Wolfshead - S/T

I was overjoyed when Racer posted a Bandcamp link to Wolfshead a few days back. Not that I was particularly waiting for the link or anything, it was just . . . well, when I hit the little play button and my world got turned upside down, I felt an exhilaration that doesn’t come around all that often. Thank you Racer for going to the effort of getting this link up!

So, Wolfshead is a two-piece stoneriffic, doom-y sludge metal band (Eh? How’s that for muddying up the categorical waters?) hailing from England. I guess one could say these cats are part of the resurgent new wave of heavy British rock that’s going on right now, and like a bunch of the bands in this particular scene, Wolfshead are creating music their way . . . starting with a basic sound rooted in heavy blues and then letting the music go where it needs to go. What I hear is a classic hard rock sound mixed with Monotheist-era Celtic Frost . . . an order of something really heavy with a side order of even more heavy!

“Warbringer” kicks this sampler off with a thrash-y groove laden riff and rocks along at a good pace. I’m digging the little guitar flourishes that they drop into the verse, almost giving the song a classic NWOBHM feel. The gang chants of “Hail! Hail!” makes me throw my fists in the air, making typing an absolute bear, but oh-so-much fun! The end section breakdown is crushing in heft and weight, brutally distorted and reminds me of some of the finer moments from Lair of the Minotaur.

The first play through of this recording had me mouth agape in awe when “Garden” pummeled me senseless. This is where the Monotheist Celtic Frost sound comes seeping out of the well water. Thunderous and overpowering, the guitars vibrate everything in the immediate area of my speakers to ash, and the vocals are about as ominous as they can get, channeling a bit of the Tom G. Warrior tormented angst. I love the subtle guitar licks these guys throw in every so often . . . always keeping things interesting, keeping the music moving forward, and not allowing things to get stale. Fucking killer song!

“Pissin’ Blood” (always a good time), is an upbeat thrashing garage rock burst of audio excitement! If your head isn’t bobbing up and down on this one, you’re damaged. It’s alright. It’s nothing personal. This track, probably more than any other on this sampler, is the most accessible in the sense of fitting in with any particular genre or scene. It’s short, to the point, non-stop rollicking fun, and while it doesn’t really venture outside of the retro sound, it does have little nuggets of intrigue mixed into the mix.

As if these guys were saving the best ‘til last, “Death Priest” is a punishing escapade through the surreal. This six minute epic excites me more than any other because it’s out there . . . it’s dynamic and experimental, but no less accessible than the rest of this rocking set of music. Within the first minute of the song, Wolfshead bring a number of different moods. Opening with a stonerfied and fuzzed out riff for a few measures, the boys then drop into a dirge-y Sabbathian palm muted riff that includes some sexy guitar licks. Then the music opens up again, longer sustained notes creating a break in the tension created by the palm muted and spartan verses. The vocals, while strained in places, crack in all the right places and make this song feel like a horrifying travel through the darkest recesses of the mind.

Word has it that Wolfshead are working on a full length album, to which I can only sit here in stunned silence with a stupid grin on my face. If their full length follows the footprint of this sampler, I’m gonna have a damn good time rocking from here to eternity! This sampler isn’t perfect, but then again, it doesn’t need to be. The energy is there, the structures are there, the musicianship and vision are there . . . Check it out, drop the guys a buck or two and download the tunes for yourselves. Or, sit in front of your computer and listen to the stream for the rest of your lives. Either way works for me. Just do it.

Pope

http://bandcamp.listentowolfshead.com/

Leather Nun America - Kult Occult

It's getting harder and harder for me to write a review about Leather Nun America.  After pouring my soul into reviews of two of their albums so far, what do I have left to say about their latest long player, Kult Occult?

How about it's even better.  How about the heavy is heavier and the beautiful is beautifuller.  (?)

Let's face it, Doom is a rather limited template.  The framework was established over 40 years ago by Black Sabbath, and it frankly hasn't changed much since then.  Leather Nun America faces this challenge by fully embracing the entiretly of their doom heritage while not being afraid to mix things up a touch.  Drop in a stoner riff here and there.  Mix up the tempos.  Flavor the stew with rock and grunge and metal.  Dribble in some Vitus and Obsessed and Wino.  Create your own magic powder spice.  Stir with a detuned bass.  Flavor to taste. 

And as before, the resulting concoction is deadly.  Kult Occult is the work of a band fully at ease with their music, stretching their arms and legs against the frames of their genre barriers, and coming up with new ways to destroy their rock.  "Murderkkult" shows this off beautifully.  Doom is the word here, hard and heavy and plodding and thick, as the song trounces in at a brontosaurs pace.   And the earth feels it, trembling under each massive note.  The dual vocal effect is cool here, as is the ascending guitar riff that flavors the end of the verse.  Then, just as the song may be reaching a point where the plodding pace is becoming too familiar, lightning strikes!  In a second, the riff is transformed, the drums infused with adrenaline.  John Sarnie explodes into a guitar solo that sears the screens of my speakers as it flares out.  Another riff changed, another breakdown.  We're into full-on, fist-pumping stoner/doom/metal/rock/whatever mode here and the song is a corker.  The band drop back down to the opening doom to wrap things up and the whole thing feels about as complete as a messy, satisfying orgasm.

