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!

Dwellers
Good Morning Harakiri
Small Stone

Well, it turns out that Peace, and Other Horrors, the four-song EP Dwellers put out last year, was an experimental little project because there’s not much folksy, acoustic Americana Gothic to be found on their debut full-length, Good Morning Harakiri. Although, to be fair, Good Morning Harakiri does contain a good deal of slide guitar, but it’s used as a vehicle for delivering some grungy psych-blues instead. I suppose the idea behind this one is that the six songs included here are the musical equivalent of splitting yourself open and spilling your guts all over the place, and if that’s the case, this Salt Lake City trio (comprised of Iota and Subrosa members) has made one fine mess. While it is atmospheric, exotic, and trippy at times, Good Morning Harakiri is, ultimately, blessedly doomed, absolutely heavy, and full of Southern-fried muscle, and if Gideon Smith was to ever rip through a set of songs from Soundgarden’s Ultramega OK in Earth’s jam room, this is what it would sound like. Forget what it does to your insides — this ritual rock rattles your goddamn bones.

Listen to “Lightening Ritual” from Good Morning Harakiri!

The Heavy Eyes
Heavy Eyes
Self-Released

Full-on Delta doom from these Heavy Eyes, whose debut full-length is dripping with enough Southern cough syrup to make you forget you’re listening to a stoner rock record. Between the tumbleweed riffs of songs like “Wax Apple” and “Where is Wilder” to the Memphis medicine of songs like “Iron Giants” and “It’s Been So long,” Heavy Eyes slides on through the smoke and takes a midnight sail down the winding river of groove. Of course, this is a stoner rock record, a real lid-dropper, and the fuzzy psych-blues of songs like “5%,” “Voytek,” and “Supermoon” play right into your floating hand, man. A real solid album, this one, and The Heavy Eyes do awfully well to treat you like the custodial prize in the landmark case of Cactus V. Clutch, presided over by judge Fu Manchu in the court of Sabbath. Hell, you just have to have an affinity for bands with ‘leaf’ in their name, and The Heavy Eyes will do right by you.

Listen to The Heavy Eyes’  Heavy Eyes right here!