Weedeater
Jason…The Dragon
Southern Lord

It’s been four years since their last album, but Weedeater’s Jason…The Dragon finally sees its release, no doubt a welcome relief to vocalist/bassist “Dixie” Dave Collins whose shotgun-cleaning accident in January of 2010 left him without a big toe and delayed the album’s recording. Now, I never heard word whether the toe was successfully reattached or whether he blew it to smithereens and is altogether toe-less (or how this incident affected his relationship with his “favourite shotgun”), but it seems Collins’ sacrifice was not in vain because the North Carolina trio (completed by Dave “Shep” Shepherd on guitar and Keith “Keko” Kirkum on drums) has come out the other side of the whole mess with a real nasty bite to ‘em. That’s not to say that Weedeater weren’t as viscous as a frothing rottweiler before with all that feedback n’ fuzz, but Jason seems to find the band one step closer to oblivion; they’ve taken the Southern-fried sludge of earlier albums, dipped it into a big ol’ bucket of doom, and are spit-roasting it over Hell’s hot fires for maximum evil flavour. I mean, the quad shot of “Hammerhandle,” “Mancoon,” “Turkey Warlock,” and “Jason…The Dragon” all sound like Satan mowing over eternally damned souls atop a John Deere while a Motörhead record melts off a turntable into a hot, thick corrosive mess. For tradition’s sake, though, they manage to slip some back porch numbers in there, like the rubbery “Palm and Opium” and the album’s instrumental closer “Whiskey Creek” (complete with the sounds of crickets and rain), and the album title’s play on words (in line with …And Justice for Y’all and God Luck and Good Speed) shows that even without a full slew of digits, the band has kept that (now forked) tongue planted firmly in their tobacco-stained cheek.

Listen to “Mancoon” from Jason…The Dragon!

Sons of Tonatiuh
Sons of Tonatiuh
Hydro Phonic Records

Real nasty spawn, these Sons of Tonatiuh, born under a bridge in the worst part of Atlanta, left to muckrake a miserable existence from wee hellions with pockets full of coal to teenage pariahs with duffel bags full of stolen goods, now barely alive, toothless and hungry, channeling their anti-social behaviour into a rent-by-the-hour racket. This here self-titled full-length debut is what happens when street urchins demand to be heard; ugly, crusty, disease-ridden doom that’s lost all sense of control and shoved a twisted scrap of sheet metal into your leg just to get at that moldy, half-eaten sandwich in your pocket. Socially morbid, squeegee-bleed, spastic death metal with the rank odor of sewer water, fetching flies and whores, holding dominion over the unseen, chemically ruined, appalling and bloated rot, lecherous companion to all kinds of Black Cobras, Weedeaters, and Scum. Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.

Listen to “From Ashes” from Sons of Tonatiuh!