"Indra" has a guitar tone so fat and thick you could melt it down to pave roadsides.  I'm think Wino here in one or all of his variations, but it's all Leather Nun.  As always, they manage to find the groove that grabs the song and pulls it out of doom doldrums.  That groove so obese I could saddle er up and take her out for a ride.  Leather Nun have always done this over the course of their career.  Found that groove.

"Lasting Dose" is an example of the beautiful.  Yeah, Iommi established that template also, adding brilliant acoustic/classical passages to Sabbath albums to create a break from the pounding.   And every band since has found a way to work that thread into their album fabric, but Leather Nun do it better than most.  Sarnie's guitar is just so beautiful and the arrangements of the atmospheric numbers add to the depth of the album, not just serve as a distraction from the heavy.  In fact, I could argue that "Lasting Dose" with it's stark acoustic guitar, gentle hand percussion, and long-effected guitar is just as heavy and just as haunting as the heavy numbers. 

Start to finish, Leather Nun America have released one of the best doom/metal albums of the year.  Sarnie is an under-rated Axe master and should be whispered in the hallowed halls of the doom guitar Gods.  Noel Holloway and Mark Markowitz lay down the foundation with precision and abandon.   I hear lots of talk on the internet about bands like Elder and Orchid.  They're great bands.

Leather Nun America should be spoken of in the same sentences.  And Leather Nun America should be mentioned first.

--Racer

http://shop.psychedoomelic.com/

Atriarch - Forever The End

 

Stepping foot inside of a brand new world, to most, can be a very scary obstacle to overcome, let alone facing it head on. As the newest member of The Ripple Effect, I knew that I had to review something so gigantic, so large in scale that it would take nonstop drilling of my brain to understand everything that was being fed to me. I wanted a record that would tie my hands behind my back and force feed me garbage that tastes like paradise. I wanted something so raw that my neighbors would have to call the Sebastian County Police Department and complain that the echoing disturbance coming from my house sounded like someone was being thrown around by some mysterious force. With that said, Atriarch's Forever The End was the most suitable record that I could see fit for the occasion.

As I gear up and try to prepare myself for what's about to happen while I listen to this record, I couldn't prepare myself for what actually happened. Forever The End, the debut onslaught of mayhem from this four-piece, delivers some of the most monstrous and hellbent chords in the world of Blackened Death/Doom and a very small pinch of Crust. While this record might be a shaker and a roller in the world of metal, I can't help but think that this four track behemoth  of a record is anything but spiritual. Maybe not spiritual in the sense that it's praising a higher power of some kind because is definitely not the case here, but more in the sense that it completely takes the listener to another world. A world filled with outstanding gloom, dark shades of grey that litter the ground and even though the world you just stepped into seems calm, chaos reigned behind and above you as clouds started to evaporate into rain drops of acid.

Forever The End, overall, is a nasty, filthy, disgusting piece of art. Some might say those words are negative but to me, those words are the best ones to use when describing how this record feels, not sounds. Don't get me wrong, the record itself does sound disgusting, in a good way of vibes, but it also feels very filthy and muggy. The third track, "Fracture", should be the example you look at when you try to find the outrageous scum that dwells inside Forever The End. "Fracture", along with the whole record really, provides very sluggish sections that will make you feel as if you are being drowned in misery. In the past I've been very vocal and opinionated that with the majority of Blackened Death/Doom releases, the guitarist(s) need to step their game up in major ways. I may be the only one that feels this way but the bass and drums are what really make a doom record sound like it does and Forever The End is no different. The way that the drums literally vibrated the cup of water on my desk while this record was playing, blew me away. On the flip side, the drums, or what I call them, the soundtrack to Satan entering a room filled with worthless humans, also deliver on a scale that nobody can touch nor disagree with that they sound exactly what hell looks like, in a good way.

This record provides things, as mentioned above, that I really haven't felt since I listened to Meth Drinker's self-titled debut record earlier this year. The vibe you get that everything around you is collapsing into a burning pit of flames while the smell of burning flesh is heavy fogging the air in front of you. Forever The End and Atriarch both have laid waste to everything I wanted in this record. It has the atmosphere, the horrible disease ridden riffs that will make the pictures that hang on your hallway wall fall, only to shatter into tiny pieces and this overwhelming burden to just keep blasting this record until it melts, literally.

So, as I sit confused as to what I just heard from this record, yet I completely understand and latched onto everything that was thrown at me, I ponder the question to myself along with asking you, why can't every single record I come across sound like Forever The End? Simple question, right? The only answer I can give you is that most bands, to me, want to make it huge without much effort. That most definitely isn't the case with Atriarch because if I'm judging this band from this debut full-length alone, I can't see why they won't be featured in the most popular metal magazines or be put on tours with the bands they've looked up to for years. Atriarch - The one band that grabbed me by my throat the second this record started to spin.

Buy the record here: http://atriarch.bandcamp.com/

-Nicoali

XII Boar – XII

This is the 2nd installment in my random reviews. Racer sends me tons of stuff to check out and unfortunately I don’t get to hear all of it in a timely basis so once a month I pick something completely at random and write it up. The only rule is listen first, look at promo material later.

