MUDLARKER ~ RADIO SILENCE .... review

Aside from Mott The Hoople and three of the original Pretenders Hereford, UK is probably better known for its cattle than it is its rock music but that does not mean that there is a dearth of aspiring rockers to be found in the city. One such Hereford based band hoping to make their mark on the world are Mudlarker, Tom Berrow (vocals); Marc Jones (bass); Elliott Crosby (drums) and Dave Knott (guitar), a band who pitch their grooves somewhere between current era stoner rock and metal and 70's classic rock. Some out there may remember the band from their moderately well received  2023 self-titled release "Mudlarker" but if you are one of those that missed out do not worry because you have the chance to make up for that oversight by giving their follow up "Radio Silence" a spin, a far more dynamically robust musical affair that sees Mudlarker combining their growl with an added element of bite!

Title track "Radio Silence" kicks things off in style with raucous and ragged guitar riffage crunching out over a solid and uncomplicated bass and drum groove all of which is accompanied by strong clean but raw and throaty vocals that tell a sci-fi themed tale of abandonment and isolation, a truly ass-kicking number to start an album with. "Leviathan" follows and starts with wind effects and feedback then erupts into a dark and dank doomic groove that has just the merest hint of bluesiness in its attack that bluesiness further reflected in the meter and tone of its gritty vocal and piercing but tasteful guitar solos, however at the songs mid way mark the song suddenly shifts into proto-doom territory with chugging Sabbath-esque refrains holding sway over up-tempo rhythms, the songs vocal here a little more forceful and insistent. The bluesy aspects of the preceding track are given a slightly bigger platform on next track "Godshead" but gradually move up to more heavier torch-like dynamic as the song evolves while "The Persistence" makes no pretence at being anything other than thunderous and doomic. Up next is "Dreadnaught (impending ruin)" a brief but quite effective semi-instrumental with rumbling rhythmic underbelly over which drone-like guitar effects and a remote mantra like vocal create a feeling of otherworldliness. That mantra-like vocal resurfaces again in  "Cruisership" along with a heavily distorted bass line and militaristic drumming, the guitar work here is circular and slurred and works well in that it gives the song a spinning off centred and out of control feel. Mudlarker opt for more traditional four to the floor heavy metal dynamics for the first half of "Reaver" but then slide into low'n'slow stoner doom territory for the second half of the song. Now we did mention, in the opening piece to this review, that Mudlarker count among their influences 70's classic rock and next song "River" is them fully immersed in that genre, bluesy guitar tones, bouncy bass and chunky drumming supporting a soulful clean and powerful vocal,  there is not a trace of stoner or doom to found anywhere on this number. For their final song, "Empyrean" Mudlarker go epic, not so much in length more in feel, a sprawling and atmospheric tome with a superb vocal that builds layer by layer until it reaches a peak and then finally fades out on waves of dissonant and droning guitar, a fittingly strong finish to seriously strong album. 

Mudlarker's self titled debut was an impressive release from a band with the potential to be a major force in this thing we call the "underground rock scene", it had everything; great songs, superb musicianship and strong vocals, the only thing that did let it down was its production which didn't quite deliver the crispness and clarity the bands sound deserved. "Radio Silence" does not suffer from the same problem as its predecessor, the production here is right on the money the vocals sit exactly where they should be in the mix, the guitar work comes over sharp and concise and the drums and bass have so much more depth and punch, add these production values to the stronger song structures and arrangements the band bring to the table this time around and what you have is an absolute killer second album.

Check it out .... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

DYING HYDRA ~ STRANGE AND BEAUTIFUL THINGS ....review

November 2024 has turned out to be quite the month for those who like their grooves heavy, atmospheric and Danish, not only have we been graced with an exceptionally impressive release from Copenhagen based outfit Alkymist (reviewed here) but also a release from Dying Hydra, a trio also hailing from the same city. Dying Hydra, Tejs Kyhl (drums); Lars Pontoppidan (guitar/vocals) and Patrick Fragtrup (guitar/vocals) are unusual in that they have no bassist in their line up instead preferring to bring that all important low end rumble to their grooves via clever deployment of octave pedals. The bands latest release "Strange And Beautiful Things" (Black Grain Records), the follow up to their well received debut album  "Of Lowly Origin", is built around a conceptual theme that explores humanities effect on our environment, specifically our oceans, an album that finds the band tackling some very weighty issues with some seriously weighty lyrics and music.

