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From the barren tundra to the north (Toronto), comes the Sons Of Otis (formerly just Otis); lumbering heaviosity shackled to stoned and droned spaciness. Think the Melvins, Black Sabbath, Hawkwind. Take just the spaced out jams from Monster Magnet songs, stretch them out even further, add even more fuzz and echo, and voila. And, they cover both Mountain and Saint Vitus!!
Worshippers of all that is heavy, get ready for the return of Canada's stoner ambassadors, the Sons Of Otis! Their new, fourth album, simply titled X (which I guess could be the Roman numeral ten, but would that make any sense?), is another dose of their, uh, stoned spacey blues-based psychedelic heavy drug-rawk... good stuff for fans of Monster Magnet, Hawkwind, Ufomammut, and the doomier likes of Electric Wizard and St. Vitus!
With heavily effected vocals (is the singer even in there somewhere we start to wonder?), Orange amps vibrating in the void, riffage reverberating raw and run-down, this is stoner rock at its darkest and most dazedly wandering, slow and plodding. Is there life in outer space? It's hard to tell from this record. Recorded by (of course) Billy Anderson, this album ends with a fourteen-minute opus that seems even longer, not that you'll want it to end, entitled "Liquid Jam". It is indeed. Not that there's any *short* songs on here at all. X also includes includes their superbly slo-mo, Funhouse-ish cover of "The Pusher" by Steppenwolf (previously on a picture disc 10" they did a few years ago, but this may be a new version though), further underlining, however needlessly, the band's heavy '60s psych/drug direction.
Yup, dunno who Otis is, but if these are his kids, he obviously failed to have that parental say no to drugs talk with 'em...
Ok, well if the world really ends this weekend ("Judgment Day" Saturday May 21st y'know) then I think THIS is what we plan to be listening to, and loud, when the Christians get Rapturously sucked up to heaven leaving the rest of us to deal with God's wrath or whatever. Hella epic doom metal here folks, it'd make the perfect soundtrack to all that apocalypse... This cd is a remastered reissue of the two cult cassette demos done by this Swedish band back in the day (circa 1989 and 1992), almost 80 minutes of music in total. Majestic, massive, mystical, and as you might expect, manna to Candlemass fans, this band's closest comparison.
Includes the song "Queen In Black", typical of Sorcerer's grandiose, dramatic style, one that was covered by modern day Puerto Rican epic doom metal mavens Dantesco on a recent release reviewed here, you may recall. And speaking of covers, this disc contains one too, an impressive take on Rainbow's classic "Stargazer", with Sorcerer's vocalist ably acquitting himself in the Ronnie James Dio role.
This edition (nicer than the cd compilation done in 1995) includes new liner notes from long time Sorcerer fan John Perez, of equally epic doomsters Solitude Aeturnus (a big enough fan to have reissued this on his own label Brainticket!). Lyrics also included in the cd booklet, along with art from the original cassettes.
So if you dig old school, melodic metal with leaden riffage, squiggly guitar solos, the occasional tolling bell, and - most significantly perhaps - soaring, cathedral-spire-ascending vocals, a la Candlemass, Solitude Aeturnus, Dantesco, Savatage, Memory Garden, etc., then Sorcerer is a definite must-have. Too bad they broke up after making these two tapes (which sound fantastic, by the way, not at all like "demos"), no doubt on account of how this style wasn't terribly in vogue at the time... but apparently now they've reformed and have been playing some European festivals, so maybe there will be more to the Sorcerer discography sometime soon. Well, long as Saturday isn't really Judgment Day, that is!
This is the first we've heard from Southern sludgesters Sourvein since guitarist Liz Buckingham left the band to join Electric Wizard, and also since Hurricane Katrina fucked up their hometown. But now the survivors in Sourvein got it together to dish out these four new tracks (recorded in Virginia), and also they go on to promise in the liner notes that "New Orleans Will Rise Again!"
Though an ep, Emerald Vulture nears the half-hour mark, in part 'cause track four delves into some extended power electronics noise territory before it's over. That sort of droning nastiness makes perfect sense coming from Sourvein, who aim to maim with both brutal riffage and vicious vokills as well... they're definitely on the negative side of an already fairly negative genre, and who can blame 'em? So if you find, say, Corrupted too happy, here you go! That's a joke, of course, but seriously we're digging Emerald Vulture's blend of Bongzilla/Electric Wizard styled dope-lope riffs and utter Khanatesque darkness...
Of course, post-Katrina we've been concerned about the Crescent City and its inhabitants for a lot of reasons, cultural heritage being just one of 'em. And while many folks associate New Orleans with music, they're probably thinking jazz and zydeco, but you may also know that NOLA is/was home to a satan's host of sludge/doom/dirge bands, foremost among them the pioneering EYEHATEGOD. And if you like EHG, you're pretty much already a guaranteed Sourvein fan too. So it's good to know that NOLA's sludge/doom/dirge tradition continues...
BLEAAAARGH! DOOOOOOM!! Southern Lord strikes again with the new, Billy Anderson produced disc from Louisiana doom-squad Sourvein. Now featuring the guitar of Liz from former NYC all-girl doomsters 13, Sourvein takes the crusty Eyehategod/Grief/Corrupted style of doomgrind to new highs (lows?). Well, maybe not new ones, but just as extreme. Darker and scarier than fellow heavies Bongzilla or High On Fire, Sourvein simultaneously give a nod to the Sabbathy '70s sounds of doom pioneers St. Vitus, while ratcheting up the brutality of their crashing, crushing riffs into modern extreme metal/punk territory and beyond. It's like someone got the Melvins really really angry, and they're trapped in cave, frothing at the mouth, ready to die and kill -- and for some reason, they're trying to play Sleep songs. What? Stay away from those drugs. You know what I'm talking about? Good, then you'll want "Will To Mangle".
In our quest for the heaviest, trippiest, sludgiest, most psychedelic doom ever, we thought we had finally found the holy grail, in the form of UK outfit Bong. No beating around the psychedelic stoner doom bush, no 'cosmic whatever' or 'high priests of blah blah blah', no, Bong got right to the heart of it, naming themselves after the very relic that truly must have inspired most of the bands we love. We can almost imagine a massive bong, painted gold and surrounded by demonic seraphim, hanging above an altar in some sort of alternate universe cathedral, where all of our beloved groups worship, attaining divine inspiration, delivered to us in the form of drug soaked, tripped out ultra heavy sonic blissouts. But one thing we forgot to consider, one element that could, and very likely would, trump the simple bong, one thing that would elevate that essential and beloved stoner relic to the next level, more cosmic than earthbound, an implement derived to catapult the group, and the group's listeners to the heart of the sun, taking the legacy of all the came before, from Hawkwind to Bong, from Pink Floyd to Bongzilla, and sending them into space. It worked for Jason Voorhees (Jason X is INSANE), and it works for these Aussie doomlords, the awesomely named SPACE BONG, whose name promises extreme spaced out psychedelic heaviness, and most definitely delivers!
But, while you might be expecting, dirgey, abject, Bunker-like sludge, or even droned out Bong like psychedelia, the truth is Space Bong land somewhere inbetween, adding a healthy does of melody, their sound beholden to classic doom, as much as newer, weirder, slower stuff. Four loooooooong tracks, the shortest 12 minutes plus the longest over 21 minutes. The sound is massive, downtuned guitars, pounding drums, dueling vocals, one a demonic bellow, the other a Khanate like shriek, and while the ingredients aren't all that different than other doom outfits, it's what they do with it that counts. The opener, begins with a weird ambient intro before launching into a glorious sprawl of plodding slo-mo crush, then out of nowhere, super catchy guitar harmonies suddenly surface, soaring over the churning chug below, and then dissipate, leaving a field of pulsing feedback over tribal drumming, weirdly hypnotic and tranced out, and when the vocals come in, the result is some sort of super tripped out avant abstract psychedelic doom drift, which instead of slipping back into the doom that started things off, locks into a weird droned out deathmarch chugscape, before finally exploding into a final blast of furious psych doom.
And the thing is, it's not all doom in Space Bong land, the second track is downright rocking, almost stonery in fact, a killer main riff, swaggery and snarly, but it's really just a feint, cuz a minute later, the song collapses into another stretch of feedback drenched glacial creep, this time, buzz heavy bass drives the woozy churn, the sound super dynamic, lots of starts and stops, weird stretches of tranced out guitars, bursts of feedback, drones galore, not to mention some psychedelic noise, some glitched out ambience, processed vox, and all sorts of other chaotic noise woven into Space Bong's twisted druggy doom.
And we're only halfway through! The second half of the record plays out similarly, big bombastic drumming, some seriously classic metal sounding riffing, more harmonized guitars, wild squalls of keening feedback, fields of grinding guitar noise, super tripped out near ambient dronescapes, stretches of twisted mathiness, and a little bit of groove here and there, the closer displaying some seriously Sabbathy swing, and some killer psychedelic leads, and a super crazy catchy almost NWOBHM sounding final few minutes, albeit on the tail end of some seriously extreme dirge/sludge crush.
Random copies will come with a Space Bong patch!
Spaceboy is San Francisco's oddest avant-metallic combo, starting with their name (and album title) and going from there. They smoke a lot of pot and play music like prog rockers gone death metal. Actually it sounds like half the band is playing death metal
This, their second full-length (and first for SoCal's premier doom metal label, Southern Lord, home to SUNNO))), Khanate, Warhorse, Boris, etc.) clocks in at nearly an hour. There's eleven tracks, with every odd-numbered track being a brief, spacey instrumental interlude. The songs proper are super-heavy and dark, full of complex technical metal guitars & drums, distorted vox, and stoned drone ambience.
All we can do is cite a bunch of stuff that this seems influenced by or kinda reminds us of: Neurosis, Voivod, Meshuggah, Mahavishnu, Hawkwind, King Crimson, Today Is The Day, Old Man Gloom...
Listening to this, though, is like trying to peer through some nebular haze in a distant galaxy. It's going to take a while to fully understand the advanced calculus at work here. One thing we do understand: it's heavy!
