The latest from local label Valley King, is the first release from Black Elk Medicine Band, the solo project of Isaiah Mitchell of recent aQ Record Of The Weekers Golden Void, as well as psych rock shredders Earthless, and in BEMB, at least on this single, Mitchell is joined by Phil Manley (Trans Am, Life Coach, The Fucking Champs, etc.) and John McBain of the mighty Monster Magnet (and Carlton Melton!). You'd never know it on the B side, which just happens to be the one we listened to first - a dark, brooding, seventies sounding psychedelic drift, swirling soft tangles of slow burn guitar shred smolder, draped over a thick, ominous sprawl of sinister synth buzz, sounding like Mitchell's homage to Funkadelic's "Maggot Brain", the same sort of dark psych brood, tense and emotional and moody.
But flip the record over, and Mitchell and crew let loose with a heady barrage of spaced out psych that wouldn't sound out of place on a Golden Void or Earthless record. A simple skeletal programed rhythm pulses away beneath clouds of heavily flanged riffage, and yep, some seriously soaring heart of the sun shredding, sounding almost like a snippet of a much longer jam, fading in, the action already underway, the band locked into some seriously tripped out psychedelic mesmer, Mitchell laying down another blast of tangled super emotive guitar god leads, over a tranced out motorik background, eventually fading out, as if the actual jam, the one we just got a single side glimpse of, continued well on into the forever.
LIMITED TO 500 NUMBERED COPIES!! In a swank sleeve featuring all new artwork from artist Alan Forbes, each one signed!
Upon first hearing the name "Black Hell", you can get at least a vague of idea of where this quartet lies on the sonic spectrum. Then you see the wordless album cover, a beautiful and clear image of a mighty desert rock formation haloed by a shock of pink light and surrounded by a series of optical cubes. Nice cover, for sure, but for some reason it conjures what you might expect from some experimental album or what have you. They say you can't always judge a book by its cover. And maybe that means something, somewhere... Because a few seconds into How The Rest Was Lost, everything clicks and it all makes sense: Oh, this is heavy as fuck cosmic STONER ROCK! From the deserts of Arizona, no less. So you can totally judge a book by its cover.
Black Hell deal in, like we said, heavy as fuck cosmic stoner rock, emphasizing the groove and looking way beyond the stars. There is a good deal of melody too, sort of melancholy, and totally catchy, with absolutely huge sounding production to give you a nice dose of mountainous drumming and totally rifftastic guitars that sound loud enough to fill all the open space on the album cover. The vocals are cool, and somewhat atypical of the genre, maybe higher than what you sometimes get with heavier groups, but definitely not in a bad way. It's actually quite similar to the guy in The Sword. Not quite as high as the dude in Mammatus, and not as whiney as the guy in Kyuss - the singer's voice is clean and expressive, not guttural or booming or anything. With song titles like "Lunar Procession", "Storms of Jupiter", "Lycanthropy", "Planet Maker", and "Celestial Conquest" (that was all of them, they're just pretty fucking cool), you should know whether or not this is for you. We say bring it on.
This Italian band's sole album from 1985 is a tough one to figure out. An oddity all right. They're definitely a metal band at heart -- the fast-paced, pre-album demo track "Midnight Madman" included here as one of four bonus cuts is proof of that -- but on their album itself, they somehow created a much more unexpectedly PSYCHEDELIC and spacey, synthy sound. Totally dark and gothic in a metal way, yeah, but lost in space at the back of a black hole (of course), a slowed-down, doomed-out, dosed-with-cough-syrup vibe, splicing bits of Voivod with the likes of Jacula... in fact, the lurching music on this crackly disc (mastered directly from a none-too-pristine vinyl copy, the original reels having been lost to time, and sounding to us all the better for it!) could be AQ-faves Jacula given an '80s metal makeover... the church organ strains that open "Demoniac City" surely set that tone. Meanwhile, the title track cops a riff from Sabbath's "Electric Funeral", as if to give the nod to their biggest influence we're pretty sure. But the doomy compositions of vocalist/bassist/organist Robert Measles (great name!!) also derive from phantasms far beyond our plane, we're pretty sure of that as well.
Those in the know about Italian '80s metal acts like Death SS, Paul Chain, Bulldozer and Dark Quarterer are aware that a bizarre, poverty-stricken sort of prog weirdness often infects the proceedings, and Black Hole are no exception. In their case, on this album, it makes for something really strange and special, creating a cultish legacy that led to this cd reissue. We're glad to get to hear it! Now it's time to burn the black candles and visit Black Hole's "Spectral World" ruled by "Blind Men And Occult Forces"...
Former Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Zakk Wylde (he of the trademark pick squeals) rocks with a brand of hard, dirgy rock. Southern-tinged (a la CoC) stoner metal? 'Cause it's Zakk the stoner metal contigent might not pick up on this, but it actually blows away most other efforts in the genre: it's super heavy, full of (of course) great guitar playing and some excellent songwriting. Zakk handles the vocals too, with a voice again reminescent of CoC's Pepper Keenan. For fans of Acid Bath, Alice in Chains, Down, etc.
Our good pal Cayce, who sadly passed away back in 2007, was as obsessive about freaky and fucked up music as we are, and was the first to bring this record to our attention, which we might have otherwise ignored on account of the somewhat dodgy sounding band name they possess. Black Mayonnaise? Eww. But Black Mayonnaise are definitely AQ-material, Cayce was right. Self-described (it says it right on the back cover) as "Warped Lunar Sludge-core", this band is akin to a lo-fi melding of SUNNO))) and Godflesh. It is sludgy and doomy, but not so much heavy or riffy, more just ominous and creepy and droney and dubby and distorted... Imagine plodding, repetitive, hypnotic, echoey drum machine hits mixed with mellow Merzbow-ian drone, whilst gargling, not-even-vocals bubble up from a tarpit of rumbling bass, amidst sundry sci-fi synth noises and the distant wails of whales and wookies. And there's a 'cover' song on here too, "Graveyard" by the Butthole Surfers, a choice that speaks volumes.
Listening to this disc is like stumbling through a miasma AND slowly sinking into a mire. We love it! Chances are there's only one guy behind Black Mayonnaise, and he recorded this in his bedroom -- but it sounds more like it was recorded in a moist, dark cave...perhaps the cavernous stomach of some extraterrestrial monster. Gastro-intestinal, interstellar doom, anyone? If that sounds good to you like it does to us, then this is quite recommended.
We loved the recent full length Black Mountain record (except for the first track, see the full length review for more on that) a bastard mix of Sabbathy stoner rock, weird white soul and drone-y VU style dope rock. The best track by far was the massive "Druganaut", with it dueling male / female slacker vocals and THAT riff, the chorus that got our heads banging everytime it came on, no matter how hard we tried to fight it. The extended version here blunts the power of THAT riff just a bit, but not without good reason, as the whole track is stretched waaaaay out, and drenched in reverb, as well as all sorts of buzzy noodly synths and a thick layer of hiss, which makes the whole thing sound just that much more fucked up and drugged out. It sounds what I imagine the orginal would sound like if you were doped to the gills! The extra tracks are pretty killer too. "Buffalo Swan" is a droney, blissed out hypnotic drug jam, with plenty of ambient shimmer and bass driven breakdowns. Creepy and mysterious. "Bicycle Man" is a rollicking fuzz bass, jangle pop garage rock workout complete with nonsense lyrics and harmonica! And finally "No Satisfaction (Campfire Version)" sounds just like you would think, a simple Dylan / Stones piano and strummed acoustic guitar sing along, with a stomping rhythm and lazily drawled boy girl vocals. A pretty kick ass (and pretty lengthy at 25 minutes) slab of druggy, seventies soul infused groove rock!
