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This is 'Liberation through Amplification.'
Wino is the rarest of beasts-
an elder statesman of a metal genre who is still revered and hasn't faded into
irrelevance. It's a testament to his skills as a song writer and his charisma
or star quality, if you prefer, that is sadly lacking from the scene these
days.
Whether
it be his output with The Obsessed (uniformly excellent), Saint Vitus
(ditto), Spirit
Caravan (ditto), The Hidden Hand (ditto) one off involvements
like Shrinebuilder,
Place of
Skulls and even Probot (again, ditto) Wino is always an engaging aural presence.
We
are a decade on from his last acoustic solo album (not counting his records
with Conny Ochs) and I listened to “Forever
Gone” wondering what type of songs he would present this time.
Pleasingly, this feels like a sequel to “Adrift”- Wino has retained the lovelorn and melancholic qualities of that
record and they are presented just as starkly here.
Only
two tracks feature a full band presentation, the rest are guitar and voice-
with some extra instrumentation to compliment the stark arrangements here and
there. The title track and the three tracks that follow are wistful and also
dark. In fact, it's not until the seventh track, “So Fine” that there are any kind of uplifting vibes to be really
heard. A hint at Wino's headspace
may be found in the album's powerful closing statement- a cover of Joy Division's
“Isolation”. Lyrically, the album is great throughout and Wino's ruminations on the world are worth the price of admission.
If
Wino is in a lonely place of dreams
where hours turn into years, as “Lavender
and Sage” proclaims, then he is gifting us some great music. How many more
records there will be we simply cannot know. It's crazy, but Wino started up The Obsessed in 1980. To put
this into perspective, Lemmy started Motorhead in 1975, so only five years of
activity split the two talismanic frontmen.
You'll
certainly wade through dark and murky waters as you listen through this album,
but as you might expect, there are hidden depths that are worth investing the
time to find here. A natural and worthy successor to “Adrift”, full of sombre
reflection and eloquent musings.
01. "Remains" (6:23)
02. "A Prelude To..." (3:20)
03. "Bloodshed" (3:04)
04. "12 Years in the Tomb" (5:24)
05. "Wormhole" (5:22)
06. "Hour Glass" (5:23)
07. "City Park" (4:01)
08. "Last Breath" (6:38)
09. "Useless" (1:32)
The Review:
Saint Vitusreturn with their first full length
since 2012 and their first with Scott Reagers on the mic since... 1995! Saint Vitus' position as one of the greatest doom bands of
all time is not in doubt- even if people think that doom these days is two
hippies playing two chords to larger crowds thanVitushave ever pulled.
Reagers'
previous best albums with the band are all seminal to doom; the Sabbathsludge of their debut, the punk leanings of “Hallows
Victim”, the career high-point of “Die Healing”... classic all and
wonderful entries into the doom genre that went so far as to form and innovate
it. After the joy of Wino returning to the band and then the release of “Lilie
F-65”, many fans were a little underwhelmed- the record had a few too
many fillers and felt rushed (if a record born a decade and a half too late can
be “rushed”).
So
what about their new self titled effort?! Well, this is the best album since “Die
Healing”, no doubt and for me it is a good deal better than many of
their other albums as well. With the band line up drastically changed (Armando
Acosta dead, Mark Adams fighting a battle with Parkinsons and Wino having
exited), Saint Vitus have something to prove here.
They, of course, are up to the task: Dave Chandler is still a maestro and one
of my favourites- not to mention most instantly recognisable- guitar players
and Reagers sounds just as fired up as he did three decades ago. Unbelievable,
but true.
This
time around, you get eight full tracks and an experimental soundscape with
samples. The sound is superb- thick and organic, very clear but it sounds so
alive and full of power. Henry Vasquez pounds the kit like Bonham in his later
years and that large diameter bass drum gets a thorough kicking. Pat Bruders
(ex-Down/Crowbar) brings a fat and competent
bottom end while the two veterans are on fine, fine form.