Sniffin & Snortin (parts 1 and 2!), Run & Hide, Bad Woman, Don't Say No, Wanna Take You Home...sound good? Those are some of the song titles on this classic women-and-drugs obsessed dumbo-rock Japanese psych album. It stars guitar whiz and massive stoner Shinki Chen (also of Foodbrain and oodles of other obscure Japanese psych outfits), bassist Masayoshi Kabe (from Foodbrain too), and singing drummer Joey 'Pepe' Smith -- a Vietnam vet whom you might know from the Filipino band Juan De La Cruz, whose album "Shake Your Brains" is one of the few that tops this for sheer truly stoned rock retardation (a good thing). Too bad we can't get those in anymore. But you'll hear at least one of their tunes on this, the second SG&S album, originally released as a double LP in 1972, which we happen to like even better than their 1971 LP "Eve" though Mr. Julian Cope made that one a "record of the month" on his website Head Heritage. Anyway we have this one, not that one.
Speed, Glue & Shinki, as you might imagine from their name, were a goddamn weird, messed up, completely wacked heavy psych/blues/prog band. So messed up that this time out, guest musicans wrote (and performed?) most of it! But it doesn't matter. And even when Joey plugs in a Moog synth to do a whole LP side devoted to the Sun, Planets, Life, Moon, and Angels, this never ever remotely gets pretentious and proggy (not that we don't like proggy). It just can't. Speed Glue & Shinki are primal, so primal, too primal. At least one track hints at the Stooges, some others Zeppelin, while the rest approximates a brain-damaged James Gang. Record collector types might recall the fancy, expensive Shadoks LP reissue that was available a couple years ago for about two seconds. We were enthralled with the lovely tiger cover art and the ridiculous rock and have been hoping ever since to bring in a cd version, and at last we tracked down a few copies that we had to order from Sweden, so act fast for your Speed, Glue & Shinki fix if you think you want it.
MPEG Download: "Red Doll" [/audio/speedgluered.mp3]
MPEG Stream: "Red Doll" [/audio/speedgluered.m3u]
MPEG Download: "Song For An Angel" [/audio/speedgluesong.mp3]
Shame on anyone who somehow managed to miss the acoustic Harvey Milk instore, with HM frontman Creston Spiers tackling stripped down Milk tracks, Leonard Cohen covers, heck, he even covered "Three Is A Magic Number" from Schoolhouse Rock. Well this one is for those of you who blew it, or for those of you who didn't but still need more.
A super limited yellow vinyl 7", the second and supposedly last pressing, 300 copies, already sold out, we have about 30, of Creston Spiers from Harvey Milk performing acoustic, two originals, both awesome. And both sounding like could-have-been Harvey Milk tracks, or obscure Leonard Cohen covers, anyone at the instore knows exactly what we mean, his voice and way with melody is so distinctive, and owes quite a bit to Mr. Cohen. On these two tracks, Spiers' vocals are rough and ragged but still melodic, accompanied by stripped down steel string guitar, spare and melancholy, with slightly off kilter arrangements, the tone mournful and melancholy. Barring a recording of "Three Is A Magic Number" you couldn't hope for more.
Pressed on thick clear yellow vinyl, housed in a clear plastic PVC sleeve, limited to 300 copies, out of print, this is most likely your last chance...
As if we didn't know it already 'cause of this being on the up'n'coming stoner rock label RidingEasy (formerly EasyRider), a glance at the fine print in the thanks list here gives the game away, with Spiral Shades vocalist/songwriter Khushal Bhadra offering special thanks to "Black Sabbath, Scott 'Wino' Weinrich, and Pentagram". Yep, Spiral Shades are another heavy psychedelic stoner doom band doing the '70s sounding Sabbathy thing, and like a bunch of other recent entries in the field (including several on the same label) they do it damn well. All the more impressive, 'cause the two members of this band live far apart, on separate continents - Bhadra dwells in Mumbai, India, while Filip Petersen, who handles guitar, bass and drums, hails from Norway. Via the magic of the internet, we assume, they made a love-of-Sabbath connection. Yep, it says here they got acquainted on YouTube! But listening to this, you'd never think communications technology had progressed past whatever it was they used back in the early '70s (rotary dial telephones? air mail letters? pot smoke signals?). The nine tracks of swinging, wah-and-fuzz infused heaviness on here sound stuck in the '70s for sure, Spiral Shades sounding VERY Sabbathy as we mentioned, a la a more esoteric, less-plagiaristic Orchid (though, it must be said, we do hear the chug of "Childen Of The Sea" borrowed by one of the tracks here). Providing a lot of verisimilitude are Bahdra's vocals, a nasal, very Ozzy-ish wail indeed. Goes great with the lumbering riffage and spiraling (that's right) distorto-delic soloing - yeah, the guitarwork can get pretty darn tripped out and atmospheric, there's a reason they called this FX-laden record the Hypnosis Sessions! Heavy head music, maaannn.
Notch another one up for the current retro-doom-psych renaissance. If you dig the recently listed likes of Electric Citizen, Salem's Pot, Sons Of Huns, Admiral Sir Cloudsley Shovell, and Ovvl, or such bands as Cathedral, Witchcraft, Lord Vicar, Kadavar, and Sleep (plus of course the old guard of Pentagram and Sabbath too), you oughtta check this out! Compact disc or double colored (red) vinyl.
Not long after their excellent debut album Jug Fulla Sun, ex-Saint Vitus/The Obsessed frontman Wino and his new band (a.k.a. Shine) of stoner rock doomsters return with this equally smokin' 5-song ep. Great stuff. However, could the cover art be any worse?
Here's the eagerly-awaited second full-length slab of doom-groove from legendary guitarist and vocalist Wino (aka Scott Weinrich) and his band of stoner rock saviors/survivors Spirit Caravan. Like their 1999 debut "Jug Fulla Sun", this builds on the sound of Wino's previous downer-metal outfit The Obsessed (and his experience singing for psychedelic-punk doom-lords Saint Vitus back in
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Scott "Wino" Weinrich (ex-Saint Vitus, The Obsessed) returns with his new stoner rock power trio (until recently, known as Shine). This, their debut full-length, was made possible by Joe "Wino's biggest fan" Lally of Fugazi's new label Tolotta. Doom, groove, riffs, Wino's trademark Ozzy-tinged vox: this is the real deal. On Allan's top ten for the year so far.
Two new tracks from these stoner metal heroes. The A-side's "So Mortal Be" is typical rockin' Spirit Caravan fare, while on B-side "Undone Mind" bassist Dave Sherman takes over on vocals from Wino, his rougher, more wretched pipes fitting well with the song's doomier vibe. White vinyl by the way.
Joe Lally's Tolatta label sadly seems to have shuffled off this mortal coil (that's why we can't get those first two Dead Meadow albums anymore, too bad for new fans who came to that band via their debut on Matador this year) and Tolotta's flagship stoner rock outfit Spirit Caravan did the same, as well, with leader Scott "Wino" Weinrich moving on to new projects The Hidden Hand and Place Of Skulls, notching more bands on a resume that also includes The Obsessed and Saint Vitus. But demand remains for Spirit Caravan's two Tolotta albums so Meteor City has stepped in with this double cd that combines 'em into one neat package -- plus bonus material that makes this essential for completists even if they've already got the original albums. Perhaps Meteor City will arrange to do the same with the Dead Meadow discs? Hint hint. Anyway, if you're a Wino/Spirit Caravan fan who missed either Jug Fulla Sun or Elusive Truth, now you've got another chance. And in case you're unfamilar with Wino & co., but stoner-curious, here's a quote from our review of Jug Fulla Sun, which was definitely one of the top stoner rock releases of the past ten years: "Doom, groove, riffs, Wino's trademark Ozzy-tinged vox: this is the real deal." In addition to the two whole Tolotta albums, these cds include three totally unreleased songs, plus five 7" and comp tracks, and three demo tracks recorded by the band back when they were known as Shine.
The latest groove rock offering from ex-Carcass guitarist Michael Amott. No Carcass-y grind here, just swampy, grindy, bluesy stoner rock. But still heavy as fuck, with heaping helpings of Hammond organ ladled all over it.
'70s lovin', long-haired n' heavy (musically speaking, that is -- they look kinda skinny, actually) Swedes the Spiritual Beggars, whom you know as the "stoner rock" band of ex-Carcass, current Arch Enemy six-string wizard Mike Amott, introduce a new singer (the guy from Grand Magus, another one of what must be millions of Swedish stoner rock bands) with "On Fire". It's going to take a few more listens than we've had the chance to experience to determine if this new album is any kind of step up for a band we already like quite a bit, or just more of the same -- but so far, anyway, it seems pretty cool! The Hammond organ still throbs mightily, as they run through rockin' riff-fests and mellow, spacey psychedelic excursions. And the new guy's vocals are just fine, if a little cliched (their old singer Spice wasn't Spiritual Beggar's drawing card anyway). In the mood for a loud n' proud, modern-day take on Deep Purple and the like? This ought to fit the bill.
The rare first album by Swedish stoner rockers Spiritual Beggars finally reissued on cd with four bonus tracks! Not to be confused with fellow stoner rockers Spirit Caravan, Spiritual Beggars is the band in which ex-Carcass, current Arch Enemy six stringer
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Two excellent stoner rock groups go head to head on this split single: Mike Amott's much-loved Spiritual Beggars and newcomers Grand Magus.