August’s victim is a UK based outfit called XII Boar and their new 4 song demo simply titled XII. Track one starts off with a blast of feedback, the drummer counts the band in and we’re off into the void of a metal rendezvous. I chose wisely! XII Boar describes themselves as a stoner/sludge hard rock band and who am I to argue? The first song is called “Trainwreck.” Fast n furious that brings to mind Entombed and Cathedral with a little bit of early Venom and Bathory thrown in. Production is crude but suits the music very well and the vocals are guttural but not completely buried in the mix.

“Beg Borrow Steal” is up next and is slower but more pissed off sounding. Especially when the singer yells “God damn! Fuck yeah!” I would gladly salute that in concert with my can of beer. About a minute in the band shifts into a faster tempo jam that sounds like it was inspired by Black Sabbath’s “Behind The Wall Of Sleep” then slows down again for a bass break and a “Snowblind”ish guitar solo. These guys cram a lot of riffs into a 5 minute song. The song “Sludge” is pretty much how you would expect it to sound. Heavy and sludgy but faster than a lot of bands that play in this style and they’re done in less than three minutes. The last song “Skol” is a killer pillaging machine of riffs with some excellent cowbell during the “Supernaut” drum break. Each of the instruments take turns trading solos before the vocals come back in and a very heavy jam brings things to a conclusion.

XII Boar play a little too fast to be considered doom metal, but have enough slow and heavy stuff to satisfy that audience. They also bring in a much stronger classic rock influence of Motorhead speed and Blue Cheer fuzzed up blues riffs to reach the grizzled old timers. Lucky for me I picked this one at random. Definitely looking forward to hearing more from these guys. You can download the entire demo at their website. Check ‘em out.

--Woody

http://www.xiiboar.com/

Blackwolfgoat - Dronolith

Screw your assumed preamble: is track one, "Building buildings," a reference to seminal German industrial band, Einstürzende Neubauten, whose name roughly translates to "collapsing new buildings?" The track, with its spiraling, elaborating, layering on layers instrumental riffs, could be a lost track of theirs....

Track two, "Ruane" shows up as very similar to something Selaah might write, a single guitar riff (generally acoustic) that gets progressively more complicated and layered over with secondary and tertiary riffs and/or melodies....

It's ridiculously soothing, late at night. It might otherwise be more than you're ready to hear, and/or be patient enough for.

"Tyche" sounds like either a lost Sunn O))) track or the intro to Pelican's "The Creeper" (both written by Greg Anderson), and "Fear of Stars" intro with solo bass guitar followed closely by the same acoustics we've come to love/like... "Event Radius" opens with feedback and never really evolves beyond a mildly-interesting soundscape (though in terms of "aggressive ambient" music, i.e., what you can listen to when you're falling asleep yet also mildly pissed-off, it totally works), and final track "Dronolith" is about 10 minutes too long (it's nearly 16).

It's good, it's not great. It's nothing you haven't heard before, but it's worth hearing.


--Horn

Pentagram – Last Rites

Crack is a helluva drug. Pentagram mainman Bobby Liebling was hooked on the stuff for a long, long time and saw many bands he’s influenced crawl past him in the doom metal sweepstakes. After decades years of fluctuating line ups, shady record deals and spotty releases he seems to have gotten himself straightened out and is back with a good new album, Last Rites on Metal Blade Records. I was on the fence about picking this up but knowing that long suffering guitarist Victor Griffin had rejoined Pentagram again was a big selling point.

Right off the bat, Pentagram comes out swinging hard on opening song “Treat Me Right.” For a band considered one of the pioneers of doom metal they throw down a Motorhead worthy scorcher. Victor’s tone is hella-huge as he fires up a killer speedy riff and the band kicks in. Bobby’s voice sounds stronger than it has in a long time and you can just see his Marty Feldman bug eyes popping as he spits out the lyrics. We’re off to a good start!

“Call The Man” returns to more familiar doomy Pentagram material and lets the stomping rhythm section of Greg Turley (bass) and Tim Tomaselli (drums) shine on this one. Tim and Greg have done time in Victor’s band Place Of Skulls and it’s obvious those 3 have a great musical rapport. The proof is in the groove. “8” starts off moody and tribal before shifting gears into a psychedelic headbanger. Hopefully they have some strobe lights and fog machines when they play this one live. Victor takes lead vocals on “American Dream” and unsurprisingly it sounds a lot like a Place Of Skulls song. The only song I’m not in love with on the album is “Windmills and Chimes.” For some reason when they go into the chorus “Baby I Love Your Way” pops into my head. It doesn’t really sound like the Frampton song but it bothers me enough that I have to skip past it every time.

Pentagram has a huge backlog of songs that were written throughout the 1970’s and Bobby usually revisits a few on each album. “Everything’s Turning To Night” and “Walk In The Blue Light” are on the First Daze collections that Relapse has put out. The arrangements are a little different and the fidelity is much improved on the originals. “Into The Ground” and “Nothing Left” go back to Bobby’s pre-Pentagram band Stone Bunny. I’ve never heard the originals of either of these but they’re both heavy doom mongers. “Into The Ground” has a 70’s Judas Priest feel with some nice Glenn Tipton melodic lead playing.

Last Rites is a solid metal album and hopefully Bobby will stay away from the pipe so he can keep his kick ass band. Even better news is that Pentagram will be touring and the Bobby Liebling documentary (also titled Last Rites) will be released later this year.