An exotic sounding guitar motif introduces opening track "Lithification" joined by light percussion and sharded chord voicings from the second guitar, so far things are sounding quite post metallic and ambient but then that first guitar motif  gradually starts to get a touch more crunchier and intense, that percussion begin to get a little bigger and heavier and that second guitar starts to add a little more bite and growl to its tones, without really noticing it we, the listeners, have been gradually moved from a place of  ambience and serenity to a place of chaos and mayhem, a gloriously heavy chaos and mayhem fronted by powerful raspy and guttural vocals. Next song "Aurelia" again begins languid and post-metallic but here the move from languid post metal to heavy sludge is less gradual, and when we say heavy sludge we are not talking brutal, there is a refined and complex element to Dying Hydra's heaviness that makes it seem doubly strange that the word "progressive" is not bandied about more when discussing their music. Third track "Abyssal Clocks" is an atmosphere drenched behemoth that sees the vocals shifting back and forth between  impassioned gravelled howls and deep guttural growls over a constantly swelling and dissipating musical backdrop while "Grasping Stone" is a rhythmic tour-de-force taken to another level by eastern flavoured guitar textures and a full on throaty vocal. Penultimate song "Into Existence" finds Dying Hydra pushing those elements of post-metal and prog, that have coloured each track up to this point, to the fore, musically still staying very much in the sludge arena but with much more emphasis on texture and colour. Finally we arrive at "Ancestral", the songs furious driving rhythm patterns serving as a platform for the two guitarists to trade off crunching  riffs, ear catching motifs and tasteful licks beneath equally furious vocal interplay, if you find you have been holding your breath in awe right up to the last note of tis song then be safe in the knowledge that we at Desert Psychlist were doing exactly the same thing, whew!

Wikipedia defines sludge as "an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music that combines elements of doom metal and hardcore punk" and goes on to say "the genre generally includes slow tempos, tuned down guitars and nihilistic lyrics discussing poverty, drug addiction and pollution". Well if you take that as your gospel then Dying Hydra's "Strange And Beautiful Things" is not what you would call your archetypical sludge album, sure its down tuned and incorporates slow tempos and its concept does broach pollution but then factor in its post-metallic textures an its prog-like structures and you have an album that is probably more sludge(ish) than it is actually full-blown sludge. If you really needed to hang a tag on this album then "damn fine complex heavy music with a social conscious" should just about cover it.

Check it out ..... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

ALKYMIST ~ UNNDERR ... review

Having recently published a review of an album themed around a battle on British soil between Celts and invading Saxons (Sergeant Thunderhoof's "The Ghost of Badon Hill"), it seems quite fitting to now review an album by a group of Danes, a people who also made their mark on Britain's shores. The band in question is Alkymist, a progressive doom outfit from Copenhagen, featuring Peter Bjørneg on vocals, Stefan Krey on guitars, Kaspar Luke on bass, and Per Silkjær on drums. The band have just released their third album "UnnDerr", a robust blend of gnarled prog-metal, doom, and sludge fronted by a mix of harsh, guttural and sinister vocals that pack a surprising level of both power and clarity.

"The Scent" kicks things in to motion, it is a song that begins just how you would want music of this genre to begin , thrumming, heavy and loud, albeit with just the merest hint of slurred grunginess in Krey's guitar tones, but then things settle down and the band slide into a sinister doomic groove over which Bjørneg informs us in equally sinister tones that "The scent of beauty becomes venom when it’s inside your dreams and wakes your demon", the vocalist reverting to a more gritty bear like roar in the songs recurring heavier sections, Luke and Silkjær ably supporting both vocalist and guitarist with some seriously impressive drum and bass work. "Digging A Grave" follows and as its less than cheery title suggests this is not a song to lift your spirits and give you a good feeling about your day, no this is a dark dank heavy ode to despondency and despair set to a backdrop of chugging saw toothed riffage and thunderous percussion, your darkest thoughts given a lyrical and musical platform. Up next is title track "UnnDerr" its sinister opening guitar motif, backed by swooning synth-like effects, initially this song has the feel of something The Cure might have toyed with in their Seventeen Seconds/Faith/Pornography period but those similarities are soon forgotten when the hammer goes down and the band launch into a sludgy doomic groove over which the vocals alternate between low throaty rancour and coffin creaky malevolence. "Light OF A Lost Star" might sound like it has some sci-fi connotations but lyrically it seems to be more about hope and the human condition than it does spaceships and planets, and this is backed up by the music which is just a little less dank and suffocating than that which has gone before, we must emphasis the word "little" here though. following song "My Sick Part" is a short sharp doomic romp with guitar parts that are a touch more strident and crunchy with rhythms a little more furious and fast paced while its follow up "Fire In My Eyes" is a sludgy doomic mid tempo behemoth fleshed out with prog-like guitar texturing and swirling psychedelic solos and featuring a really intense and powerful vocal performance from Bjørneg. Final number "Masters OF Disguise" uses quiet/loud/quiet dynamics to ramp up its impact and add atmosphere, its an old trick but one that works perfectly here especially when twinned with vocals that share a similar dynamic, the real clincher though is the husky semi-whispered vocal, sung over a backdrop of gently picked acoustic guitars, that takes the song to its conclusion, its just sublime.