We've had records from some hateful, extreme, heavy and truly black bands in the past but Stallagh definitely out-hate and out-black them all. Named for WWII concentration camps (the extra 'g' and 'h' stand for 'global holocaust'), this Dutch blackdoom industrialnoise horde, are often compared to Abruptum, for their extreme and ultra personal approcach to music making, but they take it even a step farther. Not content with harsh hateful vocals, Stalaggh actively set out to recruit mental patients and convicted murders, by using connections working in mental hospitals and carefully planning their recording sessions to coincide with the two days a month patients are allowed to leave the hospital. Woah. The main vocalist featured on the first 30+ minute track (originally released as Projekt: Nihil) is a convicted murderer who stabbed his mother 30 times when he was 16 years old, and subsequently spent the next 11 years in prisons, juvenile detention facilities and mental hospitals. Apparently he suffered from an extreme aggresion disorder, anorexia nervosa and a host of other mental problems. During the recording sessions he indulged in very excessive self-mutilation while howling and wailing through all his hate and pain and fury. Sadly, he killed himself mere months after the recordings were made. The second half hour track (originally released as Project: Terrror) features vocals from three different mental patients, one female. Wow. That's some seriously intense and messed up shit for sure. A rare and maybe problematic instance of music that straddles that blurry line barely dividing art and exploitation, a stretching of the boundaries, an exploration of how far one can go to tap into primal emotions and create music that is emotionally pure, no matter how hard it is to listen to or understand. But the results do definitely convey that hate and despair and misery, which probably can only actually be attained by going to such great lengths. This stuff is so bizarre and so fucked up but somehow strangely beautiful as well. The sheets of noise smear and shift, occasionally attaining an almost drone like quality (albeit an extremely harsh one) .
Nihilistik Terrror is a massive, mind frying, soul shattering, freaked out, slab of droning, fuzzy, buzzy, whitenoise brutality, not black metal, not even metal really, more a sort of industrial noisescape, most definitely black, and bleak and harsh, but these are not songs, they are slow shifting sonic fields of squealing shrieking distortion, grinding ear shredding ambience, crunchy and gritty and NOISY! Definitely one for the extreme noise fanatics and lovers of the harsh and brutal, but black metallers who dug later Abruptum might check this out as well. There might be riffs here, maybe even songs, but if there are, they are buried under an impossibly dense ocean of sound, layer after layer of white hot noise and sonic sludge, all swirling maniacally around the terrified, vitriolic, angry, hateful, freaked out howls and screams of real human beings with truly damaged psyches. So intense!
Includes both original releases, remastered and sonically even more harsh and aggressive, with a previously unreleased bonus track.
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Attention fans of '70s heavy hippie rock!! Another primo proto-metal reissue from the fine folks at Rise Above Relics, who brought us the fantastic Bang boxset we listed not long ago. 'Tis a band/album well deserving of the deluxe treatment given here, especially welcome since only other Steel Mill reissue we've seen in the past was somewhat shoddy looking. THIS, though, is really nice, packaged with an elaborate illustrated 32 page booklet, in a slipcover adorned with new art (while the original, quite effective, surreal cover painting remains preserved within). They've renamed it too, the original lp from 1971 (there it is again, brothers and sisters, Nineteen Seventy Freaking One!!) was called Green Eyed God, this gets a new title of Jewels Of The Forest (Green Eyed God Plus) on account of all the bonus tracks included, and the remastering job, and other improvements.
So, with a name like Steel Mill, you'd expect this British band to be industrial-strength HEAVY, maybe even coming close to Black Sabbath territory. Well they do... and they don't... heavy, yeah, but opting for artier, more progressive atmospheres a lot of the time. Opener "Blood Runs Deep" is a good example, combining big, loping, rather urgent guitar riffage with passages of much mellower, jazz-inflected psychedelia via languid saxophone. Give that one a listen, and if you're like us, you'll know you want this right away. That "jazz" element, represented by what sometimes seems like pagan riot of horns, gives Steel Mill a vibe of mystic, exotic grooviness, putting 'em rite in there with underground tribes like Comus and Cromagnon. Some of these songs sound like rock rituals, like "Treadmill", with its fuzz and (literal) grunt.
Ultimately, they're an excellent, eccentric "heavy progressive" outfit, a la early King Crimson (you can be sure they loved "21st Century Schizoid Man"), Gnidrolog, Gravy Train, Tucky Buzzard, Wild Turkey, Sweet Slag, Steamhammer, East Of Eden, Murphy Blend, Amon Duul II, Culpeper's Orchard, Blackwater Park, Necromandus, etc.
Their acid rock guitar solos and lumbering riffs lean towards the Sabbath, but there's also gentle ballads ("Turn The Page Over") and fluttering flute (featured on the moody "Black Jewel Of The Forest", and elsewhere). Not that, as we've pointed out before, Sabbath themselves didn't indulge in some of their own flute flutter now and then! Steel Mill balance the light and heavy with aplomb, often in the same song. Darkly dreamlike and outre, yes, but also heavy enough for any proto-metal head. If someone were crazy enough to try and compile a collection of 1971's heaviest riffs, they'd definitely have to give Steel Mill some attention. (Er, although technically, some might quibble, as while this was recorded in '71 and the "Green Eyed God" released as a single then, the lp itself was apparently not released until 1972, and then just in Germany, with a UK release only appearing in '75.)
The original album is great all by itself, but we're also digging the bonus tracks. There's 9 of 'em, including songs from a 1972 single, as well as five unreleased studio demos of garagey popsike recorded in 1970. And, one last song - a new one, recorded by a reunited Steel Mill in 2010, "A Forgotten Future, A Future Past". And you know what, it's pretty good! Better than you might expect, actually, fitting in remarkably well. Nice how a lovingly done reissue like this can give an long lost band a new lease on life.
Is there any other band that's SO GOOD live that I (Allan) would actually plan a trip somewhere thousands of miles away almost entirely on the basis of getting to see 'em play? 'Cause that's what I'm doing for Halloween -- flying to New Orleans, which would be fun anyways but is gonna be extra-awesome 'cause this Philly-based, all-instrumental power trio will be tearing down the house at Checkpoint Charlie's on the edge of the French Quarter, as they apparently do every Halloween. And as if to pile on the excitement, what shows up at Aquarius this week but a brand new Stinking Lizaveta opus? Yay! Their fourth album finds 'em doing what they do best, adhering to their math rock + jazz + exotic flourishes + sheer rock and roll exuberance formula, with perhaps a little bit more stoner rock added to the equation this time around. Imagine an instrumental Spirit Caravan melded with The Fucking Champs and Gone...something like that. Heavy, sinuous, emotive, grandiose, intimate, anguished, epic, melodic, HEAVY. It's not a perfect album, though -- the drum sound could be better (or at least the drums could be not so loud) sez Andee, and it suffers as all Stinking Lizaveta records do in comparison to their spectacular live performances. Basically, they are SUCH a good live band that it's just hard for them to ever make an album that's nearly as good as they are in person. I love their records, but they really don't compare to the band on stage. Their intense playing, telepathic interplay, and sheer energy are all there...but not as much as you get live. That they're such a formidable proposition live works against their recordings in another way: they probably just assume that if they just go in the studio and kick ass like they do on stage, they'll make the best album ever. Of course, it's not quite that easy. Still, Caught Between Worlds is worlds above almost everything else in the post/math/instro/stoner rock realm... Recommended -- get this and also don't miss 'em if you get the chance, they're on tour right now!
We've been waiting for this for a loooong time, the new, third (duh) album from one of our favorite bands, the amazing Philadelphian power trio Stinking Lizaveta. The first thing to say is that we like how the front cover shows band members seated
For those who need to know more, let's give you the basics: This is ROCK. Goddamn. An instrumental trio of godly Les Paul guitar, hard-hitting mathrock drums, and virtuoso upright electric bass. It's not exactly metal, it's not jazz, but it's heavy and tight and blows away most other rock outfits on the planet, live especially. And "III", with somewhat fuller production than past efforts, reminds us that Stinking Liz kick ass in the studio too. Imagine Black Flag/Gone mixed with King Crimson, or AC/DC playing Mahavishnu instrumentals, or The Champs falling in love with each other, moving to the country, and practicing yoga. Those are woefully inadequate comparisons, of course, but that's cause this band is its own incredible thing. With "III", they've added some synth and violin to the mix -- and even some half-buried vocals on the very first song -- but primarily what you're going to hear is the basic guitar/bass/drums trio, simply cookin'. With gas. Fuckin' huge propane tanks of it, exploding left and right. Whoops, but then let's not forget the moments of delicate, Eastern-tinged post-rock bliss to be found here as well. Lizaveta's multi-genre rock synthesis results in a unique and varied album, from the tension-buildup of a slowburning track like "Tenuous" to the Frippian ambience of "Diana" to the psychedelic soulshiver of "Naked And Alone" with its doomy Black Sabbath bassline and Yanni's lengthy Fushitsusha style blues-psych guitar blowout. The brothers Papadopoulos (Yanni, guitar and Alexi, bass) and drummer Cheshire Agusta do all this and more, with sincerity, passion and might.
Joe Lally (Fugazi) released this on his label Tolotta, best known as the home of stoner rock heroes Spirit Caravan. I'd really like to see both SC and SL go on tour together, that would be something...
Oh, Stinking Lizaveta, why do we love you so? We'd count the reasons but it's tough to write about a band that's like, one of the best bands EVER, we'd have to say, particularly if you ask Allan. We'll wax poetic about 'em, for sure, but it's gonna just sound like fanboy hyperbole. And having said that, can you expect an unbiased review here? Hell no, we're proudly biased regarding this virtuoso instrumental three-piece (rock god guitar, Energizer drums, upright electric bass) from Philadelphia. What we'd really like to do is just humbly suggest that you GO SEE THEM PLAY whenever you get the chance, which is more likely than you might think, since they're indefatigably touring pretty much all the time. If only like five percent of the people reading this right now are moved to sometime go see Stinking Lizaveta for the first time on our recommendation, we can feel like we've done y'all a service, since we're super duper sure that anyone who does will be amazed and become big fans too. Who can resist the exuberant, enthralling instrumental prowess displayed by this telepathic trio playing their unique blend of mathy metal, post rock, and heavier-than-thou hippiepunk jazz?? (They call their music "doom-jazz" by the way.)