Doom metal bands aren't exactly uncommon these days - which is a good thing, as we can remember when there were only like five or six of them, really! - but we know that I Hate Records can be counted on to bring us the best. Also, this band, Italy's Black Oath, we already were familiar with due to an earlier, self-titled cdep that we never could get enough of to list (though we might still have a copy or two in stock if you ask). We liked that, and we like this. What's not to like? Ultra heavy, fuzzy guitar chords surge solemnly forth like black rays from some sub-Hell, weighty riffs churn and crunch, with mournful, melodic vocal lamentations rising up over it all. Black Oath incorporate additional church organ atmospherics as well, adding to the idea that doom metal monks are making this music (and also giving us a suggestion of '70s prog a la Jacula). The album is strong throughout, coming to an epic close with the eleven minute title track, that manages, within the confines of their monkish aesthetic, to really "rock out" at the end, while also bringing in rainstorm sounds and classical strings.
Most simply put, Black Oath manifest themselves like sludgier version of Candlemass, with plenty of Italy's occult metal tradition (Jacula, Death SS/Paul Chain, Black Hole, and AQ fave Tony Tears) prominent in the mix as well. This sombre, majestic album ought to find favor with fans of the aforementioned, also Griftegard, The Wounded Kings, Fall Of The Idols, Thunderstorm, and maybe Moss too, though this isn't so "ultra" doom as the latter. A delectable, despairing dose for all discerning doom hounds.
Most long time readers of the aQ list are familiar with the stumbling weirdo surf guitar flecked outsider black metal of the German horde Varghkoghargasmal, whose peculiar brand of 'wooden metal' was a huge hit around here. So much so that our very own Andee released Varghkoghargasmal's Drowned In Lakes on his tUMULt label. Varghkoghargasmal mainman Avenger has more up his sonic sleeve, including not one, but two other projects on this week's list, one of which is this twisted blackened duo, appropriately monikered Black Priest Of Satan, which finds Avenger teamed up with the also awesomely named Molestor Kadotus, the two conjuring up a sound that's not all that far removed from Varghkoghargasmal actually. The drums are murky and stumbly, the guitars fuzzed out, the whole sound is loose, off kilter and home brewed, some seriously raw primitive satanic black doom, which is only further twisted by the crazed vocals, multiple vocal lines, some growled, others almost chanted, and still others soaring into shrieked falsettos, with voices overlapping, getting all tangled up, drenched in reverb and delay, giving the vokills, and the whole sound, a seriously dubbed out, almost psychedelic vibe. The music itself lurches from slo-mo black metal buzz, to sludgey Sabbathy doom, to lumbering chaotic thrash, always on the verge of collapse, and always wreathed in a seriously fucked up occultic ritualistic vibe, that makes this sound like some lost tape traded artifact from the late eighties or early nineties! Awesome.
As you can guess from the title, this is the second album by Massachusetts psychedelic sludge doomsters Black Pyramid, sequel to their self-titled full-length from 2009, also on the MeteorCity label. We somehow missed that one, much like we did with the first Elder, another MeteorCity act from the Bay State that we recently highlighted the 2nd album by... and boy are these bands kinda similar in other ways, yep both stoner sludge trios, both kicking out the double digit length jams, both (like a lot of MeteorCity bands) worshipping at the altar of Sleep and the like, and worshipping 'em well. If you like Elder and WhiteBuzz, you oughtta check out BP!
The disc starts off with the very metal "Endless Agony", one of those galloping, triumphant, leading-beserker-troops-into-bloody-battle sort of songs. And that's the vibe on a lot of this record, storming stuff that fans of Sleep's aggro offshoot High On Fire should cotton to. Certainly the first couple of tracks take no prisoners... then they get REALLY Sleep-y (but not sleepy), on "Night Queen" which has that swinging Sleep-like lope, a la "Dragonaut". (And a la Black Sabbath too of course.) That then leads into the disc's first true epic, the 12-minute plus "Dreams Of The Dead", which interweaves Black Pyramid's crushing riffage with introspective psych explorations and milder melodic moments. They follow that with a brief, beautiful instrumental acoustic number, "Tanelorn", as if to serve as an intermission of sorts, a quick, quiet break before the rest of "side two", the second half of the album mirroring the first, containing both raging metal ("Sons Of Chaos") and lumbering doom ("The Hidden Kingdom"), culminating in another double digit epic, "Into The Dawn", complete with classic riffing, gruff but glorious clean vocals, Melvins-y grind, delicate guitar bits, and spacey synth drone over the course of its nearly 16 minutes. All kinds of awesome there. BP could be likened to a sludgier Saviours, in fact, when we're not hammering on the Sleep comparisons. Again if you liked the recently-reviewed Elder on the same label, you should give Black Pyramid a go!
For the 35th anniversary of Black Sabbath, Rhino unveils this massive box set collecting in their entirety the eight studio albums by the original Ozzy Osbourne-fronted Black Sabbath line-up. And that's just great, fantastic. But actually I (Allan) personally think something even more substantial is in order for the band that, more than anyone, invented heavy metal -- a physical monument, perhaps a Gothic cathedral to be built in Birmingham England, where their music could be constantly playing on hidden loudspeakers 24-7? Something like that. But then again, they are pretty much my favorite band of all time. There's not room here to explain why, but I'd say Sabbath are in a large part responsible for my fanatical interest in music of all kinds and thus my job here at Aquarius Records. Seriously. The heaviness, the riffs, the emotion, the sincerity, the originality, the love, the darkness, the mystery, the humanity... Black Sabbath stand above all others.
So... anyway this box set gets a hardy recommendation from me. Basically, if you don't already have all the remastered cds of the Ozzy-era albums, then you should BUY THIS. It's a deal. 12 bucks an album, plus a felt-covered 78-page hardback book and a bonus DVD! And we're talking about some of the BEST ALBUMS EVER. Black Sabbath, Paranoid, Master Of Reality, Vol. 4, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, Sabotage, Technical Ecstasy, Never Say Die. Ask me to list the top 20 heavy metal albums -- nay, rock and roll albums -- of all time and at least the first six of these will be on it! (Actually, please don't ask me, but you get my point.) The DVD consists of four songs performed live on the German Beat Club TV show, with that great psychedelic early '70s video effects processing. You've probably seen "Iron Man" or "Paranoid" from this before, they show 'em on VH-1 or MTV sometimes. But there's also "Black Sabbath" (dig the extreme close-ups on Ozzy's anguished face as he sings) and their rockin' cover of "Blue Suede Shoes"! Sabbath fans might already have these, though, as they've been available before. The book contains lots of great pictures, a detailed Sabbath timeline, two lengthy essays about the original Sabbath's rise and fall, and (at last!) printed lyrics from all eight albums...the surreal drugged-out poetry of the Sabbath Bloody Sabbath lyrics in particular are brilliant. Lots to pour over here, and even a Sab fan like myself learned somethings (like, it's Tony Iommi, not Ozzy, coughing in the intro to "Sweet Leaf"). Maybe the one unnecessary thing in the book are the celebrity blurbs that litter the pages -- Sabbath don't really need the endorsement of Beck or Henry Rollins, do they?! And I also must complain that nowhere in the band history or timeline does the post-Ozzy Sabbath even get a mention: Ronnie James Dio at least deserves better than that!