The
opener “Remains” is primeVitus- paranoid, despairing, slithering. Great start. From
there you get the curveball “A Prelude
To” with its quiet delivery and west coast nightmare vibe- a wonderfully
offbeat track. “Bloodshed” is fast
and pretty furious, a throwback to “Hallows Victim” for sure. “12 Years In The Tomb” is a beast- but
you know that from the stream already.
“Wormhole” keeps the doom
flowing slow and low while “Hour Glass”
has a riff to die for , even if “City
Park” is the experimental soundscape that no one is really asking for.
Fortunately, “Last Breath” is a doom
101: monumentally heavy and dark. ClassicVitus. By the time the
full on hardcore of “Useless” ripped
out of the speakers, I was sold on this album.
This
is classicVitus every step of the way and I could not
have hoped for a better album this late in the game. Just where it will sit in
the band's canon of releases, I'm not sure, particularly as the
sound/production and mix is so good that it is hard to compare to earlier
albums as it is just so pleasing to the ear. You never know, it could be their
last album and if that is the case they will have gone out on a high.
How the hell do you approach a release like
this? Any Sleep fan
had been hoping, expecting, waiting for a full-length to follow up the
band-disintegrating opus “Dopesmoker”. Even after original drummer Chris Hakius
departed amicably after a series of reunion dates in 2009, there was hope of
things to come. The immediate live participation
of Neurosis stalwart Jason Roeder, the sporadic
trickle of new output like “The Clarity”
single in 2014, and the ascension to “elder statesmen of metal” status of
Matt Pike and Al Cisneros made some monumental future output all but
certain. And in a particularly keen bit
of stoner humor, the trio dropped “The
Sciences” on, of course, 4/20. I
actually feel pretty bad for anyone else dropping their own passion projects on
a date that Sleep practically owns. And beyond the particular bit of gimmicky
scheduling, “The Sciences” is as
appropriate a paean to smoke altered consciousness as stoner metal worshipers
could have hoped for.
The introductory title jam is a wall of
savage, droning fuzz. It’s chaotic, gut
churning, and LOUD even through a pair of earbuds. Like a bongrip as rocket launch, the brief
number propels into “Marijuanaut’s Theme”. Cisneros’ bass tone and subtle variations is
a welcome counter to Matt Pike’s signature MONSTER playing, and his brief solo
breaks are invigorating. Each speaker is
palpable in Pike’s riffing, but he’s distinctly not hijacking as a repository
for High on Fire castoffs, or vice versa. His style with Sleep is
looser and dirtier, less Fast Eddie Clarke and more Tony Iommi. His ability to simultaneously melt faces in
two distinct outfits should never be discounted, but here, with less autonomy,
his soloing shows a joyfulness that you don’t often get in the gritty, paranoid
shredding of the most recent High on Fire albums. And, from a production standpoint, this is
completely beholden to power trio methods – when Matt shreds, there may be
multitracked lead freakouts, but there are no rhythm guitar overdubs. The whole thing could be pulled off live and
sound just as full as the record.
“Sonic Titan” is
one of those long fermenting cuts that first saw life decades ago, appearing as
a rough cut on the Tee Pee issue of the
(still incomplete) “Dopesmoker” in
2003. Anyone professing that the
“original” is better, is likely trying way too hard. This is a honed, heavy, beefed up track. Plus, Sleep is all about that
positively pornographic tone, and while the “Dopesmoker” outtake has a raw appeal, the warmth and fuzz crackling
across my speakers is perfect. Plus,
this may be my favorite use of bass wah post-Sabbath. In my brief scrolls through social media, Al
Cisneros’ peculiar vocal delivery seems to be a divisive issue: for those who
followed Om, Al’s style is not surprising, perhaps a
trademark, and even beloved. For others,
the flat affect is confounding. I’m of
two minds here – sometimes it sounds like the vocals are just a little too high
in the mix, but I also really love distinctive vocal cadences. To hear Cisneros fronting Sleep is a joy – and the register of his chants on “Sonic Titan” is a welcome departure
from the strained yelp of the earlier, live cut of the long gestating song.