-- Woody

Buy here: Last Rites
Buy here mp3: Last Rites

http://www.metalblade.com/pentagram/

Project Armageddon – Departure

Project Armageddon has mastered the science of quantum physics, and here’s my reasoning behind said assessment. You put on their record, Departure, and you suddenly find yourself at the end of it. No, no. It’s not a glitch with my system . . . the disc doesn’t just magically skip over the content and pick up with the final droning notes. No . . . I’ve heard every note on this album several times, so I know the content is there. Time simply gets lost when this sucker is spinning in its tray. Project Armageddon has managed to make forty-five minutes of music feel like five. The good thing about this? I always want to hear more!

This Houston, Texas trio delivers a pummeling brand of doom metal, at times reminding me of Black Sabbath, especially when they take the more psychedelic roads with the music. These guys do a great job of balancing the all out destructive and cutting guitar tones with the more ambient and ethereal moments. Departure is the kind of album that works best with no external distractions. Lock yourself in a darkened room with a few candles or a lava lamp . . . maybe a black light . . . get comfy in your bean bag chair and take a few leisurely rips from your four foot bong. As the music swirls around you like the smoke from your bong, notice the intricate weave of tones and notes that Project Armageddon layer across your mind. Close your eyes and just follow the music. Let it teleport you to a land far, far away from your daily concerns.

The opening salvo from Departure is a tune called “Plague For Shattered Man” and the guitars are of that sludge-y, stoner variety . . . akin to Deliverance-era C.O.C. and just as devastating. With a riff this heavy, one might expect the rest of the band to drop in and carry the tune in high energy fashion, full tilt rock n’ boogie . . . but nay, Project Armageddon take the tune in a slower direction, almost plodding. Interestingly enough, though, the song doesn’t lack in energy due to the snail crawling through molasses tempo. This song is balls and the musicianship is freaking killer, specifically in the way of the guitars. Love the tones, love the Middle Eastern vibe to the solo, love the drums, love the bass. Seriously, there’s nothing to not like on this song. The vocals may be a bit difficult for some to digest as they tend to be sung in a higher register than would seem natural for the detuned sludgery of the music, but y’know . . . Ozzy got away with it for all that time with Sabbath, so get past it, folks.

Speaking of Sabbath, “Psyko-Sonic” reminds me of that classic Sabbath sound . . . a little bit of “Planet Caravan,” some parts of “Electric Funeral,” maybe some portions of “Black Sabbath.” Just cool and surreal sounding stuff, the kind of music that you can lose yourself in, and the BAM! The guys drop in with fully amplified, fully distorted guitars, and shake you back to your senses. The one aspect I keep keying into on this track is the clean guitars in the droned out mellow portions and how this subtlest of applications gives the mesmerizing portions that extra special texture. It’s the nuance, baby! Music with the subtle twists and turns are always the most interesting listens.

The band then go on a prog-tastic adventure in doom-y musicianship and dedicate the next twenty minutes and four songs to the story of a Nazi bred superhuman race called The Sonnekonige, which was part of the story line to a James Rollins novel called The Black Order (fun read if you get the chance . . . in fact, the whole series is pretty good escapist fun.) The piece opens with an acoustic guitar led, rhythmic track entitled “The Reckoning of Ages, Pt.1,” and acts as the lead into, you guessed it, “The Reckoning of Ages, Pt. 2.” The second chapter of the saga builds and builds and builds in classic sludge-y fashion, droning power chords over sporadic drum and cymbal crashes, before the grooving stoner riffery of “Steward of Shame” kicks in. This third chapter is where we first hear vocals about the tale of the superhuman Sonnekonige, but in truth, the music tells the tale just as well. The thundering stomp of the rhythm almost gives the impression of a legion of soldiers marching towards the world’s destruction. The tones of the guitars are massive and it feels like the weight of all existence is planted squarely on our shoulders.

The title tracks wraps up the album and opens with a classic riff coming straight from the vaults of Sabbath. Check this bad boy out . . . I’m loving their use of breaks to highlight the various instruments. A little bass lick here, a little guitar fill there, and the whole song comes together real well. Despite these short musical breaks, the song has a great flow to it and always feels like it’s moving forward. It also benefits from having a bit of a more up tempo feel than most of the other tracks. Point that spotlight over to the bassist as he drops in a pretty cool solo over that ever so cool guitar riff. Great way to put the close on a bitchin’ disc!

Project Armageddon will appeal to, obviously, the Black Sabbath fans out there, but also to the new generation of doom metal fans . . . people who dig Venomin James or Ogre should pay close attention to these guys. Departure is quite simply a brutally heavy album that touches on some of the fantastic elements of “What if . . . ?” The Sonnekonige epic is a perfect example of the imagination running wild with the concept of a specially bred superhuman, designed solely to do it’s masters bidding. Then, as always happens, the master loses control of his subject and all hell breaks loose. I dig it! Let the music take your mind places that it doesn’t normally go! Laced within all of the fantastic concepts are the warnings of what could be if we give a party absolute power. The collapse of social order, the loss of life, the destruction of our host organism, Mother Earth . . . when the fantasy stands on the brink of reality, the scenarios become horrifying. Thanks for the mind fuck, guys . . . Project Armageddon, ladies and gentlemen!  