This new album, their fifth (as always, engineered by Steve Albini) is an excellent demonstration/distillation of everything that's great about Stinking Liz (though we'll offer our usual caveat that they're EVEN BETTER live, you just can't entirely bottle/record that magic). These 16 new songs are some of their best yet, full of the ponderously head-nodding riffage, gorgeous arcs of lead guitar, and explosive rhythmic excitement we expect from 'em. There's moody tension throughout, with clusters of dense note-spirals building to ultimate release. Slow-burners like "Willie Nelson (Tired Of The War)" coexist with the sheer metallic chug of "Indomitable Will" and the darkly psychedelic storminess of "Cyclops", to offer a few examples, these elements prevalent all across this disc, no tracks lacking. And despite being an all-instrumental band (but for Yanni howling into his guitar pickups upon occasion, as on "Soul Retrieval") this isn't just a techy display of chops, it's passionate creativity drenched with sweat and emotion. Another all-instro trio y'know we love is The Fucking Champs, but Stinking Lizeveta are waaaay more soulful. They come a lot closer to the aesthetic of Earthless (another of this list's highlights), but instead of untethered interstellar exploration they compress and complexify that jamminess into tightly-wound compositions. Stirring stuff. And soooooo recommended.
Not '80s metal, not '70s metal, this is '60s metal. Or at least, heavy hippie psychedelic garage rock to be more precise. The Shadow Kingdom label, who seem to go for cult current metal bands and even more obscure reissues, reached pretty far back for this one, all the way back to the late sixties (the recordings collected here date from between '65-'70 as far as we can tell). Stone Garden were from the Pacific Northwest, predating the Seattle grunge scene by a couple decades... But if they'd been born later, we could almost imagine 'em on Sub Pop, playing shows with Mudhoney and, uh, Soundgarden, yeah.
Pounding drums and bass, wild jamming organ, and plenty of throbbing distorted guitar, that's what you get from Stone Garden. No, it's not Black Sabbath (it never is) but this ought to appeal to heavy psych, proto-metal heads into Blue Cheer, Bubble Puppy, Sir Lord Baltimore, Iron Butterfly, Fraction, Negative Space and the like. For the era, and considering their age (in the pictures here, Stone Garden are really young looking, though shaggy-haired, teenage kids still in high school), this was on the HEAVY side of the blues rock spectrum most definitely. Not all of it, but enough of it. "Assembly Line", ferinstance, is an appropriately grim lament, laced with acid guitar soloing. They were into Cream and Hendrix, you can tell.
Throughout these 15 tracks, production quality varies, some material was recorded in a real studio, others in a basement home studio, still others in a living room, or live on stage. So this collection has got a patchwork production vibe for sure, but that doesn't stop Stone Garden from rockin'. And when they did make it into a studio, they took advantage of it, you gotta love the freaky tape speed manipulation studio shenanigans that make "Grayworld Forest" an even weirder place to wander than the title suggests.
Stone Garden's music has been reissued before, originally on a limited edition (long out of print) vinyl by Rockadelic in the '90s, and also on compact disc by Gear Fab, but this Shadow Kingdom cd edition is the best, with a bunch of previously unreleased bonus tracks and a nice booklet full of liner notes, vintage photos and, on the back, what we're guessing was the b&w flower power sleeve of their sole 7" release, circa 1969, with the boys looking really REALLY young on it. Which means you can flip the booklet around and have it as a the cd cover instead of the crappier looking "Stonehenge" cover inherited from the Rockadelic lp version, if you like.
Stoneburner's previous slab of crushing heaviosity came to us via the Seventh Rule label, but they fit in just as well on Neurot, their new home. Certainly Neurosis fans ought to want to willingly submit to Stonerburner's burly onslaught of atmospheric sludge sonics. These Portlanders are serious pros at atmospheric sludge all right, their well crafted compositions balancing sections of steamrollering metallic power with others of postrocky slow/low moodiness.
To elaborate, amidst all their epic-length tracks packed full of riffs to pound you into the ground, the occasional pretty part will surface - an acoustic guitar interlude there, a passage of sombre quietude there - before the distorted amp-abuse and accompanying pained throat-rasped vocals kick (your head) in again. Stoneburner's brand of doomed-out lumbering despair comes in a variety of modes and it's all very effective and affecting, guitar solos included. Their previous disc, the one on Seventh Rule, was titled Sickness Will Pass, but it hasn't, yet, for them, or their listeners...
"Play At Maximum Volume" it says here, right on the face of the cd. Well, OF COURSE! Duh. Stoneburner, from PDX, are another sludgier-than-thou (and maybe than Thou) metal band, whose debut full-length is brought to us by the same label, Seventh Rule, recently responsible for the newest, aQ Record Of The Week awarded Author & Punisher album, as well as cool discs from the likes of Atriarch, Batillus, Wizard Rifle, Indian and other heavy hitters. Furthermore, one of Stoneburner's guitarists used to wield his axe in the late, great Buried At Sea.
So, it comes as no surprise that Stoneburner, in the nasty doomed-out tradition of such bands as Buried At Sea, Graves At Sea too, Eyehategod, YOB, and yes their hometown pals & labelmates Atriarch, are loaded for bear with fuzz-storted heavy riff-chuggery and throat-ripped vile vokills, along with some suddenly quiet, postrockish detours into acoustic-atmospheric moments that serve to make the prevalent heavy and wretched sounding parts all the more heavy and wretched by contrast (and earn Stoneburner some extra points for musical nuance and sophistication). Six songs here, including an unlisted bonus soundscape-y one (that the CDDB tells us is called "Thank You For Listening").
The misanthropically doom/sludge lovin' amongst us will indeed be playing this at the recommended volume. But we doubt the neighbors will be thankful for listening.
Oh, and we like how the "band pics" in the digipak are all (only) of the individual band members pedals - drum pedals for the drummer, many and various effects pedals for the others.
All right, time to get yr underground proto-metal kicks! Remember the new album from San Francisco longhairs Dzjenghis Khan we highlighted last list?? Well THIS is exactly the sort of thing those retro-stoners were going for. Step up for an authentic '70s hard psych experience. Stonewall's rare, awesomely fuzz riffed record was recorded in '69, but not actually released until 1974, and even then without the band's knowledge, due to exploito-label shennanigans. Read the liner notes for more about that. (Actually, other sources claim this was recorded circa '71-'72, and then released in '76, we don't know what to believe, but either set of dates sounds plausible.)
Stonewall pump out stompin', rockin' boogie, durn heavy for '69 (or '71), fronted by an expressively raspy vocalist, gripped by the spirit of rock n' roll at its countercultural best. He also busts out the occasional harmonica wail. But it's generally guitars to the fore, and fuzzed-out. There's some Hendrix and Cream influences of course, maybe Led Zep too depending on when this really was recorded, and we're treated to some total organ jammin' blues rockin' on "Try & See It Through", while "Atlantis" hints at the slightly proggier riffage of Captain Beyond's debut....
Definitely for fans of Sir Lord Baltimore, Dust, Bang, Jerusalem, etc. Also if you remember a much more recent (but very retro) band from the '90s called The Want, who did a disc for Southern Lord, this sounds pretty much just like them. Which is cool 'cause we really digged The Want. Maybe they really digged Stonewall?
Oh, and yes, this IS the same Stonewall album that was previously reissued on cd some years back by the Italian label Akarma, with a different cover and title (Akarma called it Stoner, and the cover had a wall of Marshalls, with blood seeping from several of 'em.) Presumably this is the how the original lp really looked.
If you picked up the Spanish Trip compilation we reviewed a few months back, you might recall a song by this band from Seville, that we described as an example of "off-the-rails Deep Purplish bludgeon". And by "off-the-rails" we meant that their track, "I Don't Know", was played with a sloppy, wild abandon that made sound almost punk. Pretty cool! Well that song was from this, their only full-length album, originally released in 1974, and finally now reissued on cd in a fairly deluxe package (slipcover, bonus video clip), which features another seven tracks of hard rockin' proto-metal psych with gobs of heavy organ and acid blues guitar soloing...there's even a drum solo on here too. More aggressive than progressive, The Storm did their best to live up to their name, kicking out the jams more energetically than any other band from Spain up to that point in Spanish rock history except maybe Tapiman (whose excellent album with the pink skull on the cover was also recently reviewed by us, you may recall). Yet despite all their "storminess", though, these guys seem to have a sunny side too. Not downer rock by any means. You can kinda hear their '60s Beatles-lovin' pop roots.
Now, we've gotta say, on our last list we reviewed the comparably hard rockin', equally vintage Pax album from Peru, and it didn't get quite the response we were hoping for... we thought there were more of you proto-metal fans out there reading this stuff! Hmm. But if you're there, this is one you might dig (and that Pax too, go back and read about it).
Want some brutal "war crust" to, um, brighten your day? Look no further. Stormcrow (from Oakland, and not to be confused with the Italian black metal band of the same name) team up with likeminded metallers Sanctum (from Seattle) for this split cd on the ever-reliable, heavy as heck 20 Buck Spin label. Dark and wretched, violent and crushing, it's a raw mix of speedy death and moody doom from two bands both of whom love their Bolt Thrower and Amebix, Winter and Doom. The grey-shaded artwork depicting armored foes in medieval combat is quite appropriate, as across this sprawling split, they're either charging forward with berserk fury, or trudging battleweary from the killing fields... (generally Sanctum do the former, Stormcrow the latter). Imagine Asunder with D-beats.
Hot on the heels of the recent super limited cassette on Flingco (got a few left, ask if you want one), comes this also limited lp from Gareck Druss, aka A Story Of Rats, who might be more familiar to aQ folks as a member of PDX doomdronedirge outfit Tecumseh. And A Story Of Rats actually seems like a logical extension of the Tecumseh mothership, a more minimal, hushed sound, but definitely the same sort of dirgey drift.
Thought Forms is a single sprawling epic split up into two sidelong movements, the first is as you might expect, a creepy atmospheric dronescape, all distant sounds, reverbed field recordings, warm whirling tones, the sound drifts meditatively, but begins to grow more industrial, as the sounds grow more caustic, bell like chimes, are wreathed in distortion and begin to crumble, vocals buried so they sound like more rumbles and whirs, keening fragmented melodies drift beneath the surface, the sound constantly in motion, but subtly so, shifting from deep somnambulant creep to washed out shimmer and back again. The second side/movement is more looped and hypnotic, woozy and psychedelic, the sounds more hazy and softly swirly, melodies blurred into chordal thrum, it's prettier than the A side, but the darkness seems to grow gradually, a droned out soft noise that builds and builds into a crumbling and ominous black buzz outro. Most definitely for fans of all things slow and low, minimal and droney, dark and drifty.