“Antarcticans Thawed”,
a Lovecraftian epic with shades of spaghetti western in the opening, is the
best track, and features Al’s best, most intense vocal performance on the record. In comparison, “Giza Butler” is a bit too restrained. It sneers but never snarls, though the riffs
and mystical cannabinoid is a damned bit of fun that should be adapted into its
own issue of Heavy Metal (the fantasy mag, not the genre). And if “Giza…”
transports us to outer rim planets of continental nugs, the sweet, acoustic
denouement of “The Botanist” is an
instrumental sendoff that brings the most bleary eyed listener back to
equilibrium.
So can it possibly live up to the hype? Honestly, what could? This is not “Dopesmoker” part 2, or even a follow-up to “Holy Mountain”. But even
though this is heralded as a comeback record, it’s really a new permutation of
the gestating giant. From the first crashes and fills, Jason Roeder establishes
his own identity as a new element of Sleep. Whether here or with Neurosis,
he’s a titan of the kit. He, thankfully,
doesn’t ape Hakius’ beloved style – peppered with idiosyncratic snare work and
warped cymbal crashes. In reality,
anyone doing a “Hakius v. Roeder” rundown is playing a fool’s game: they stand
not so much in opposition as distinctly powerful eras of Sleep –
the playful, Loki style playing of Hakius and the muscular, Thor on drums
mastery of Roeder.
So it’s a bit of a cheat – Sleep but not the Sleep you expected. But in the course of 6 prog-infused stoner
metal jams, Cisneros, Pike and Roeder earn all the goodwill they garnered in
the post-“Dopesmoker”
wilderness. If anything, their well honed prowess
outmatches any expectations. Wherever “The Sciences” is ranked in the Sleep discography, it stands as a testament to a band who
had to wait nearly 20 years for the critical and music-buying public to catch
up. Or, more aptly to spark up, sit
down, and thrust themselves into the hazy riff worship they’ve been peddling
longer than nearly anyone still relevant in the metal game.
“Muerte” is a glorious affirmation of Will Haven's greatness and raises the
bar for heavy music in 2018, an awesome awe inspiring achievement for a
band 23 years into their existence.
“Muerte” CD//DD//LP track listing:
1. Hewed With the Brand
2. Winds of Change
3. Kinney
4. The Son
5. 43
6. No Escape (feat.
Mike Scheidt of YOB)
7. Unit K
8. Ladwig No. 949
9. Bootstraps
10. Now in the Ashes
11. El Sol (feat.
Stephen Carpenter)
The Review:
Hopes
of heavy veterans returning with an album that rivals their finest early work
are rarely realised. Sacramento hellraisers Will Haven
gave a timely reminder of their potent racket on 2011 LP “Voir Dire”. After a lengthy break the band now return with the awe-inspiring
“Muerte”, a massive record that gives
“Carpe Diem” a run for its money as
their finest hour.
The
quiet ambience of “Hewed With The Brand”
is soon shattered by Grady Avenell’s glass gargling bark which heralds an
earth-shaking explosion of riffage. Straight away the band lock into their
trademark staccato assault, sounding bigger, heavier and uglier than ever
before. The material here strikes a perfect balance between maintaining Will Haven’s crushing sonic palette while adding new layers
of songwriting complexity. Will Haven have always
had a penchant for hypnotic, effects-heavy interludes of calm in amongst the
mayhem but now these sections have been incorporated into more challenging, dynamic
compositions like “The Son” and “Now In The Ashes”. Key to this epic,
immersive sound is the more prominent use of keyboards. When they were first
introduced on “Voir Dire” they added
a welcome subtle texture to the bands rumbling sludge. Now they have evolved
into an all-encompassing wash of ethereal noise that lends these tracks a rich,
unique atmosphere.
“No Escape” provides a powerful
centrepiece to the album bolstered by a stunning guest vocal performance by YOB’s Mike Scheidt. A typically brutal lumbering explodes
into a slow-motion lament with Scheidt’s timeless croon really hammering home
the emotion. The melancholic doom of the outro is strangely beautiful with
wordless howls conveying an aching sadness.
Deftones’ Stephen Carpenter joins the fray
for the massive finale of “El Sol”.
This track is a perfect celebration of the friendship between these two hugely
influential bands and demonstration of what both are capable of at the peak of
their powers.