 There are those out there who love good hard heavy doom but have a problem with the harsh vocals that so often accompany music of this nature, those people will have no such problems listening to Alkymist's "UnnDerr", yes the vocals here are in turns guttural and growly but they are delivered with a depth power and clarity you don't usually get with these type of vocal dynamics and as for the music... well it ticks all the boxes needed... and then some. 

Check it out ....

© 2024 Frazer Jones

RED SCALP ~ HALLUCINATIONS ..... review

Desert Psychlist remembers back in 2014 stumbling across an EP appropriately titled "EP no,1" by a Polish outfit going by the name of Red Scalp, it was a pretty good collection of stoner rock/heavy psych tunes but was nothing really that out of the ordinary. Two years later this same band released their debut album "Rituals" and it was like listening to a totally different band, the music still existed very much in the same genre pool as its predecessor but there was a polish and depth to this release that had not been there before. Next came "Lost Ghosts" followed two years later by "The Great Chase In The Sky" two albums that pushed the envelope of what could be done within the narrow confines of the genres Red Scalp had chosen to work in. Red Scalp were evolving, release by release, from stoner rock journeymen into real contenders and that evolution continues with new EP "Hallucinations", an EP truly deserving of the praise that will undoubtedly come its way.

A short but effective solo sax piece going by the title "In" kicks things off and is quickly followed by the track "Hallucination" here we find Red Scalp jamming on a groove not too distantly removed from Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song" but sounding not unlike something you might hear in a club being danced to by kids wearing lurid t-shirts and shorts. Fear not though you worshippers of the riff this is a tune that rocks hard and rocks especially hard when the guitars come in heavier in accompaniment to the songs vocals which are delivered with deliciously sneery intent, there is a hell of a lot going on in this song and all of it is GOOD! "Now" rears its head next and is another short piece, this time heavy on the synths and very reminiscent of  something UK prog ravers Ozric Tentacles might have dallied with, it is followed by "Paralyzed" a manic rock/rave workout that mixes faintly sounding 60's vocal melodies with sampled narrative to great effect. It has to be said that this song seems to be going in a hundred different directions all at once with synths guitars drums and vocals all fighting each other for dominance yet despite all this mayhem, and probably because of it, is a totally captivating  listen. Final track "Be Gone" is probably a little more straightforward and stoner-ish than what has gone before but don't for one minute think that Red Scalp's take on straightforward and stoner-ish is anything like other bands and artistes version of those terms, oh no Red Scalp's comes with a side order of musical schizophrenia and otherworldly weirdness.

There are not many bands out there blending psychedelic hard rock with elements borrowed from today's dance culture and there will probably be those who, because of reading those words in a review, will avoid this superb release like it is carrying a disease. However those unafraid to bend an ear to music a little outside their comfort zone will discover in "Red Scalp's " Hallucinations" a release that will rock their socks off but might also have them throwing a few shapes.

Check it out ..... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

SERGEANT THUNDERHOOF ~ THE GHOST OF BADON HILL ...review

Sergeant Thunderhoof , Mark Sayer (guitars); Josh Gallop (guitars and backing vocals); Darren Ashman (drums) ; Dan Flitcroft (vocals) and Jim Camp (bass)  have built themselves a reputation many bands would be envious of, they have built that reputation not just because they have consistently delivered music of depth and quality, one album after the other, but also because they have throughout their career consistently engaged with their fans and supporters, conversing with them via messages and social media answering criticism and acknowledging praise with a class some bands and artists would do well to learn from. They are also a band with a sense of humour, even once running a competition to see who could give their last album, "The Sceptred Veil" the most scathing review, however, when it comes to creating music they are deadly serious. Their music, a focused blend of new age prog, swaggering hard rock and thrumming metal, is in turns blustering, complex and melodic, it is music with an appeal that crosses over all those usual boundaries that divide fans of rock music with extreme loving metal heads through to mainstream rock radio listeners all able to find something to tie their flag to on a "Hoof" album. Now many may have thought that Sergeant Thunderhoof had reached their creative pinnacle with the superbly well received " The Sceptered Veil" but those thoughts have been well and truly scotched with the release of latest album "The Ghost of Badon Hill" (Pale Wizard Records) an absolute game changing release from a band who many are now starting to consider to be one of Britain's finest musical exports in years.