The packaging is incredible, hand screened jackets, black and metallic gold ink, the vinyl pressed on swirled black and grey vinyl, packaged with a super swank insert, again hand screened in metallic gold ink, on heavy textured paper.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES.
Here's yet another one of those bands that we'd vaguely heard of (or perhaps not) but never really encountered actual records by, and now that we have we can't figure out why they weren't a bigger deal! I think I first became aware of 'em via the thanks/influences list on a Pentagram album. Kinda always assumed they were your basic British blues rock but on the evidence of this, their 1970 debut they were something a little different than the Cream/Zep sort of thing I'd imagined. They're rather more like a '60s psych-pop singles band, of the garagey/Nuggetsy variety, with the fuzz factor and sheer guitar heaviness cranked way up toward proto-metallic levels. More psych than prog, more pop than blues. Kinda punk too. Very kick ass and energetic, catchy and rockin', venturing from the paisley-painted pop melodicism of "Around The World In Eighty Days" to the slamming punkish "Only What You Make It" to a number of extended fuzz guitar workouts... but first and foremost it's good old-fashioned hard rock. Think Thin Lizzy. Or Dust, or Budgie. Or even early, early Rush (one song here always puts Byram in mind of "Working Man"). But as mentioned it's got a poppy '60s garage vibe unlike a lot of those acts... And there's enough proggier, psychier elements loaded in here to pique the interest of a wider audience than just the hard rock lovers among us. The guitar parts especially are full of odd harmonies and melodic richness that bring to mind Amon Duul II, if Amon Duul II could have managed to fit their open ended song structures into a tighter blues rock straight jacket. What makes Stray's music work so well is their attention to structure: keeping their compositions on a tight leash and avoiding the esoteric meanderings that can be a pitfall to many prog rockers. This and their sense of dynamics, knowing just how and when to throw the switch and rip the seat of your pants, is what must have made them a seriously kick ass live band (and apparently they were super popular as such in and around their London, England turf, but unfortunately never managed to cash in on the hard rock success like some of their contempories). They recorded numerous albums, of which this first one is likely their best (though their second LP Suicide is a good one too, and we're just not that familiar with the rest of their '70s output), but their biggest claim to fame might be that Iron Maiden covered one of their songs on a b-side ("All In Your Mind", the very first track on this disc). Stray's version was way better btw.
We sure do love Finland. And boy do we love slow motion sludgy doom. So it makes perfect sense that this here disc would find its way into our grubby gloomy doom loving mitts. Stumm are a glacial power trio that traffic in that sort of harsh ugly crusty death doom dirge sludge we've come to dig so heavily. We just can't seem to get enough. It's metal sure, heavy and downtuned, but a lot of the appeal, very much like the blurry buzz of black metal, is it's proximity to pure drone! As the guitars get lower, and the songs get slower (or conversely faster and blurrier) riffs become stretches of slow shifting sound, hypnotic and dare we say soothing. Not entierely like a doom metal Steve Reich or a sludge Terry Riley. Most of us would just as likely fall asleep listening to the most recent Moss record as we would a Coleclough or Chalk record. And Stumm are carrying on that fine tradition. A harsh raw nihilistic doom metal that drones and buzzes and pulses, slithers and lurches more than it rocks.
There's got to be a way to designate sheer impossible dooominess. In the past we've just added more 'o's to the word doom, 20 'o's, 40 'o's, but where does it end. Eventually there will be a band so slow and sludgy, the whole review will be a single word, doom, but with 11,342 'o's. We're tempted to give Stumm a rating based on the multiple 'o' doom scale, but this this disc is not just a single sludgy smear of sound, it's definitely doooooooooom (let's stick with 10 'o's for now), with most of the record, stumbling and staggering, all druggy and dizzy, a 16rpm creep through a thick forest of buzzing E strings and drumming that sounds like it's being dumped out of the back of a cement mixer. But here and there, the clouds part, revealing a bit of sky through the dense canopy of oppressive heaviness, be it a bit of clean guitar or some warm warbly bass... hell, who are we kidding, those moments are so brief and fleeting they're only there to lure you in and set you up for a massive pumelling, frozen like a deer in the headlights, looking skyward, eyes reflecting that tiny glimmer of sunlight, before moments later Stumm take your head clean off with a spiked and sludgy iron bar, as a million 'o's begin to rain down from the sky, like metallic black hail, burying you beneath a crushing, suffocating mound of doooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.............
4 songs. 35 minutes. Mastered by James Plotkin (Khanate, Phantomsmasher / Atomsmasher, Flux, OLD, etc.)
It says right there on the sleeve: "100% Sludge". They had us at 100% sludge. Ummm, anyway, two of Finland's sludge rock heavyweights team up, each taking a side of this here 12", and each, surprisingly, doing something new and unique with their bit of sludge. Not that we wouldn't have loved another slab of slow motion dirgery, but we're even more psyched to see what weird shapes, some of this sludgedoomdrone can get twisted into.
Up first is Loinen, whose lp we totally flipped over a while back. They of the crushing doom with Scott Walker style vocals. Yep! You remember now? Well, here they try another something, also completely different, their side begins with a super distorted bass riff, spread way out, allowing for lots and lots of space, and in those spaces, there are strange chanted choral vocals, female, repeating the same pattern over and over, inexorably tangled up with the plodding riff. It's all very mysterious and hypnotic and continues on for nearly three quarters of the side, at which point the vocals finally come in, a strangled alien croon, alternately growling and sort of moaning, and it's not until nearly the end of the side when the drums finally kick in, and for the first time it begins to resemble the aforementioned 100% sludge. A lurching doom trudge with now croaking vocals all wrapped around that relentless distorted bass line. Finally, right at the very end, the track explodes in a frenzy of freaked out chaos, drums everywhere, feedback squealing and shrieking, the track dissolving in a blast of blown out brutality. Weird and quite cool.
So how do fellow countrymen, and masters of their own particular brand of sludginess, Stumm, respond? With yet another strange take on sludge, there's, at least for this lp side, is downright pretty. Thick swaths of washed out guitar rumble and soaring streaks of feedback all tangled and up like some gorgeous alien melody, not harsh at all really, more just strange sounding, and really quite beautiful, the first time we've heard feedback so skillfully sculpted, underneath, drums are simple and spare, it's more about atmosphere and mood it seems, a thick heavy dreamy drift. Right in the middle there's a brief burst where the guitars get more jagged and angular, and some howling shrieking vocals swoop in, but before you know it, they've swooped right back out, and the track is again drifting darkly, a strangely soft sludge shimmer. So great.
LIMITED TO 265 COPIES!!! These are the only copies we can get. Once they are gone, they are gone for good. Packaged like the Loinen 12", in a similar eye melting black and white high-school-binder tweeker pen and ink cover, with crazy art by Loinen member G.G., a tripped out world of strange figures and weird text and upside down crosses, and squiggles and creatures and who knows what else...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Submerged is a loud sludge / stoner rock band from Finland sorta like Eyehategod / Cavity with a treblier Sub Pop feel to it. Pretty cool stuff on the terminally fucked Bad Vugum label.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
The Japanese, we all know, are no slouches when it comes to heavy, psychedelic rock n' roll. From seventies masters like the Flower Travellin' Band and Far Out and Blues Creation to current heavies like Boris and Green Machine and DMBQ (to name but a few from either era), there's a tradition of long-haired, amped-up mayhem over there... Well if you're like us and big fans of all that, you should know about this band, Subvert Blaze. They were a late '80s, early '90s psychedelic metal / stoner rock outfit, retro bellbottomed badasses doin' Sabbath and Hendrix covers alongside equally heavy originals just a few years before it was all that cool to do so. Their drummer later joined Ghost, but it's here where you'll really hear him put his gong to good use. Subvert Blaze did two albums for the Osaka-based noise and psych label Alchemy, Subvert Art and Subvert Art II, which have been out of print for some time, until recently when this double cd set appeared, reissuing the tracks from both those albums, and more! So we figured some of you might be interested...yeah it's thirty bucks but it's an import and a double cd, and getting the two original discs would have cost more and you wouldn't have the bonus tracks, which include a cover of "Summertime Blues" as well as a twelve-minute epic original entitled "Elegy (Of Turkey City)", and the band's two tracks from the Osaka Greasy Truckers compilation (early versions of "Butterfly" and "Innocent"). Convinced? Or do you need more description? Let's see... Kinda like Can meets Sabbath, total heavy psych rockin' and rollin', with gargly rough vocals and a dark energy. Yeah, if you can dig a band that combines heavy riffage with technical progginess and spacious, psychedelic moodiness, and is prone to the occasional extravagant drum solo, you might be a Subvert Blaze fan too! (NB. their singer/guitarist went on to form even heavier Alchemy act Garadama.)
The main problem with unearthed supposed 'proto-metal' rarities or 'holy grail' psychedelic artifacts, is that after hearing for years and years how amazing and heavy and fuzzed out they are, often when we finally get to hear them, they so often sound a lot more like ordinary bar rock, or blues rock, the hype far exceeding the sound.
No such problem with South African heavies Suck. This, their only record has been circulating for years as a bootleg, and the first time we saw it, we knew it had to be good. The cover was a cool black and white photo of a little long haired hippy kid sitting in the grass next to a kick drum, the band was called Suck (rumored to have almost been called FUCK), and the record was called Time To Suck, they covered Sabbath and King Crimson and Deep Purple, they're from South Africa and the record originally came out in 1970. It HAD to be good. But we were cautious, we had most definitely been burned before, but thankfully there was no need for caution cuz holy shit is this stuff amazing. Hard and heavy, super rocking, wildly psychedelic, the fact that if you weren't familiar with the covers here you'd be hard pressed to pick out the one original says a lot about these guys.
