That’s it. You’ve convinced me, Brooklyn. You are now thee number one spot in the world for heavy, weird, fuzzy, psychedelic music. Okay? Hull, Elks, Bad Dream, Weird Owl, Children…and now Bezoar. I’m sure there’s plenty more rats crawling around in the sewers there that I’m not even aware of, but as far as I’m concerned right now, none of ‘em are bigger — or carry more diseases — than Bezoar. I mean, even their name invokes images of a mythical beast from children’s fables, and this three-headed varmint more than lives up to the hairy, red eye scares it promises. Expounding doom-infused wyt noize, Bezoar’s debut full-length, Wyt Deth, is a lumbering mess of feedback and mildewy riffs, a witchy, warbling deth-psych album that’s definitely hard to listen to, but surely impossible to turn off. Whether it’s the short and sweet allure of songs like “Burn Everything” and “Nikola” or the long and devastating hold of songs like “We Are Not Alone” and “Knight,” the whole damn thing is nauseously enchanting, and you might think it sounds like a dungeon full of hungry, dying prisoners moaning for sunlight, water, and mercy, but that’s just Sara Palmquist (bass/vocals), Tyler Villard (guitar), and Justin Sherrell (drums) laying down the most mystical stoner metal you’re likely to hear all year. Awesome stuff.
Infernal Overdrive Last Rays of the Dying Sun
Small Stone
Discovering that Boston hero* Marc Schleicher has surfaced as the front man for New Jersey rock n’ road warriors Infernal Overdrive is one hell of an early Christmas present, my friends. Hell, I’m not sure I’d be here today if it wasn’t for Schleicher’s brawlin’ brand of East Coast riff n’ roll, so to hear him once again stranglin’ the six-string like a twenty dollar hooker is something special; a sure sign that the wheel of the American rawk machine is back in the grip of one of its most prolific drivers. Last Rays of the Dying Sun, the band’s full-length debut, is, quite simply, arena rock for dive bars, like KISS or Cheap Trick on a chain link tour through Southern wilds, and the way they saturate it with razor-backed hooks, sky high solos, nasty drum fills, and blacktop lingo (“I-95,” “Electric Street Cred,” “Rip It Out,” “Motor”) will lead a man to submit himself to a life of drinkin’, cheatin’, lyin’, and dyin’. Or, if you prefer, a life of glory. You know, I don’t think this one actually comes out until 2012, but either way, Small Stone has finished this year off — or started the next — on a definite high note.
*I’m not from Boston, but I have spent many years there vicariously through people much cooler than me, and I would be utterly shocked to find out that anyone who played in Cracktorch, Antler, and Quintain Americana isn’t a hero in that town.
Listen to “Rip It Out” from Last Rays of the Dying Sun!
A babbling brook; chirping birds; the slow, mournful lament of a cello. Thus, Agalloch’s latest wintry tour is revealed to us, drawn in running watercolours of black and grey. Marrow of the Spirit, just the band’s fourth full-length in 13 years and first since 2006′s Ashes Against the Grain, thrives on a cold and desolate atmosphere the band has come to make distinctly their own through a hybrid of progressive folk and black metal, meaning songs like “Into the Painted Grey,” “The Watcher’s Monolith,” and “Ghosts of the Midwinter Fires” sound like wolves carefully devouring frost-bitten corpses while the album’s grand opus, the 17-and-a-half minute “Black Lake Nidstång” and its closer “To Drown,” swirl around you in whispers of smoke from a pit of dying embers, the former eventually roaring back to life, the latter succumbing to its inevitable extinction. Marrow of the Spirit is incredibly rich and powerful in scope, weaving chilling intricacies with brutal ferocity for a devotedly earthly sound no doubt enhanced by its analog recording. Not just an impressive album by Agalloch standards, but an impressive album by any standards.
Listen to “The Watcher’s Monolith” from Marrow of the Spirit!
Bezoar
Infernal Overdrive
Agalloch