--  Pope

Zoroaster - Matador

I had a heard a little of Zoroaster in passing and always liked what I heard but was never totally knocked out. Sludgy, heavy, droney. There’s tons of this kinda stuff around these days, but the early reviews of their new one (and 3rd full length) Matador sounded like it was right up my alley. More rock and psych is what I was hoping for and now I got it. Zoroaster are known as Atlanta’s loudest band. Based on the live reports I’ve heard, they’re louder than Mastodon and the Atlanta Rhythm Section combined. Photos of them show walls of amps, flaming drums, smoke and 3 really unpleasant looking rebels wailing away.

Matador features 9 songs in 45 minutes and takes you on a trip through all the elements of the heaviest shit out there. Opening song “D.N.R.” starts off thrashy before morphing into some OM-ish drones. Will Fiore’s guitar is crushingly heavy but with lots of definition (Orange Thunderverb amps are awesome!). Very tall bassist Brent Anderson has a towering tone and drummer Dan Scanlan really pounds those tubs hard. It’s gotta be murder for him to be heard in their practice space with all those amps. Will and Brent share vocal duties.

“Ancient Ones” has a rocking Black Sabbath groove with some hoarse vocals that are almost black metalish in places. There’s even a tambourine in the mix. “Odyssey” is indeed a tripped out journey. Great groove and dynamics. “Trident” has some great guitar solos that remind me of the great Helios Creed. My favorite song is probably “Firewater.” It’s really tripped out. The bass and drums lay down a pretty speedy groove while all sorts of insane guitar noise is detonated on top of it. Longer songs like “Old World” and “Matador” both clock in around 7 minutes and don’t wear out their welcome. “Black Hole” is one of the faster songs and is followed up with the much slower “Odyssey II.”

Matador flows really well as an album. Play it start to finish for a very satisfying listen. The other Zoroaster music I’ve heard has had very murky production and really long songs. I’m glad they cleaned up the sound and cut some of the fat off the songs. Matador reminds me of another favorite album of 2010, Ufomammut’s Eve. Both these bands combine the heaviest of the heavy with acidic Hawkwind and Pink Floyd space jams.

Zoroaster just wrapped up a tour with Black Tusk and Dark Castle but are hitting the road again in Zeptember with Nachtmystium and The Atlas Moth. Everyone says the Zoroaster live experience is an all out assault on the senses with bright lights and a huge sound. --Woody


buy here: Matador

http://www.myspace.com/thezoroaster

A Sunday Conversation with Ufomammut

Do Italians do it better? When it comes to psychedelic/experimental metal, the answer is a loud “Si!” Ufomammut recently released their 5^th album entitled Eve and it’s a mind bending mix of Pink Floyd at Pompeii trippiness and Black Sabbath heaviosity. Bassist/vocalist Urlo and guitarist Poia were nice enough to answer some questions for us here at the Ripple Effect. Even though their music is deadly serious, these guys have a great sense of humor. Pour yourself a nice glass of grappa and read on. Ciao!

Eve is your fifth album and contains 1 song divided into 5 parts. Talk a little about the songwriting process and how it was different from your previous albums.

Urlo: It's been a different approach to the song structure, working on a single long track has been quite different from what we've done in the past. We started with the idea of realizing an album structured like “Meddle” of Pink Floyd but we did the mistake to start from the long song.

Poia: We focused more on transitions and dynamic between parts: from whisper to scream.

Is Eve a “concept album” (like Tommy or The Wall) or more of a musical suite (like Tales of Topographic Oceans or Love Supreme)?

Urlo: Don't know, it's just what came to our minds.

Poia: I think it's more a very long single song.

Where did you record Eve and how long did it take?

Urlo: We recorded Eve in Roma, at Locomotore studio with our Soundlord Lorenzo Stecconi.

We had it done in 10 days.

For someone who’s never heard Ufomammut before, how would you describe it to them?

Urlo: Well, it's a nice album, just give it a listen.

Poia: It's a mixture of easy listening and complicated listening. So you'll need several listenings for appreciate the listening.

What was the first music that really excited you? And how long after that did you pick up an instrument?

Urlo: Sex Pistols. Then I started in play bass accidentally cause our previous bass player left the band and we had a gig coming in a week. I was only a singer...ahahaah

Poia: It was an Italian musician called Franco Battiato, in 1980. Then, I began with the guitar when I was seventeen, trying to play Led Zeppelin songs...

Who are some of your biggest musical inspirations? Favorite albums?

Urlo: Meddle of Pink Floyd, Malval of Shora, Lysol of Melvins, Lucifer Rising of Bobby Beausoleil and many more.

Poia: Beatles, Pink Floyd, Sabbath, Zep, Purple, King Crimson, Spirit, Captain Beefheart, Creedence, Ten Years After, Area, Sleep, Kyuss of Blues for the Red Sun, The God Machine, 35007, the early Motorpsycho and Monster Magnet, Entombed, Sons of Otis...

What current bands do you find inspiring?

Urlo: Shora, Shining and everything starting with SH.

Poia: Shora for me too, and Circle.

How do you feel about people posting your music for free on blogs?

Urlo: It's good. The more people listening to us the more we'll be happy.

Poia: It's an important thing. This way the music is flowing around the world. Then, if you like it you can always buy the physical object containing the music.