Apparently Suck were infamous in South Africa for raucous, sometimes violent, always chaotic live shows, they were only a band for 8 months, and in that time only ever recorded ONE original track, and released one proper album, Time To Suck.
Two Grand Funk Railroad tunes, "Aimless Lady" and "Sin's A Good Man's Brother", King Crimson's "21st Century Schizoid Man", "Season Of The Witch" by Donovan, Free's "I'll Be Creeping", Deep Purple's "Into The Fire", "Elegy" by Colosseum and finally Black Sabbath's "War Pigs". That's a serious selection of songs. Then there's the one original, "The Whip", a killer chunk of Zeppeliny slither and Sabbathy crunch, some wildly proggy arrangements, frenzied guitar leads, incredible drumming, and lead vocalist Andrew Ionnides' Robert Plant like wail. A churning heavy metallic rock jam that sounds right at home amongst all those better known tunes.
Their version of "21st Century Schizoid Man" is fierce and super distorted and as heavy if not more so than the original. "Season Of The Witch" burns slowly, peppered with cool fluttering flutes and all sorts of subtle guitar filigree, and of course "War Pigs", that takes balls to tackle that one, especially in 1970, but these guys definitely make it their own, staying pretty true to the original, minus an even more blown out intro, and the addition of some weird percussive string plucks or maybe bongos, way up in the mix, but makes it even more dizzyingly psychedelic, and if anything, their version as a whole is just a bit more chaotic and off kilter, an definitely faster, more like the German TV version of the Sabs you can find on YouTube.
Needless to say, this is an essential proto-metal document, one that is actually pretty metal, fuzzed out, super heavy, intensely rocking, psychedelic and druggy, plenty proggy, and well, the song selection can't be beat!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Out of the blue, this slab of heaviness is now available on vinyl! A real swank package with new artwork courtesy of the UK's Dirter. Here's our review of the original cd release from 2001:
The world's first, best, only, (and last?) EARTH tribute band oozes forth with their second album. Some might question if there was more to be accomplished in their emulation of the glacial "power ambient drone" metal practiced by Earth, but this album should quell any skeptics -- it's slower and lower and sets yet another standard for heaviness. Thus, probably an essential addition to the collections of AQ's extreme doom fanatic patrons! And this time the boys in Sunn go beyond their obvious Earth worship to acknowledge another influence: one of the four lengthy tracks found here is a cover (or, an interpretation, anyway) of a Melvins tune! Recommended.
Now reissued on vinyl!!
First released way back in 2001, SUNNO)))'s 00Void was later re-released on Japanese label Daymare, which included a bonus disc, on which Nurse With Wound remixed and re-envisioned the record, and transformed it into something haunting and surprisingly lovely. That bonus disc was recently reissued on vinyl (with some slight alterations, apparently), as was the double cd version, but for folks who got the remix disc vinyl, and need 00Void to complete the set, your prayers have been answered, as now Southern Lord has re-released 00Void on vinyl once more (the previous vinyl edition years ago was on Dirter).
00Void was in fact, SUNNO)))'s first proper album, the preceding Grimmrobe Demos, being just that, demos, but sonically, it picked up right where Grimmrobe left off, huge undulating slow motion riffscapes, epic, majestic, glacial, ominous and black hole heavy. Although it hardly seems necessary at this point, for those who have managed to somehow avoid SUNNO)))'s sonic influence, SUNNO))) began life as the world's first, best, only, (and last?) EARTH tribute band, emulating and bowing before the glacial "power ambient drone" metal of Earth, creating a little cult of the dronedoomdirge faithful, long before the hipster set caught on, but this record, as much as Grimmrobe before it made a case for SUNNO))) as their own entity, sure they owed every aspect of their sound to the band they were birthed to honor (still do really), but they managed to subtly imbue that same sound with their own influences and experience, creating something even more slow and low if that were even possible, setting yet another standard for heaviness.
So on 00Void, SUNNO))) indulge in pure unfettered doom, loosed from any sort of rhythmic constrictions, unmoored from traditional song structures, letting riffs and tones and pure vibrations emanate from their wall of speakers, like some monstrous black tuning fork, almost more a physical sensation than an aural one, but those movements of blackdrone infused with a musicality that blossoms slowly the deeper you allow yourself to sink. Suffocating, pummeling, crushing, oozing, but also soothing and beautiful. Maybe one of our favorite SUNNO))) records for sure. And if the pure grim heaviness of the three originals wasn't enough, 00Void also includes a cover (or, an interpretation, anyway) of a Melvins tune! Another band who were dabbling in slow motion heaviness long before it was cool...
The final installment in Daymare's comprehensive SUNNO))) reissue campaign, and probably the most eagerly anticipated, not just because 00 Void is one of their best, but because the extra bonus disc features the original record reimagined and recontextualized by dadaist sound sculptors Nurse With Wound.
00Void is in fact, SUNNO)))'s first proper album, the preceding Grimmrobe Demos, being just that, demos, but sonically, it picks up right where Grimmrobe left off, huge undulating slow motion riffscapes, epic, majestic, glacial, ominous and black hole heavy. Although it hardly seems necessary at this point, for those who have managed to somehow avoid SUNNO)))'s sonic influence, SUNNO))) began life as the world's first, best, only, (and last?) EARTH tribute band, emulating and bowing before the glacial "power ambient drone" metal of Earth, creating a little cult of the dronedoomdirge faithful, long before the hipster set caught on, but this record, as much as Grimmrobe before it made a case for SUNNO))) as their own entity, sure they owed every aspect of their sound to the band they were birthed to honor (still do really), but they managed to subtly imbue that same sound with their own influences and experience, creating something even more slow and low if that were even possible, setting yet another standard for heaviness.
So on 00Void, SUNNO))) indulge in pure unfettered doom, loosed from any sort of rhythmic constrictions, unmoored from traditional song structures, letting riffs and tones and pure vibrations emanate from their wall of speakers, like some monstrous black tuning fork, almost more a physical sensation than an aural one, but those movements of blackdrone infused with a musicality that blossoms slowly the deeper you allow yourself to sink. Suffocating, pummeling, crushing, oozing, but also soothing and beautiful. Maybe one of our favorite SUNNO))) records for sure. And if the pure grim heaviness of the three originals wasn't enough, 00Void also includes a cover (or, an interpretation, anyway) of a Melvins tune! Another band who were dabbling in slow motion heaviness long before it was cool...
This deluxe Japanese reissue is gorgeously packaged as always, swank matte finished textured paper gatefold, printed inner sleeves, insert with liner notes (all in Japanese), but most importantly of all, a whole extra disc, a complete reworking of 00Void by Nurse With Wound. Most folks probably never even made it this far in the review anyway, the mention of NWW remixing SUNNO))) in the first paragraph probably had most people scrambling for the add to cart button, but for folks who stuck it out, it's well worth rebuying 00Void again for the extra disc, as it's a fantastic disc of haunting drones and abstract soundscaping, constructed using the glacial doom of SUNNO))) as the building blocks, which is surprising considering how shimmery and serene much of this is.
The opening track is one long slow billow of sound, gentle clouds of muted metallic reverberations, deep resonant chiming tones, soft smeared bass notes, all blurred into a creeping drift, that is more Chalk or Coleclough than SUNNO))). The second track is evenmore abstract, isolating, or adding voices, peppering the dreamy drone with strange metallic clang, moaning horn like bleats, sprays of hiss and buzz, all over a warbly wandering bassline, the vocals driving the song at points, a nasally croon entangled in the tracks gauzy gurgle, the bass getting thicker and thicker, coated in grit and grime and hiss, the vocals effected and almost demonic, breaking glass, weird industrial clatter, and lots and lots of hisssssssss.
The final track, another gorgeously minimal drone, the sound of SUNNO))) smeared and blurred and muted into a hushed thrum, soft subtle layers shifting and blending, warm and rich and textured but simple and spare, near the end, voices and radio static surface, but still barely audible, another whispered layer beneath a sea of tranquil hushed whir. Pretty dang cool, even if it's fairly far removed from the sound of the original, but then again, that's sort of the mark of a good remix as far as we're concerned.
Be warned, we got a bunch but they'll probably go quick, so when we run out, be prepared to wait for us to get more from Japan.
The third (duh) album from the lower-than-low doom duo of Stephen O'Malley (Burning Witch, Khanate) and Greg Anderson (Goatsnake, ex-Engine Kid). SUNN O))), formed in tribute to defunct Sub Pop heavies Earth, never fails to warm our doom-drone lovin' hearts,
The first two tracks, totalling 22 minutes, constitute a new SUNN original, with dark waves of Earth-worthy droneriff rolling relentlessly ever onward. (Track one is called "Mocking Solemnity" and track two is called "Death Becomes You", but there's no discernable break between them, it'll really all one piece.)
Then come the two mixes, and the surprise is that they're even better than the SUNN-alone tracks!
Maybe that's 'cause they were produced by Masami Akita, aka the notorious Japanese noise artist Merzbow! His first mix (5 mins) drops some atonal piano into the dronezone of Sunn, while mix number 2 (13 mins) really goes for a grinding godhead experience. He really takes it to another level.
After the Merzbow tracks, "Flight" closes out with another original track called "F.W.T.B.T.", and it's another good 'un, featuring guests "Bootsy Kronos" on bass, and, uh, "Aspirin Feast" on drums. Drums!
Steve O'Malley did a great job with the album design, too, somehow emulating the graphics of Earth's "2" with nicely colored picture of a hunting dog, a shot of the SUNN boys looking like long haired, black clad twins, and -- get this -- what appears to be Ozzy Osbourne's Klonopin perscription from a Beverly Hills pharmacy!
Southern Lord recommends this to fans of Earth, Melvins, Thrones, Thomas Koner...and we do too!! Add to that list Boris, Corrupted, Fushitsusha, and Loop (the last two are SUNN fan Julian Cope's comparisons)... "Flight of the Behemoth" is truly a massive, rumbling, varied, experimental DRONEDOOM ESSENTIAL!