The whole set is packaged smartly in, of course, a black box. There's two smaller cardboard slip-case style boxes (labeled 1970-1972 and 1973-1978 respectively) that fit in there with the book, each of 'em holding four digipack cds, with the original album art. The cds themselves are remastered. Sadly, there's not much in the way of extras -- no bonus tracks to speak of (the only one being "Evil Woman" from the UK edition of their debut). But Sabbath weren't a band that recorded a lot of throw-away b-sides or un-issued song demos. After all, these eight albums were from a span of eight years, the first four from just 2 years. So they were quite prolific but it all ended up on their albums -- and what's so amazing is that there's no filler. For the first six albums at least, almost EVERY SONG is great, and contains a riff eternal. That's why they're gods. However, I do think that they could have dug up some live material (there's bootlegs of lots of good stuff) or the rumoured demos from pre-Sabbath incarnation Earth. Too much to hope for I guess. And the DVD could have included more than the Beat Club footage: what about the California Jam or Don Kirschner's Rock Concert or their promotional videos? Oh well. Again, that's only gonna matter to extreme fans like myself, everyone else should be more than satisfied with just the timeless, legendary music from the albums anyway.
Previously hard-to-find on cd, the last great Sabbath album, 1983's "Born Again" sees Ian "Deep Purple" Gillan stepping up to the mic, replacing Ronnie James. This lineup only lasted one album, but it's one of our favorites.
First post-Ozzy outing, Dio's Sabbath debut.
Live with Ozzy in '74 or so. Finally remastered and available on a non-shoddy label.
Totally legit Italian-label LP reissue of Black Sabbath's third album, from 1971. And it's really swank, the nice plastic sleeve housing the properly-embossed record jacket, which contains a poster and of course, the record itself, a 180 gram purple-colored vinyl pressing! Nice. We probably don't have to tell you that Master Of Reality is one of Black Sabbath's best, heck one of the best elpees EVER, with Tony, Geezer, Ozzy and Bill whumping out such classics as "Sweet Leaf", "Children of the Grave", "Into The Void", "Lord Of This World" -- good grief every track on here is brilliant!
We probably don't have to tell you that Master Of Reality is one of Black Sabbath's best, heck one of the best elpees EVER, with Tony, Geezer, Ozzy and Bill whumping out such classics as "Sweet Leaf", "Children of the Grave", "Into The Void", "Lord Of This World" -- good grief every track on here is brilliant!
Their second album with Dio, and despite the absence of drummer Bill Ward, it's an all time metal classic with some of Sabbath's best songs.
The final Ozzy-era Sabbath disc.
Essential.
Forget about the Ozzfest reunion tours, this is live Black Sabbath (the BEST BAND EVER, sez Allan) from their '70s heyday, with the original, Ozzy-fronted line-up. Two discs worth of the heaviest of metal from the originators of the form. Super-exciting but for one thing: many Sabbath fans probably already have disc one, formerly known as the "Live At Last" album (recorded in 1973, released in 1980 against the band's wishes at the time -- 'cause they'd fired Ozzy and Ronnie James Dio was now their singer. Now, of course, they've got no problem with it). Still, one whole disc of previously (officially) unreleased live Sabbath is worth more than the 24 bucks this is going to cost you. And it comes with (while supplies of this handsome limited edition digipack version last) a poster and guitar pick, plus three bonus tracks too that aren't on the regular jewelcase edition.
Here's the track listing:
(Disc One) Tomorrow's Dream, Sweet Leaf, Killing Yourself To Live, Cornucopia, Snowblind, Children of the Grave, War Pigs, Wicked World, Paranoid, (Disc Two) Hand of Doom, Hole in the Sky*, Symptom of the Universe, Megalomania*, Iron Man*, Black Sabbath, N.I.B., Behind the Wall, Fairies Wear Boots. (Asterisks indicate bonus tracks only on this digipak verison.)
As a live band, Black Sabbath kill -- absolutely charismatic, energetic, and creative. And of course, HEAVY. Plus, you get to enjoy Ozzy's stage banter ("Are you high? Are you high? So am I!"), and variant, improvised lyrics/solos. In the middle of "Wicked World" on disc one, Tony Iommi gets a melodic, medieval solo, then they go into a jazz break, then jam on a whole 'nother riff, with Ozzy making up lyrics, that could have been a great song but never made it into the studio in this form, and then charge into "Supernaut", followed by a Bill Ward drum showcase, then back to "Wicked World"...
So, "Past Lives" is pretty incredible, from a musical standpoint. Of course, they could have included a lot more -- there's lots of pics from Sabbath's appearance at 1974's California Jam but as far as I can tell, no tracks from it. And where's "Blue Suede Shoes"??
Further complaints: although there's plenty of cool old pics of the Ozzy and the boys, and it's a nicely designed package, they should have gotten a Sabbath fan to proofread the liner notes (their third album is Master of Reality, not Masters of Reality, for instance -- and I think it's the Birmingham Town Hall they played at in 1972, not Burmingham Town Hall) but that's a quibble. What really does suck is that the tracks on disc two are given no specific dates and venues of recording -- it just says "recorded live at various locations & dates during the seventies". Lame! It seems from the track selection and Ozzy's between-songs comments that the majority of the second disc dates from around 1975, right before the release of their Sabotage album (they do "Megalomania"!!). Is this from the Philadelphia show recently bootlegged as a triple LP box set? Other songs are from their December 20th, 1970 show at the Olympia in Paris. I've got a bootleg of that and the tracks here certainly sound better than they do on the boot. Now, why the people who put this together didn't think we'd want to know where and when the tracks were from I can't imagine... But anyway, especially if you don't already have Live At Last and probably even if you do, this is an essential purchase for Sabbath fans.
Essential.
Remastered version of the Sabs' most "prog" album, the masterpiece known as "Sabotage". Essential.
Really good, but perhaps not absolutely essential.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Essential.
Essential.
Only one of the most important debut albums in the history of rock and roll!!! Essential.
What the heck's up with Glasgow these days? Until recently, Glasgow was all sunshiney jangle pop and brooding epic post rock. Or so it seemed. Maybe we haven't been paying attention. Maybe it's been a while since we took a good hard look at the seedy underbelly of Glasgow's music scene, but something sinister is definitely going on over there, cuz all sorts of filthy, brutal, heavy, sick sounds are oozing across the sea and into our cowering frightened ears. Next list we'll probably be listing a record by another Glaswegian crew called De Salvo, who are scary as shit, and here we've got the latest from Black Sun.
Black Sun is a bit of a name over there, but they're a new name to us, although it only took a few minutes of this filth for us to realize folks over here, especially the ones into massive dronedirgedeathcrush and slow motion ultra doooooom will likely be freaking out big time.
Three tracks, all 'versions' of the same song, the first, 19+ minutes taking up the whole of side one, is all lurching downtuned lumber, squealing harmonics, all locked into step with the pounding drums, the vocals tortured and anguished and WAY up in the mix, the sound somewhere between Khanate, Eyehategod, and Neurosis. About halfway through the sound simmers down a bit, a low slung softly churning bass rumble, clean minor key guitar lines all spidery and skeletal, warm whirring keyboards, that eventually slip into a groove that sounds uncannily like a slowed down Three Mile Pilot. Clean crooned vocals, laid over the woozy rhythm, before exploding back into stuttering metallic stop start lurch, gradually growing more and more noisy and unhinged.
The flip side takes the same track and jacks up the industrial vibe, way more low end crunch, a bit murkier and muddier, the vocals buried in the mix, little streaks of feedback peeking out from behind thick caustic slabs of rhythmic pound. Very reminiscent of Godflesh or Pitchshifter, relentless and machinelike, but wreathed in swirls of strange keyboards, and mysterious effects and all manner of fucked up guitar filigree. In some ways superior to the A side, at least to these ears. And finally, the second half of the B-side offers up the 'dub' version, which takes the more industrial version of "Paralyser" even further, the rhythm stripped down, the guitars processed and clipped, the vocals twisted and doused in effects, the arrangement all spaced out, the drums pounding one second, careening from speaker to speaker the next, the whole track actually is panned pretty hard, making headphones essential for experiencing the full dizzy drift. Definitely left us wanting more...
