Where do you go when you've been shot in the stomach and vultures are already circling your soon-to-be corpse? Where do you hide from the Southern Reaper, who rides upon his skeletal steed, with a scythe in one hand and a shotgun in the other? How much peyote is too much? And how much exactly does an ounce of tumbleweed cost?
Fear not, for the Tumbleweed Dealer has returned stronger and more baked than ever to answer all of these questions. At the border between the Wild West and drug-induced psychedelia stands Seb Painchaud and his gang of ghoulish cowboys, all bearing arms, pipes and enough weed to make Al Cisneros sense a disturbance in the smoke. Western Horror is the band's second album, released just today, and, if you know what's good for you, you have awaited this album with trembling hands and heavy breathing. Was it worth the wait?
HELL YEAH BITCH!
Tumbleweed Dealer might have just perfected a new genre of music that I have decided to call country-doom, even though it reeks of many other delicious flavors. There's a lot of late-Earth influence going on here, as Seb Painchaud conjures an intricate weaving of shamanistic, Wild West-tinged riffing with some bluesy hues and tons of melody, complimented by some insanely groovy bass work and simple yet atmospheric drumming. I sort of knew what to expect, as I have listened to their previous work A LOT. Hitting play on the album's opener, aptly named Bluntlust, has managed to blow me away. The entire song exudes summer vibes through every note and you think you're in for a fun ride, but things quickly take a turn for the sinister with Slow Walk Through A Ghost Town. From that point on, Western Horror constantly changes gears and alternates between moods, but one thing remains constant: the band's penchant for creating mesmerizing tunes that could be the soundtrack to a spaghetti Western horror movies about skeletal cowboys and ghastly rancheros. Repetition and various motives are used with confidence and grace and, by the time the album was over, I realized I ended up loving this band even more.
Tumbleweed Dealer is like the bastard son of Earth - they sucked on Dr. Dylan Carlson's tit enough to get a taste of the country drone they have professed in their recent years, but then they broke into daddy's medicine cabinet, took a few sips of whatever they could find in there, grabbed the family shotgun and went out to terrorize the West. Western Horror is their best work yet and one of the most exciting albums to come out in 2014 so far. Lock'n load!
No idea how I've managed to miss this, but the bongriffic (it's a combination of the words bong and riff and terrific, get it? I'm a wordsmithing genius, the voice of a generation) weedians from Montreal, Quebec's Tumbleweed Dealer have released a re-recorded version of Resurrected Yet Again, the final track from their excellent debut EP, Death Rides Southwards. It sounds better than ever, with crispy guitar lines and perfect mixing. It really breathes new life into the track. The song comes with a sweet poster to go along with it, designed by Alexandre Goulet.
Tumbleweed Dealer are actually gearing up for the release of their second full-length album, for which they just finished recording. It is now in the mixing stage and, if this new single is any indication, it's going to be their best work yet. I'm psyched to hear it and if you haven't heard this amazing band yet, it's high time that you do! For fans of Earth, stoner rock and bluesy grooves.
During my daily trek on the interwebs, I came across this sweet instrumental psychedelic stoner rock band from Serbia called Owl Oxidant. It's totally obscure and I haven't been able to pull any extra information other than what's available on Soundcloud, but I don't even care - the music is so damn fine that I have no problem sharing it with everyone. There are only 3 tracks available at the moment and they all mix groovy rhythms, psychedelic ambiances and scorching bluesy licks that make me wish I was frying under an oven sun, my feet dipped in the sea and a cold beer by my side. I'm definitely keeping an eye out on these guys. Hopefully they'll release more stuff and a label grabs them - they're excellent!
Thanks to Zann O))) for originally sharing this on Facebook. You made my morning, buddy!
Oh man, the recent terrible weather is really wearing me down. Between rain, snow, never ending blizzards and freezing temperatures, I feel like I haven't seen the sun in forever. Lately it's been getting a little warm, so the snow has started melting into that horrible brown, mushy substance that stains your pants the minute you go out. Long story short, it's gross outside and I hate it. I hate you too.
Enter Juleah, a cute singer and multi-instrumentalist from Austria, who seems determined to chase away the winter and bring me the summery vibes I crave. Her newest album called Entangled and Entwined is a superb collection of songs mixing slow rock, jazz and shoegaze and Juleah seems to craft her songs with only one purpose in mind: chilling. The music is guitar driven with minimal percussion and soft, mellow vocals. The album's title is spot on, as Juleah's guitar lines and chords often coil around each other like those sweet neon green snakes that live in the tropical forests, creating a nice, layered feel. If you listen closely, you can catch small glimpses of blues, country, stoner and psych rock in Juleah's guitar playing, but the album lends itself much better as background music to a lazy relaxing morning. It makes me wanna eat strawberries with whipped cream. It makes me wanna sit on the sand by the sea like a beached turtle, with just my feet in the water, enjoying the sun. It makes me wanna pour vanilla ice cream on my head and let it melt and maybe later some dogs could come and lick it off my face. It makes me wanna swim in grape jelly. Gah!