Your records have tons of cool layers. Do you try and recreate the sound of your records when you play live or do you prefer a rawer approach?

Urlo: We try to reproduce the record live the best as possible. Working on Eve has been difficult, there are a lot of layers!

Poia: Anyway live is different thing, and thanks to our live soundmaster Ciccio, we are both layered and totally raw :-)

Ever had any good Spinal Tap moments on stage?

Urlo: Mmmhh... guess not.

Poia: I must confess, never saw the movie. But I'll watch it very soon, and I'll tell you.

Vinyl, CD, or digital? What's your format of choice?

Urlo: I start with the digital and if I like it I buy CD (cause I listen to it easily). I love vinyls.

Poia: I think CD, but I prefer the big size of vinyl, for appreciating artworks too.

What’s the crowd like at your shows?

Urlo: Bearded men screaming. We're searching for girls, possibly not bearded...

Poia: It depends on the country we play.

How’s your hearing these days?

Urlo: You mean my ears? A little deaf, but still good. If you mean what I'm listening to... a lot of different stuff.

Poia. My right ear is frizzling.

Bands like Genesis, Van der Graaf Generator and Gentle Giant found an audience in Italy before the rest of the world. Why do you think Italians love prog rock so much?

Urlo: Because in Italy people is more interested in the good technique first. That's why nobody like Ufomammut here...

Poia: You have said all...

Were hardcore bands like Raw Power and Negazione an inspiration?

Urlo: Not for me. Never listened to them too much.

Poia: I'm sorry, I know them only by name.

Who’s the biggest mammone (mamma’s boy) in the band?

Urlo: Poia? Or me? Or Vita maybe? We're all mammoni!

Poia: Ufomammone.

Is it frustrating to go on tour and have to endure inferior food?

Urlo: Sure. We need spaghetti to survive, like vampires we need to refill our bodies with pasta. And coffee.

Poia: Of course. As Italians we are very proud of our food and wine. We know, we are boring about food, but it's probably the ONLY thing in which “Italians do it better” ;-)

Why do northern Italians look down upon their countrymen below Rome?

Urlo: Because we're idiots.

Poia: Since the fall of the Roman Empire, Italy has always been divided. It is a quite young nation, formed by several regions, each with its own dialect/language, food, wine (again!) and, amongst all, habits.  This is peculiar of Italy, but could be a problem for someone. Even in 5 km things slightly change. For many people difference between us is an excuse for divisions, instead a matter of enrichment. We can apply the same consideration on what it's happening today with the problem of foreign immigration. It's a natural and unstoppable process, the chance of mixing dna and cultures. But it's seen as a real danger, especially from the “most blind” part of our country, including our government.

What’s next Ufomammut?

Urlo: Ufomammut again. And hopefully a little of Farwest Zombee...

Poia: Dont know, we'll see in future.

Preferisci pasta e ceci o pasta e fagioli?

Urlo: Pasta e Ceci forever!!!

Poia: Pasta, aglio,olio e peperoncino.

Ufomammut - Eve

God bless the Italians. Even though my last name is MacDermott, I was raised by my Italian grandmother Emilia. She filled me with tons of Italian pride and the most incredible homemade food anyone could ever dream of. So it always makes me excited to be able to heap praise upon my paisanos who create great rock, whether it’s Raw Power, Negazione or the incredible new one from Ufomammut.

Eve is their fifth album and it’s a single 45 minute song divided into 5 separate sections. Picking up what Pink Floyd left behind at Pompeii, Ufomammut add a lot of unbridled aggression to their brand of doomy space rock. Part 1 starts off like a creepy film score and builds up intensity by adding more and more layers of instruments, chanting and sound effects before dissolving into the weirder Part 2. About halfway through an extremely heavy riff is introduced that pummels you for about 5 minutes.

Part 3 is another heavy one with some tortured vocals and some bleating sci-fi sound effects. Part 4 could almost be the single off the album. It’s only 4 minutes long and has a deep, heavy groove and some frenzied guitar soloing that sounds like someone gave David Gilmour a bunch of crystal meth. Part 5 is a 13 minute journey that starts off slow but ominous, then gets heavier with a bunch of urgent voice samples and ultimately expires with some hypnotic creepy guitar patterns.

Eve is the full cosmic experience. There are many band s (too many, in fact) that try to merge Black Sabbath heaviness with Pink Floyd/Can/Hawkwind spaciness that ultimately are kinda dull. This record has no filler and sounds better each time you play it. 

--Woody

http://www.ufomammut.com/

Buy from: http://www.supernaturalcat.com/eng/eve_preorder.html 

The Single Life – 7” of Fun: Featuring Hirax, Heavy Water Experiments, and The Fitt

Hirax – Blasted in Bangkok

Having just written about Hirax’s 2004 release, The New Age of Terror, I was inspired to find the piece of music from my youth that actually turned me onto the band in the first place. A few search functions later, I found myself on eBay and within mere minutes, I was paying a king’s ransom for Hirax’s 1987 7” demo, Blasted in Bangkok. But, it was worth every penny. You see, I picked this disc up around ’88 or so, played it forward, backward, sideways, upside down . . . basically, the songs became a piece of my being and I remember being sprawled out on my bed vegging out to the cover photo. I ended up trading the disc to some dude for a pile of loot, but truth be told, I don’t remember what any of the stuff was and couldn’t even be certain if I retain any of said loot in my collection. So, back to present day and Blasted in Bangkok is being handed to me by poor, underappreciated postman Sal, and it was like being in high school all over again . . . sans the alienation, massive waves of depression, and bad acne.