Essential listening for the usual suspects. If your favorite sounds are most often described with the adjectives doomy, crumbling, blackened, pummeling, crushing, heavy, crusty, metallic, slow motion, glacial, filthy, then my friends, you should prepare to kneel in supplication, and stare directly into the Black Sun...
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES, housed in a very Godflesh looking sleeve, with a heavy cardstock insert, liner notes on one side and strange bloody symbols on the other.
They had us at Blackwolfgoat, pretty much! We had to check it out. And it lives up to the name, in fact, surpasses it, 'cause that moniker, while suggestive of darkness and evil, is just a bit silly too, ain't it? Silly isn't how we'd describe Blackwolfgoat's droned-out heavy psych guitar hypnosis, though. Somnambulant, spacey, sinister, solitary, but not silly. Still we like the name. Also, this comes to us via the reliable stoner rock label Small Stone, a good mark of quality heaviness. And this is stoner all right, but not quite rock, falling on the more abstract and experimental, drone-dirgery side of things than Small Stone's usual fare, the shadowy psychedelic nature of this music coming closest to the label's left-fielders like Tia Carrera and Los Natas, but with a vibe that's blacker, bleaker, yet still beautiful.
The half dozen tracks here, almost all built up of looping layers of blown out guitar grind, are what sound like minimalist one-man-and-amp instrumentals, playing riffs so slow and sludgey and slidey that they're often more like waves of distortion sometimes adorned with electronic feedbacky blips... it's not just swampy, it's SwampTHINGy. It's like this Blackwolfgoat guy (we're assuming it's a guy) is just jamming out, doing his thing that maybe you too, if you're a guitar player could do, but are you? No. And maybe you shoulda. 'Cause it's pretty cool. But do you share this psychedelic hermit's black void vision?
There's enough variety across these six tracks to keep it interesting, if you're in danger of utterly nodding off then wham, what about the primitive percussive "Aspirin Forever", with crinkly noise and clanky beats, a brief interlude of weirdly rhythmic, out of nowhere WTF?-ness that threw us for a loop (or loops). That's followed by the lovely album ender "Hotel Anhedonia", a super relaxed, druggy, jangly (if something this thick can jangle), kinda poppy, mantric meandering 10+ minute solo, the cleanest guitar on here so far, as the track slowly fades out and Blackwolfgoat rides off into the the glowing sunset.
Reminds us of / possibly influenced by, the likes of Earth, SUNNO))), Barn Owl, Boris, Sleep, Davis Redford Triad, Ulaan Khol.... but (we'll repeat) especially Earth, particularly circa Phase III: Thrones And Dominions, or the Hendrix-worship of parts of Pentastar: In The Style Of Demons.
Oh, and we just checked the credits, it IS just one guy, who furthermore recorded all "songs/sounds" on this album live in the studio, with no overdubs at all.
Yet more stoner rock from the deserts of Scandinavia!
Experience the chilling terror of.... BLIZARO! Thrill to the nightmarish sensation that is... BLIZARO!
Enjoy the lovely melodies of... BLIZARO! Space out to the swirling sizzling synths of... BLIZARO!
Puzzle at the schizophrenic doom-prog-metal-soundscapes conjured by... BLIZARO!
Oh yeah, we've been waiting for this one for a while! Keen readers of the AQ list might recall mention of Blizaro in our review of the debut Crucifist release on Profound Lore, earlier this year. We mentioned that the guitarist from that blackened death-thrash entity, John Gallo (also of true doomsters Orodruin), had an awesome, eccentric synth-based side project called Blizaro, whom we'd experienced via some self-released cd-r's. Thus we were looking forward to Blizaro's upcoming full-length cd, and at long last, it's finally here! Like a mad scientist's lo-fi, DIY mashup of Goblin and Black Sabbath, Blizaro is right up our dark and creepy alley. Yours too we might imagine. It almost makes up for that Tony Tears album having gone out of print.
There's definitely plenty of metal bands who have taken inspiration from the classic Italian horror/suspense "giallo" cinema (and soundtracks), we're thinking Necrophagist, Hooded Menace, Cathedral, Moss, Acid Witch... and of course other musicians too, recent good examples being Zombi, Majeure, Magda, and Umberto. (Oh, and NightSatan, whose album we should soon have, too.) But Blizaro kind of take it to another, weirder level of worship. Blizaro is bizarro, yes that's for sure. Their sinister synthesis of Goblin/Sabbath has some off-kilter, confusional, sorta Sun City Girlish elements to it as well. It never really gets very metal, actually, but also stays away from the disco thing too.
Divided into two halves, one "Physical" and one "Mental", this disc offers up a deranged range of strangeness, from the fuzzed out Sabbathy psych riffage of "Midnight Lurkers" to the purely synthesized spacey suspensefulness of "Violet Cosmos". The eight minute opening epic, title track "City Of Living Nightmare", is a progged out tour de force of both gentle, eerie melodies and jagged martial metal riffage. It certainly sets the stage for what follows... cinematic symphonics, whispered vocal incantations, organ drones, monkish moans, sickly grooves, acid guitar soloing, druggy atmospheres... with song titles like "Eyes In The Caskets", "Catacomb Man", "Portallucinations", and "Ceremonial Bone Ritual". And then, at the opposite end of the album, as if to give credit where credit is due, Blizaro wind up the disc with a spot-on cover of Goblin's theme to Suspira! Almost unnecessary, after what's come before, but a nice touch nonetheless.
Quite recommended, especially to those who dig, say, both Osanna and Witchfinder General, or Fabio Frizzi and Paul Chain (all artists, among many others, that Blizaro cite as influences). Man, if only this were an actual soundtrack to an obscure old giallo, in the tradition of Argento and Fulci, we'd sure love to see that movie!!
So, people, if you dare, feel the embrace of the purple-hued, witch-haunted horror that is... BLIZARO!
To quote ourselves, prepare again to "feel the embrace of the purple-hued, witch-haunted horror that is... Blizaro!"
Yup, in reviewing this double disc journey into the violet cosmos of the prog/doom/soundtrack obsessed, mostly-one-man-band Blizaro, we would find it hard to top what we said about 'em before, in our review of the album we made a Record Of The Week back in 2010. That disc, City Of Living Nightmare, we likened to a mad scientist's lo-fi, DIY mashup of Goblin and Black Sabbath - a hybrid of psychedelic doom metal, synthesizer prog, and Italian giallo soundtracks that totally blew us away. That was followed by a split with female-fronted occult doom-deathsters Wooden Stake, also really great.
But what came before? Well, several homebrewed cd-r's worth of Blizaro music preceded the compact disc debut we had made Record Of The Week. Some of us here had tracked down copies of those, and ever since we've been hoping they'd get reissued so we could share 'em with you. In fact, we liked 'em so much, we got in touch with the man behind Blizaro, John Gallo (guitarist for Rochester, NY doom metallers Orodruin), and were "in talks" with him to re-release the these cd-r's together on a proper cd, via aQuarius, like we did with our White Hills and Carlton Melton Record Store Day discs! But then the Italian label I, Voidhanger stepped in and snatched Blizaro away from us - which is perfectly okay 'cause they really did such a great job putting together this nicely appointed package, which they expanded to two discs, not just one, incorporating not only the material from Blizaro's three pre-City cd-r's, but also a more recent recording we hadn't yet heard, plus a whole bunch of unreleased bonus tracks too.
Disc one of Strange Doorways consists of the tracks from Blizaro's The Old Wizard Of Winter (2009) and Black Magicians (2012) cd-rs, along with three extra unreleased tracks. Disc two's got the Horror Rock (2006) and Blue Tape (2008) cd-r's, and five extra cuts. 40 tracks in all! It's quite a varied array of material, all of it proving how amazingly talented and creative John Gallo is as a musician and songwriter. The music here ranges from creepy groovy stuff in the Goblin-y realm, to full on '70s hard rockin', to quirky prog epics, to strange synthesizer experiments, to classical guitar styled fantasias, and even echoed-out synthbass bunkurfunk. Lots to listen to, lots to like. The Old Wizard Of Winter stuff is heavily synth-based (originally recorded as a Christmas gift for relatives!!), mostly all Moog and organ, whereas elsewhere Gallo puts his electric guitar and quite a few other instruments to good use, his voice too, and gets a bit of help from friends, including his bandmates in Orodruin, and members of Revered Bizarre. BTW, Blizaro now has a membership of three, Gallo plus a drummer and bassist, so here's hoping they go on tour and we get to see 'em!
The thick cd booklet features pages and pages of track-by-track liner notes from Gallo himself, discussing his ideas, inspirations and equipment, how each track came together. Kinda writing his own review, he namechecks everyone from Goblin and Paul Chain to Vangelis and Tangerine Dream to Atomic Rooster and Arthur Brown. We can hear it all, for sure. Wow. We've heard plenty of bedroom recorded indie pop and electronica, black metal too, but eccentric progged-out proto-metal? Blizaro does that - and more - quite convincingly. Highly recommended of course.
This Canadian doom-psych-prog-metal band's 2008 debut was a big fave 'round here, we likened their female-fronted n' flutey, Hammond organ driven occult heaviness to "Electric Wizard given a medieval, madrigal makeover" and compared 'em to a hypothetical Atomic Rooster + Jacula + Jex Thoth hybrid. So, stoked are we to announce the arrival of a brand new Blood Ceremony, still damp and crimson, and damn good! There's a few ways, we figure, a band like this could go: get darker and more extreme metal (a la Wooden Stake), or lighten up and develop more in their prog direction (we could imagine 'em sounding something like Curved Air in that case). Or, of course, they could provide more of the same, which would elicit no complaints from us. And that's what Blood Ceremony pretty much opted for, this album coming off like a continuation / perfection of their debut, nine more songs of vintage '70s sounding, witchy rockarolla. With plenty of rollicking Hammond organ and swinging retro riffery, they deliver the progged-out proto-metal goods like it's 1971 and they've just come from getting stoned with their groovy coven. Complete with a flute happy instrumental ("The Hermit"). And definitely, with a lot hinging on the dramatic, stagey, sometimes soft, sometimes soaring, vocals of Alia O'Brien.
Again, VERY much in the vein of Jex Thoth. O'Brien and Blood Ceremony are almost the Burning Saviours to Jex Thoth's Witchcraft, if you follow that doom-nerd analogy. Another would be Black Sabbath with a sex change, and Deep Purple or Uriah Heep's keyboards hired on... as Sabbath's actual keyboardy stuff, courtesy caped wonder Rick Wakeman on Sabbath Bloody Sabbath ferinstance, was a lot more "synthy" sounding than the classic Hammond vibe heard here, played in kick ass fashion by O'Brien by the way, a triple threat talent who's also the band's flautist, flaunting it indeed, what would they do without her?
Not that the guitarist, for one, doesn't get to shine as well, in the riff department, and dueling leads with the organ, like during the swirling, surging tour de force of the epic "Oliver Haddo" (the album's second longest song, not quite beating out the 10 minute plus closer, "Daughter Of The Sun", another extended, involved rite, all right).
This time, produced by Sanford Parker (Pelican, Yob, Zoroaster, Samothrace, The Gates Of Slumber, etc.), which perhaps accounts for some of the added thickness/heaviness we sense here, though the debut was heavy too. He also supplies some Moog.
This disc's too-dark cover photo of the band is about the only disappointment, whereas the cover painting for their first album, by fantasy artist George Barr, was something to look at. But for listening, this is indeed the answer to your prayers to the Great God Pan. So good, we simply can't get enough of this, and if you too are truly in the mood for some beauteous and bombastic, rockin' pagan prog heaviness, then it's time to begin Living With The Ancients!
Come, come to the sabbat!! It is now upon us, The Eldritch Dark, album number 3 from one of our top favorites amongst the burgeoning new wave of female fronted occult rock bands, Toronto's Blood Ceremony. And there's a LOT of good bands in that "scene", a bunch of 'em on the same label(s), Rise Above/Metal Blade. Blood Ceremony are a bit heavier than their UK compatriots/competition, Purson, reviewed last list, but a heck of a lot more folky and Comus-y than The Devil's Blood (RIP - that band's final release comes out next week).
While vocalist/flautist/keyboard player/witchy woman Alia O'Brien is once again the star of the show, there are evocative male vocals on here too, from bassist Lucas Gadke, first noticeable on track 3, the semi-acoustic "Lord Summerisle" - that's right, a reference to the Wicker Man movie there, hardly a surprise, considering their inspirations. All the songs are about black masses, dark woods and witchery, dontcha know. And capture a '70s Britfolk, Wicker Man vibe for sure, being both catchy and atmospheric, total progged-out pagan hoedown material, full of not just flute but fiddle too. Plus synth and Hammer Horror organ as well, and of course some seriously doomy guitar riffage, that you can dance a reel too (but you'll halfway expect to get a sacrificial dagger in your heart at some point in the fun). Obviously recommended without reservation to fans of the aforementioned bands, also Jex Thoth, Jess And The Ancient Ones, and their non-female fronted psych-folk-doom godfathers Pagan Altar. We should also mention Jethro Tull and Black Sabbath here just to be complete!
Been looking forward to this one! The debut album from this seemingly time-lost Toronto band, the latest in the current spate of retro-proto-doom-metal bubbling up from the underground. All the heavy '70s Sabbath/Pentagram riffs -and- occult vibe of a band like Witchcraft, with soaring female vox and a thick coating of vintage Hammond organ, spooky and bombastic. It's an equation along the lines of Atomic Rooster + Jacula + Jex Thoth, maybe. Yeah, we're down with this. And that's just after hearing the first song. Then track two kicks in with some proggy flute! With LOTS more flute to follow on the rest of this album. So now they've added some Jethro Tull to the mix... Black Widow, Uriah Heep, Rainbow, and a mess of other more obscure '70s acts could also be cited as references too, along with the much more recent likes of the aforementioned Witchcraft and Jex Thoth.
Now, if you hate Jex Thoth's singing, you might have a similarly tough time with Blood Ceremony, but we found that the lady here isn't quite as polarizing a proposition. And it's her dramatic vocals that gives Blood Ceremony their special sound, along with her flute playing. She's also the organist. But let's not forget the guitars... it's tough not to grow your hair long and sprout bellbottoms when exposed to these lumbering, loping riffs, all of 'em seemingly from the school of Sleep's Sabbathier-than-thou classic "Dragonaut"! Or imagine Electric Wizard given a medieval, madrigal makeover.
And the lyrics... "I see witches in the sky, flying toward the quaalude eye"?? Ok. These guys and gal are definitely "smoking black drugs from Satan's bong" (I think that's what they said). Speaking of witchcraft, the dark arts of pagan ritual are of course Blood Ceremony's main subject matter, on tracks like "Into The Coven". The grooviest black mass we've attended in a while, right here. After spinning this for a while, if you find toads hopping about near your stereo, we wouldn't be surprised...
Appropriately enuff, back from the dead it would seem. Bear witness to the long, long awaited return of psychedelic doomsters the Blood Farmers! After almost twenty years, the cult is alive. Still unhealthily obsessed with Z-grade schlock horror films - we'd love to dig into the the insane VHS collection we figure these guys must have - this NYC stoner/sludge/doom trio hit us here with only their second proper full-length album since their self-titled debut from 1995! (There's been just one other Blood Farmers cd, Permanent Brain Damage, previously reviewed by us, containing an earlier demo + live tracks).