Mysticism, folklore and Arthurian legend are the bedrocks upon which Sergeant Thunderhoof's latest album "The Ghost of Badon Hill" has been built, for those not up on their history of Britain Badon Hill was the site of a battle between the resident Britons (Celts) and the invading Saxons in the bands home county of Somerset. The album begins with "Badon" its suitably medieval flavoured intro of gently picked guitars is complimented by sparse but effective bass and militaristic drumming. Vocals at this point are delivered clean and croon-like but as the song moves towards a more forceful and torch-like dynamic those vocals become more intense and  powerful, its impressive stuff and this only the first track! Following song "Blood Moon"  is a much more forceful and heavier affair with chugging riffs and thunderous drumming supporting swirling lead work and sharded chord textures over which the vocals posses just a touch more bite and grittiness. Next we come to "The Orb of Octavia", this has got to be, in our humble opinion, one of  the best songs The Hoof have ever recorded, There are many ways you could interpret the lyrics to this song, is it a soldiers last words to a loved one before facing battle or is it just a vain plea to be remembered by an unrequited love.. we don't know but if there is a song anymore emotionally intense and beautiful, yet that still manages to retain its air of edgy heaviness, then we at Desert Psychlist have yet to hear it. If you are writing an album that has at its core a battle then you need at least one rousing call to arms type song and "Salvation for the Soul" serves (partly) as that song. Anyone who has read a Bernard Cornwall novel will know that battles, in the period this album is set in, were not fought remotely from behind a gun but face to face in the hell that was a shield wall, men were pushed up against each other never knowing if the next spear or sword to break through said wall was going to take their lives. If you survived a shield wall you were a hero if not you were just dead, a situation summed up perfectly in the lines "As the echoes fade in to the moonlit night we step up to face the hordes, our lives on the line" and "Beneath the stars we wait, where destines are made through the fear and the pain" Next up is "Sentinel" a wonderfully arranged piece with a groove that fluctuates between languid and soaring over which reflective lyrics are delivered in powerful and deeply emotive tones against a backdrop of swirling prog(ish) guitar colouring and sympathetically delivered rhythms, the song finally signing off on a haunting piano motif. Final number "Beyond The Hill" is a stunning tome that is part a tribute to those that have given their lives to a cause they believed in, "An end to what we have known for so many years", and part a sorrowful lament for all those touched by conflict, "Shaking fury up to the night sky as she kisses her child’s hand", an again emotive and thought provoking piece.

Musically stunning and lyrically intelligent Sergeant Thunderhoof's "The Ghost of Badon Hill" is everything you could ever want from a modern era rock album, it  is a release that rocks and dooms in equal measure while also incorporating into its make-up elements of complex prog and textured psych. Add to this genre crossing tapestry a concept that actually works, and doesn't leave you scratching your head in confusion, and what you are left with is an absolute modern day rock masterpiece.

Check it out ..... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

CARACARA ~ HORTIS MENTIS CANTOS .... review

 

Rhode Island sultans of groove Caracara, Ed Jamieson (guitars); Matthew Meehan (vocals); Christopher Colbath (bass) and Matt Johnson (drums), jam a groove that is a blending of 70's hard rock, 90's desert rock and present day heavy psych, agreed it is a sound not uncommon within this thing we call the "underground" but the panache and pizzaz they bring to the table with that sound most certainly is. Some may remember Caracara from their 2022 release "Vagrant Witness Canto", a release that reached a very respectable #11 on the December Doom Charts of that year and was described by Stoner Hive's Joop Konrad as "Stoner that will shake your bones and doom you soul. Impressive and powerful stuff!", and if someone with Joop's standing says something is powerful you better believe it is. The band return this year with "Hortis Mentis Cantos" four epic sized slices of grooviness guaranteed to blow both your mind and your socks off!

