This killer slab of tranced out heaviness, now back print on vinyl, as a picture disc this time! Here's our review of Conference Of Birds when we first reviewed it waaaaaay back in 2006:
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
Their debut last year, Variations On A Theme, was heralded by many as the second coming of Sabbathy stoner/doom legends Sleep. No surprise, considering that Om consists of two thirds of Sleep, and pretty much sounds like two thirds of Sleep too. Same low-end bass (Al Cisneros), thundering drums (Chris Hakius), and druggy, chant-like vocals (Al again, stepping up to the mic). All that's missing is the guitar (Sleep guitarist Matt Pike is busy with High On Fire right now). We gave that album the thumbs up, won over by the psychedelic trance-like heaviness of their jams and their mantrically soothing yet (to us) unintentionally amusing singing, which made us giggle 'cause it just never let up, delivering endless deadpan lyrics of cosmic hippy nonsense in a zoned-out monotone. We don't want to say it was so bad it was good, 'cause it really wasn't bad, but there was some of that kind of bad/good alchemy going on. And we ended up lovin' it.
And of course, the resemblance to old faves Sleep helped too.
Now Al and Chris are back with the second Om opus. It's simultaneously a heckuva lot like their debut but even better somehow. Productionwise, yes. And also perhaps 'cause while the two-piece line-up on Variations sounded like Sleep without the guitar, and maybe (heck, definitely) would have been even better with a guitarist, now they've made that lack of guitar seem more the ways things should be, by getting more and more hushed and spacious and minimal here, thereby making it seem like just bass and drums is enough, not like something's missing. They've made a virtue out of a necessity, realizing that by really adopting a "less is more" aesthetic they'd be playing to their strength. And it works. Listen to it straight through (you'll want to... it's two tracks, about 33 minutes) and you'll find it quite floatational, even without chemical assistance. This riff-repetitive spaceout drone dirge drug is all you need. And Al's lyrics remain occultic, obtuse and slightly absurd, giving this the effect of a hypnosis tape meant to help build your vocabulary (along with heightening your consciousness). He uses such everyday words as "clesiast", "epison", "aurican", "tunnement", and "agurate". It's heavy rock that requires a heavy dictionary to decipher!
So if you liked the first OM, you'll love this. And if you weren't sure before, definitely check this one out. As with their first album, file with Sleep's Jerusalem, Electric Wizard's Supercoven, and UFOmammut's Godlike Snake.
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
Their debut last year, Variations On A Theme, was heralded by many as the second coming of Sabbathy stoner/doom legends Sleep. No surprise, considering that Om consists of two thirds of Sleep, and pretty much sounds like two thirds of Sleep too. Same low-end bass (Al Cisneros), thundering drums (Chris Hakius), and druggy, chant-like vocals (Al again, stepping up to the mic). All that's missing is the guitar (Sleep guitarist Matt Pike is busy with High On Fire right now). We gave that album the thumbs up, won over by the psychedelic trance-like heaviness of their jams and their mantrically soothing yet (to us) unintentionally amusing singing, which made us giggle 'cause it just never let up, delivering endless deadpan lyrics of cosmic hippy nonsense in a zoned-out monotone. We don't want to say it was so bad it was good, 'cause it really wasn't bad, but there was some of that kind of bad/good alchemy going on. And we ended up lovin' it.
And of course, the resemblance to old faves Sleep helped too.
Now Al and Chris are back with the second Om opus. It's simultaneously a heckuva lot like their debut but even better somehow. Productionwise, yes. And also perhaps 'cause while the two-piece line-up on Variations sounded like Sleep without the guitar, and maybe (heck, definitely) would have been even better with a guitarist, now they've made that lack of guitar seem more the ways things should be, by getting more and more hushed and spacious and mimimal here, thereby making it seem like just bass and drums is enough, not like something's missing. They've made a virtue out of a necessity, realizing that by really adopting a "less is more" aesthetic they'd be playing to their strength. And it works. Listen to it straight through (you'll want to... it's two tracks, about 33 minutes) and you'll find it quite floatational, even without chemical assistance. This riff-repetitive spaceout drone dirge drug is all you need. And Al's lyrics remain occultic, obtuse and slightly absurd, giving this the effect of a hypnosis tape meant to help build your vocabulary (along with heightening your conciousness). He uses such everyday words as "clesiast", "epison", "aurican", "tunnement", and "agurate". It's heavy rock that requires a heavy dictionary to decipher!
So if you liked the first OM, you'll love this. And if you weren't sure before, definitely check this one out. As with their first album, file with Sleep's Jerusalem, Electric Wizard's Supercoven, and UFOmammut's Godlike Snake.
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
We just scored a handful of copies of the Japanese import edition of the most recent release from psych-drone-trance lords Om, which features a BONUS TRACK not on the domestic version, but which can be found on the ULTRA limited split Six Organs Of Admittance / Om 7" on Holy Mountain that comes out next week (7/11/06)!! Here's what we had to say about Conference Of The Birds first time around:
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
Their debut last year, Variations On A Theme, was heralded by many as the second coming of Sabbathy stoner/doom legends Sleep. No surprise, considering that Om consists of two thirds of Sleep, and pretty much sounds like two thirds of Sleep too. Same low-end bass (Al Cisneros), thundering drums (Chris Hakius), and druggy, chant-like vocals (Al again, stepping up to the mic). All that's missing is the guitar (Sleep guitarist Matt Pike is busy with High On Fire right now). We gave that album the thumbs up, won over by the psychedelic trance-like heaviness of their jams and their mantrically soothing yet (to us) unintentionally amusing singing, which made us giggle 'cause it just never let up, delivering endless deadpan lyrics of cosmic hippy nonsense in a zoned-out monotone. We don't want to say it was so bad it was good, 'cause it really wasn't bad, but there was some of that kind of bad/good alchemy going on. And we ended up lovin' it.
And of course, the resemblance to old faves Sleep helped too.
Now Al and Chris are back with the second Om opus. It's simultaneously a heckuva lot like their debut but even better somehow. Productionwise, yes. And also perhaps 'cause while the two-piece line-up on Variations sounded like Sleep without the guitar, and maybe (heck, definitely) would have been even better with a guitarist, now they've made that lack of guitar seem more the ways things should be, by getting more and more hushed and spacious and mimimal here, thereby making it seem like just bass and drums is enough, not like something's missing. They've made a virtue out of a necessity, realizing that by really adopting a "less is more" aesthetic they'd be playing to their strength. And it works. Listen to it straight through (you'll want to... it's two tracks, about 33 minutes) and you'll find it quite floatational, even without chemical assistance. This riff-repetitive spaceout drone dirge drug is all you need. And Al's lyrics remain occultic, obtuse and slightly absurd, giving this the effect of a hypnosis tape meant to help build your vocabulary (along with heightening your conciousness). He uses such everyday words as "clesiast", "epison", "aurican", "tunnement", and "agurate". It's heavy rock that requires a heavy dictionary to decipher!
So if you liked the first OM, you'll love this. And if you weren't sure before, definitely check this one out. As with their first album, file with Sleep's Jerusalem, Electric Wizard's Supercoven, and UFOmammut's Godlike Snake.
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
The second track from OM's recent Advaitic Songs gets the dub reworking, again by Alpha & Omega, who redid Addis for the first 12", and like that, this new one doesn't need to stretch to far to transform OM into straight up dub, since OM's sound is essentially a doomy dub to begin with. But here, that doom is shed in favor of some old school classic dub sounds. Upstroke guitars, simple grooving rhythms, bass for days, in fact, the bass, and the vocals are really the main thing thee new version retains, the bass driving everything, the sound warm and and hypnotic, a little mellow, but with just a hint of sonic shadow. The vocals translate perfectly, although they're a wee bit more cringeworthy stripped of the supporting sonic heft of the original. And like that first 12", if you weren't familiar with OM, you might not even know this was a remix/reworking, it sounds pretty genuinely old school dub. That said, not all OM fans will dig. A quick look online and seems like lots of folks didn't really get it, or like it, which is surprising considering how dubby in spirit at least OM's actual sound already is.