The
possibility of Will Haven delivering one of the albums of
2018 seemed minimal at the start of the year. “Muerte” is a glorious affirmation of their greatness and raises the
bar for heavy music in 2018, an awesome achievement for a
band 23 years into their existence.
“Firepower” is one of the best albums in Priest's canon- it has the
songs, the sound and the playing to match their best.
“Firepower” CD//DD//LP track listing:
1. Firepower
2. Lightning Strike
3. Evil Never Dies
4. Never The Heroes
5. Necromancer
6. Children of the Sun
7. Guardians
8. Rising From Ruins
9. Flame Thrower
10. Spectre
11. Traitors Gate
12. No Surrender
13. Lone Wolf
14. Sea Of Red
The Review:
It
would be fair and accurate to say that there are only a handful of bands in the
metal genre that can accurately be described as legendary due to their
progressing the genre and defining the sound and image. Naturally, Judas Priest are one of that very select number. The band
brought twin guitars (with more bite than either Wishbone Ash
or Thin Lizzy) into the metal world, along with
screaming vocals- often with an aggressive edge to them- and utilised double
bass drums and complex arrangements long before most.
Priest's
70's output catapulted the heavy metal genre forward- “Sad Wings of Destiny”, “Sin
After Sin”, “Stained Class”, “Killing Machine” and “Unleashed In The East” are classics one
and all (even if SAS is a little uneven) and sowed the seeds for thrash, power,
speed and even death metal in their approach. 2018, then, finds the band 28
years on from their last classic (“Painkiller”)
and a couple of decades on from a truly consistent album. To be clear, I love
70's Priest through and through. I love half of
their 80's output; “British Steel”, “Screaming for Vengeance” and “Defenders of The Faith” are all
fantastic. However, after that and “Painkiller”
the band's work in progressing and defining the genre was done. “Painkiller” was a monstrous work of
metal- still massively heavy and the production still sounds enormous- but it
is not on the level of their 70s work in my view. “Turbo” and “Ram It Down”
were quite simply woeful.
Throughout
the 90's, Priest suffered a similar fate to Maiden in that they got in a younger vocalist after their
erstwhile frontman went AWOL, who kept the band going. To be fair, “Jugulator”- featuring Tim Ripper Owen's
superb vocals- was a good and very heavy record, “Demolition” was Ripper Owens' second with the band and suffers a
little from trying to keep up with the times- but still contains some great
tracks. Halford's return was lauded but produced somewhat uneven results; “Angel of Retribution” had some classics,
but it also had the abysmal “Loch Ness”.
“Nostradamus” was a conceptual
misfire. “Redeemer of Souls” from a
few years back was the best of the reunion albums, but was over long and lacked
a little in terms of production and aggression. Oh well, thought the fans, they
are getting on a bit- we can't expect the aural pyrotechnics of the past...
maybe Priest are ready to wind down.
How
wrong we were. The Priest is back! “Firepower” is their best album for
decades. Certainly the best since “Painkiller”...
maybe even better than that. What marks this record out? The songs, the performances
and the production. This is the best set of tunes Priest
has put together in a lifetime. The playing has real fire, Halford sings
superbly. Scott Travis really works hard and puts in a superb turn on the kit-
he sounds animated and powerful. Andy Sneap and Tom Allom have combined to make
an incredible production team. The album sounds incredible. Muscular, heavy and
with a sheen that makes this really listenable.
From
the off, the band deliver two stone cold classics: the title track and “Lightning Strikes” could have opened
any Priest album and been regarded as two of the
best racks on there. They are that good. From there, the album is consistently
good and often fantastic. “Evil Never
Dies” is a foot stomping beast, “Necromancer”
is classic metal in every sense of the word. There are more melodic songs too; “Never The Heroes” is a touching semi
ballad- but still features a stunning riff. “Children From the Sun” and “Rising
From Ruins” may hint a little too much at the more plodding material from “Defenders of the Faith..”. but they are
still good songs and, frankly, the fact that I am even comparing them to the
weaker tracks from one of Priest's best albums
speaks for itself. They are still pretty good.