Yet again, proving that you haven't really owned a Sunn 0))) record until you've bought it at least twice, preferably three times, comes two more blasts from the dark side of the doom, what many consider to be Sunn 0)))'s finest moments, their debut, The GrimmRobe Demos, and Flight Of The Behemoth! Both expanded with over the top new packaging, gorgeous Japanese style mini lp gatefold style cd sleeves, inserts, printed inner sleeves and Japanese style obi's, but most importantly a whole disc of unreleased material!!
The third Sunn 0))) disc (still waiting on record number two, 00 Void, to get reissued), Flight Of The Behemoth, is packaged in an amazing metallic gold on black mini gatefold sleeve, printed inside and out, the various images from the old version reproduced on the printed inner sleeves, a fold out poster with liner notes and track listing and a discography on the other side. The first disc is discussed in great detail below, but the new, extra disc is a live recording from earlier this year, featuring Sunn 0))) and Merzbow performing together, and engineered by Masami Akita, Mr. Merzbow himself. Which makes sense since the second half of Flight Of The Behemoth was actually Akita remixing Sunn 0))) anyway. So you probably know what you're in store for, some seriously noisy business, which is of course what you get, two massive slabs of Sunn 0)))-y sludge, caked in blown out sheets of Merzbowic grit, shrieking feedback, malfunctioning electronics, high end shrieks, thick chunks of crumbling distortion, blasts of spaced out FX, while beneath it all, the sound of Sunn 0))) continues to grind and churn like some subterranean sonic lava flow. Pretty awesome, and much like when he performs with Boris, Akita knows how to make his noise compliment, instead of overwhelm. So yeah, Sunn freeks and Merzbow obsessives will absolutely need this, and if you somehow never managed to pick up Flight Of The Behemoth, now is as good a time as any. So here's what we had to say about Sunn 0))) 3: Flight Of The Behemoth, when we first reviewed it way back in 2002:
The third (duh) album from the lower-than-low doom duo of Stephen O'Malley (Burning Witch, Khanate) and Greg Anderson (Goatsnake, ex-Engine Kid). SUNN O))), formed in tribute to defunct Sub Pop heavies Earth, never fails to warm our doom-drone lovin' hearts, even as SUNN's thick, sludgy wall of bass-heavy guitar distortion utterly numbs our bodies. We loved their last album "OO Void" so much that we were both eager to hear this new one, and a bit apprehensive 'cause we heard it had a bunch of remixes on it, which sometimes means throw-away BS. But as it turns out, not in this case, thankfully!
The first two tracks, totaling 22 minutes, constitute a new SUNN original, with dark waves of Earth-worthy droneriff rolling relentlessly ever onward. (Track one is called "Mocking Solemnity" and track two is called "Death Becomes You", but there's no discernible break between them, it's really all one piece.)
Then come the two mixes, and the surprise is that they're even better than the SUNN-alone tracks!
Maybe that's 'cause they were produced by Masami Akita, aka the notorious Japanese noise artist Merzbow! His first mix (5 mins) drops some atonal piano into the dronezone of Sunn, while mix number 2 (13 mins) really goes for a grinding godhead experience. He really takes it to another level.
After the Merzbow tracks, "Flight" closes out with another original track called "F.W.T.B.T.", and it's another good 'un, featuring guests "Bootsy Kronos" on bass, and, uh, "Aspirin Feast" on drums. Drums!
Steve O'Malley did a great job with the album design, too, somehow emulating the graphics of Earth's "2" with nicely colored picture of a hunting dog, a shot of the SUNN boys looking like long haired, black clad twins, and -- get this -- what appears to be a certain rock star's Klonopin perscription from a Beverly Hills pharmacy!
Southern Lord recommends this to fans of Earth, Melvins, Thrones, Thomas Koner...and we do too!! Add to that list Boris, Corrupted, Fushitsusha, and Loop (the last two are SUNN fan Julian Cope's comparisons)... "Flight of the Behemoth" is truly a massive, rumbling, varied, experimental DRONEDOOM ESSENTIAL!
ATTENTION: the limited edition 2cd version of this is totally gone, this is the single disc version!
As you may have noticed, the aQ speakers have been quite clogged of late with the black sonic tar of glacial doom and slow motion sludge, molten flows of downtuned guitars, rumbling bowel churning drones, impossibly slow and primordially plodding drumming, all tangled up in huge squirming, blackened riffs, like mammoths struggling to loose themselves from pits of black tar. We've also been quite obsessed with the more virulent strains of buzzing, bizarre black metal. Leviathan, Xasthur, Benighted Leams, Blackdeath, Deathspell Omega, Furze, Lurker Of Chalice and the like. But just imagine for a moment, if that river of sludge we love so much ran right through the darkened Nordic forest, or if you took all that buzz and fuzz and held it under a thick layer of black pitch, while it struggled desperately for breath, or if you took the bombinating blur of Burzum and slowed it waaaaay doooooooown, or better yet, what if Dylan Carlson of Earth grew up listening to Darkthrone and Mayhem instead of Hendrix and the Mentors. Well you'd probably get something like Black One. To be honest, what forms the basis of Black One is really not all that different than other SUNNO))) records. It's still a series of 16 rpm metal riffs, morphed beautifully into plodding hypnotic smears of metallic ambience. The blackness here comes from several sources: the art and the imagery for one, a very metal looking cover drawing, olde English fonts, O'Malley and Anderson have adopted properly metal monickers for the instruments used: axe subs, icy inverted crosswinds upon four string zamboni, grail, glacial winds, calls from beyond the grave! Then there is the presence of two current BM legends, Malefic from Xasthur and Wrest from Leviathan. That said, there are moments, where SUNNO)))'s immediately recognizable sludge does twist itself into more black metal shapes, and it's those moments that Black One truly taps into a direct line to the fiery abyss. Imagine listening to Immortal through some sort of time warp, where Blizzard Beasts is stretched into a single icy contrail spread out over 666 years, a hazy black cloud swallowing everything in its path. Add some truly frosty and fucked up vocals and ghostly guitars from Wrest and Malefic, all manner of gorgeous sonic filigree from Australian experimental guitarist Oren Ambarchi and noise guru John Weise, some text by Seldon Hunt, and that oh so familiar Sunn-y O'Malleyïartwork, lyrics via Dead (from Mayhem), Malefic, Wrest and Abbath (of Immortal) and you might just be looking at a truly and utterly black one indeed.
Besides Boris, SUNNO))) are the undisputed masters of the limited, the repackaged, the-must-buy-for-a-single-track, the must-have-every-color-vinyl, a crazy cult of completism. Almost every release by both bands, has seemingly been offered in multiple limited releases, slightly altered versions for Japan and the US, ridiculously limited runs, and impossible to get tour only editions. We put up with it, cuz, well, both bands rule, and continually kick our asses. And it's kinda fun chasing down weird hard to find releases and super limited editions. To a point.
We're happy to report, that unless you are one of the very lucky ones, saw the band on tour, or spent a fortune on eBay, then these three Japanese reissues are absolutely worth rebuying, as each one includes a bonus disc (or discs) that most folks probably never got their hands on. In fact, we were never able to get any of them for the store. So we'd wager lots of you will be super psyched to pick these up, even if you already have the Southern Lord version. Especially since buying the original versions on eBay would probably cost as much as these multiple disc Daymare versions, and they look amazing, re-designed packaging by Stephen O'Malley, printed inner sleeves, cool miniature lp style gatefold jackets, Japanese liner notes, obi's, really really nice. LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES too, so these will probably not be around for long...
Black one includes La Mort Noir dans Esch/Alzette, a super limited (1000 copies) tour only cd, gone in a flash, within the first few dates of the tour, so even folks who made it out probably never even saw it. We never managed to get ANY copies at all, and it's been a super expensive eBay item ever since. The thing about La Mort Noir dans Esch/Alzette, is it might be even better than Black One proper! Recorded live in Luxembourg, the core duo of O'Malley and Anderson is augmented by Malefic of Xasthur on vocals, Dylan Carlson from Earth, the guy from Beaver on synths and Steve Moore on trombone (who also plays horns for Earth), and the set is monstrous, a dark and oppressive black dronescape, guitars are thick and glacial, the horns add another layer of buzz and throb as do the synths, Malefic shrieks and howls atop the din, it's pretty heavy and intense. And it sounds good enough that it we find ourselves digging it more than the album, and it sounds like it could very well have just been a second disc of a Black One double cd. Which, well, it is now!
And just in case you need the scoop on Black One, here's our review from when we first listed it:
As you may have noticed, the�aQ speakers have been quite clogged of late with the black sonic tar of glacial doom and slow motion sludge, molten flows of downtuned guitars, rumbling bowel churning drones, impossibly slow and primordially plodding drumming, all tangled up in huge squirming, blackened riffs, like mammoths struggling to loose themselves from pits of black tar. We've also been quite obsessed with the more virulent strains of buzzing, bizarre black metal. Leviathan, Xasthur, Benighted Leams, Blackdeath, Deathspell Omega, Furze, Lurker Of Chalice and the like. But just imagine for a moment, if that river of sludge we love so much ran right through the darkened Nordic forest, or if you took all that buzz and fuzz and held it under a thick layer of black pitch, while it struggled desperately for breath, or if you took the bombinating blur of Burzum and slowed it waaaaay doooooooown, or better yet, what if Dylan Carlson of Earth grew up listening to Darkthrone and Mayhem instead of Hendrix and the Mentors. Well you'd probably get something like Black One. To be honest, what forms the basis of Black One is really not all that different than other SUNNO))) records. It's still a series of 16 rpm metal riffs, morphed beautifully into plodding hypnotic smears of metallic ambience. The blackness here comes from several sources: the art and the imagery for one, a very metal looking cover drawing, olde English fonts, O'Malley and Anderson have adopted properly metal monickers for the instruments used: axe subs, icy inverted crosswinds upon four string zamboni, grail, glacial winds, calls from beyond the grave! Then there is the presence of two current BM legends, Malefic from Xasthur and Wrest from Leviathan. That said, there are moments, where SUNNO)))'s immediately recognizable sludge does twist itself into more black metal shapes, and it's those moments that Black One truly taps into a direct line to the fiery abyss. Imagine listening to Immortal through some sort of time warp, where Blizzard Beasts is stretched into a single icy contrail spread out over 666 years, a hazy black cloud swallowing everything in its path. Add some truly frosty and fucked up vocals and ghostly guitars from Wrest and Malefic, all manner of gorgeous sonic filigree from Australian experimental guitarist Oren Ambarchi and noise guru John Weise, some text by Seldon Hunt, and that oh so familiar Sunn-y O'Malley�artwork, lyrics via Dead (from Mayhem), Malefic, Wrest and Abbath (of Immortal) and you might just be looking at a truly and utterly black one indeed.
