glass – guitars/vocals Tom Davies – bass/backing vocals Michael Amster – drums