If
“Flame Thrower” strays too close to Spinal Tap territory in the chorus lyrics, it makes up for
this with energy and riffs for days. Plus, Halford's verses are pretty neat and
have some nice references to the band's past- with some serious hooks in the
bridge to boot. The band deliver another catchy mid tempo track in “Spectre”, another metal classic in the
form of “Traitor's Gate” which has
some great story telling, more anthemic hard rock/heavy metal in “No Surrender” (it could be from any of
the band's best albums) and a Sabbath-esque curveball
in the form of “Lone Wolf” which
delivers sinister atmosphere and serious groove. Halford is absolutely on fire
here as well. They even manage to sign off with the best ballad they have
written since the 1970's in the form of “Sea
of Red”- an epic finish to an album I thought the band would never make.
Every band member excels.
“Firepower”
is one of the best albums in Priest's canon- it has
the songs, the sound and the playing to match their best. Even if being very
picky, there are only a couple of weaker tracks and they are STILL good. For a
classic band to make an album like this after so long is incredible. For it to
be Priest to have done it is an absolute
triumph. If this is to be Glenn Tipton's last record, he has signed off in
style, having kept the band going through the good and bad times. If this is to
be the latter day high point for Tipton, Halford, Hill, Travis and Faulker then
that is fine with me. To be clear, this leaves every other giant metal band's
work of the last twenty years in the dust (with the possible exception of Heaven and Hell's“The
Devil You Know”- Dio-era Sabbath in all but
name- which was a majestic album). “Firepower”
is so good, I can't quite believe it. This can be added to Priest's
list of classic albums. A long list just got one longer. There are fourteen
tracks here, but this album goes to eleven.
1.
I Know Words
2. Twilight Zone
3. Victims of a Clown
4. TV5/4Chan
5. We’re Tired of It
6. Wargasm
7. Antifa
8. Game Over
9. AmeriKKKa
The Review:
“This
isn’t the future we were promised. They said there’d be jet-packs, and flying
cars, and hover-skateboards, and self tying shoe-laces, and, and, and…”
Yes, the films, and the TV shows all lied. As it turns out, our timeline is
less Back to the Future II, more Orwell’s
1984. You know who, in a weird way, seems to have known exactly what
the 21st Century would be all about, though? Al Jourgenson
and Ministry,
that’s who.
Ever
since their 1992 anthem “N.W.O.” sampled the then
president, George H. W. Bush, Ministry have been pedalling an
anti-authoritarian, anti-right-wing American message. And ever since “N.W.O.”, they’ve been hacking up the words
of US presidents, and incorporating them into their patented brand
of drink and drug fuelled industrial-metal. This approach
culminated in the band’s early 2000s
anti-Bush (junior) trilogy of albums: “Houses of the Molé” (2004), “Rio
Grande Blood” (2006), and “The Last Sucker” (2007). Ministry officially
split in 2008, but continued to release re-mixed and previous
recorded material fairly steadily. Then Uncle Al came back
with all new material for 2012’s “Relapse”, which was
soon followed up with a definitely, absolutely, unequivocally, final
album (their thirteenth studio album, in case you were
wondering) entitled “From Beer to Eternity” in 2013. And
that was Ministrydone.
Over. Dead.
Then,
on the ninth of November 2016 it was announced, much to the amazement
of many, many people in the world that Donald J. Trump was going to
be the next president of the United States of America. Trump the king of
the idiotic sound-bite. Trump the liar; the “lets’ build a wall around
Mexico and make them pay for it” guy; the ex-reality TV star;
Trump the alt-right’s leader of choice. Had
Al Jourgenson somehow tragically lost his life post 2013, I feel there’s a
genuine chance Trump’s presidency would have resurrected him. His
deadlocked, leather-clad corpse clawing its way through the earth, bursting
forth from the grave screaming “GET ME TO THE FUCKIN’ STUDIO, NOW!”.
“AmeriKKKant” is the album
that brought Ministryback
from the dead. Again.
Trump’s
infamous words “we will make America great again” – suitably
warped and fucked with – are the first thing we hear on opening
track “I Know Words”: the ominous, middle eastern influenced,
instrumental (save for all the Trump samples) introduction to the
album. “Twilight Zone” is a weighty, plodding industri-stomp,
very much in the “Scarecrow” mould. It too, features plenty
of Trump samples, and a good dollop of that harmonica which crops up in
more Ministrytracks
than you remember.
