Sun Gods in Exile Thanks for the Silver
Small Stone
Sun Gods in Exile aren’t disgraced deities. No, I’d call ‘em Camaro cowboys, muscle car mobsters shakin’ down merchants, barkeeps, and wenches from Portland to El Paso. They’re outlaws with a mind to control the classic rock racket one laid back, Southern-fried riff at a time. Intentions regarding their sophomore album, Thanks for the Silver, were made perfectly clear when they brought in newest member Christopher Neal to lay down all kinds of organ, harmonica, and slide guitar, and so it is that the revved up motor roll of 2009′s Black Light, White Lines has been smoothed out and grooved on. It’s only appropriate that Thanks for the Silver tote titles like “Hammer Down,” “Moonshine,” “Since I’ve Been Home,” “Broken Bones,” and “Smoke and Fire,” but be it biker glam or ballad, it’ll all remind you of either AC/DC, New American Shame, The Four Horseman, or Antler. That means listening to this will make you feel like you’re gettin’ drunk on a jug fulla sunshine boogie, so pony up yer thirty pieces, partner, because you’re about to have a bloozy good time.
Listen to “Nobody Knows” from Thanks for the Silver!
Orange Goblin A Eulogy for the Damned
Candlelight Records
If you’ve got a beard, own a bong, or ride a bike, chances are this year’s most anticipated release for you is Orange Goblin’s A Eulogy for the Damned. And why not? The band released its first six albums in ten years, and its now been damn near five years since 2007′s Healing Through Fire, so chances are you’ve got one hell of an itch to take to the starry highway to hit up OG’s cosmic dope show once again. But where the UK quartet was once raw and bloozy it is now cooked and mean, and the smoky caravan kitsch it once proudly boasted in its space-brewed riffs has given way to a prouder, louder form. In fact, aside from vocalist Ben Ward’s chain-link preaching, the Southern boogie doom of “Save Me From Myself” or the bold groove of “Return to Mars,” there’s very little left in the way of OG’s former scuzzy self, and what stands before you today is a tyrant fifteen stories tall, an angry world-eater with a heavy metal law to lay the fuck down. And this is a metal album in many ways thanks to songs like “Red Tide Rising,” “Acid Trial,” “The Fog,” “Death of Aquarius,” and “Bishop’s Wolf,” which is not something you could have really said about any past OG album. It is also very much a statement album, the aforementioned songs leaving the deepest cut, but even OG’s familiar stoner rock fare, like the melodic “Stand For Something” and “The Filthy and the Few” contain a demented edge to ‘em, and the acoustic-psych intro on closer “A Eulogy To The Damned” points to OG’s dark, force-fueled approach to making this record. If you’ve ever hoped that Orange Goblin would one day step up and make a power move, that they’d drop all that whiskey-soaked astro-noodling and put some steel and muscle into their tunes, A Eulogy for the Damned is your hope come true.
It’s been three years since we last heard from The Parlor Mob, whose debut album And You Were a Crow successfully cradled the fine line between mainstream exposure and underground appeal, a rock n’ roll record borne of barefoot ideals and mustache machismo that was part Led Zeppelin, part Black Crowes, and all radio play. But the New Jersey band has surfaced with their follow-up, Dogs, which, like its predecessor, should curry compliments from people on either side of the popularity divide. However, unlike And You Were a Crow, Dogs has a more commercially viable edge to it, a darker, heavier hard rock flavour, heard especially on the songs “How It’s Going to Be,” “Fall Back,” “The Beginning,” and the album’s first single, “Into the Sun,” complete with a pop-driven chorus. What Dogs lacks, however, is the hippie groove that packed And You Were a Crow full of dust and soul, and while “Hard Enough,” “Slip Through My Hands,” and “Holding On” capture some of that ol’ feel good vibe, it’s clear The Parlor Mob have kicked it into attack mode this time around. You know, Dogs could have a little more boogie for my buck, but now that Dirty Sweet have rode off into the hazy horizon, it’s The Parlor Mob or bust. And I’m not ready to go down just yet.
Sun Gods in Exile
Orange Goblin
The Parlor Mob