Amidst some healthy doses of nostalgia, I slapped the piece of wax on the turntable and applied needle to groove, and man! It was like I had never stopped listening to this thing! Rumbling bass and drums tore out of my speakers as “Fear the War Within” cuts through the shit and starts the pit. Despite the poor production or mix or what have you, the song is arguably one of the best tunes Hirax has ever committed to tape. Odds are, the song wouldn’t have had the same impact on me if it were produced to a sterling quality, the rawness of the recording truly captures the emotion of the music. Filled with mid tempo breaks coming out of speed metal passages, Katon W. De Pena’s soaring vocals and cry for equality, “Fear the War Within” shows the band stepping away from the traditional speed/thrash metal of the time and crossing over to more of the hardcore vibe. For me, this whole song comes together perfectly . . . primarily, it’s the lyrics and the way they seem to effortlessly flow out of Katon’s brain. For the past twenty years, I’ve sung the first verse like I was spinning the disc on a daily basis.

Flip this bad boy over to the B Side and prepare to have your face blown off by “The Beginning of the End.” Opening up as a true speed metal classic, Hirax then drop down to a killer guitar driven mid tempo mosh part. Man! What a killer groove! The huge bass volume gives the song a dense hardcore feel, but at the same time, has a warm tone that works as a nice counterpart to the more sterile and rigid guitar tone. Again, hearing this song for the first time in twenty years, it’s as if I had never stopped giving this disc love. I found myself immediately singing in tandem with Katon as he attacks the choruses and then I was a whirlwind of flailing limbs, completely oblivious of any obstacle that was in my path. I love Hirax . . . and it all started with Blasted in Bangkok. It appears that in 2000, the band re-released this demo on 10” white vinyl and included another track, so . . . it looks like I need to make another trip to eBay. www.blackdevilrecords.com

Heavy Water Experiments – Single

Heavy Water Experiments is one of those bands that have never been easy to pigeon-hole. Going back to when they were known as Imogene, I remember listening to them and thinking, ‘They’re heavy, but melodic; loose and spacey, but progressively complex.’ Heavy Water Experiments will always challenge the most discerning music listener, at the same time as they create a rich textural sound to have humming away in the background of one’s daily activities. So, when we received the new single from the band, we were excited beyond all belief, immediately racing to the turntable to give the sky blue vinyl a spin. As per usual with HWE, the bass is heavy . . . man, its heavy! But this time around, as the A Side single of “Hermes Told Me So” hums along in its mesmerizing fashion, we begin to recognize the elegant textures of the keyboards as they create a semi-transparent wall in the background of the song, Robert Salguero’s drum work channels a bit of the late, great John Bonham’s thundering attack, but maybe even more impressively, multi-instrumentalist David Melbye’s softer, more melodic vocal approach. God! The more I listen to this song, the better and better it gets. Heady and intelligent lyrics sung with an airy voice, mixed with the shimmering sound of the keyboards and propelled by a dense wall of rhythmic sound . . . does it really get any better than this?

The heavy drone tone of the Heavy Water sound continues with the B Side track, “The Plunge.” This time along though, the band seems to stretch itself more than what I’ve heard in the past. “The Plunge,” while still harboring many of those late 60’s psychedelic sounds has a heavy pop feel to it. For some reason, I keep thinking of the Mary Tyler Moore show when I hear this, when in actuality, the song would fit better with the imagery of a darkened basement during the Summer of Love . . . lava lamps bubbling away, couples curled up in bean bags, soft clouds of smoke from burning incense or a fired up joint . . . I love the subtle guitar interlude in the middle of the song and the big gong crashes. This song, like many in the bands repertoire, is deceptively complex; filled with great ambient portions of sound while retaining a heady musicianship that would befuddle the average musician. All we need now is a 12” version of Heavy Water Experiments so we can really get our freak on! www.heavywaterexperiments.com 

The Fitt – S/T

Sludgy, virulent, mean, and nasty, The Fitt is a new find for me. Submitted by Big Neck Records, this 7” is comprised of six tracks and all of them massively distorted nuggets of sound. I’m not really sure if one would consider these guys doom metal or sludge metal or stoner metal or what, but the common theme throughout all of the sound is the heavy density of the tones. On initial listen, I thought the pressing was at 45 rpm, but upon switching to 45 and listening, well . . . it was Alvin and his furry little friends were smoking a lot of herb and living in squalor, firing off some of the most insane music in their illustrious careers. But alas, the disc is pressed at 33 1/3 and after giving it the self titled disc a few more spins, it all began to make a lot more sense.