The B side amps up the dubbiness even more, dousing the vocals and rhythms in echo and delay, words and snare cracks careening into the ether, wreathed in warm swirls of melodica melody, everything dreamily druggy and delightfully hazy and washed out.
We'd recommend spinning this at 33rpm though, if you want to get some of the doom back, at that speed, it's a dirgey doom-dub creep, the vocals a demonic bellow, the music tarpit thick, the rhythm a droney dubby dirge. Either way, cool stuff, fans of the first 12" will want this one too, and open minded OM fans, give this a try, cuz you know these days it seems like dub, more than metal is the sound that influences OM's sound, see also OM frontman Al Cisneros' dub solo singles for more proof of that!
Here it is, the first post-Chris Hakius Om studio record. And there sure has been a lot of whining. "How could Al Cisneros continue when half the group (Om being a duo) left?" "The new guy doesn't hit as hard," "It's on Drag City," blah blah blah. Fuck all that. If people cannot understand that music should be about progression and taking new risks, then they should stick to the old records and leave it at that. That said, there will be no mistaking this for anyone other than Om. The template hasn't changed drastically, but new drummer Emil Amos (who also pounds the skins for Grails and has a kick ass project of his own, Holy Sons) has certainly brought something new and fresh to the table. His drumming is more meditative, less pounding than Hakius' style and at times a little, ahem, "jazzy", and it honestly suits the direction Om had been heading in perfectly. And when the band does kick into its trademark fuzzed out monolithic jams, the changes come off as more dynamic and drastic. So, if you loved what Om has done before, chances are God Is Good will not disappoint.
The album kicks off with "Thebes," a 19 minute monster that begins life as a subdued sitar drone. The band jams it out for a while with clean bass and focused drumming, and of course, Al's amazing and totally out there stoner lyrics, before switching gears into the musical theme they have been exploring since, uh, Variations On A Theme. The best part is how it recalls the foundation from which Om was born while still showing the progression they have made since Amos' arrival. And it's fucking perfect. With Steve Albini once again at the recording console, you can safely bet that it sounds incredible, spacious yet controlled, with every nuance of Om's minimal but super amplified approach coming out nice and clear. Following an epic fadeout comes the second song, "Meditation Is The Practice Of Death", which is carried forward by a snaky, Middle Eastern styled bass groove as Amos provides some awesome drum work heavy on the cymbals and toms. The droniness just feels so great, with Al's monotone voice maintaining its steadiness over production that seems to show off a heavy dub influence. Probably weren't expecting that the first time you heard these guys, were you? But it actually makes total sense. Towards the end, there is a killer FLUTE solo, and its awesomeness should be enough to silence any of the non believers out there. This is still Om, but believe it or not, they are taking things into new realms, which is made even clearer on the next track, a two part song called "Cremation Ghat". Perhaps the fastest and busiest Om song to date, the song begins with a highly focused cyclical bass groove and percussion accented by hand claps playing out over a steady pound and a serpentine vocal chant. It's actually a bit reminiscent of Circle, but then Part II goes into a slow burning groove with the same sitar loop from "Thebes" entering the picture over more Middle Eastern inspired melodies. The album ends as it began, with the sitar loop urging you to press play once again. This is seriously great stuff.
So yeah, God Is Good is good, and we can only wonder where Om will venture after this. Luckily, it will probably still include 19 minute songs, thundering bass, hypnotic drumming, and totally stoned shamanic incantations, so really what's to complain about?
If you've ever heard OM live, well, you know what it's like to see them live. A piece of vinyl, no matter how weighty, can't really compete with that. But, if you'd like to experience OM's stoned live ceremony from the comfort of your own recliner, divan, or yoga mat - and there's a lot to be said for that - the simply titled Live lp on Outer Battery will do the trick.
Mean to emulate a '70s classic rock live boot, with raw sound (no overdubs, man) and a simple white sleeve with a pasted on, wraparound b&w cover photo of the band on stage, this document from one date on OM's 2013 European tour is a must for all OM-heads. It features four tracks - on Side A, "Sinai" and "Meditation Is The Practice Of Death"; Side B has "Cremations Ghat I" and "Bhima's Theme".
Featuring much echoing drum-thwack, zoned out chant, mesmerically heavy riffage, and a worshipful crowd of Belgians, it is very much like "you are there". While at the same time, OM can help you to "be here now".
On "Acapulco Gold" colored vinyl, LIMITED TO 800 COPIES.
People have been dying for this one. Two epic sidelong tracks, recorded live in the Holy Land, from one of the world's heaviest duos, thee mighty Om. And in fact, this lp is the final recording of the original duo, with drummer Chris Haikus, who has since left the band to be replaced by the drummer from the Grails.
And a fitting swansong it is, as these two tracks are monsters, one from Conference Of The Birds, one from Pilgrimage, and as you might expect, the sound is massive, the bass churning and throbbing, the drums relentless and pounding, the duo locking into trancelike grooves, hypnotic and mesmerizing, and of course so so so heavy. What else do you need to know. It's Om, two tracks, each taking up a whole side, pressed on super thick vinyl, in super deluxe sleeves, and of course EXTREMELY LIMITED, only 3100 copies made (each one numbered), we got 25 and there's a good chance we won't be able to get more. You have been warned.
The mighty return of the transcendental RIFF! The third Om record! By now the methods and purpose of their ultra heavy music of the spheres is clear. The music on this album, much like the first two, is stripped to its essence. Bass and drums churning out super hypnotic heaviness and repetitive chant-like vocals creating a cyclical whorl of trance-rock divinity.
With a lot of new releases from bands we love, change in sound and development of style is important, Om seem to operate with different principles than the average rock and roll outfit. The consistency of their sound lends itself to the eternal nature of the music, as if all three of their records are really just movements in some expansive, cosmic symphony. Within Om's canon, change is felt like the passing of time without the aid of a clock or calendar, existing in the infinite void. And what an ass kicking void it is! The riffs and rhythms on Pilgrimage are certainly just as good as those on either of their previous releases, which means amazingly heavy and heady slabs of stoned out ROCK!
The record starts off with the title track, which is an expansive slow burner. Mesmeric and spiritual, soft spoken vocals and a propulsive tom and tambourine beat. The riffs on this track, as well as the bulk of Om's material, have a certain eastern quality, like some strange Sabbath-raga meld, and they go on forever and ever, taking the listener on some sort of mystic celestial voyage. By track two, "Unitive Knowledge Of The Godhead", the fuzzed out bass distortion kicks in, and the sound gets HEAVY! This Sleep-like heavitude continues into the 11 plus minute "Bhima's Theme", by which point in the album the listener is more than likely completely transfixed, eyes a-glaze with the eternal riff burned into their brain. The last song on the album is "Pilgrimage (Reprise)", which makes for a very circular experience, like when listening to the album all the way through, time disintegrates and 32 minutes seems like a split second or a week or an eternity! Heavy, mannnn...
Possibly one of the most distinctive things about Pilgrimage is the recording itself. This album sounds fucking great! We mean, for a band that just consists of bass guitar and drums, you could not pick a better engineer than Mr. Steve Albini, whose forte has always been the rhythm section, and he completely nailed the sound! It's warm and cavernous, and completely swallows the listener whole.
So, if you are in tune with the amaranthine vibes of Om's two previous records, you will most certainly appreciate this one as a continuation on the path towards the essence of musical anima mundi!
RIFF TO ETERNITY!
Have you been missing Sleep? No, not your forty winks, we mean the mighty stoner metal behemoth that was San Francisco's Sabbath n' sweet leaf worshippers Sleep. The endlessly repetitive riffs, the swinging molasses sludge jams, the massive, mantric starscapes of drugged-out space rock drone and dirge? Yeah, we've been missing Sleep too. They broke up after their magnum opus, the one-hour/one-song album Jerusalem (aka Dopesmoker), members eventally resurfacing in The Sabians and High On Fire. And now Om, the closest thing to the Jerusalem of olde! So if High On Fire's loud and speedy Motorheaded heaviness hasn't quite been giving you that same Sleepy feeling, then here's -another- post-Sleep outfit that might just do the trick.
First get rid of the guitars ('cause this is just Sleep's rhythm section, bassist Al Cisneros and drummer Chris Hakius). All they really need is a drum kit, a bass guitar and about 10,000 watts of amplification. Then set the controls for the heart of the sun, and ride all the way there seemingly on a single churning, hypnotic mesmerizing riff, stretched over three long tracks. A super distorted, fuzzed out magic carpet ride into oblivion. The main difference between Sleep and Om (besides the lack of guitar) are the vocals by Al Cisneros. Lots of vocals. And not screaming or growly, we're talking clean, chanting, trance-like vocals, WAY up in the mix. Well, they do sound a bit like the singing in Sleep, just way more prominent. It may be the single thing that keeps folks from getting into Om. But the vocals definitely grow on you, and the laconic sort of slurry sing song-y delivery just further enhances Om's druggy mesmerism. Al's stiffly delivered, endless nasal incantations are in fact now being imitated by the staffers here at Aquarius in our everyday conversations. They definitely give the whole thing a definite Hawkwind / Pink Floyd vibe, which is a VERY good thing. This is most definitely not 'metal', although metalheads will probably dig it. Electric Wizard fans especially! This is relentlessly riff heavy, ultra repetitive, simple, spaced out, hippy drug rock of the highest order. Musically it almost sounds like a Lightning Bolt record played at 16rpm, that effortless bass / drum interplay slowed down to a loping lumber, a slow motion slither, a creepy crawl. Head nodding music for head bangers. A swirling, fuzzy, spacy, mesmerizing, drone rock trip! No wonder ol' Julian Cope wrote it up as a record of the month on his great Head Heritage website...
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
NOW ON CLEAR VINYL! When the first pressing of vinyl sold out, Holy Mountain decided to repress on clear wax. Nice. Here's our review of the music, which remains available on cd too:
Have you been missing Sleep? No, not your forty winks, we mean the mighty stoner metal behemoth that was San Jose's Sabbath n' sweet leaf worshippers Sleep. The endlessly repetitive riffs, the swinging molasses sludge jams, the massive, mantric starscapes of drugged-out space rock drone and dirge? Yeah, we've been missing Sleep too. They broke up after their magnum opus, the one-hour/one-song album Jerusalem (aka Dopesmoker), members eventally resurfacing in The Sabians and High On Fire. And now Om, the closest thing to the Jerusalem of olde! So if High On Fire's loud and speedy Motorheaded heaviness hasn't quite been giving you that same Sleepy feeling, then here's -another- post-Sleep outfit that might just do the trick.
First get rid of the guitars ('cause this is just Sleep's rhythm section, bassist Al Cisneros and drummer Chris Hakius). All they really need is a drum kit, a bass guitar and about 10,000 watts of amplification. Then set the controls for the heart of the sun, and ride all the way there seemingly on a single churning, hypnotic mesmerizing riff, stretched over three long tracks. A super distorted, fuzzed out magic carpet ride into oblivion. The main difference between Sleep and Om (besides the lack of guitar) are the vocals by Al Cisneros. Lots of vocals. And not screaming or growly, we're talking clean, chanting, trance-like vocals, WAY up in the mix. Well, they do sound a bit like the singing in Sleep, just way more prominent. It may be the single thing that keeps folks from getting into Om. But the vocals definitely grow on you, and the laconic sort of slurry sing song-y delivery just further enhances Om's druggy mesmerism. Al's stiffly delivered, endless nasal incantations are in fact now being imitated by the staffers here at Aquarius in our everyday conversations. They definitely give the whole thing a definite Hawkwind / Pink Floyd vibe, which is a VERY good thing. This is most definitely not 'metal', although metalheads will probably dig it. Electric Wizard fans especially! This is relentlessly riff heavy, ultra repetitive, simple, spaced out, hippy drug rock of the highest order. Musically it almost sounds like a Lightning Bolt record played at 16rpm, that effortless bass / drum interplay slowed down to a loping lumber, a slow motion slither, a creepy crawl. Head nodding music for head bangers. A swirling, fuzzy, spacy, mesmerizing, drone rock trip! No wonder ol' Julian Cope wrote it up as a record of the month on his great Head Heritage website...
Previously only on 10" vinyl via Neurot, now finally available to compact disc users! David Tibet is an obsessive man, amassing a huge collection of books, records, paintings, and ephemera from his favorite artists, religious leaders, and cultural icons; and he often incorporates bits and pieces from that collection into the apocalyptic hymns of his band Current 93. A couple years ago, Tibet found himself awestruck by Om's first album Variations On A Theme and approached the stoned-metal mesmerists about working together. Through their correspondence, Om's bassist Al Cisneros found himself a contributor to the Current 93 opus Black Ships Ate The Sky, and then the two projects decided to produce this split release. What you get from Om is exactly what you would expect: heavy-as-fuck bass lines, lumbering drum propulsion, and tranced-out vocal incantations very much along the psychedelic vein of Sabbath and the druggy side of Hawkwind. Normally Tibet outsources the guitar work on his Current 93 records to the likes of Ben Chasny, Michael Cashmore, or Tony Wakeford, but here he's picked up the guitar, the bass, and a ton of distortion to match what Om does on the other side. He proves that he too can muster a heavy doom-drone riff laced with caustic waves of distortion and feedback. Of course, his revelatory vocals emerge from the cyclical riffs as does a caterwaul of droning bagpipes.
David Tibet is an obsessive man, amassing a huge collection of books, records, paintings, and ephemera from his favorite artists, religious leaders, and cultural icons; and he often incorporates bits and pieces from that collection into the apocalyptic hymns of his band Current 93. A couple years ago, Tibet found himself awestruck by Om's first album Variations On A Theme and approached the stoned-metal mesmerists about working together. Through their correspondence, Om's bassist Al Cisneros found himself a contributor to the Current 93 opus Black Ships Ate The Sky, and then the two projects decided to produce this split 10". What you get from Om is exactly what you would expect: heavy-as-fuck bass lines, lumbering drum propulsion, and tranced-out vocal incantations very much along the psychedelic vein of Sabbath and the druggy side of Hawkwind. Normally Tibet sources out the guitar work on his Current 93 records to the likes of Ben Chasny, Michael Cashmore, or Tony Wakeford, but here he's picked up the guitar, the bass, and a ton of distortion to match what Om does on the other side. He proves that he too can muster a heavy doom-drone riff laced with caustic waves of distortion and feedback. Of course, his revelatory vocals emerge from the cyclical riffs as does a caterwaul of droning bagpipes. There have been a couple of different pressings of this single; and what we have is the domestic, blue translucent vinyl version.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
FINALLY THE REPRESS IS HERE! These split singles went out of print in a flash soon after we first reviewed 'em on list 244. But more were promised, and now at last they're here, for now...
Most of you have already smashed the add to cart button to bits before even getting to reading the review, so we'll keep this brief. A monumental match up of modern psychedelic masters from the NorCal locale. On one side is the mighty post-Sleep behemoth known as Om, a bass and drums duo who churn out extended sludge mantras, and on this track it's no different. A super fuzzed out doomy plod and groove. When we first threw this one, we accidentally had it on 45 and it sounded pretty dang killer and super blown out and weird, until the vocals came in and went all doom chipmunk on us. But at 33 it was even slower and heavier and dirgier just the way it was meant to be. Note: the track on this 7" is the bonus track from the Japanese version of Conference Of The Birds that we listed recently, so a few of you may already have this song! On the other side we have Ben Chasny and his Six Organs Of Admittance, who seem to be upping their own personal dirge quotient in order to compete with the sheer heaviness of Om. There is still some lilting folk, but it's buried beneath wild squalls of psych guitar freakout that sounds VERY Japanese (High Rise, Mainliner, Fushitsusha).
Definitely essential.