It's been worth the wait, for those of us who love fuzzed-out downer psych trudgery with oodles of heavier-than-thou atmosphere, yep. Not much has changed over the years, Blood Farmers still sounding beholden to Black Sabbath, Saint Vitus, and that aforementioned vintage VHS collection - this album's title track, ferinstance, is inspired by the 1971 film The Headless Eyes, about a one-eyed, eye-gouging serial killer/artist. Fans of some bands that have become popular more recently, like Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, definitely ought to check this out, they'll appreciate the synthesis of '70s exploitation cinema subject matter and Sabbatherian riffery that Blood Farmers dish out here. Part psych, part metal, it's a stripped down, garagey, lumberingly groovy sort of sound they have, embellished with some sinister synths, and the use of samples from the old movies they reference. Imagine The Heads, jamming with Electric Wizard. Or early Monster Magnet, but much more doom, with a huge horror vibe.
There's plenty in the way of moody, spaced/nodded out, almost-ambient interludes betwixt the more punishing fare, lots of this largely instrumental - however, the deep voiced holler of singer Eli Brown (often treated with underwatery FX) is definitely heard from, alongside the slo-mo six-string wizardry of guitarist Dave "Depraved" Szulkin, whose blown out riffs and acid rock leads have a hypnotic effect, abetted by the thumping rhythms of drummer Tad Leger (formerly of '80s technical thrashers Toxik, not that that has much to do with anything you'll hear here, nor does the further trivia that he also played with The Great Kat too at one time).
Blood Farmers do an amazing job of creating a heavy MOOD as well as making heavy sounds, a mood in keeping with their cinematic inspirations, but actually much more affecting and less ridiculously kitschy than a lot of those low-budget movies actually are. Speaking of mood, one of our favorite tracks here is the final one, an especially doomed-out cover of a beautiful song called "The Road Leads To Nowhere" from the David Hess soundtrack to The Last House On The Left (the vinyl reissue of which was reviewed by us not loo long ago). It's real nice, taking that song and turning it (after an acoustic guitar intro) into a heavy rock track, quite different from the original, but retaining the melodiousness of it, Eli's vocals also more restrained and melodious here as well.
We're really digging that song, and the rest of this, A LOT, and just hope they don't take another 19 years to make their next album! FYI, vinyl folks, an lp version is planned for release on the Patac label in the (hopefully) near future...
Doom! Not just doom...but maybe the best doomy release of the year, sez Allan...and it's a reissue. Of a demo tape, no less. NewYork's Blood Farmers (now defunct) recorded one self-titled album in 1995 for the (also now defunct) German label Hellhound, who are not to be confused with the Japanese label Leafhound responsible for this release. The Hellhound album was an obscure, now-out-of-print, but seriously heavy and deranged slice of doom-adelica in the vein of the masters Black Sabbath and especially Saint Vitus. But it turns out that the Blood Farmer's 1992 demo was easily as good if not better than their actual album (and has only one cut in common, "Bullet In My Head", which is a very different version here). Heads up, heads -- this starts with the 14 minute long psychedelic doom opus "Behind The Brown Door" ends with another 14+ minute epic "Deathmaster", a suite in five parts. Extended fuzz-wah terror ensues throughout those epics and all over the album as a whole, with guitarist Dave Depraved's soloing brilliantly channelling the heavy trippiness of Vitus' Dave Chandler. There's also more more concise rockers here like the aforementioned "Bullet In My Head" and "St. Chibes". Basically, imagine The Heads jamming with Vitus or Church Of Misery. Regarding the latter, the Blood Farmers share the same serial-killer obsession as do those Japanese doom freaks, but theirs is really more about the fiction films about the serial killers than the killers themselves. In addition to the original demo tracks, which are remixed and remastered, there's also a live bonus track from '96, itself followed by a hidden bonus track of ambient music/sound fx, accompanying a monologue, all doubtless lifted from one of the Blood Farmer's fave horror flicks. So if you'd like a severe dose of acid-sludge rock, look no further!
On our last list, we celebrated the return of this cult horror-obsessed heavy psychedelic doom unit, with their brand new album, Headless Eyes, which, believe it or not, was the Blood Farmers' first album since their self-titled 1995 debut! A long wait, but worth it, for all fans of moody, garagey, fuzzed out doomadelica.
We'd never reviewed that self-titled album, originally issued by Germany's now defunct Hellhound label. But when we got Headless Eyes direct from the band, we found they still had copies of the debut available, too - a cd reissue done a few years back by Japan's also-now-defunct Leaf Hound label. So we figured, heck if folks liked Headless Eyes so much (which they did, we had to restock) let's get some of their first cd too, to list - and here it is. You'll find that the Blood Farmers' sound is pretty similar on both albums, despite the nearly twenty years between 'em. The same core members are doing their thing - guitarist Dave Depraved kicks out the Sabbathy riffage and unwinds FX-laden, spindly acid rock leads, very much under the influence of Dave Chandler & Saint Vitus (and tons of '60s/'70s heavy rock obscurities), while vocalist Eli Brown bellows trippy tales of terror derived from a lifetime of watching '70s horror/exploitation cinema (the band is named after such a B-movie, Invasion Of The Blood Farmers, from '72, a film so low-budget the actors were paid with six-packs of beer). That's the Blood Farmers formula, basically, and it works darn well, making for a good mix of psychedelic atmosphere and heavy, headbanging catchiness. Anyone (like us) who thought Headless Eyes was killer will find this disc very enjoyable too, and vice versa. It provides more riffs, more fuzz, more horror, more cowbell!
And stick around for the lovely acoustic instrumental coda at the end, "After The Harvest".
This panda is bloody, dead, and gone...welcome to the funeral. Bloody Panda's debut full length, Pheremone, is a treat of funerary DOOM to be sure, but we get a lot of super rad doom don't we? It seems like every list there's another sky-melting, sun exploding super heavy band to flood your earholes (thankfully!). Among the heap of doomy metal Bloody Panda certainly stand out. First of all, the most obvious unique quality is the wailing, crooning vocals of front woman Yoshiko Ohara. Her beautifully chromatic singing adds a sort of otherworldly haunted vibe to BP's punishing sound. So weird and sick and ghostly. Also the band is just ruling! The musicianship on this is outrageous. Check out the drumming on the opening "Untitled" track, the pattern at the end (you'll know). That's some bugged out shit right there. There's organ, and guitars and basses tuned to the sublevels of hell, and really interesting rhythmic structures scattered throughout the entire record. There's also a ton of subliminal noise elements beneath much of the music. Basically if you're a fan of less-traditional, fucked up weird ass doom metal, this record is for you. Enough twists and turns to make it stand out among the hordes of heavy. Recommended.
New York doommongers Bloody Panda return with full length #2, this one courtesy of the always rad Profound Lore label. The band specializes in a style of glacial doom sounding like it was recorded in an enormous cathedral in the dead of night. Funereal keyboards and subsonic bass run alongside lumbering drums that put everything into a spiraling trance as the downtuned guitars puke out overwhelmingly negative sounding riffs. Then, there's the kicker, Bloody Panda's unassuming vocalist Yoshiko Ohara, whose beautiful and clear voice can just as easily switch from sweet croon to Yoko Ono howl to a throat ripping banshee scream to a guttural demon bark. Her super bleak lyrics focus on all the various aspects of mental instability that doom bands know and love, like a fever induced nightmare where Bloody Panda is the house band. Ohara's awesome and disturbing artwork perfectly mirrors the sounds within Summon, with lots of black space and faceless figures shrouded in slivers of hazy color. There are certainly some similarities to Neurosis' more, ahem, "tribal" moments, while the band's almost goth sensibility, not to mention the female vocals and organ, bring to mind Asva, but there is enough other stuff going on to make Bloody Panda stand out. This is only made clearer by the accompanying dvd, featuring a video for the 21 minute motherfucker of a song, "Miserere". Filmed by the band members themselves in various parts of Brooklyn in addition to shots taken in Indonesia, the dvd offers a stunning visual enhancement to Bloody Panda's sonic assault.
