I prefer to review albums the year they are released in order not to appear dated, but sometimes albums find their way to me the following calendar year. I respect the effort (and, in some cases, money) bands put into sending me their music for review, so the least I can do is give them some blog time. Here’s a quick run through some music that was released in 2011, because it’s never too late…
Nordic Nomadic Worldwide Skyline
Tee Pee
When Chad Ross of Toronto psychedelic rockers Quest for Fire decides to go solo, he does so as Nordic Nomadic, and his output (2007′s self-titled album and this one), while softly bathed in psychedelic waters, is not drenched in the kind of fuzz that soaks Quest for Fire’s body of work. Instead, Ross reverts, like a mystic on a mountaintop, to the natural order of things, his dreamy folk dictated by delicate finger picking that dances over haunting drone, distant distortion, and deep bass, his voice a spiritual messenger sent to soothe your soul.
Roman numerals? Check. Skull wearing a crown? Check. Band name so good I can’t believe it’s never been taken? Check again. Yeah, I did all sorts of book cover judging with this four-song EP, making a barrel full o’ assumptions that the substance was going to match the style, and sure enough, it does. Chest’s MMXI EP is some bad-ass, bottomed out business, a feast of Finnish doom served at a rotting roundtable where the ghosts of Galahad and Gawain are scrounging up the sludgy scraps. It’s a thing of beauty when the eyes and ears work together, isn’t it?
Lauren K. Newman (drums) and Terrica Kleinknecht (guitar) originally began life as Stickitin, an experimental double drum duo (!), but must’ve decided that they could make a lot more sludgy noise if one of ‘em picked up a guitar, and thus Palo Verde was born. These Portland, Oregon (there it is again!) DIY females are as back-to-basic as they come, recording and self-releasing their own albums over the years out of their home studio, and have gigged in a million and one bands you and I have never heard of, a devotion no doubt laced with small traces of insanity. Which is why we get something like the unrehearsed four-song, 45 minute Zero Hour, completely unlikable in the best way possible, an unbearably raw, amplified beat down powered by corrosive, dying batteries. Apparently Palo Verde are best experienced live, but this album is certainly making an impression.
Bring the Knife Bring the Knife
Thrashachusetts Records
Bring the Knife is a Boston metal band whose self-titled debut 7″ fuses Anthrax thrash with C.O.C. crossover, tosses in a whole bunch of Wylde-esque squealing harmonics (courtesy of ex Glamorous Stuntcock axe wielder Pattie the Gimp), and delivers a barroom mosh madness that ought to have people betting on hardcore elbow thrusts like basketball games. Released on singer Duncan Wilder Johnson’s own Thrashachusetts Records label, Bring the Knife contains all kinds of treacherous bite, specifically Johnson’s socially conscious verbal attacks on “At the End of Days” and “I Walk Through Flames Every Hour to Feel Free” and the B-movie brain punch of “Werewolf Fuckdown” and “Viking Skull Thrust”.
The Hip Priests Full Tilt Bullshit
No Balls Records/Ghost Highway Records
The rock n’ roll manifesto as translated by The Hip Priests is clearly defined by Full Tilt Bullshit‘s opening saliva-covered salvo: “Sonic Reproducer”. Pretty simple, really. While they may not necessarily be young, they are awfully loud and exceptionally snotty, and it’s been years since the UK band last jammed up my radar with their super lubed hot rock action. The frothy fun of 2006′s Number of the Priests EP and 2007′s full-length Tight ‘N’ Exciting had all but fizzled out in my mind when I caught wind of a 2011 split with Electric Frankenstein, and just like that the boys were back. It was like the ghosts of Stiv Bators and Fred “Sonic” Smith were smiling down on me, and now there’s even a new full-length album of garage punk madness to get all revved up about. Bruising bastards born to lose and booze, The Hip Priests busted out of the demise of The Divine Brown and the X-Rays with a mission to mash the spit-saw energy of bands like The Stooges, Dead Boys, The Dictators, Gluecifer, Turbonegro, and The Hellacopters into a greasy gush of over-sexed, electric awesomeness. Despite the time that’s passed, and the fact that during the album’s recording the band split with their singer and the studio lost the entire album (the band obviously got themselves a new singer and re-recorded the whole damn thing), The Hip Priests are still a fully functional rock n’ roll hard-on that has come to fuck and get fucked up, and Full Tilt Bullshit charges its way through a singular vision of masturbation (“Wrist Action”), ejaculation (“DNA Dynamo”), provocation (“Loud ‘n’ Lewd”), and titillation (“Outta My Head [Into Your Pants]“) like a bull in a knickers shop. Only for the cheap n’ loose among us, this one.
Check out the video for “Sonic Reproducer” from Full Tilt Bullshit!
I prefer to review albums the year they are released in order not to appear dated, but sometimes albums find their way to me the following calendar year. I respect the effort (and, in some cases, money) bands put into sending me their music for review, so the least I can do is give them some blog time. Here’s a quick run through some music that was released in 2011, because it’s never too late…
Bädr Vogu Exitium
Momento Mori
An indecipherable logo on a crudely drawn, nightmarish, post-apocalyptic scene usually portends ugly sounds, and so it is with Oakland’s Bädr Vogu, who slog and growl their way through a sludgy mess of crust and doom metal on their full-length debut Exitium. The songs are long, the titles contain words like ruin, belligerence, slum, and filth, and I swear the bass guitar on “Nomad” sounds like barking dogs. Hell, it sounds like that on all the songs. I could tell you more but I think you’ve got a good idea of the necro-madness that awaits you here.
Self-deprecating genital humor aside, Sweden’s One Inch Giant bring about twelve inches of solid stoner rock to the prehistoric party on their debut album Malva. Songs like “Ripe and Bold” and “Feed the Fire” drop outta the sky like fuzzy meteors, and “Echoes in the Night” and “Treasures That Betray” are the inevitable doom of their impact, but it’s the bluesy hard rock hooks throughout Malva that really shake the trees. In fact, songs like “Fur of the Lord” and “Train of Lies” are laced with so much smack groove that the band sounds as much like Alice in Chains as they do Goatsnake, which is pretty awesome.
Vol. 2 is actually the third release from Miriam in Siberia, who are actually from Italy. They even sing in Italian, which seems to suit their breezy psych rock particularly well. And Vol. 2 is miles better than their 2006 self-titled EP and 2009′s Il Suono del Phon, as if the band finally decided to ditch the light, meandering AOR, put both feet on the gas, and drive straight into the mouth of the acid witch to steal her last remaining teeth in order to crush them down and feast on the dust. You might need a translator for the lyrics, but you should be able to understand the fuzzy, organ-fried prog pretty damn well.
Nordic Nomadic
Chest
Palo Verde
Bring the Knife
The Hip Priests
Miriam in Siberia