Set the Dial is the fourth full length from Savannah metal heads Black Tusk, and if you’ve had the pleasure of hearing either of their latter two, Passage Through Purgatory or Taste the Sin, you know exactly the kind of sludge covered punk you’re about to receive (John Dyer Baizley artwork and all). You see, like its predecessors, Set the Dial rumbles its way through murky swamp and crusty gutter to get to where you feel most safe and comfortable only to heap a hell of a lot of petulance and abrasive screams onto you. That being said though, as crumbling, noise-driven attacks, Black Tusk’s earlier efforts thrived on destruction, where Set the Dial‘s objective seems to be one aimed at rebuilding, at harnessing the rust-stained chaos in order to rise to loftier heights. They do this through the coy use of groove, which lays in wait on table-setter “Brewing the Storm” and then busts through the muck and mire to take over songs like “Mass Devotion,” “Set the Dial to Your Doom,” “Resistor,” and “This Time is Divine,” making Set the Dial‘s riff-driven focus the main, albeit subtle, point of difference. At the end of the day though, it’s another grease-charged album of Georgian origin, and one could spend an entire month getting filthy, high, and in trouble listening to Black Tusk and their mates of state, Zoroaster, Kylesa, Mastodon, and Baroness.
In case you’ve been living under a very large and heavy rock, Mastodon are back with their fifth full-length, The Hunter, a non-concept, non-epic album that’s as straightforward and concise as anything they’ve ever done. Of course, this is Mastodon we’re talking about, so as straightforward and concise as The Hunter might be, it’s still a strong arm of flailing beats, mind-bending time signatures, schizophrenic riffing, and eerie vocal harmonies, all delivered in either a full-on mortal crush or an unwavering cosmic vapor lock. However, under the fur-lined cloak of freedom afforded a band of their stature, Mastodon appear to have made the conscious decision to forgo the brainy, extreme aspects of their abilities for a puffed chest, ‘rock-the-fuck-out’ approach. Songs like “Black Tongue,” “Curl of the Burl,” “All the Heavy Lifting,” and “Dry Bone Valley” find the Atlanta quartet choosing brute force over precision, trading in their clockmaker’s hands for those of a caveman, while songs like “Blasteroid,” “Stargasm,” and “Spectrelight” (featuring Scott Kelly of Neurosis) are the most vintage Mastodon songs of the bunch, an abundance of devastating wonder tailor-made to amaze. The album’s not without its departures, however, including mellower, dramatic cuts “The Hunter” and “The Sparrow,” as well as the weird, anthemic “Creature Lives,” which features drummer Brann Dailor’s vocal prowess. It would be hard to argue that Mastodon hasn’t been one of the most influential bands on heavy music the last 10 years or so, and if The Hunter demonstrates anything at all, it’s that in a sea swelling with admirable contemporaries, they can do something like buckle down and play laymen without giving up the charge.
Check out the video for “Curl of the Burl” from The Hunter!
On Battle Stations, Maryland instrumental three piece Admiral Browning take the cosmic noodling of The Atomic Bitchwax, the abrasive structure of Stinking Lizaveta, and the fretted fury of Mastodon to create metal jams powerful enough to command a whole fleet of warships (okay, maybe not a whole fleet, but three for sure) to certain victory. From the album’s dedication aimed at anyone who’s survived a life-threatening illness to its Skillet artwork portraying the aquatic besting of a robotic beast, the pervading theme is a positive, triumphant one. Battle Stations, AB’s fourth release, is also a personal win for the band, who conquered the stagnant waters of creativity they felt surrounded them after the release of 2009′s Magic Elixir. Charging hard with opener “Riff Crisis,” it breaks down at the three minute mark and a trend is set whereby Battle Stations is rife with songs within the songs, and it’s as if you’re treated to more than just the five listed on the jacket. Nowhere is this more evident than on the album’s longest songs, “The Binary Language of Moisture Vaporators” and “Dreams of Hammurabi,” both of which traverse multiple metal landscapes in melodic, thrash-y, fuzzy, attention-grabbing fashion. Add to the mix the psych-charged “One Lucky Canary” and the exotic flare of “Interlude” and you’ve got one wild fight on the waves, my friend.
Black Tusk
Mastodon
Admiral Browning