Figured we should list this, the third album by '60s San Francisco proto-metal acid rockers Blue Cheer (you can't get much more "acid rock" than Blue Cheer -- they're named after a type of LSD after all!), since it was recently reissued in Akarma's midpriced "karma price" series. And also 'cause on the second side of this 1969 album (titled New! Improved! with about 50 percent accuracy) you'll hear the guitar playing of Randy Holden, whose rare, classic Population II record was recently reissued on LP and subsequently purchased by throngs of old time heaviness-lovin' AQ customers. If you've got that, you've gotta have this too. Holden, formerly of LA garage rockers The Other Half, was Blue Cheer's replacement for original axeman Leigh Stephens, but Holden lasted only a few months in the Cheer, recording just half of this record with 'em, three songs total: the fairly epic "Peace Of Mind" and "Fruit & Iceburgs" and brief coda "Honey Butter Lover". Then he split to make the Pop II album as a duo with drummer Chris Lockheed, which basically sounds a lot like the second side of this album... indeed you'll find versions "Fruit & Iceburgs" on both records. That's what you want this for, the Holden side, which sounds like a more wasted, doomedelic Cream. It's the last hurrah of Blue Cheer as a "heavy" guitar band, really. Whereas the first side of New! Improved!, recorded after Holden left and featuring ex-Kak guitarist Gary Yoder, has got a lot of honky tonk piano and comes across more like something the Rolling Stones would do, either rustic and rollicking or really melodic and mellow. Not heavy at all, though certainly very hippie and of its time with songs like "West Coast Child Of Sunshine". So we're mainly just recommending this for the approximately 15 minutes of wailin' Randy Holden stuff on here.
However -- if you don't already have Blue Cheer's first two albums, Vincebus Eruptum and Outside Inside, though, get those first! Especially Vincebus, if you want to hear the REAL birth of heavy.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Also from '68, these San Francisco anti-hippies' second album, another classic of super-heavy (for its time) psychedelic proto-metal.
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
When we listed this on our site before, we were pretty succinct, 17 words:
Their 1968 debut, the birth of metal? With "Summertime Blues". Dumb yet so brilliant. Essential heavy history.
And yeah, that's basically it. The first album from San Francisco ballroom badasses Blue Cheer, is a seminal heavy psych proto-metal power trio document indeed. Druggy biker blooze that taught so many later bands - from Pentagram to Comets On Fire, Fushitsusha to Dead Meadow - how to turn it up to 11. Have Dickie Peterson, Paul Whaley, and Leigh Stephens been inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame yet? Apparently not and it's a travesty.
While we like other, later Blue Cheer albums and lineups, THIS is the one that belongs in the early annals of metal history. In '68, what else was this heavy? Blue Cheer themselves never were again.
Produced by Abe "Voco" Kesh (yes, that's where that band got their name), this includes Blue Cheer's aforementioned monster cover of Eddie Cochran's "Summertime Blues", also their killer version of Mose Allison's "Parchman Farm" (which they call "Parchment Farm" for some reason), BB King's "Rock Me Baby", and bunch of equally lumbering, blown-out Peterson originals like "Doctor Please" and "Out Of Focus". While they sound closer to Hendrix and Cream than to the yet to be birthed Black Sabbath, this is ye olde acid rock at its rawest and heaviest.
Chances are, if you're into metal and/or psych, you already have this, but if you don't, now's the time to grab it!
We're running out of ways to describe these guys. Out thesaurus has been bled dry. Bleak, hateful, grim, blackened, harsh, hellish... By now you should have at least an idea of where this diabolical duo are coming from. Epic slow motion expanses of blacknoize, and rumbling blown out low end, howled blackened dronemusic, ritualistic abstract guitar torture, these four tracks here, three are live, and previously released (but on tapes and cd-r's so limited, that unless you were THERE, you probably never saw one), one is previously UNreleased, well worth it for the black hearted and evil ear-ed.
The live tracks are brutal, might be the heaviest we've heard these guys, processed black soundscapes woven from grinding industrial crunch and howled hellish vox, heaving slabs of caustic low end dissipate in clouds of whirring downtuned thrum, way more effects than usual, tripped out and almost psychedelic sounding, streaked with super distorted white noise hiss. The B side begins with some gurgling black ambience, all rumble and creep, peppered with corrosive shards of amp buzz, eventually growing more and more heavy culminating in a strange assemblage of cool moaning melting riffage. That riffage then gets locked into a strangely hypnotic loop before devolving into yet more freaked out abstract heaviness.
Intense, punishing, pummeling, black as fuck and heavy as all get out, which to those of you into that sort of thing, means this is definitely recommended.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES! Comes in an incredible sleeve, spot varnished animal head on a rich black background, with an 11" x 11" printed insert.
Super limited new slab of sickness from these purveyors of gloriously abject noise drone filth. So limited in fact that it's already out of print, and we have the last 20 or so.
Brutal ambient filth from the Pacific Northwest, as only BSBC can do it. Moving further and further away from any semblance of doomdronedirge and more into a totally abstract free noise direction, albeit their sound still infused with an element of doom.
These two tracks are sprawling soundscapes of hissy buzz, industrial clatter, rumbling drones, post industrial ambience, an almost static wall of murky sound, but distinctly depressive and doomy for sure. A continuous grinding low end assault, that makes Khanate and Bunkur seem downright musical, which they actually are compared to BSBC, who seem to be more interested in evoking terrifying feelings with sound, of creating a bleak and soul shattering soundworld from walls of black buzz and rumbling doom drenched drones. Mission accomplished.
LIMITED TO 250 COPIES. ALREADY OUT OF PRINT. THESE ARE THE LAST COPIES EVER. Creepy black and white sleeves, pressed on thick white vinyl.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Right now, everything released by these Northwestern dealers of doomdeathdirgedrone, is out of print, EXCEPT for these two cassettes, Prossneck, Germany 1629, and the split with fellow noisemakers Drowner. But these won't last long. These two tapes are both tour only, limited to 100 copies, we got 20 of each, and judging from past Blue Sabbath Black Cheer releases, those won't last long at all, needless to say, one per customer, and even more needless to say, if you want one of these, don't dawdle! Blink and you'll miss 'em.
This one features two looooong blasts of caustic blur and buzz, murky slowed down vocals, thick waves of hiss, everything churning and roiling, heavy and noisy and brutal, heavy on the drone, built a bit like a low end Whitehouse, some strange demon with a tracheotomy proselytizing over a hellish din, soon joined in by what sounds like terrified screams, and the sound of flames on flesh. Really really creepy. The flipside is a bit more abstract, a drifting sea of crumbling distortion and blurred hiss, some grinding rumbles and buried almost-melodies, sort noise tangled up with deep black industrial dronemusic. As always, heavy and frightening and black as pitch.
Once again, LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!! We have 20, that is it!!
Latest in the Doom Mantra series of super limited lps comes from black noise duo Blue Sabbath Black Cheer (after previous installments by Colossloth, Worship and Wicked King Wicker, as well as future releases planned for Dead Raven Choir and The Throes Of Darkness) and is split between previously released ultra limited and now way out of print rarities and new unreleased material, as well as featuring a handful of guests including Mason Jones and Rubber O Cement!.
