The Devil’s Blood
The Thousandfold Epicentre
Ván Records/Metal Blade Records

The Time of No Time Evermore, The Devil’s Blood’s 2009 debut full-length, was — ahem — bloody brilliant, one which led me to discover a whole rash of occult rock acts currently burning up black candles on foggy stages all over the world. The Eindhoven band’s ritualistic spin on the classic metal of the 70s was nothing short of spellbinding, and it has been under that spell that many have waited, like patient subjects, for the enchanting follow-up. Indeed, The Thousandfold Epicentre can best be described as enchanting, a more ethereal and mystical offering than its predecessor. With its eleven songs borne of psychedelic desire, and five of those stretching themselves like witchy fingers beyond the seven minute mark, it is a bolder and more indulgent record that leans heavily on epic orchestration as though it were an ash-stained pulpit from which the band is delivering their Satanic sermon. However, it’s stand-outs like “Cruel Lover,” “She,” and “Fire Burning” that employ the galloping, Thin Lizzy-like attack that made their debut so great, and without those, this album most surely would have gotten lost within itself.

Listen to “Fire Burning” from The Thousandfold Epicentre!

Lecherous Gaze
Lecherous Gaze
Tee Pee

Fresh off their split with Danava and Earthless (review here), Oakland’s Lecherous Gaze take a less-than-fresh approach in re-releasing their 2010 four-song EP, Audio Testament, as a self-titled Tee Pee debut. A re-release usually means better production and mixing, but, much to the band’s credit, there’s not too much evidence of that found here because these songs still sound like they were recorded in a room full of tin garbage cans and shag carpeting. Lecherous Gaze contains the kind of kick-out-the-jams fuzz n’ roll that could only be made by flophouse orphans who spent their wasted youth picking scabs, bumming cigarettes, flipping through muscle car magazines and the thick-bushed pages of Playboys from the early 70s, and listening to AC/DC, The Ramones, MC5, and Thin Lizzy records. Of course, that’s probably due in large part to the fact that singer Lakis Panagiotopulos blows into the mic like Joey Ramone or Phil Lynott with dying batteries, and that the groovy punk rock riffs on “Phaze,” “Sold,” and “R’n'R Lust” are so raw, sweaty, and delicious you can practically taste ‘em (the ones on “Graveyard” are so bluesy you can practically feel ‘em), but then what good is an electric cock sandwich if it’s not smothered in classic righteous sauce, huh? The whole thing is damn downright dirty and four songs just isn’t enough. I want more and you will too.

Listen to “Phaze” from Lecherous Gaze!

The Twilight Singers
Dynamite Steps
Sub Pop

After having spent the last few years as one half of The Gutter Twins (with Mark Lanegan), Greg Dulli has returned to leading The Twilight Singers, his bread and butter since his old band, alternative masters The Afghan Whigs, disbanded in the late 90s. Dynamite Steps, the band’s fifth album, ends their longest run of years without a release (five) after a prolific run of four albums in six years at the start of the millennium. If anything has changed in those five years it’s the growth in Dulli’s standing as an American classic, as a revered and respected rock n’ roll icon, and in turn that has enriched the efforts of his Twilight collective, who deliver their darkest, most emotional album to date. Thick with Dulli’s gruff but evocative voice over top a sweeping soundscape that runs soulful, sexy, serious, and stellar, Dynamite Steps is indie noir of the highest order, a flickering flame of hope at the end of a long, dirty, hopeless tunnel. Every single one of the songs on this album breathe with a mesmerizing profundity and while its hard to pull out highlights, “Last Night in Town,” “On the Corner,” “Blackbird and the Fox” (featuring Ani DiFranco), “Never Seen No Devil,” and the title track ought to find room in Dulli’s ever growing catalog of brilliance, and will make you take to the city streets in the dead of night to look for meaning in its dimmest lights.

Listen to “Never Seen No Devil” from Dynamite Steps!