Recorded live, in an ancient cathedral in Bergen, Norway, Domkirke is pretty impressive slab of avant heaviness, and continues to display SUNNO))), the duo of Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson (and usually any number of auxiliary members), moving further and further away from their Earth worshipping roots. Having become a bona fide ART band, you're now more likely to catch SUNNO))) in a gallery, or a cathedral, than on a metal bill, which is fine, as their sound is the rare beast that does manage to bridge that gap, and most appealingly, manages to alienate and piss off folks on both sides of the divide.
So for this performance, the band chose to create a piece that reflected the history of the cathedral, creating something much more ritualistic sonically, vocal based, incorporating chants, Gregorian hymns of the Middle Ages, evoking the despair of a time of plague and death, a truly medieval sound, woven into SUNNO))'s more modern minimal glacial dronemusic. The two most noticeable additions to the SUNNO))) sound for this performance are Attila's powerful operatic vocals, and the gorgeous buzz of the cathedral's massive pipe organ. And the opening track is just that, ditching the guitars entirely, letting the organ unfurl massive minor key whirs and shimmering rich harmonies, while Attila moans and croons, sometimes adding another layer of low rumbles, other times, wailing dramatically. The organ so rich and lustrous and majestic and powerful. Reminds you that no matter how many amps you have and how much distortion you use, some things are inherently heavier than guitars. But that doesn't keep the Sunn boys from trying, as the second track returns to more familiar territory, offering up a glacial slow motion flow of crumbling super distorted guitars, more melodic than usual, churning over a back drop of shimmering organ drones, and again Attila's vocals slipping from hissed whisper, to rich mellifluous chant. Add to that a bit of electronic filigree from noisemaker Lasse Marhaug, and you've got a pretty ominous and intense slab of medieval murk. The guitars do unwind into surprisingly melodic figures now and again, but always return find their way back to that main, heaving tarpit riff.
The third side (movement), begins as more of the same, although this time the track sprawls into some almost free noise, the vocals demonic and intense, the guitars spilling out of the amps in noxious black clouds, squalls of electronics, sheets of feedback, sounds almost like SUNNO))) free jazz, unhinged and frenzied, but still bleak and black and heavy. The final movement might be the heaviest of the bunch, those oh so familiar slow motion riffs, wash over that swirling sea of whirring organ, a massive organic, almost fluid sound, alive with energy, black, yet glowing from within, building to a suffocatingly intense climax, the guitars crumbling and blown out, the organ at fever pitch, the vocals another layer of buzz and howl, the whole thing threatening to bring down the ancient stone walls, before dropping out completely, leaving Attila's rumbling low end growl, and then finally leaving just the organ, to play out mournfully and mysteriously.
Pretty fantastic. It almost makes us wish SUNNO))) would just get a pipe organ in the band, permanently. Might make touring a bit tough, but heck, it might just be worth it!
Incredible packaging, one of the thickest gatefold sleeves we've ever seen, adorned with gorgeous abstract oil paintings on the outside, and photos of the performance on the inside, full color printed sleeves, with more performance photos, pressed on black vinyl, limited to 5000 copies, never to be released as a cd or a digital download.
The first thing we thought when we threw this on, was, man, it's gonna be pretty tough to top Domkirke. The last SUNNO))) release, vinyl only, found the duo of Greg Anderson and Stephen O'Malley recording their low end Earth worshipping drone symphonies in an actual cathedral, incorporating the cathedral's church organ. Hard to imagine anything heavier.
For Monoliths and Dimensions, the duo drafted in all sorts of extra help. The usual suspects sure, Attila Csihar on vocals, guitarist Oren Ambarchi, but also, a veritable orchestra, French horns, violas, piano, hydrophone, English Horn, Conch Shell, double bass, and that's just on album opener "Aghartha", which on first listen sounds like the SUNNO))) of old, all churning low end, slow motion glacial riffage, but as the track progresses, the heavy riffage peels back, revealing, a sea of moaning horns, Csihar's haunting intoned vocals, creaks and groans, and the actual sound of water (the hydrophone?), eventually getting super abstract and minimal, before fading out completely.
"Big Church" featues four guitarists (Ambarchi, O'Malley, Anderson and Earth's Dylan Carlson) as well as trombone, trumpet, organ, tubular bells and a choir!!! The choir giving the track a definite Arvo Part vibe, haunting and choral, drifting ethereally over the slow burning rumble of the multiple guitars, before locking into a strangely melodic almost slowcore creep.
"Hunting & Gathering (Cydonia)" featueres yet another expanded lineup, this time including a "Man choir", the track begins all standard doom, crushing lugurbrious riffage, growled gurgeled vokills, but the man choir's deep haunting chant adds a whole other dimension, creating a sort of choral doom hybrid, much like the other track, but this one remains much darker and heavier.
Finally, the record closes with Alice, this time with horns AND strings, and the song that probably is most responsible for describing this record as "SUNNO))) with strings". It starts out all woozy and twangy like some nineties slowcore jam, except for the Morricone-ish horn swells, the guitar crunches few and far between, the sound quite spare and skeletal, and weirdly enough, downright pretty, a shuffling slow motion drift, the whole thing surprisingly melodic, and spacious, quite possibly one of the loveliest (and most unlikely) SUNNO))) tracks yet.
SUNNO))) have done wonders with their limited sonic pallete, who would have thought a one time Earth cover band would have survived this long, and resulted in such an impressive body of original work, but the group have grown and expanded and explored, they manage to incorporate all manner of sounds and textures and guest players, to realize their ultimate vision, while somehow keeping the core sound intact. We only just got this in, and we've been listening to it like crazy (which should tell you something), and the more we hear it, the more we dig it, especially that last track. Quickly becoming one of our fave SUNNO))) discs...
Incredible packaging as always. Deluxe booklet, exquisitely designed, with lyrics, lineups, diagrams, photos, illustrations, some of the pages vellum, all housed in a transparent printed vellum slipcover.
Yet again, proving that you haven't really owned a Sunn 0))) record until you've bought it at least twice, preferably three times, here comes two more blasts from the dark side of the doom, what many consider to be Sunn 0)))'s finest moments, their debut, The GrimmRobe Demos, and record number three, Flight Of The Behemoth! Both expanded with over the top new packaging, gorgeous Japanese style mini lp gatefold style cd sleeves, inserts, printed inner sleeves, but most importantly a whole disc of unreleased material!!
The GrimmRobe Demos was the first most of us had ever heard of this supposed Earth tribute band, their debut disc in a cardboard sleeve, wrapped in a black trash bag silkscreened with the Sunn 0))) logo in metallic gold, the sound a filthier, sludgier version of Earth's classic 2 album. We were in doomdirgedeathdrone nirvana. And still are. After a million Sunn 0))) wannabes, the GrimmRobe Demos still sound as heavy and sludge-y and as gloriously grim as ever.
The packaging is of course fantastic, a super thick gatefold mini lp style sleeve, printed in that deep blue and silver, inside a HUGE booklet affixed to the front, with extensive liner notes, in English and Japanese, including a looooong essay, Ode To The Grimmrobe, by Seldon Hunt. Each disc is in a plastic sleeve housed in a full color printed sleeve, the disc proper has more images like those inside the gatefold, while the bonus disc has a flyer and photos from the live show within. So yeah, Sunn 0))) performing live, back in 1999, when they were still an opening act (opening for Angel Rot, who?), 25 + minutes of crumbling low end destruction, gritty and grimy and filthy, a massive roiling morass of downtuned guitar rumble and shimmering feedback, gorgeous and of course brutal, and capturing Sunn 0))) near the beginning. Fans will of course want this, the packaging, the essay, the killer live show, but just like Flight Of The Behemoth, folks who missed out on the GrimmRobe Demos the first time around, should must definitely rectify that situation RIGHT NOW.
Of all the SUNNO))) cds, and there have been a LOT, this remains perhaps the closest to the original template of worshipping Earth II to a T. Which as far as we're concerned, at least sonically, is a very very good thing. Earth tribute band? Sunn? Huh? For those confused, or new to the world of Sunn 0))), let's elaborate.
Once upon a time, there was Earth, a slower than slow, heavier than heavy Sub Pop combo that took the Melvins molasses drone riffing over the edge. Turning sound into something so slow and physical you could almost feel it more than hear it. They disbanded, disappeared, and since then they've resurfaced, albeit with a new, WAY less sludgey sound, so it was and IS up to the dudes in Sunn 0))) (get it, Earth, Sunn, there's also a Sunn tribute band called Moon) to revisit, and resuscitate Earth's genius genesis (back when Kurt Cobain used to play with 'em!), and thus, Sunn 0))) deliver what could be a part two to Earth 2, loooooong tracks of primordial dirge, humming and rumbling and crumbling and moving like a blackened glacier, riffs sprawled out over minutes instead of seconds, a slowly churning propulsive murky low end beast. One track is even named after Earth leader Dylan Carlson. And of course, as we mentioned above, the band name Sunn is derived from the proximity in the solar system to Earth, but also, and maybe moreso, the amps of choice for both outfits, appropriately so 'cause it's the amps more than the guitars that you hear here. They're not covering Earth tunes here, but are basically following the same formula towards drone metal godhead. Essential for all devotees of the ultra-heavy!