When
the bass comes in on “Victims of a Clown”, you could be
forgiven for thinking you were listening to something off of 1989’s “The
Mind is a Terrible thing to Taste”. This is very much classic Ministry,with
the scratching of new member, turntablist DJ Swamp, the only real indicator
that this isn’t some lost pre 90s off-cut.
Eight
minutes(!) or so in, we get a final blast of the higher BMP industri-thrash
stuff more associated with latter Ministry(and with much of the output
of Al’s most recent side-project Surgical Meth Machine).That Burton C.
Bell fella out of Fear
Factory(remember them?) growls “Hey! What he say?
Vomiting conspiracies. God damn the racist blind. Anti social impotence ignites”.
“TV 5-4 Chan” continues the tradition of
short, sharp, “TV” titled
tracks which have graced their albums since the early 90s. This
time guns, racism, and white nationalist are the targets. It segues into “We’re
Tired of It” which is an up-tempo thrash diatribe against “Fucking
insane Christian Hypocrisy”, with Bell on vocals once again. “Wargasm”
is more very classic sounding Ministry, with a chorus reminiscent of 1996’s “The
Fall”. Samples talking about “the people’s war” and “the
mother of all bombs”… you get the idea. “Antifa” is a
chug-along anti-fascist anthem “Brown shirt little snowflakes never want to
admit, Terrified of the red and black flag, Antifa's the shit”. Enough
said. Oh, you want to know which old Ministry song it sounds like? A bit
like “Just One Fix”, I suppose.
Closers “Game
Over”, and title track “AmeriKKKant”, are a pair
of mid-paced, somewhat more reflective songs. The rage of
earlier tracks turned to despair at the inevitability of just how fucked we, America, and the world as
a whole actually are. There is a nice brass section in “AmeriKKKant” to
offset that slightly, though. “It's like the Nazis back in '39, Like the
Romans on the verge of decline. Like the Russians back in '68, How is this
supposed to make America great?”
Jourgenson
has referred to “AmeriKKKant” in
recent interviews as “Pink Floyd on meth”. Yes, it’s a concept album,
and yes several of the tracks do have rather excessive running times, but
ultimately this is a Ministryalbum.
I’m not going to say “just” a Ministryalbum, because that would be doing Al
and company a disservice, but it’s 100% a Ministryalbum.
Have you heard previous Ministryalbums
and enjoyed them? Good, then this is another one of those. Yes, some will
argue that not much has changed musically in the Ministrycamp for
some twenty-odd years, but what’s even weirder is to think that US politics has
somehow become more regressive in that time. If it feels like you’ve heard this
all before, then maybe that’s just because Al Jourgenson has been right all
along.
This
album is a statement of intent, placing the focus on convulsive rhythm changes
and dissonant, jagged riffs over accessibility. ‘Kingdoms Disdained’ is Morbid Angel's most
uncompromising album of their career and their best album in nearly twenty
years, and I don’t consider that light praise.
‘Kingdoms Disdained’ CD////DDLP track listing:
1. Piles of Little Arms
2. D.E.A.D.
3. Garden of Disdain
4. The Righteous Voice
5. Architect and Iconoclast
6. Paradigms Warped
7. The Pillars Crumbling
8. For No Master
9. Declaring New Law (Secret Hell)
10. From the Hand of Kings
11. The Fall of Idols
The Review:
‘Illud
Divinum Insanus’ was a fucking disaster. I’ll
never begrudge artists testing new waters or feeling like they need to do
something different. But when the end result is shitting the bed, the best you
can do is take it as a learning experience and head back to the drawing board.
In Morbid Angel’s case, that meant Trey Azagthoth
scrapping the entire lineup from ‘Illud
Divinum Insanus’ and starting over completely. Replacing that lineup here
is Steve Tucker, returning to the bassist/vocalist role he held for most of the
period from 1997 through 2004, along with current Annihilated/ex-Abysmal Dawn drummer Scott Fuller.