Still more metalcore, and STILL we can't get enough. This is some seriously punishing, pummelling brutality. Plenty of death metal chug and that double kick/muffled guitar syncopation that drives me crazy no matter how many times I hear it. It wouldn't be metalcore without some sensitive emo-boy breakdowns, and there's some of that here, but those sensitive moments are brief, and before you know it are buried under a full metal crush, squealing feedback, pounding double kick, paint-peeling riffs, throbbing earthquake bass. On Broken Wings seem to have a thing for the half time breakdown, that slow-down-to-a-crawl, guitar tuned so low the strings hang loose from the fretboard, molten lava riff, with sub-human death metal grunt vocals, and Metallica's 'One' style double kick bursts. SO HEAVY. It kills me. A wicked wall of sludge, grinding and throbbing, before it erupts into a full-on metallic fist to the sternum. There's also some weirdly melodic post rock bits, but even those bits are slathered with massive drop-D (or C) riffs that mow down everything in their path leaving a stage full of destroyed equipment and a pit full of broken bodies. There's even a couple handclaps(!), that's right just a couple, dropped in the midst of the metallic maelstrom, but you'll just have to find those yourself. So good. Quite possible the heaviest metalcore record yet!
We discovered the 200mg label via their recently released No Skull Left Unturned retrospective, which covered all the various Man Is The Bastard offshoots, the music of course was amazing, but it was also incredibly packaged, with multiple discs, patches, pins, books and booklets, so over the top. We decided to dig a little deeper and discovered a whole slew of strange and mysterious dark sounds, from ambient drone to outsider blackness to noise, everything we heard we dug, so we decided to dig a little deeper and list everything we could get.
This release, from an entity known simply as Ondo, comes to us from Sweden, and is one looooong 40 minute track, of deep metallic dronemusic, thick shimmering layers of distorted sound, reverberating buzz, and smeared streaks of electronics. The sound is creepy and ominous, very cinematic, it's not hard to imagine some long tracking shot of an old graveyard, huge black birds soaring overhead, a dilapidated old house, a rusted out car in the yard, a tire swing barely shifting in the afternoon breeze, the sort of sloooooow shot that builds the suspense, that readies you for whatever horror might lie in wait. That's what the music of Ondo sounds like. Long drawn out tones, deep resonant notes, thick crumbling corrosive rumbles, bits of feedback and snippets of voices, everything dripping in effects and oozing with menace. This is definitely dark ambient music, but it's not all that ambient, it's active, some strange lifeforce inhabits these sounds and propels it forward, along with the listener, drawing us ever closer to some inexorable doom. Awesome.
LIMITED TO 101 COPIES! Packaged in a cool oversized screenprinted cardstock sleeve, inside a 12 page printed black and white booklet on thick cream colored paper, packed with cool creepy old woodcuts.
The return of Swedish black metal masters, Ondskapt , who alongside blackened brethren like Funeral Mist, Deathspell Omega, Watain and the like, keep the black fire burning, but unlike the weirdly melodic classic metal of Watain, or the gnarled and twisted blackness of Funeral Mist and DSO, Ondskapt are something much more raw and primeval, primitive and TROO, their sound still hewing closely to the classic BM sound, the buzz and the blast, the howled monstrous bellow, the epic riffage, the frantic frenzied brutality, but where Ondskapt truly shine, is in their ability to conjure up atmosphere, to create a sound that evokes horror and misery and grim blackness, sure the riffs slay, and the band is brutal and punishing, but their sound oozes with a black spirit, an abject hopelessness that black metal is meant to embody, and that ambience, while not always overt and obvious, finds its way into every note, and every riff, the sound becomes more than black metal, it becomes blackness ITSELF, the buzz and blast just a mechanism for delivering that true grim blackness.
The tracks here are epic and intense, veering from relentless blasting black metal buzz, to woozy lumbering doom, to pounding midtempo dirge, the riffs are epic and melodic, the melodies majestic and soaring, the drums powerful and crushing, the vocals hellish, but again, it's less what the various elements are doing, and more HOW, it's like these sounds are some sort of conjuration, a grim black ritual, moaned clean vocals, spiraling warped Burzumic buzz, depressive melodies and intense sorrowful ambience, all woven into a more traditional black metal framework, the sum a magical and mystical sonic spell that imbues the sound with an atmosphere of utter dread and black grimnity, and makes Ondskapt blackened high priests of black dread and demonic sonic evocation, and Arisen From The Ashes is their gospel.
This is another one of those record we've been trying to list for ages but only just now managed to get enough of. This latest offering from Swedish black metallers Ondskapt will fit perfectly right there on your shelf next to your Deathspell Omega, Funearl Mist, Watain and Nortt records (that is assuming you don't alphebatize). Super reminiscent of old Mayhem (circa De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas) this is black metal in the classic style, buzzing and furious, epic and majestic. Few modern bands can pull that stuff off and not sound like second rate clones, but Ondskapt sound straightr out of the early nineties EXCEPT for their strange penchant for doom! Amidst all the buzzing and blasting, there are all sorts and manner of doom, litling, loping, seasick bits of midtempo doominess with creepy arpeggiated minor key melodies over simple pounding drumming, droning, buzzed out slow motion dirges with Iron Maiden-ish leads over the top, stretches of doom-flecked Burzumic buzz, all wrapped in black and surrounded by brutal bursts of black metal and occasional stretches of droning near-ambient malevolence. Then there's the vocals as well, which are pretty bizarre, veering from sort of shouted, through a bullhorn, politcal rally sort of vocalizing to full on throat shredding howls, demonic shrieks bordering on total hysteria a la Weakling. That's sort of what makes Ondskapt so cool and weird, a definite homage to the classic sound of Scandanavian black metal, but mixed with a heaping helping of depressive doom, and then all that sort of weird stuff, strange vocals, obtuse riffing, convoluted song structures and creepy ambient interludes, all mixed into a bizarrely brilliant black whole!
A grim, dank blast of fetid subterranean buzzing blackness from these Satanic Swedes, originally released in 2003, Draco Sit Mihi Dux was Ondskapt's debut, and found the band channeling a black frenzy similar to other Swedish groups like Watain, Ofermod and Funeral mist, mixing murky midtempo dirges with gnarled bursts of frenzied buzz and epic black metal majesty. The sound simultaneously raw and grim, dense and thick, a tranced out discordant dissonance, that while distinctly Swedish, seemed to owe much to the French as well (Deathspell, etc.), the tracks epic and serpentine, with the guitars slipping from doomy churn to atonal grind, the drums booming and echo drenched, mathy and complex, with some seriously dizzying stretches of wild double kick, the songs epic and ever shifting, moody and murky, the vocals tending toward guttural growls, only occasionally slipping into more hellish shrieks, or even more strangely, warped, clean crooned, almost operatic vox that give the proceedings a bit of an unhinged vibe. But for all the howling blackness and churning riffage, the atmosphere here is key, suffocating and fantastically tense, ritualistic and ominously grim, with much of the record devolving into thick sprawling expanses of droned out dirgery, laced liberally with blast and buzz, but even at its buzziest and blastiest, the sound still retains much of those slower parts' inherent bleak miserablism and dense sonic murk. Awesome.
Reissue comes in a swank digipak with a big booklet, all printed metallic gold on black.
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Has there ever been a better name for a doom / sludge band? We think not. And with a name like that we were imagining some multiple o'd mega ultra doooooooooooom, but instead these Italians aren't as ooze-y as you might expect, in fact they traffic in something a bit groovier, their psychedelic slo-mo doom rife with, stonery, Sabbathy swing, right from the get go (after a little intro with silly Satanic samples over a field of feedback) the band launch into the first of many serious stoner rock jams, but fear not, there's plenty of sludginess and abject downtuned churn, and the vocals too, a harsh, Eyehategod style glass gargling bellow/shriek, the sound massive, the guitars thick, and practically oozing (yep!) crumbling distortion, and yeah, there are grooves all over the place, the band lumbering druggily between stonery riffage, and knuckle dragging dirgery and back again, with some tracks landing somewhere right in the middle, a few bordering on classic doom, others something all together more harsh and hateful.
It's all heavy though, extremely heavy, blown out psychedelic stoner doom stomp of the highest order, druggy and dirgey and slithery and Satanic and while maybe a little too groovy for the grim, troo, ultra doooooooomlords out there, for everybody else, this is some seriously primo stoner-sludge psych-doom, and if you're anything like us, it's a sound you just can't get enough of...
Heck yeah. This nasty-named, evil-sounding Chicago metalgrind trio dish out the raging headbangables here, following up their so very appropriate split with Providence's Black Pus from earlier this year with this, their second totally sick album. 'Tis blackened and brootal, pounding and thrashy, with extreme, anguished vokills - the singer probably spends a lot of his income on throat lozenges. Speed-wise, there's plenty of 1,000 mph blasting and shredding along with some slo-mo sludge parts too. And, additionally, there's enough in the way of avantgarde noisy textures and trance-inducing use of repetition to make 'em possibly the grinding metal band of choice for fans of Kevin Drumm, Wolf Eyes, and Zs fans, as well as Slayer, which along with the geographical point of origin, helps to explain why these guys are on Thrill Jockey (home too of minimalist, mathy, "transcendental" black metallers Liturgy, of course).
By the way, here's a (dumb) idea for these guys - how 'bout next time, they simultaneously release two albums called Ooze Your Illusion I and II?
The first thing you notice is the amazing die-cut artwork. Orange and red overlapping circles each with target like concentric inner circles, cut to resemble a fuzzy washed out mountainscape of orbs and spheres, with the tray card cut so the cd nestles perfectly into one of the valleys. So nice. The second thing you notice, or the first thing you notice once you throw this in the player, is how compltely KICK ASS this record is. This is literally all we've been listening to the last few weeks! We always talk about Queens Of The Stone Age as being this guilty pleasure we all seem to have. But what's so guilty about liking them? They rock, have great catchy songs, the remnants of that huge sun baked Kyuss fuzz guitar. What's not to love? Well, it could be our aversion to the whole MTV / VH1, dating or not dating Brody Dalle?, People Magazine / US Magazine, Dave Grohl killing time, supergroup, more crooning than rocking, not really about the music anymore?, corporate rock element. Yeah, could be.
So what if there was a band of young guys, who put out a record on punk / metalcore label Trustkill, and who took all of the stuff that made QOTSA so great, but turned that stuff inside out, and added all sorts of other disparate elements, turning what could have been just a decent QOTSA rip off into one of the coolest, catchiest rock records of the year?! Well, we'd probably make it record of the week and gush like giddy music nerds. So let us commence gushing, shall we?
Imagine huge fuzz guitars, unfurling super rocking Kyuss / Rocket From The Crypt / Burning Brides sort of stoner garage pop riffs, sometimes langorous and lysergic, sometimes so heavy and intense it's almost impossible to not air guitar! One track in particular, "The Kaleidoscope" has perhaps one of the best riffs EVER (sez Andee and Jason) an impossibly God-like Kyuss / Sabbath fusion, that gets everyone in the store nodding along like Wayne And Garth in Wayne's World. So we've got the riffs, now we go to the vocals, which go from breathy falsetto, to growly indie whine, to howled rock wail, with plenty of occasional female vocals, sometimes employed in surprisingly unorthadox ways giving a couple of the songs a really bizarre edge. Hard to describe, you just have to hear it.
But this is not just about rocking, as much as we wouldn't mind that at all. No, there's lots of weird wonderful pop experimentation all over, from loping bass driven Pinback-ish lullabies, droning brooding minor key dirges reminiscent of the Deftones or maybe Tool, some Sonic Youth-y skree and textural weirdness, even some moody electronic miserablism that has Depeche Mode worship written all over it. It all works so well together somehow, heavy and head banging, dreamy and blissed out. Can't believe this band isn't HUGE. But we're secretly a little glad they aren't. For now at least. The sticker on the front insists that You And Me "obliterates the boundaries between indie rock, stoner rock, metal, emo and garage." Before we heard it we were pretty sure that was some serious label hyperbole, but now we're not so sure. Open Hand take all that stuff and more, wrapping everything around some of the best pop songs we've heard in ages and comes up with a record that hasn't stopped kicking our ass since we got it. Record of the week is always a tricky proposition, we try to make it something out of the ordinary, something mysterious and weird, maybe something hard to find or impossible to get or maybe just overlooked, but once in a while, those things don't seem to matter as much as the simple fact that a record gets played over and over and over over, every day, all day, here AND at home, on our computers, in our iPod's, with no end in sight, that speaks volumes. And sure, maybe you can catch their video on MTV once in a while, or maybe hear them on the radio, but that's not a bad thing at all. If only everything on the radio or on MTV was this good. The world would be a much better (and most likely much stranger) place!
New on Man's Ruin. Operator: Generator are the Bay Area's answer to Kyuss. Groovy doomy swinging stoner rock. Not quite as heavy though, O:G sit somewhere right between Kyuss and Queens of the Stoneage. Warm fuzzy guitars, reverb drenched vocals, and a rhythm section that spits out prime chunks of seventies groove.
Reissued yet again! This time with an extra disc, featuring 2 previously unreleased tracks and a video! Not sure if it's worth buying again (although it probably is for Allan and Andee) but if you haven't got this yet (WHY NOT?!?!?) then now's the time. And you can also get yourself all psyched up for the fall release of not one, but TWO brand new Opeth albums (Use Your Illusion style!). The bonus tracks are cool, but we're not sure they're essential, both are gorgeous and simple, finger picked acoustic guitar workouts with plaintive vocals. Really nice but definitely NOT HEAVY. The video is cool though, lots of Opeth-in-the-studio footage. But here's what we had to say about the disc last time:
Opeth are GODS. The Swedish gods of progressive death/black metal, that is. And by progessive, yes, we mean full on '70s style prog-rock, mixed with the heaviest, most crushing metal attack you can imagine. The many many local SF fans of Weakling should be aware: this band was one of the big influences on Weakling's trance-inducing compositions. Opeth's songs can be equally epic and hypnotic, but of course incorporate a wider, dare we say lovlier array of musical elements. In Opeth's arsenal, there's vocals both growled and clean, acoustic guitar, an incredible sense of dynamics, and inspired melodicism. Blackwater Park (inexplicably named after an obscure krautrock boogie band? we can't figure it out) follows their awesome Still Life album, making for the fifth entry in the Opeth pantheon. While it would be hard to be much better than that album (and that's what we thought about Still Life's predecessor, My Arms Your Hearse too), Opeth continue to perfect perfection, I guess. While the nine-minute plus song lengths found here don't push past earlier excesses, Blackwater Park does see Opeth progressing into even more, uh, progressive areas. Being Pink Floyd fans, they even got Steve Wilson of UK young Floyd proggers Porcupine Tree to produce! So, the mellow parts are mellower, the metal parts cleaner and more precise. If you've never heard them before, we might suggest starting with their more psychedelically murky masterpiece My Arms Your Hearse, but Blackwater Park should also be on your list. Pure art from the masters. All that drool was justified.
Here it is, the "mellow" album from Swedish death/prog metal masters Opeth. Originally, this was to be the second disc in a heavy vs. light two disc set, but they chose to release 'em separately, with the heavy one, "Deliverance" coming out last year. "Deliverance" pretty much sounded like an ordinary Opeth record (that is, amazing) and had its share of acoustic bits like they all do, though it was darn heavy overall. But this one is ALL mellow, so it certainly stands out as an anomaly in the grand Opeth catalog. Basically, if you like those quiet, melodic, cleanly sung, pretty, psychedelic parts of Opeth's albums (always an important part of their unique formula) you'll undoubtedly enjoy this record, 'cause that's all it is. We thought maybe that they'd get all retro and folky and '70s on this (since we know that long-lost Scandiavian psych prog stuff is their inspiration), but despite the lack of "metal" here, this still has a modern, almost slick sound. We found ourselves digging it, but also unavoidably (and futilely) waiting for the heaviness to suddenly, satisfyingly kick in. You just expect it -- that's their schtick, those dynamics. One solution would be to put this in a multi-disc changer with four other Opeth albums, and play it on 'shuffle' mode!
We wonder what someone who's not already into Opeth (or metal!) would think of this. Maybe for a lot of prog heads this would be their favorite Opeth opus, for there rest of us it's an interesting addition to their canon but we do look forward to the next, light AND heavy Opeth album!!
MPEG Download: "Death Whispered A Lullaby" [/audio/opethdeath.mp3]
I'm going to make this a short review -- only because mere words cannot adequately express the godliness of this band. And because, chances are, you know that already. This new release (their sixth album) will sell itself. Formerly a totally underground cult act, Sweden's Opeth are now extreme metal superstars, and deservedly so. Taking modern brutal, technical death/black metal and melding it with the '70s progressive, psychedelic rock aesthetic that they love so much, Opeth have forged a new style of super heavy, epic & melodic metal of which they are, simply, the masters. Dynamics -- extreme shades of light and dark -- are an important element of their sound, and "Deliverance", um, delivers as you'd expect: you get both thrashing, heavy riffing with Voivod-like twists and gargled death metal vocals, AND pretty, Pink Floydian space-rock with tuneful, folkish singing and acoustic guitars, all in the same song. But, as you may know, "Deliverance" does intentionally lean towards the "heavy" side of the Opeth equation, as they've recorded another album called "Damnation" for release in March with which to explore their more gentle side. This one certainly sounds like an Opeth album (i.e. amazing), we'll see if that one does too.
One of our very favorite metal bands returns with a new album, a domestic release for big-league metal label Roadrunner, which made us wonder if they'd somehow gone all nu-metal on us. Opeth as an Ozzfest band? Well, this is the slickest Opeth record yet, surely. And there's clean singing on here that does seem like it might be geared for (gasp) radio airplay...but, that singing is in the same song with total death metal growling. So it's really the same ol' Opeth we know and love. A well produced, super dynamic and atmospheric blend of death metal and progressive rock, with epic-length songs, ripping technical playing, and sensitive acoustic interludes. And a healthy dose of Mellotron and other keys, moreso even than in the past, as they've now made their keyboardist an official, permanent band member. It could be we're hearing a hint of nu-metal in some of the bouncier, stop start bits...but put that in the context of proggy baroque keyboards, and this is definitely not Slipknot or Korn, that's for sure. And if Opeth can turn what they do into "pop" music and get away with it, more power to 'em. Not that that's likely...
Is this eighth Opeth opus destined to be considered a classic like several of their earlier albums? Well, c'mon, it's undeniably tough for 'em to top what they've done in the past, regardless of how good this is! We are glad to have all the shades of Opeth back together on one album after the heavy disc/light disc dichotomy of their twin previous releases Deliverance and Damnation. And anyway, at this point we can't imagine any Opeth fan daring to not purchase, listen to, and (out of love or awe) worship this!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Now on vinyl. Third & perhaps best (yet) album from this Swedish band worshipped the world over for its combination of heavy death/black metal and epic progrock (i.e. they're no strangers to ten-minute plus song lengths). Note title derived from a Comus lyric!
Third & perhaps best (yet) album from this Swedish band worshipped the world over for its combination of heavy death/black metal and epic progrock (i.e. they're no strangers to ten-minute plus song lengths). Note title derived from a Comus lyric!
People have been waiting for this record like it was the new Star Wars movie or something. And, why not? After all, their last record, 'My Arms, Your Hearse', was a masterpiece. Probably the best mix of black metal, '70s progrock, and just plain awesome songwriting; riffs, melodies, power, that record had it all. Now the new album is finally here, and it too seems destined for similar acclaim. The basic formula remains, a complex, oh-so-skilled mixture of might and beauty. Like all Opeth releases to date, this one will take a little time to digest! Impressive. And, needless to say, definitely better than that lame Star Wars movie!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Fancy packaging edition.
Sometimes you can tell what you're gonna get just by an album cover. Rarely is that more true than with metal records, and the stern looking bearded dude with the winged helmet on the cover of I: Redbad is a pretty good indication of what lies inside - furious, overblown pagan black metal that buzzes and rages like a fucking war. Ophidian Forest is a trio with members stationed in the Netherlands, Croatia, and right here in San Francisco - imagine that. They conceive their music through file swapping online, and the liner notes explain that the three band members have never communicated through phone and wouldn't even recognize each other in person. So how are the results so amazing? Dark forces are surely at work with this one, not only is the music way more "natural" (not to mention totally awesome) than you might expect from such a lack of formal communication, but it may even work in the group's favor; with nothing to focus on except the creation of thrashing metallic glory with an extra heaping of mythological nihilism, the project has taken on a greater meaning than if it would have been defined in the traditional sense of what a band should be. Obviously these three are connected on some higher plane in the realm of black metal, because I: Redbad is a perfectly realized vision, a take no prisoners onslaught of filth and transcendental power. It's also a well thought out concept record focusing on the life and times of the Frisian King Redbad (c. 680-719), who in true metal fashion resisted the Christian onslaught of the Merovingian dynasty while maintaining the pagan ways of his people, who lived near the North Sea extending along the borders of the Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark.
But this is hardly just for you history buffs out there. The guitars remain firmly in the red, the drums keep things blasting relentlessly, and the atmospheric keyboards add a nice touch of otherworldly ambience. And then of course, you get the singer's hateful, distorted screeches, adding a nice witchy element to the affair. Things are as filthy as you could hope for in a metal band, but the songs are also so punky and catchy that you might be surprised to find these sticking in your head for quite some time. To top things off, the band members all look like nefarious forest dwelling wizards, which certainly adds to the mystical vibe they have effortlessly obtained. One can only hope these guys keep up with the collaborations, because this stuff definitely covers everything we love about our black metal.
Record number two from this intercontinental pagan black metal horde, and like their first record a pretty impressive feat, considering the drums were recorded in California, the guitars and basses captured in Croatia, and the keyboards laid down in the Netherlands, but somehow, all of the elements came together to form this epic, sprawling, super complex, super frenzied collection of blackened grimnity, and indeed epic it is. As well as strangely melodic, the pagan element more pronounced this time around, and the keyboards higher in the mix, as well as some seemingly way more intricate, almost mathy arrangements, but other than that, the blown out heaviness and frosty blackness that defined the first record are in full effect. The first track makes that abundantly clear as it explodes with some Scandinavian style buzz, and a little pagan melody, a frantic soaring bit of black metal majesty, peppered with stuttery start stop breakdowns, but always slipping smoothly right back into more blasting insectoid buzz.
Throughout the record, the vocals are garbled and monstrous and harsh, the drums dense and pummeling, the keyboards ethereal and unobtrusive, but adding lots of atmosphere and subtle melody, the tracks are expansive and almost proggy, the riffing super tranced out and droney, in fact, lots of the parts seem to blur into a sort of droned out psychedelia, cyclical, repetitive and totally hypnotic. The vibe somehow manages to be raw and crusty as well, and a little punky, hooks and melodies woven deftly into parts that would otherwise be more like black blurs, the result is some surprising catchiness, alongside some super intense black brutality, and lots of unexpected and seriously -A- typical black metal elements: ultra twisted and convoluted drum parts, lush layered guitars, some gnarled off kilter riffage, warped keyboard melodies, all wound up with the more traditionally blackened elements into a constantly evolving, ever shifting, dizzying barrage of awesome twisted blackness.
LIMITED TO 400 COPIES. Comes housed in a half sized dvd style clamshell case, with a metallic silver printed cover, and an insert with lyrics/liner notes.
[And don't miss the secret hidden track, a super cool, weridly poppy black metal jam that we were convinced had to be a cover...]
Brand new split from these two black metal outfits. There's the intercontinental trio Ophidian Forest, who have gotten much love on the aQ list in the past, one third of which is in fact the man behind eco-terrorist drums-and-dulcimer black metal one man band Botanist, who are teamed up with a San Jose one man band called Haeresiarchs Of Dis, who we've yet to review on the our list, but who some aQ metalheads have dug for a while.
The split, titled Darkest Origins, is in fact, just that, early material by both bands, unreleased until now, which as you might have guessed means more raw and lo-fi, which is just fine with us. Ophidian Forest are up first, and while the production is a bit more rough, their sound seemed to be already essentially fully formed, classic almost traditional black metal, shot through with some weird woozy melodies, the occasional almost carnivalesque keyboard, the vocals so raw and raspy, they sound like blast of staticky hiss, the overall sound washed out and a bit blurry, but in a way that really suits the sound, giving everything a tranced out vibe. OF dip often into a sound more midtempo and atmospheric, especially on the final track, which has a melody in the background that almost sounds like a Christmas carol, but when wedded to the shriek and blast, the buzz and howl, it pushes the sound toward something approaching almost choral, take the drums and vokills away and we'd have some seriously blissed out gauzy ambience, but fused to the black buzz, it becomes something pretty cool and weird.
From what we'd heard of Haeresiarchs of Dis in the past, his sound was a furious unrelenting, almost dizzying onslaught of lightning fast black buzz, furious and frantic and frenetic, a relentless blasting fury, shot through with all manner of warped melody, and constantly shifting texture, super dynamic, peppered with swaths of swirling synth, and some seriously insane vokills. And all of that is definitely evident here, although again, in a slightly more lo-fi version, with HoD slowing things down now and again, for some serious chugging, and more punkish pound, the vocals augmented by strange samples, the whole thing laced with some surprisingly melodic classic metal sounding melodies, not to mention the occasional bit of piano driven atmospheric ambience, or psychedelic swirl, or creepy static drenched Caretaker like drift, but all of that weirdness if woven into the overall blackened buzz.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Now, it's difficult to believe that the same guys responsible for the absurd Vondur are also involved with the much more serious, epic, doomy black metal of Ophthalamia, but they are. A Long Journey" is a re-recording of the band's debut from several years back, original titled A Journey In Darkness... improved production and more capable band members being the main differences. The Vondur and Opthalamia albums also represent It's last efforts in black metal, as he recently quit all his bands (these two plus War and Abruptum), sold all his black metal paraphernalia (midget-sized chainmail anyone?) and moved away from Sweden...
A nice reissue of this cult classic Swedish black metal album, another one of those things that it seems that we should have reviewed when it first came out, but didn't, probably 'cause back in 1995 the AQ "list" was just getting started. And we were also only just then getting into the black metal as well, come to think of it. But we did love this album, and still do. It's especially majestic, melodic, quite unusual black metal, on the slower side, with epic progressive atmospheres reminding us of early Opeth perhaps, and also Dissection, with which this band has some connection. The winding guitar lines are what stands out for us, as played by none other than the infamous "It", also a key member of Abruptum, Vondur, and War. Unlike those other band of Its, this isn't so primitive and noisy. It's more about the guitar, which weeps melancholically over martial but sorta jazzy drumming, playing insidiously catchy, sorta folky riffs that are woven into doomy, sorrowful, and sinuous compositions. What we really like is when it gets kind of frantic, as in the middle of "Slowly Passing The Frostlands/A Winterland's Tear" (all the songs have the two-part names, by the way), all twisted and tangled, and the song starts to sound a heck of a lot like a Black Flag instrumental or something from one of Greg Ginn's first two Gone albums!!
Raspy vokills and weird whispers factor into the mix as well, along with a "practice space" production vibe, making this sound more black metal than it might otherwise, given that the herky-jerky, never ending guitar riffage also sounds more like rollicking '70s heavy rock on occasion. Making sure there's no question about it (and It) being black metal, though, if the band's medieval/gothic/ridiculous painted portraits weren't enough, along with their pedigrees in other bands (Abruptum, Marduk, Pan-Thy-Monium, Swordmaster, etc.) this ends with a bonus track (as did the original cd), that's a cover of the great "Deathcrush" by Mayhem.
Ophthalamia made several albums, but this - their second, strangest, and we think most memorable - is our favorite, and also one of our favorites among Its entire discography. Glad it's back in print, a great reminder of all the fantastic, original albums we were discovering back in the '90s coming from the Scandinavian metal scene...
What hath the popularity of The Osbournes wrought? Music for the weirdest nightclub you've never been to, apparently. Opium Jukebox is actually Martin Atkins of Killing Joke -- Opium Jukebox seems to be his project for doing trancey techno cover versions of rock music. He's already done a Sex Pistols tribute, an alt-rock one with Nirvana and Jane's Addiction tunes, and has a Rolling Stones tribute in the pipeline. None of which much interest us...but THIS does. He's roped in a sitar player and dug up some vocal samples ("courtesy some dodgy market place in the Far East") to do a "Bhangra" style album of Black Sabbath covers!! Yep, a blend of traditional Indian instrumentation and modern electronic synth and beats making essentially instrumental and 'exotic' (but mostly recognizable, if you know your Sabbath) versions of the likes of "Iron Man" and "War Pigs". For some reason they've neglected "Sweet Leaf", which seems odd 'cause this has a definite hookah-suckin' vibe -- most of the synth effects sound like bong hits, even. It's super-cheesy, but how can you resist? We couldn't. While we would certainly recommend the artistry and atmosphere of Rondellus' Latinized early music style Sabbath-chants above "Bhangra Bloody Bhangra", there's still a place on our shelves next to that AQ-fave Rondellus "Sabbatum" disc for this. It's a worthwhile novelty for sure. Wonder why it exists, but listen and enjoy (or at least, confuse your friends). Track list: Supernaut, Iron Man, Heaven & Hell, N.I.B., Paranoid, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, Snowblind, Embryo, War Pigs, Suicide Solution (hey that's a solo Ozzy song, not a Sabbath one!), and Supernaut again.
And as we later discovered, if you dig this, check out the Opium Jukebox Sex Pistols record which is done in a similar style, sitars and all.
We made The Puritan our Record Of The Week a couple lists back, the twisted ultra doom project of Reverend Bizarre's S.A. Hynninen, aka Albert Witchfinder, and that record was indeed twisted and doomy, crushing and slow, warped and mysterious, a little bit gothy and dramatic, a lot bit pummeling downtuned crush. So now we have Opium Warlords, Hynninen's most recent project, which we would have made our record of the week as well if it was a bit easier to get, cuz holy shit, it's like an even more fucked up Puritan, the slow parts are slower, the croony gothy parts, are, well, MORE. It's a creepy crawly burning, sprawling avant doom juggernaut, equal parts classic doom a la My Dying Bride and Paradise Lost, Japanese sludge a la Corrupted, Boris, Solar Anus, and strange minimal prog, but it's WAY poppier too, and pretty, so much so, that we often forget what we're listening to, seventies British prog? Peter Hammill? Sounds strange, and it definitely is, but even in true doom outfit Reverend Bizarre, Hynninen and his crew were way weirder than your average doom band. And the thing with Opium Warlords, is at first it just seemed slow and weird, but it totally blossoms, the more melodic songs revealing themselves as epic and catchy, well crafted avant prog. Or something.
The record opens in full on doom mode, big crashing chords ring out, lots of space, the vocals a mewling croon that goes from growl to falsetto, as the track plods along for 8+ minutes, lurching along doomily, yet melodically, before slipping into the second track, a super spacious skeletal drift, that sounds more like Bohren than Boris, before finally stumbling into full on doomsludge, harsh howled vocals, and strange twisted melodies, until the record shifts gears entirely.
The next two songs, nearly 22 minutes, is a smoldering dark cabaret, guitars distorted and spidery, with Hynninen really singing, dramatic and emotional, it almost sounds like some long lost dark krautrock ballad, no drums, minus the occasional rumbling percussion off in the distance, just a warm drift of lush chords, and minor key melodies, really gorgeous, and timeless sounding.
Which gives way to another bout of doomic pummel, but again surprisingly melodic, all instrumental this time, just the guitars churning, the drums pounding, all wound into a tense chunk of doom pop heaviness.
The next track gets all Eastern with some layered guitars, and abstract percussion, heavy for sure, but also a bit raga like, with a strange mix, big bass thrums way up in the mix, the song eventually transforming into a convoluted math metal workout, which gives way to yet another chunk of more classic sounding doom. Slooooow, and spare, harsh growled almost falsetto vocals, over the pounding drums and big distorted chords left to ring out, heavy and slow, but still really pretty...
The final proper track, is all muted bass strum, jangly clean guitar, total dreamy pop vocals over the top, eventually growing more and more rocking, before finishing off in a tangle of almost Champs sounding guitar harmonies and then 30 seconds of feedback and amp buzz.
The whole thing put to bed by the 5 second closing track, a brief burst of pounding grunted furious grind metal. Phew.
Baffling. Brilliant. Even the booklet is utterly confusional. Packed with random text, strange doodles, diagrams, there's even a fragment of one of his papers from grade school, plus the record is NOT live, and it's unclear if this is a band, or if Hynninen plays everything himself, the artwork is super striking, very pink, and on the back, Hynninen offers up this description of Opium Warlords' self described "Black Gobi Desert Rock", which just may render the above review moot:
"A ritual of jet-black sonic occultism inside an imaginary subterranean temple. A mental trip to the minimalist galaxies of suffocatingly slow and heavy nekroambiences. A ground-breaking bi-polar exploration. A droner's delight and headbanger's holiday. A rave of deranged militarist dance beats. A celebration of psychosexual isolation. Essential and easy-to-listen-to fear music for unbalanced and self-hating youth. Kutu-vibrations for sweatshirt-sporting rillirillos. A message "from beyond". Uncontrolled emotional outbursts to cheer up those with the long faces. Something just for you, who "have heard it all" and "really could not care less". Quality time for a suicidal inner-space astrodoomonaut."
3rd album from this aQ fave band with perhaps the best "truth in advertising" name in the realm of psychedelic doomy druggy heaviness. They also have some of the strangest album titles too. A project of Sami "Albert Witchfinder" Hynninen, of Reverend Bizarre (R.I.P.) and The Puritan fame, Opium Warlords' brand of doom metal is often on the minimalist, avantgarde ambient side of things, and oddly prog-inflected. Sprawling Finnish weird-ass doom dirgery at its best!
These slo-mo riffscapes meld the sombre Sabbathy-ness of Reverend Bizarre with the more experimental, extreme likes of early Earth (Extra-Capsular Extraction era), some of the tracks being stripped down to just guitar only, others accompanied by the plodding of a live drummer, or the even more precise plodding of a drum machine. They can range from the somnolently super-sludged to the curiously acoustic, always massively moody in any case, simple and effective. Several are purely instrumental, while some feature Sami's deep voiced vocals ponderously intoning melancholic lyrics, like on the morose, majestic organ-laced 12 minute epic "The Self-Made Man" (which concludes with a noodling, jamming outro that Orthodox might do in one of their more Greg Ginn-ish moments). Sami also occasionally unleashes some wretched black metal style anguish in the vokill dep't. as well, as on the quietly despairing "The God In Ruins".
Depressive and dreary, but strangely comforting and beautifully mesmeric at the same time, Opium Warlords have again come up with a hard to describe, quite original slab of less-is-more, confusion-infused doom (or doom-infused confusion). Scratch your heads and bow down, as they doom on!
We flipped for the first Opium Warlords record, so much so that we wanted to make it Record Of The Week, but like this new one, it was just too difficult to keep in stock and available. Otherwise you might be reading a Record Of The Week review right now instead of just a VERY enthusiastic highlight review! OW is the most recent, and most active solo project of S.A. Hynninen, aka Albert Witchfinder, he of late great doomlords Reverend Bizarre, not to mention, the man behind weirdo avant doom outfit KLV, as well as spaced out doom sludge psychedelic one man band The Puritan.
So here's mysterious missive number two from Hynninen's Opium Warlords, the very strangely named We Meditate Under The Pussy In The Sky, and if anything, it's even more far our and difficult to describe. We'd say it's doom, but really it's not, not really, or it is, at least in places, but otherwise, it's pretty experimental. We'd like to say it's heavy, and it is, but only in places, we CAN say, it's psychedelic, cuz it is all over, and weird, and warped, and demented and damaged. This is definitely one of those records, where all you can really do is describe the sounds.
The brief opener is a five minute drift of shimmering guitar, of clanging chords, a droned out psychedelic guitarscape, that flits from hushed drift to crashing chaotic clang and back again, it's slow building psychguitar intro to what is essentially the record's centerpiece, the 12 minute "Slippy", which also just happens to be the most whatthefuck track here. Beginning with tribal drums and haunted house organs, we were preparing for a sort of majestic creeping doom, but instead, after about 2 minutes, the sound shifts dramatically, like someone switched channels, and the sound is suddenly a weird sort of calypso-like prog, angular guitars, super distorted, bursts of jagged cymbal crash, harsh hellish vokills, looped and loopy, all over a strange sort of shuffling groove, but that only lasts for a couple minutes as well, before the sound slips into a hushed barely there drone, before exploding into that calypso prog freakout once again. Eventually, the sound settles into a dark bit of psychedelic shimmer, all clean guitar, minor key melody, clean vocal croon, sounding almost like fifties doo wop, this too goes on for ages, until suddenly, the track explodes into a heaving blast of lurching distortion drenched doom, laced with weird jagged dynamic stop/starts, and then again, slips into that weird calypso like percussion for the last minute or so. Holy Finnish whatthefuck. So nuts, but so genius!
The last three songs are on the shorter side and are not nearly so twisted. The first is a sprawl of doomic dirgery, laced with chiming clean guitars, and underpinned by roiling basslines, and what sounds like hysterical female screams, the sound growing more and more Eastern sounding, and buzzy, as the track progresses, sounding like some droned out snake charmer jam by the end. The second is a seriously distorted drum and bass dirge that sounds a bit like Ride For Revenge, super murky and minimal, before shifting gears partway through into a sort of Hypothermia style post-black metal / post rock clean guitar and drums groove, which is soon joined by buzzing psychedelic guitar tendrils, ending with an abstract sprawl of dubbed out FX drenched bass buzz. Finally, the third, and last track of the closing three, erupts in a billow of amp buzz and rumbling distortion, out of which emerges a dreamy tangle of guitar melodies, laid back and woozy, the final track playing out more like an outro, nothing too weird or tripped out, just a darkly psychedelic coda, surprisingly lovely considering the tweaked and twisted nature of the rest of the record.
Another blast of confusional brilliance from this Finnish master of baffling psychedelic heaviness and outsider minimal doom confusion. Recommended to all Finnish music freaks for sure, but also anyone into confounding heavy outsider weirdness, which we're guessing is a whole lot of you.
Fantastic! One of our all-time obscure proto-metal, heavy psych faves has now been reissued on vinyl. Long, long ago we had a cd version, but that's long gone and this is definitely a nicer, more definitive reissue, done totally legit (for the first time we're now told) with the cooperation of the original band members. Here's more or less what we said about it before:
Here's good 'un for you Seventies proto-metal lovin' brothers and sisters out there, being another reissue of a vintage slab of heavy psych rock from way back when, in the vein of Captain Beyond, Dust, Bang, Leaf Hound, Jerusalem and the like... We don't know much about Orang-Utan other than that this was probably their only release, a self-titled album from 1971, and they hailed from England (we think). Certainly this is a bit Zeppish in spots. A minor lost classic? This rocks hard and melodic with a melancholic emotional edge to many of the songs, not just the mellower ones. Great vocals and riffage!
This new vinyl reissue enlightens us a bit, we've learned that Orang-Utan were indeed from London, England, but operated there under the name Hunter. But their sole album was issued only in the USA, under the name Orang-Utan, unbeknownst to the band themselves (sneaky management shenanigans afoot!). Comes with insert featuring rare photos as well as liner notes, by Ugly Things writer Jeremy Cargill, explaining the whole weird story. Also we found out that the singer was previously in cult popsyke band Jason Crest.
VERY RECOMMENDED HEAVY PSYCH PROTO-METAL!!
We want to like this British stoner rock band, really we do, but despite their hard-rockin, heavy ways we really just can't get into 'em that much. But, they're ok. This, their third or fourth album (see, we just don't care) is produced by one guy from Kyuss and has another, their singer, doing guest vocals on two songs. But (to their credit, perhaps) they don't sound like those oft-cloned desert rockers. No, "Coup De Grace" is more of a shit-kickin' motorcycle-ridin' rawk affair with gruff vocals and cowboy boots. More nu-grunge for the '00s. We can't really say what if anything is wrong with this, but it's just not grabbing anyone here at the moment, sorry. Maybe we need to hear it at a party or something. Stoner rock types should check out the audio clip for yourselves and see what you think.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