Unlike the last few BSBC releases, this time the guys dial back the noise assault, focusing instead on texture and mood, still plenty noisy, but this time the noise is doled out much more judiciously.
The opening track sounds like it was composed using busted electronics and field recordings of actual battles, sirens wail and explosions erupt under cloud of static and glitch, wrapped in thick billows of black thrum.
The rest of the side plays out in swells of washed out minimal drift, shot through with streaks of caustic noise, intercepted voices, groaning detuned guitars, melting synths, building gradually to a full on industrial chaos-scape
The flipside begins with a looooong blast of caustic blur and buzz, murky slowed down vocals, thick waves of hiss, everything churning and roiling, crusty and noisy and brutal, heavy on the drone, built a bit like a low end Whitehouse, some strange demon with a tracheotomy proselytizing over a hellish din, soon joined in by what sounds like terrified screams, and the sound of flames on flesh. Really really creepy. As the side progresses it grows a bit more abstract, a drifting sea of crumbling distortion and blurred hiss, some grinding rumbles and buried almost-melodies, soft noise tangled up with deep black industrial dronemusic., before stumbling back into a blown out hiss drenched dronescape, harsh and heavy and intense and BRUTAL.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES. Packaged in super nice silkscreened covers, with a printed insert inside...
As more and more folks (foolishly & unfortunately in our view) choose to forgo physical media for immaterial downloads, it seems like it's as important as ever to make records special, as much collectible objects and storage devices for sound, as much cool tangible artifact from a band we care about as simply a conveyance for that band's music. And we're constantly amazed at the sort of incredible and unique packaging we see pass through aQ. Perhaps none more so that Equation Records who are constantly pushing the design envelope, with no regard for profit, hell, no regard for even breaking even, for them it's all about the art, the object, every release something special, that will be treasured, both for the sounds within, and all the amazing craziness that surrounds those sounds.
Which brings us to this. Amazing and crazy just scratches the surface. Three years in the works, an extended production rife with problems and complications, some deftly (and cleverly) incorporated right into the artwork. The record is in fact being sold significantly -below- its actual cost, which was appropriately exorbitant, based on the ridiculous and fantastical packaging. But before we get to that, let's talk music. This extreme packaging couldn't have been paired with a more appropriately extreme band, the Seattle doomdronedirge duo Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, whose infamous live Halloween night set is the focus of this release, presented here on a one sided silkscreened lp, a sidelong expanse of harrowing blackened minimalism, crashing gongs and billowing clouds of cymbal shimmer, buzzing metallic thrum, that reminds us of an Organum record gone haywire. The metal buzz gradually processed into deep rib cage rattling drones and ominous low end tones, eventually melodies creep in, and the sound is transformed into an abject tarpit doom, peppered with blown out blasts of percussive crunch, and bursts of Merzbowian white noise, but always settling back into a deep, ominous thrum. Lion roar rumbles give way to keening moaning black buzz, downtuned and crumbling, all weirdly mournful and melodic, the whole thing laced with tortured vox, seriously harrowing and amazing. And as if that weren't enough, there's also a single sided 7", with an etched B side, the music a crumbling wall of super distorted power electronics style crunch, grinding slabs of corrosive textures and heaving buzz blurred into a weirdly meditative, but still seriously corrosive drone. And as if that STILL weren't enough, there's also a cd (not a cd-r), collecting a handful of rarities from various tape releases and splits, as well as some unreleased jams, the sounds varying from percussive post industrial pipe fight bombast, to droned out feedback drenched ambience, and from militaristic minimalism, to grinding blacknoise blowouts. Phew.
NOW we can talk about the packaging, which we should preface with the word MAGNETS!!! ("Fucking magnets, how do they work?!"), more on that in a second, but if you want a visual accounting of the packaging, check this out: http://youtu.be/ZthdRUqd68w
So yeah, there is a one sided lp, with a silkscreened B side. There was an issue with the silkscreening, so there's an insert affixed to the sleeve, explaining the situation. There's also a red vinyl 7", one sided, etched on the B side, and the aforementioned cd of rarities. The 7" comes in a proper picture sleeve with two 7"x7" pro-printed card inserts, the cd comes in it's own proper sleeve as well. Also includes is a silkscreen turntable slipmat, as well as a 12" by 24 poster. Add in 4 stickers, a 2-sided 12" pro-printed card insert, and two separate silk screened covers, each one affixed with magnets, the two sleeves magnetically adhered! There's also a 2" pin, a numbered certificate, all of this is housed in a thick PVC sleeve, sealed with a circular sticker, and on the front, is a sticker, with a description of the record in Latin, and a translation in English. Wow. Needless to say, this is a beauty, an extravagantly conceived and executed labor of love, that is even more impressive when you hold it in your grubby little paws.
LIMITED TO 235 COPIES!!! Guessing this won't be around for long!
Another missive from some grim otherworld, the latest in a hellish black flow from the brackish depths, a never ending glacial eruption of blackened sonic filth and blown out white noise brutality from this despicable duo, this latest, a three song 12", is currently, due to the insanely limited nature of their releases, the only thing these guys have available, but not for long we predict, as this too was limited to a mere 525 copies, we got about a tenth of those, but as with past releases, we can't promise they'll be around for long.
More of the BSBC caustic black ambience, a cacophony of junkyard clatter, the clang of pipes, all sorts of crunch and grind, under a thick wash of high end buzz, and shifting clouds of blurred hiss, monstrous vocals buried in the murk, some riffage too (we think), but those riffs mostly exist as simply another layer of blacknoise, a never ending wash of grinding static heaviness. The second track ups the heaviness, the vocals more bellowing, more surges of black tar low end, still cloaked in sheets of white noise, but churning violently beneath the surface, a rumbling, rib cage rattling drone, that seems to be splintering and crumbling to pieces before our ears.
The flip side is much more tranquil (it's all relative though), a minimal driftscape of distant whir, twisted fragmented melodies buried way down in the mix, the grinding of alien machinery, peppered with squalls of speaker shredding buzz, the track quickly escalates, the noise getting noisier, the buzz getting buzzier, the vocals more howled and anguished, the whole thing pushing toward a Merzbowian white noise blowout. Imagine sitting in a concrete bunker with a thousand transistor radios tuned between stations, with the volume all the way up, an ear shredding symphony of static, while in another concrete bunker Wolf Eyes and Khanate play at full volume, barely audible through the suffocating cloud of hiss all around you.
Brutal, punishing, abject, harrowing, hateful, heavy, and pretty fucking awesome. As if we even needed to tell you.
LIMITED TO 525 COPIES. Amazing woodcut paste on front cover, with a printed insert and postcard inside.
Originally released as a super limited cassette (only 50 copies), this 10" (also way too limited at 300 copies) teams up our favorite demonic duo, with the awesomely monickered Dried Up Corpse for some deep dire noise drenched heaviness.
The BSBC side is about the prettiest thing they've ever done, which means it's still vile and sick and murky and ominous and fucked up, it's just that it's not so harsh, more muted and blurred and black ambient, than some of their other outings. A sprawling deeeeeeeeep doomscape, creeping black rumbles, demonic gurgles, distant foghorn like melodies, bits of muted percussion, plenty of buzzing grit and distorted feedback, but all smeared and woozy and subterranean sounding, a darkly demonic drift, that infuses what might otherwise be warm shimmering blackened ambience, with some seriously abject miserablism and gloom.
Dried Up Corpse counter BSBC's sensitive side with a caustic chunk of chaotic crunch. Beginning with some deep whirring rumbles, the track soon splinters into full on blunted white noise, skittery and fractured and totally blown out, all the while underpinned by that initial rumbling whir, eventually the noise peels back leaving a long stretch of deep softened buzz to play us out.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!!! Gorgeous super thick hand screened sleeves, with nice two sided printed inserts.