The fruit of these extensive changes
is ‘Kingdoms Disdained’, and the
obvious point of interest here is whether they were able to put something
together worthy of the Morbid Angel name after
such a brutal fall from grace. The answer is a resounding yes. At this early
stage, ‘Kingdoms Disdained’ feels
like Morbid Angel’s best work since “Formulas Fatal to the Flesh”. Of course,
there will be some that prefer ‘Gateways’
or ‘Heretic’, but to these ears, this
album beats them both. Those two albums took a lot of time and effort to
appreciate, with a lot of attempts made to try to hear what other people liked
so much about them. By contrast, ‘Kingdoms
Disdained’ clicked immediately despite being an incredibly dense piece of
work. This album is a statement of intent, placing the focus on convulsive
rhythm changes and dissonant, jagged riffs over accessibility.
“D.E.A.D.”
might be the song most emblematic of the whole of the album. It’s a
three-minute death metal freakout, rarely staying in one space for more than a
repetition or two, completely unwilling to sit still. Azagthoth’s guitar work
and Fuller’s drumming alternate between maniacal swarming and spasmodic
outbursts of galloping rhythm and stabbing musical punctuation. Throughout the
rest of the album, these themes are explored in others songs in longer forms,
but “D.E.A.D.” gathers them all into
one place and condenses them.
Even the album’s low points never
drop below the “fine” threshold, though I think a case can be made that the
album would be better-served at forty minutes rather than forty-eight. Really,
the only song worth cutting out altogether is “The Pillars Crumbling”, which is only able to offer a less
interesting version of everything else going on around it. “Declaring New law” gets hung up on one
rhythmic idea for too long, and would have benefitted from having at least one
other major section to keep things from being monotonous. But even with these
faults, the greatness outweighs the skippable moments by a gigantic margin.
If I had to guess, I’d imagine that
fan reaction will be mixed for ‘Kingdoms
Disdained’. I can see this album being difficult to get into for some fans,
if only because it’s so hellbent on being a complete repudiation of the album
that came before it, that it throws just about any kind of accessibility by the
wayside. You’re not going to find any instantly memorable riffs like those of “Maze of Torment” or “Where The Slime Live” here. In that
sense, ‘Kingdoms Disdained’
overcompensates for the indiscretions of Morbid Angel’s recent
past, but in the process makes the most uncompromising album of their career.
For my money, that’s enough to make this their best album in nearly twenty
years, and I don’t consider that light praise. Now all we can do is see how
well an album like this stands the test of time.
This
Friday, November 17, Electric Wizard drops
their ninth album, “Wizard Bloody Wizard”. Their second release through the legendary Spinefarm Records, the album is also their first with
Clayton Burgess on bass and Simon Poole on drums. After honing their sound with an extensive
international tour, the band recorded six tracks live to tape, creating one of
their most accessible releases yet. Founding
member and doom metal icon Jus Oborn took a few minutes to talk to THE SLUDGELORD about this new chapter in the band, future
film projects, and what to expect from the legendary doom crew in the coming
year.
What was the writing and rehearsal process like for “Wizard Bloody Wizard”?
Pretty
much the same as usual, really! It was a bit of a hassle because we were moving
houses at the time. A bit all over the
place, rehearsing in different places.
But basically we work on the riffs, me and Liz, and just jam them out at
rehearsals.
In putting it to tape, did you put any restrictions on
yourselves – a certain number of takes?
It certainly sounds like a real throwback, not ProTooled but all in the
same space.
It
was all recorded live – first or second take to be honest, on all of it. I recorded all of it myself on a
sixteen-track tape. You don’t really
have options to do drop-ins and shit when you’re actually recording the whole
band live. You gotta get it right. But I like that discipline. I like the fact that you capture a
performance on tape, you know? What a
band really sounds like. And you gotta
play as fucking good as you can! You
gotta really give it everything. Because
it comes out – it’s not like ProTools or whatever where you can chop things up
afterwards. You go, “Well ok that was ok,
we can fix that bit.” Then you’re
just making some kinda classical music or something *laughs*.