When you first hear “Hawk Eyes,” there’s no doubt that you’ll think something is wrong with your sound system. My God! That bass is everywhere! Then, as the rest of the instruments are identified, it’s readily apparent that The Fitt are hell bent intent on leveling cities by sheer sound intensity. The instrumental “M80” opens the B Side and is as powerful as the titled would insinuate. Like every song on the disc, the music is dense. Not just the bass tones, but the guitar tones, the vocals, hell . . . even the drums just sound unnaturally heavy. “Killer” is an unrelenting beat down with a quasi-psychedelic wrinkle. Listening to this song is akin to peering through a cloud of pot smoke and seeing the hazy images of this musical trio hammering away at their instruments. The distorted vocals lend the greatest hand in making this song sound like a trip to a face to face meeting with one’s darkest fears. The effect is one of claustrophobia and paranoia. The effect is fucking freaky! www.myspace.com/thefitt

 -  Pope JTE

 

Jerusalem – S/T

It’s easy to see why Ian Gillan was inspired to work with this ragged and raw, incendiary gang. At their best, they managed the compelling riff-mania of Purple, fused with some serious blues licks and the pulverizing heaviness of Sabbath. But on further listen, there’s something else to the band, something much more sinister and malevolent than that simple description puts forth. Yes, Sabbathy, doom-laden riffs abound, but whereas Sabbath played their game like a B-rated horror movie from the House of Hammer come to life, Jerusalem infuse their death-blues with a true sense of the ominous. Fired by the ragged-endothelial celled larynx of Lynden Williams, and I.V. fed with a hefty does of fuzz and spit, there’s something intensely subversive lurking under the at-first-glance straight ahead protometal on this disc.

Produced by Gillan with a brief intro by the Purple man himself -- where he said, "not many bands really excite me. But this one's so raw and completely unpretentious"-- it’s still shocking to this day that Jerusalem didn’t follow in the footpath of their benefactor. Heavy, bluesy, yet melodic, memorable hooks combined with inventive song structures, inspired playing and the gutsy neo-Nazareth vocals, all the components seemed to be there for a long run of success. But is wasn’t meant to be. After this one platter, the band departed into the murky halls of rock and roll’s past.

Thankfully, Rockadrome (as they so often seem to do) weren’t content to let this mini-masterpiece of angst-protometal drift away. Lovingly remastered with the aid of original bass player, Paul Dean, Jerusalem has once again been given the room to spread it’s dark and ugly wings, unleashing a sonic force of near-crazed, ploddingly heavy proto-doom onto a once again unsuspecting world.

In many ways, Jerusalem were entirely of their time. As each song unfolds, all that is fantastic about the protometal period is revealed in stunning clarity. The mutation of blues based rock, a la Cream, into it’s much angrier, disenchanted brother. The dying twinges of psychedelia’s optimism bleeding into an ugly and snarling beast, bleeding and drooling from it’s gaping, tooth-filled maw. Traces of fuzz and wah fighting to survive amongst the downtuned bass and the pummeling low end of the drum kit. But again, listen hard and you’ll find something more. At times, I swear you can hear the amped up, stuttering attack of early Stooges. In the lyrics, hints of horror movie purple prose are replaced with the serious darkness of a funeral epitaph. In other words, Jerusalem were the real deal. What ever it was they were feeling, it was dark and consuming, and needed to be released like the beast mentioned above.

Songs like “She Came Like a Bat from Hell,” and “Midnight Steamer,” pound with a funky, staggering oppressiveness. “Murderer’s Lament,” positively punishes with its discordant attack, stop-start drumming, and descent into a darkened, cold and haunting prison. “Frustration,” brims with protometal energy with it’s fuzzed out rumbling riff and massively mutated blues structure. Throughout, the guitars are a stunning assault, a textbook of early protometal ferocity, while Williams’ vocals, always on the brink of their last functioning cell, add a frenzied, near psychotic velocity to the air.

“Hooded Eagle,” descends into massive Sabbathisms, rumbling and destroying everything in it’s path like a marauding army descending upon a defenseless Saxon camp. “Beyond the Grave,” teases with a jaunty, lute-like intro before laying waste to small villages with a two-pronged, Ozzy-inspired assault of early-Sabbath intensity. And when I mean cloak-laden darkness, I mean it. “Someday we shall meet again/Death is only a minutes pain” Williams spits out, fully convincing in his intent. But perhaps the albums greatest/darkest, most sinister moment is the magna-opus to fuzzed out heaviness that is “Primitive Man.” Williams is barely able to hold his voice together for the entire length of this massive death dirge of pummeling intensity. This has to be the grand epic of heavy, stoner doom for its time. Not one to be missed for the inclined.

But light does emerge from the vast cloak of darkness. Don’t go looking for it in the inappropriately titled “I See the Light,” which drips out of the speakers at funeral procession pace, sounding much more like a crazed man’s moment of complete loss of sanity than a moment of optimism. No, the light peeks through during “When the Wolf Sits,” which denies none of its blackened heritage, but is graced with a meaty, twisted blues riff and melody that would’ve made Nazareth proud. A true toe-tapping, sing along moment amongst the punishing wave of despair.

Rightly so, Jerusalem is hailed as one of the lost hallmark albums of protometal, easily held in the same high regard as Leafhound or Pentagram. In truth, the album is deserving of that praise and so much more. Like the recently Rockadrome resurrection of Iron Claw, Jerusalem produced some of the heaviest, darkest, most punishingly heavy and doom-laden metal to be unleashed during those halcyon days. And they were way ahead of their time. If anything, the album still sounds stunningly frightening today and I can only imagine how it must have terrified the public back then.

A true classic, and deservedly so.

--Racer

Buy here: Jerusalem


www.rockadrome.com