This album is pretty much awesome in every way and Juleah should be really proud of it. Big thanks to Russian Winter Records too, who send us amazing music on the regular. You guys rule. Now I'm going to hit play on Entangled and Entwined again and imagine it's summer all over again. Hoo doggy!
The most holy shit! submission we've received this year on the TZEEEAC email has got to be the inconspicuous message from Christian Peters, guitarist for psychedelic stoner kings Samsara Blues Experiment who also runs the Electric Magic record label, announcing us that his band was about to release a new album titled Waiting for the Flood. Oh, and he included a link for us to download and listen to it in advance. mind = blown. Definitely the biggest email-related surprise of this year and definitely something I never expected back in 2011, when we started this website.
So, is it any good? "Well that's a dumb fucking question", said everyone who's ever listened to this band, "it's Samsara Blues Experiment, how could it NOT be good?" And you're spot on, fellow SBE fans. In fact, I'd go as far as saying that Waiting for the Flood is their best album yet. Featuring 4 tracks, each one blowing past the 10 minute mark, this album is the cosmic journey old-timey Romanian astronaut Dumitru Prunariu wishes he could have taken, if only he'd had a stash of those hard-ass '70s psychedelic drugs everyone in the rest of Europe was raving about. Alas, this was not the case, unfortunately, and instead he had a boring 8-day trip in outer space where he just performed a bunch of stupid science experiments.
The dudes in Samsara Blues Experiment seem to have taken a space trip of their own, with a small detour in the Orient and the destination set to the Riff-filled Land. Striking a perfect balance between improvisation and structured songwriting, SBE have created a monster of an album, featuring '70s-inspired psych rock, heavy stoner riffs and a clear taste for long, spaced-out jams that just spiral out of control like in some crazy fever dream. The one thing that will stick with you, apart from the insane guitar solos, is the sheer HEAVINESS of the guitars and bass. Every riff they pull sounds massive, while Richard's groovy bass lines rumble away like the engines of a space shuttle, backed by the pounding drums, courtesy of drummer Thomas Vedder.
Needless to say, Waiting for the Flood is an album that lends itself well to obsessive, repeated listens. I've been listening to it on and off for about a month and I still feel I'm nowhere close to discovering all of the different movements, parts, riffs, licks, jams and solos of each track. There's so much variety and weird-tasting meat to be gnawed off these bones, it's unreal.
I'd like to thank the guys in Samsara Blues Experiment both for creating this amazing work of art and for being kind enough to share it with us. As for you, reader, you should crank up the volume and give this a spin, ASAP! It'll take you places you never knew existed. Just be sure to buckle up beforehand. It's gonna be one hell of a ride!
Here's a nice surprise from Sweden aka the land of death metal, Witchcraft and Graveyard. Maskin is a gang of rowdy Swedes who play a thick'n'heavy mix of hard rock and stoner metal. The band's singer personally sent us his music, so we're pretty much best friends now. And I'm going to reap the rewards when these guys make it big. They're gearing up for a full-length release in winter and if they keep up the fuzzy guitars, desert solos and gruff vocals, it's going to be a kickass album. The type of album you play in your car while driving on a deserted highway with the wind in your hair and the sun reflecting off your sunglasses.
You can check Maskin out on Facebook and Soundcloud, but I'm embedding their songs here too, just in case you're too lazy to click one extra time.
Brittish international men of mystery UNCLE ACID And The Deadbeats are a quartet of drone-doom-electric-fuzzy-wtf-rock, by which I mean they've kinda created their own sound over the past few years since the band's birth. With their first more obscure album "Volume 1" and the spectacular god-tier effort "Blood Lust", the band's ambiance and Hammer Horror feel has found a way into my record collection.
Let's take this piece by piece: the first preview of the stuff on "Mind Control" was the single "Poison Apple", which is streamed on youtube by the band itself, and is pretty much the strongest track on this album, with a catchy riff and catchier lyrics, it's the cream here. When I heard the whole LP, I got confused: the first half is very good, Uncle Acid-worthy material. Heavy stuff, no questions asked, but then after the first 5-6 songs, stuff got reaaaallly boring. Boring for an Uncle Acid fan, which was expecting more of their caracteristic sound, but got a couple of overly-repetitive drone songs, whom might actually please drone enthusiasts (drone enthusiasts should get a job), but in the end fail to deliver the fuzzy goodness that these Deadbeats should deliver.
This album's definitive strong point, besides its lyrical concept starring a desert cult that steals motorcycles and performs rituals in the sand, is that it all basically plays like "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", but dragged 30 miles through the Australian outback, rolled through some swamp mud and then coated in fuzz like a donut made of doom, yet you can stiff clearly hear its roots in 60s progressive acid rock. Also, that cover art's fucked up man, like.. really fucked up, so that could have gotten some improvement, because the arts for "Vol. 1" and especially "Blood Lust" are some of the best I've seen.
Queens of the Stone Age are the undisputed kings of stoner rock and whoever disagrees with this statement is no friend of mine. Now that I got this out of my system, lets talk a little bit about the album, shall we?
This thing works like everything BUT a clock. It's fucking crazy, really. So crazy that I can't help myself but end my. sentences. abruptly. Well, not crazy in a ''headbang-until-you-puke-cocaine'' fashion, but from a lyrical standpoint. Hedonism? Check. Drugs? Check. Slutty girls? Fucking check. Tho' I eventually get bored of bands who sing about the same things over and over and over again ( I'm looking at you, Red Hot Chili Peppers), somehow I can't get enough of everything Josh Homme releases with all of his 157 bands. There's something about this guy and his music, I don't know. He knows how to make his already famous ''hilbilly-ginger-alpha-male-chain-smoking-badass'' act feel fresh and exciting. Maybe because it's nearly impossible to get bored as a cocaine aficionado, so there's always something to talk about. Even Albert Einstein would say it's ''mathematically impossible'', but hey, I'm not a biologist, so who the hell knows.
Well, this is something I thought I’d never see, space rock recorded in the desert!
Simply put, these chaps decided to disconnect themselves from the real world and set up an individual studio in which to document this beast of an album; because at only four tracks that spawn over 75 minutes, this release took me a little while to digest.
At times, it reminded me very much of Causa Sui and their Summer Sessions albums (see the review here); following a similar pattern, 3rd Ear Experience ‘wrote’ their music over the span of just a couple of days, doing so mainly by improvisation. And that, in my humble opinion, is what represents the core of an artist’s imagination: to be able to let yourself go of everything else and just be there for what you really want to achieve is by no means a small feat.
With regards to the music itself, the four tracks treat the listener from an alternative perspective, as each one seems to represent a movement inside a whole. The first track, The Surface Of Last Scattering, brings out the big guns, being probably the one with the heaviest groove. This is greatly complemented by Peacock Black, second in line and the most chilled-out of the four. One might think that crossing over the twenty two minute mark could get boring, yet I’ve never felt that.
These guys don't seem like boring people, do they?
The other half of the album follows basically in the same fashion, alternating between heavy and slow in the most deft of ways, with light synth touches placed as a background for the instruments. All in all, it’s a release that never disappoints, although in order to fully understand what 3rd Ear Experience accomplished here, one must be completely detached from the world and must leave the album to soak into one’s brain - pretty much what they wanted from us from the start. Personally, I’d recommend listening to this release late at night, just before going to sleep. It actually leaves the impression that you’re in a dry field, stargazing with the best of them.
With that said and done, we thank the guys once more for providing us with a great listening experience and gladly recommend that you check them out either at cdbaby or iTunes. Meanwhile, here’s a brief excerpt of the title track in order to tickle your music loving senses.
Now, that's not to say that I sneak around his neighbourhood at night with a full trash bag, smash it against the door to his house then run away laughing maniacally. Such brutal displays of savagery don't characterize me.
No. But sometimes, when watching TV and eating junk food, I quietly collect the empty chip bags and chocolate wrappers into my backpack. Some time after this, Marco might have me over to watch movies and break some more of his furniture. I would bring my garbage-stuffed backpack along, claiming that I need it to carry the beer or something. Then, just before handing him the cold cans, I ask him inconspicuously: "Hey, Marco, is it okay if I throw away some stuff in the paper waste bin in your room?" He says yes, the poor bastard. At which point, I plaster a sinister grin on my face, reach inside my backpack and hand him my long-collected garbage, which immediately fills up his little bin, rendering it useless. It's a way for me to subtly assert my dominance. It's a way of saying "I don't feel like taking out my own trash, so you will do it for me, even if you don't want to." This has been going on for some time. He doesn't suspect anything or, if he does, he is too afraid to do anything about it. Which means that my plan is working.
This blog is kinda like that too, only instead of Marco's house, it's your computer and/or listening device and instead of greasy snack bags, it's all sorts of violent music from the deepest pits of the internet. You are also too scared to question me, so don't even bother. Just go download this free album by Romero. It's stoner rock/doom and it'll brighten up your day. See? I only do it because I care.
A stoner rock concert is a beautiful thing to witness. Even without being drugged out of your mind like in some wannabe Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas character, the massive psychedelic riffs, the obscene quantities of reverb and the hypnotic drumming have the power of taking your mind to places it's never been before. Or so I imagined, because, prior to last Friday, I had never been to a stoner rock concert, despite desperately wanting to go. So I was pretty stoked when German stoner rock gods Samsara Blues Experiment announced they would be touring Greece in February and that they were also going to hit my temporary place of residence, a mere two days after my birthday. I bought my ticket ahead of time (10 euros? A steal!) and, when Friday finally came, I bolted out of the house and ran straight to the venue where the show was about to take place.
I was early, as usual. The place looked almost deserted, save for a few lost souls enjoying some beers here and there. I walked to the bar where the same cute tattooed girl from last time handed me a cold can, I cracked it open and took a few sips, as I was waiting for the place to crowd up.
The support band soon took the stage and, after minimal preparations, dove head-first into their set. 45Rats are a young trio from Athens who play instrumental stoner rock with some clear nods to classical rock legends AC/DC. Their music is straight-up rockin', with fast drumming, some heavy metal riffing and lots of fiery guitar solos. The guitarist did his fair share of wah-wah pedal abuse during the set and at one point pulled out a harmonica from the back pocket of his jeans and busted out a sweet bluesy melody, before throwing it away and resuming playing the guitar. All in all, their set was pretty damn great and I made a mental note to check out their first EP called First Gear. 45Rats are offering it for free right here.
So the guys get their well-earned applause and the dudes from Samsara Blues Experiment immediately climb the stage and start hauling in their stuff, wiring pedals, tweaking the drums and strategically placing beer cans all over the stage. A few minutes of soundchecking - everything's in order. The show can begin.
The red lights fade out for a bit and fog starts filling up the stage and shortly after, the band just EXPLODES into a frenzy of massive riffs, rumbling bass lines and thunderous drumming. I pretty much lost my shit right there and then and I just allowed myself to become engulfed in the heavy psychedelic atmosphere. My memories of that night are fuzzy, much like Hans Eiselt's guitar tone. All I can remember is tons of fog and red lights, wailing guitar screams, groove-laden rhythmic sections and a general feeling of being in some form of altered state of conscience, where the heavily distorted psychedelic bluesy lines flow through me while I flow right along with them. As I stood there with my eyes closed, I understood once again that listening to MP3s of bands recorded in a studio is bullshit. Nothing could ever hope to equal the experience of actually being in the same room with the band as they're playing their guts out with the volume cranked all the way up to eleven. The roar of the crowd made the band return not once, but two times to the stage, after playing for almost two hours. They gave it their all and, by the end of the show, everyone was exhausted, but feeling happy and warm on the inside. We had witnessed pure passion and talent.
The only thing that put a dent in the evening for me was the utter lack of t-shirts at the merchandise stand. I would have happily gotten some piece of cloth inscribed with their band name, especially after they shared a picture on Facebook featuring a dizzying array of t-shirt designs from their personal collection.
Even so, my first true stoner rock experience has proven to be amazing, thanks to the shamans from Samsara Blues Experiment and their insane semi-improvised composition. T'was a night to remember, one which ended with an excessively long walk home and a sandwich eaten at 2.30 AM in the kitchen, while still trying to come to grips with what I had just seen. Then I had some cookies and went to bed. Bliss.
Here's a couple of songs I shot with my highly unprofessional equipment. Still, they turned out decent.
This is
what describes best Causa Sui’s music. Considering this is a triplet of albums
spawned from the same (summer?) jam sessions, the manner in which all
instruments blend in with each other is nothing short of awe-inspiring.Consisting mostly of lengthy compositions, this
particular brand of stoner rock played by these danish geniuses is not music to
be heard in the background, but rather something to be treated as a work of
art, when you just stand and stare in admiration, compelled by the greatness
that has overcome you.
Aptly
titled, this trio of albums does indeed evoke the feelings of summer in some
way or another, which are indeed the feelings that I crave for considering the
shitty weather outside. Basically, playing a song like this one
reminiscing
of past summer sessions (heh) and looking forward to the vacation days I have
programmed for around the first of May, let me tell you, there could be nothing
better right now.
Still,
there’s more to it. I’ve come to enjoy best this trio because, above all the
great instrumental work to be found here, the guest apparitions by Johan
Riedenlow on saxophone are, with the risk of sounding like I’m eating from a
bucket full of cheese, simply mind boggling. And that’s just the album version
of things, because you see, there’s also the live recordings to incite drool at
the corner of one’s mouth.
Now, aren’t
you just wondering what in the world you just listened to and suddenly feel the
urge to hear MOAR? I tell you, if these guys ever hit Romania, I’ll be happy to
donate a kidney just to make sure I get to see them. Word.
Tumbleweed Dealer is a sweet new band from Montreal (fucking Canada again!) which was born when some dude got high, found a guitar nearby and was probably on a late-Earth binge. What comes out of all this is a debut EP consisting of three instrumental songs that evoke the burning sun, the hot air and the drowsy atmosphere of a Southern summer day.
The Earth comparison rises because Tumbleweed Dealer employs the same recipe of using clean, twangy guitars to create sunny, country-bluesy drones that are perfect for baking under the sun in a hammock, with a cold drink in hand. I'd even be willing to go out on a limb and say that Death Rides Southwards is a bit more focused and put together than Earth's latest output, which can be pretty hit-and-miss sometimes.
Tumbleweed Dealer have started working on a full-length album immediately following the release of this EP so, needless to say, I hope they manage to score some Pineapple Express-grade weed so they can write more sweet tunes like these. My expectations are very high. HEYO! Get it?!
You can stream and buy this EP on a pay-what-you-want basis at Moshpit Tragedy.
Pic taken at Meteora monastery aka TOTAL FUKKIN DEATH
Since I will be (hopefully) living in Greece at least until October 2013, I figured I'd be a diligent young man and brush up on my Greek metal knowledge - when I'm not busy studying operations management, obviously. As I was walking to school a few days ago, I was listening to Resurgency's False Enlightment and I was pretty much digging it, but wasn't having any other thoughts. After coming home, I went on the Googles and what do you know? Resurgency hailed from Athens. This sparked my interest so I did a quick search on Encyclopedia Metallum for more Athens-based bands and was surprised to find that quite a few bands I liked were from the glorious Greek capital city. Hence, this article. After Zulu's massive soul wandering (great read, bro!), I thought it would be nice to wash it off with some horrific Greek metal.
Sounds good? Great, we'll get started in a moment. Not before letting you know that, as you may suspect, one city can only host so many talented individuals with a total distaste for life and gods. Thus, many of these bands share one or more common members and I will be happy to point out the relationships between them. Also, I am going to pick out an album from each band to feature and, if you like what you hear, it'll be your job to dig for more. GO!
Rotting Christ - Triarchy of the Lost Lovers (1996)
Well, let's get the obvious out of the way. Rotting Christ are one of Greece's premier metal exports and Sakis Tollis and his crew have definitely made a name for themselves, playing great black metal and trucking on since 1987 to present. They've shared members with the mighty Varathron (sadly, they're not from Athens, so I couldn't include them in this post) and Necromantia. I've picked Triarchy of the Lost Lovers because I can't deny the massive appeal tracks like King of a Stellar War, Archon or Snowing Still have. Just brilliant.
Necromantia - Crossing the Fiery Path (1993)
Necromantia are another cult band from the 90s black metal Hellenic scene. They are best known for using an 8-string bass instead of a guitar, giving their songs a thick extra layer of heaviness. Plus, I still can't get over that yellow goth Spiderman vampire dude with a goatee. He's fucking hilarious.
Nocternity - Onyx (2003)
Nocternity are responsible for one of my all-time favorite cover artworks. EVER. I fucking love this armor clad, sword-wielding warrior with his awesome helmet. They've used him on several of their albums and I love it every time. Onyx is a stormy, emotional album that's heavily inspired by Burzum's early work. Fuzzy, ambient guitar riffs float and engulf you while the simplistic drumming conveys a solemn atmosphere that's easy to get lost into. Also, these guys are total dorks, as evidenced by the fact that they have a song called Valyrian Steel (Blood of the Dragon) that's about Daenerys Targaryen. Oh, and one of the guitarists calls himself Khal Drogo. LOL. Game of Thrones bros 4 lyfe!! xoxoxo
Nocternity have shared members in the past with Varathron, Limbonic Art and Dead Congregation.
Speaking of which...
Dead Congregation - Graves of the Archangels (2008)
Dead Congregation are one of the best Greek bands around, and that's not just my opinion - it's general consensus. Graves of the Archangels is an insanely heavy masterpiece of swirling doom/death riffs and thundering drumming. The guitars have a really chunky tone which creates a dense, suffocating atmosphere in conjunction with the low growling vocals. Dead Congregations's bassist and drummer also play in Inveracity and guitarist/vocalist A.V. plays in Embrace of Thorns. Pretty sweet incestuous relationships here, if you ask me.
Still, 4 years have passed since Graves of the Archangels. It's a long time and I really hope these guys put forth some new material. One album is too little material for such a great band.
Embrace of Thorns - Praying for Absolution (2011)
You only really need to see this band's logo and artwork to get a sense of the kind of music they play. If I tell you that they share the same label as Dead Congregation, namely Nuclear War Now! Productions, it all becomes clear. Or rather, murky and horrific. Embrace of Thorns are one of my favorite bands from NWN's roster and their primitive, occult and thick brand of blackened death metal satisfies me in ways I thought were unimaginable. They share band members with Necrovorous, Dead Congregation and Resurgency and they've adopted stage names like Archfiend DevilPig, Necromancer666 aka Christ Molester or Nuctemeron Bestial Ravisher of the Divine Harmony. SICK NAMES, BROS!
I might give these guys an email and ask them if they still have some shirts available for purchase. They slay.
Necrovorous - Abhorrent Decay (2009)
This band is sort of a new find, but I really like them. I'm usually not the kind of guy who constantly says ”Yeah, this album is pretty good, but the demo was better”, but in the case of Necrovorous, this statement holds true. Their full-length album Funeral for the Sane is pretty good, but it doesn't hold a candle to the band's previous output. If you're into groovy, diseased, foul Autopsy-worship, step right up and have some fucking oldschool death metal. This material is from a split with Meathole Infection and it kills, but I've been told that their early demos are the shit, too. I haven't been able to find any of them on the internets, unfortunately. The band features members of Embrace of Thorns and Resurgency and it churns out some totally putrid songs. Highly recommended.
Resurgency - False Enlightenment (2012)
Resurgency (the band I mentioned at the beginning of this post, for you ADD-types) have released their first album, False Enlightenment, this summer. It's a pretty enjoyable record, conjuring some devastating oldschool death metal sounds that mix brutality with melody and offering enough of a reason to bang your head. The production is pretty clean, the songwriting is good, the riffing is heavy and varied, the drumming is intense and dynamic and the vocals are pretty much spot on. Also, I love the creamy colors on the cover.
Inveracity - Extermination of Millions (2007)
I guess only playing cavernous, chaotic death metal becomes too much to handle at some point, which is why you need to shut off your brain every once in a while and go to something a bit more fun. Cue Inveracity, a band featuring three members from Dead Congregation who only focuses on churning out sick-ass brutal death metal tunes. It's certainly a departure in sound from the swirling mass of unearthly chaos these guys usually play, but you won't find me complaining. In fact, Extermination of Millions is a pretty solid brutal death metal record, so if you're into heavy chugging, blastbeats and vocals that sound like a dozen chainsaws inside a cement tumbler, go right ahead and give this a try.
Birth of Depravity - The Coming of the Ineffable (2012)
Next up we have another slamming brutal death metal band called Birth of Depravity. I'm going to be honest here and admit that I have no idea what the sing about. I don't understand any of their lyrics, but I can only assume they deal with disease, sickness, aliens impregnating humans, genital mutilation and so forth. Still, The Coming of the Ineffable is a pretty cool album, despite the rather thin production. I wish there was more meat on those guitars. Oh well.
Planet of Zeus - Macho Libre (2011)
FINALLY, there's Planet of Zeus, a totally sweet band who plays stoner/southern rock in the vein of Clutch, Orange Goblin, Unida or Hermano. Macho Libre is the soundtrack of a crazy, dangerous, alcohol-fueled race through the desert - the insanely catchy riffs, blazing solos, soaring vocals and reckless drumming turn every song into a stunning party anthem. My only gripe with this album is that the vocalist sometimes uses a Southern accent, trying to sound like a redneck car mechanic or something, which is unnecessary and annoying. Other than that, 9/10 would bang my head. I'll be seeing them live tomorrow night, along with some metalcore bands I've never heard of. Should be a fun night.
This is it, for the time being. Hopefully we can agree that there's a shitload of amazing metal coming from Athens and we can look with hope to the future. A future where each of these bands keeps on truckin' and continues to insult the tastes of normal people with their horrifying music. Comments and inane thoughts are welcome, but I probably won't be reading them. I did promise a massive junk food post, after all.
2012 is a big year here at TZEEEAC HQ. Marco has become a full-time law student, ready to pursue his dream of becoming a greasy, unwashed, goofball Italian lawyer working for the mob and getting paid in guns and free hookers, while I have moved to Larissa, Greece to get a Master's Degree in Management, thus sending me to a fast-track on the road to a McDonald's upper management position. That's the best case scenario, anyway.
Even the Greeks can't spend ALL their time chilling in cafes, so I was glad to discover the position of a rock/metal bar in Larissa, called Stage Club, which frequently hosts all sorts of metal and punk concerts. Sweet! The first one I attended was the last show on the Greek segment of Orange Goblin's European tour, three nights ago.
Right off the bat, I have to say I missed the opening band, Black Juju. I was already running late when I left home, having just returned from a 15 hour boat trip - I only took a shower when I got home and then I ran straight for the club. Unfortunately, it took me fucking forever to find it and, by the time I got in, Black Juju were already on their last song. Still, they seemed pretty cool, like a mixture of occult rock, stoner and sludge metal with some Black Sabbath vibes. Sorry guys, maybe next time.
The tech dudes then started putting together Orange Goblin's stuff, so I took the opportunity to grab a beer from the cute tattooed girl at the bar and have a look around. The place was rather small, but it was very well ventilated and it had toxic waste barrels by the stage where people could put their drinks while headbanging like maniacs. The place was PACKED with huge tall bearded guys that made me feel like a dwarf, but the overall atmosphere was very laid back.
And then, out of the blue, an ominous drone filled the venue, the lights went dark and, slowly, the four British riders of the stoner apocalypse made their way on stage. A second later, the room EXPLODES with the opening riff of Red Tide Rising and people go nuts. Orange Goblin are obviously in a good mood and are excited to be there. Singer Ben Ward looks like a long-haired Obelix with lots of tattoos, joyfully singing and throwing the horns to the excited audience. Guitarist Joe Hoare is KILLING IT on the guitar, with heavy riff pilling upon heavy riff. Martyn Millard lays down the groovy, rumbling bass lines to provide a suitable background for Hoare's scorching hot solos, while Chris Turner, who sort of looks like Sons of Anarchy's Opie, thunders away on his rather sparse drum kit (NO BLASTBEATS? WHAT SORCERY IS THIS?!).
The band tears through the best pieces from their latest album, A Eulogy for the Damned - Stand for Something, The Filthy and the Few, The Fog, Acid Trial, Death of Aquarius - and throws in some older stuff too - Aquatic Fanatic, Round Up the Horses, Some You Win, Some You Lose, Time Travelling Blues - while saving the incredible Scorpionica for their final moments on stage. The band was having a blast, the audience was cheering and screaming for more, hands were being shaken and the beers were flowing. A great night, in my book.
Afterwards, I grabbed a sweet shirt, took one last look around and got out into the warm night to crawl my way back home on foot, sweaty and exhausted. But hey, it was totally worth it.
The next show I'll probably attend is Birthday Kicks/Eternal Hatred/Slab/Planet of Zeus, which should turn out to be another awesome night of local stoner rock madness. But until then, school is starting and I need to get some reading done. Pax.
You're right, I am a rotten bastard, I admit it. But I tell ya something: even though I got a lot of hate inside, I got some friends who ain't got hate inside. They're filled with nothing but love. Their only crime is growing their hair long, smoking a little grass and getting high, looking at the stars at night, writing poetry in the sand. And what do you do? You bust down their doors, man. Dumb-ass cop. You bust down their doors and you bust down their heads. You put 'em behind bars. And you know something funny? They forgive you.
Astute TZEEEAC readers will remember that Orange Goblin was the very first band we talked about on our beloved blog, touching on their first three albums and praising them for the excellent psychedelic stoner rock they produced. Frequencies from Planet Ten, their first album, came out way back in 1997 and, since then, the band has managed to keep its original line-up more or less intact. That's 15 years (jeez, how the time passes...) of Joe Hoare blazing through awesome stoner rock riffs, Martyn Millard laying down the bass grooves, Chris Turner pounding the skins and the grizzly Ben Ward singing in his harsh, powerful voice. These Londoners are nothing if consistent.
Five years down the line since their last album, Healing Through Fire, Orange Goblin make their long-awaited return with their latest effort, A Eulogy for the Damned. The first thing that struck me was the cover art. Jesus Christ, what the hell is going on here? There's a man-woman hybrid being attacked by three demons/gargoyles while riding a chopper through a sea of blood while two dead astronauts (one popping pills and another getting his drink on) and a two-headed Cerberus are floating about, along with two huge tentacles poking out of the red waters. It's certainly interesting to look at and, once you go through the songs, you'll find that each of the things on the cover are somehow related to the lyrics. Pretty clever, not to mention it's miles ahead from their previous album cover, which was an awful, half-assed Photoshop job full of skulls and shitty colors.
The good news, however, is that A Eulogy for the Damned is a rock-hard hard rock album that wastes no time in getting you to bang your head with unprecedented vigor. Album opener Red Tide Rising throws everything it's got at you. The powerful, distorted riffs, the intense drumming and Ben Ward's gruff voice work so well together that the song hooks you instantly and torments you with apocalyptic tales of Cthulhu rising from the sea and fucking shit up. The guys have also developed a penchant for awesome choruses, like the ones on The Filthy and the Few or Stand for Something, which add a lot to the rock out with your cock out feel of the album. It's also interesting to note how the album constantly shifts gears between hard rock anthems that you'd expect to hear at a drunken biker party and the more aggressive, doom-laden songs about horrifying creatures and rotting horrors, like The Fog or Death of Aquarius. And, to round things up nicely, there's even a short psychedelic tune called Return to Mars which alludes to the band's early output of spaced-out stoner rock.
After 15 years together, these guys function together like a well-oiled machine - no riff feels awkward, no drum beat goes amiss, no lyric is off-beat. The crystal clear production fits the sound quite well, even though I sometimes long for the rawer feel of their early days. Clearly, Orange Goblin know what the hell they're doing and are comfortable enough to actually have fun while playing music. A Eulogy for the Damned isn't a milestone in their discography by any means, but it's a solid record that should get the crowds screaming in a second. Hopefully, I'll have the chance to confirm that soon.
One would think that Romania isn't really a suitable environment for a stoner rock band to thrive in - "I mean come the fuck on, Romanians", I hear you saying with a dismissive smile, "your whole country basically amounts to Transylvania, a dark mountainous forest populated by vampires, werewolves and witches where fur-clad barbarians reign supreme, and Bucharest, a filthy city that's ten times more likely to produce pissed-off hardcore bands and suicidal black metal collectives than drugged-out trippy stoner rock groups. How about you focus on vampire hunting and dodging stray dogs and leave stoner rock to California?"
Well you can piss right off, you hyperthermic asshole. Romania has unbearably hot summers too and we have plenty of shitty highways that run through the middle of nowhere, perfect for long, introspective drives with the scorching sun high above you. Plus, booze is cheap, the grass is plentiful and there's tons of bad TV to be had, so being a stoner dude comes easy in Romania.
Nomega are young band who have figured it all out. These four guys hail from Timişoara, Romania and they play their own brand of instrumental stoner rock, that blends numerous elements together. They have it all: thundering riffs, trippy fuzzed-out improvised guitar wizardry, insanely tasty bass grooves (check out the opening bass line on Samsara and tell me it doesn't sound like an obvious nod to OM) and sweet drumming, everything blending together into one huge, soaring, spaced-out atmospheric sound that hooks you and shoots you off-orbit into the cosmic journey of a lifetime. It doesn't reinvent the stoner/post/psych wheel, but God damn it, it does a fine job of rolling with it.
It's sweet, it's tasty, it's very refreshing! Plus, they do the whole Orange amps thing, so you know shit's legit.
I’ve always had an on-off relationship with stoner-rock.
Back in the day, I used to consider it bland, superficial and annoying as
fuck. As each season and natural
catastrophe came and passed, stoner-rock was attracting more fragile minds in
its groovy seductive rhythms than a light bulb hanged in a swamp swarming with
flies. I soon found out that it can reproduce; hordes of incestuous children
started spawning from all over the world, creating a mesmerizing diversity of
demented stoner-related bands, whose purpose was none other than to spread the
Word. Be it stoner metal, psychedelic stoner, Bedrock stoner, albums of each of these genres were handed to
all people, regardless of age, gender or sexual fetishes… Then I got hit by a metaphorical brick in the
form of Queens of the Stone Age’s debut album, joined the hoard and stopped
being such a pussay.
Because QOTSA deserves a much longer and bombastic
introduction, I’ll just write about Wolfmother and call it a day. Wolfmother is
an Australian group of guitar-savvy kangaroos formed in Sydney, in the
I-can’t-believe-it’s-been-more-than-a-fucking-decade-ago year of 2000.
Unfortunately, the band has suffered a ton of line-up changes (being Australia,
I guess that they were frequently engaged in epic battles with giant spiders
while touring), so I won’t bother with it. Knowing that Andrew Stockdale is the
lead singer is enough.
Giant spiders get caught in my afro.
The subject of today’s analysis is Wolfmother’s self-titled
album (why the F--- no, I’m not going through that rant again), which, frankly,
I fucking hated at first. How I had the
will to listen to it even after I almost set my house on fire is beyond my
reckoning. But after a while, it grew on
me. And I mean, IT GREW, man, like my grandmother’s plants after a hellish
summer. That’s also when I realized that
I was taking it too seriously and I fucking hated myself for this.
Basically, Wolfmother is an energetic, booze filled epic
journey of badassness. The album opens
with Colossal, a not-so-suggestive-at-all-named track which sets the tone for
the entire record. You know from its first chords what to expect, and that, in
my opinion, is a pretty fucking nice thing for an album that is not meant to be
taken seriously. I like my things neat and clear.
Although many label them as a ‘’hard rock’’ band due to
their obvious Black Sabbath and AC/DC influences, I tend to disagree. That’s not even supposed to be a genre;
what’s that supposed to represent? The decibels? The intensity? Racist views?
Is it sexual? Anyway, you get my point: it’s a too-general term and the people
using it should be stoned to death. I
won’t label them as anything and I’ll take them for what they are: a flamboyantly loud band that knows how to satisfy
its fans. Bad ass riffs, chaotic
drumming, simplistic but thrill-inducing bass lines and shrieking, complex
guitar solos are the elements that draw adrenaline-junkies like me to a band
and they fucking know it.
Analyzing the lyrics would be like putting ketchup on pizza
(you don’t do that. Ever.), so I’ll have to skip to the delivery. Andrew Stockdale proved that he is an
excellent front man and spits his lines with the utmost intensity. Up until
Wolfmother, I wouldn’t have believed that a front man can be so intense without
being in a death metal band even if my life depended on it. Songs like Woman, Joker & The Thief,
Pyramid and Dimension are perfect examples of Stockdale’s talent and dedication
and you should listen to them until you collapse of exhaustion.
Other than being the album that made my week, Wolfmother is
a 12 track record that every person with a sense of adventure could enjoy. If
you’re not a fucking asshole, of course.