This is your first release with Clayton Burgess and
Simon Poole on bass and drums and they bring some real swing and soul in their
rhythm. What’s their addition to the
band been like?
It’s
definitely given us a whole new foundation we hadn’t had before. We were out on the road quite a lot in the
last two or three years, so the lineup’s really solidified. And you noticed Simon and Clayton have a
chemistry. We actually got them to
rehearse together before we brought in the guitars to get them locked in
together. And that was cool, that worked
out. I think it’s something we’ve wanted
for a long time – to have a bit of a stronger rhythm section so we can
experiment and go a bit more over the top.
I always had the idea that the guitars in ‘Wizard
were always very solid, very simple, very brutal, and then the drums and the bass
would play around a lot more. Just have
a lot of counter rhythm, counter melody.
Just another dimension, you know?
And I think it’s really worked out on this record. I’m pretty fucking pleased.
From the beginning, Electric Wizard has had a
multimedia element, whether with the film references, the Drugula comic, the
visual show. Do you have any plans with
other media or film collaboration?
Well
we’ve always been tinkering around with doing film, and we’ve filmed various
things over the years. But it’s always a
bit of a long process, a lot of the time.
It’s all kind of unfinished projects and half ideas. I think this video for “See You in Hell” is the first real video we’ve ever done! We got to experiment with a few ideas there,
recreating the old 70s TV studio sort of feel.
But moving into film is something we’d like to do. I’ve been looking into – there’s actually an
old biker movie called “Angels”. It’s a Danish biker movie by the people that
did “The Sinful Dwarf”. But it’s missing its soundtrack and missing
all the dialogue, so I’ve had the idea of re-recording it. Recording music and doing the dialogue again
– I mean the plot’s pretty easy to follow! *laughter*
And
as far as comics and stuff, I’ve been interested in doing comics for a long
time. I’ve been talking with some people. A few people seem to like the Drugula idea,
you know! I think they’d like to see a
comic like that.
It seems there’s a lot of crossover appeal, from the
beginning of metal, with horror and comics.
It’s
just part of the culture, growing up with the dark and heavy metal stuff.
One of our readers, Eric, wanted to know what you’re
listening to lately. Specifically, any
non-metal/non-doom stuff that stands out for you?
I
mean I do tend to listen to a lot of heavy rock and metal *laughs*. I’ve been listening to a lot of The Sweet, an English heavy rock band. They were kind of a pop band at first and
they started doing some heavier shit. I
think they’re a pretty big influence on a lot of people.
Non-metal
I just picked up this album by Jean-Claude Vannier –
an album called “Insolitudes”. A guy who collaborated with Serge Gainsbourg on the “Melody Nelson” album (1971’s “Histoire
de Melody Nelson”). It’s a pretty
cool album, man! It’s really dark,
weird, kind of jazz, classical soundtrack music. It’s pretty far out, pretty psychedelic, to
be honest. Good to smoke to. Fuckin blew my mind *laughs*.
But
yeah I’d recommend The Sweet F.A. (aka
Sweet Fanny Adams) to anyone. It’s some
pretty fuckin epic, awesome guitar work on it.
Are there any reissues of some of the classic, out of
print Electric Wizard stuff in the works?
Specifically, “Chrononaut” and
“Supercoven” have become pretty
sparse.
We’ve
actually been approached by some labels recently. Southern Lord have
asked us about it again, because they put out the rerelease of “Supercoven” the first time round. I’d like to see them come back out,
especially as “Supercoven” is one of
my favorite Electric Wizard albums.
OK here’s an urban legend to either debunk or confirm:
one of our readers, Dan, asked if the volume of an Electric Wizard show really
made you go deaf once?
Yeah
pretty much! *laughter* Yeah I burst an eardrum. Yeah it’s not cool. I mean I hurt my eardrums for many years and
it got pretty bad.
What are you planning as far as shows in the near
future?
With
the new record, it’s time to get out on the road. We have a few festivals lined up – Inferno in
Norway is gonna be cool with Satyricon and Obituary. It’ll be
pretty fucking heavy! And we’re back in
the US with the New Year. It’s fuckin
awesome to go over there. Seems like
everyone is still into heavy music, man.