First out of the bag comes "Tom's Dog" a deliciously crunchy blend of desert rock haziness and hard rock swagger beneath which a bluesy undercurrent is omni-present. Meehan's vocals here, and for that matter throughout the album, are delivered in clean and powerful tones and are edged with an impressive soulful weariness that adds real gravitas to his words. It is however Jamieson's guitar work that really takes the breath away here, one minute he is ripping out caustic refrains the next he is laying down shimmering fractured chord work and when he's not doing either he's tearing out spiralling solos ably supported in all of his various guitar duties by Colbath's grizzled but bouncy bass lines and Johnson's industrious yet tidy and tight drumming. Next up is "Faceless Headress" its scorching guitar intro setting the tone for a track that has the structure of a song but in places feels like an impromptu jam, its groove taking off on tangents and spiralling down musical alleyways that are totally unexpected one of which is a funky passage over which Meehan delvers rap-like sermonizing. Third track "One Myr Boat Ride" begins bluesy and alternative with Johnson laying down a jazzy backbeat anchored by Colbeth's swinging bass, Jamieson adding texture to the mix with thrumming laid back guitar colouring around a Meehan vocal which borders on lounge lizard at times, well that is until the groove shifts into trip-hop territory in its last knockings and things get a little funky both musically and vocally. Final number "The Attendee's Attendance" is a magnificent and frankly quite mental romp that is part proto-metal, part heavy psych and part doom but refuses to commit to one style or the other, one minute all furious riffage screaming solos and incessant rhythms the next plodding doomic and bluesy with the band, vocally and musically, all bringing their A game into play. 

Caracara approach this whole stoner/hard rock thing from a slightly different angle to that of many of their contemporaries, sure they've got the raucous riffs and pumping rhythms we all love and adore but they have also got this bluesy funk thing going on as well. If you like your stoner and hard rock blustering and crunchy but also infused with a little streetwise sass and attitude then "Hortis Menis Cantos" is sure to be your jam. 

Check it out...

    

© 2024 Frazer Jones

SCARECROW ~ III.... review

 

Desert Psychlist sang loud in our praise of Scarecrow's debut album, the self-titled "Scarecrow", and our admiration for the band grew even stronger with the release of the excellent "Scarecrow II". Those albums saw the band mixing doom, proto-metal, prog and orchestral music together in ways other bands were just not attempting. Having not heard anything from the band for quite a while Desert Psychlist wondered if Scarecrow were still a going concern and had not disappeared into that ether that has swallowed up so many good bands over the years but then out of the blue we got a message from Artemis (vocals/flute/keys/oud/clarinet) that a new album was imminent and that it would be preceded by a brand new EP. "Golum" Unfortunately Desert Psychlist were unable to write up a review for "Golum" but we still desperately wanted to write something up for the bands new album when it dropped  That album, "Scarecrow III".(Scarecrow Records & Ritual Sound) has now landed and Artemis, along with Max (guitar); Elijah (bass) and Vadim (drums/percussion), will need to strap themselves in as we predict a lot of love coming their way for this absolute gem of a release.

"III" begins with "The Saffron Skies Overture" an eastern flavoured orchestral piece featuring the oud. a lute type stringed instrument. The piece starts very dramatic and almost doom-like but then morphs into this sweeping desert like soundscape that evokes images in the minds eye of endless dunes, imagery very much in keeping with the artwork that adorns this album. Its all change for next song "The Hymn", this is a stuttering proto-metal rocker over which Artemis' wails his vocals like the offspring of an unholy coupling between Rush's Geddy Lee and Zeppelin's Robert Plant and Max lays down seriously impressive lead, Vadim and Elijah anchoring the groove with  thunderous drumming and gritty bass, the song further enhanced by Artemis' swooning keyboard flourishes. There are quite a few songs gracing "III" that could be considered masterpieces in their field and the first of those is "Eastern Nightmare", this is a song no other band but Scarecrow could pull off , at times it has the feel of a Broadway musical at others it feels almost highbrow and operatic, there are passages that are blustering and heavy and other passages where the vibe is almost playful, its just mesmerising from start to finish. Following track "The Foe" is modern prog-metal but played with old school prog-rock panache while "Rising Sands" is part a heavy metal gallop and part an Arabic whirl, crunching power chords finding themselves sharing space with exotic eastern motifs and orchestral flourishes, mark this one down as masterpiece #2. The mood is melancholy and reflective for the languid and beautiful " Eternal Ones" but then shifts to soaring and torch-like for the excellent "The Turtle". Things get nicely bluesy and emotive for penultimate track "Saffron Skies" but bluesy and emotive with a dusky desert undercurrent. Final song "Scarecrow III The Suite" could easily pass for a movie soundtrack due to its expansive nature, the word journey is often bandied about far too much in music reviews but this instrumental DOES take you on a journey, a journey through sun bleached landscapes where traditional and modern instrumentation flits in and out of orchestral type arrangements over backdrops of exotic rhythms, this is most definitely masterpiece #3. 

  If blustering heavy rock, swaggering proto-metal and luscious prog light s afire beneath you and you are not afraid to occasionally dip your toes into more highbrow waters then you cannot go far wrong by giving Scarecrow's "III" a whirl, it will be a decision will not regret.

Check it out .... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones