BLACK ON HIGH ~ ECHOES THROUGH TIME .... review

Texas, such a small word for a place with a reputation for being BIG in everything. Given that reputation it comes as no surprise that Texas based bands working in the arena's of metal. stoner and doom will often possess a BIG sound and Fort Worth's Black on High are no exception to that rule. The band, Nick Forkel (guitars/vocals); Chris Mullins (guitar); Brian McCoy (bass) and Ben Harwood (drums), make a sound totally in keeping with their states reputation, a sound that blends together elements of stoner rock, sludge, doom and alt-metal while still maintaining the levels of swing and groove that can pull in listeners brought up on a more mainstream rock diet. The band have just released their new album "Echoes Through Time" and it's a keeper.

"Alleyway Ecstasy" kicks things off with thick low bass and guitars jamming grunge flavoured refrains over meaty drum patterns with the accompanying vocals sporting similar grungy and slurred dynamics the result of which is a sound a little closer to the post alt-metal of early Bush rather than any of the Seattle based bands of the mid 80's, nevertheless its an impressive start. Black on High's stoner and doom credentials get an airing for next track "I Feel Lethal" the band channelling a little Sasquatch like proto-doom in their attack but tempering that attack with some nice moments of light and shade. "She Was a Witch" follows, a swaggering mix of stoner metal and proto-doom that sees an element of sludge-like harshness creeping into its vocals. "Slow and Low" seems quite an unusual title for a song that is tuned not particularly low and, apart from a brief mid-section passage, is not what you would describe as slow, however that does not stop this from being an absolute banger of a tune. Next song "Leave You" again boasts vocal dynamics that carry an air of grunginess about them but this time those vocals are coupled with a groove that is pure in your face stoner metal and features incendiary performances from all concerned. Black on High mix up their stoner metal, alt-metal and sludge with a little punk(ish) aggression for the galloping "Take These Pills" then decorate the results with guitar solo's that are a blend of 70's feel and present day shredding. Last track/title track "Echoes Through Time" finds Black on High getting atmospheric, and in places, a little bluesy with a song that swoops and sways in all the right places but retains its heaviness thanks to its thunderous drumming and ground zero low end, the song also features some searing guitar work as well as boasting, what we think is, the albums strongest vocal.

Desert Psychlist nearly passed over this album, while perusing June's new releases, due to us not being overly taken by its low key artwork, had we passed over this we would have missed out on one of the must have releases of 2024. With "Echoes Through Time" Black on High have made an album that will appeal to rock fans no matter if they are hooped shirted grungers, leather clad metalheads, tee wearing stoners or old school rockers stuck in a 70's time warp. This is the good shit people, this is ROCK!

Check it out .... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

MELTEM ~ MARE NOSTRUM .... review

Catalonian doomsters MELTEM might not be a familiar name to many out there but some of you, especially those who have a finger placed firmly on the pulse of the Spanish "underground" scene, may recognise one of the names to be found among the bands line up. Pep Carabante has provided drums for Cuzo, The Mothercrow and Wolfhead among others and with MELTEM he adds vocals and darbuka to his list of attributes. Carabante is joined in MELTEM by Daniel Pozuelo (guitar/effects) and David Giménez (electric bass and 12-string guitar) and for this, their debut, have percussionist Omar Katan guesting on daf/Iranian daf and second darbuka. Despite their use of crunching chord progressions and thunderous rhythms MELTEM's sound is not what you could call archetypical doom, sure it is dark dank and heavy but its underlying eastern influences and Gregorian like vocal intonations often sees MELTEM's music heading down paths other doom bands rarely travel, something you can discover for yourselves by giving their debut album "Mare Nostrum" (Discos Macarras Records) a spin.

Opening number "Tretze" opens with all the usual doomic bluster we expect from the genre but then in come the vocals and any expectations you may have had of hearing gothic operatics or guttural harshness are dashed against the wall, what you get instead are rich deep tones with Gregorian overtones, the song giving the listener a feeling that what they are listening to is a re-enactment of some deeply religious rite. Following track "Curcuna", an instrumental, finds MELTEM diving deep into their roots with traditional and modern percussion forming a platform for swirling guitar textures and colours that take their influences from the many cultures that border the Mediterranean Sea, that particular stretch of water serving as the theme this whole album is based around. "Mandraga" rears its head next, the song kicks off quite gnarly and aggressive in its first quarter but then settles down into a spacious and trippy lysergic laced groove before a sudden return to gnarliness announces the arrival of the vocals which again are more incanted than sang, the music surrounding those vocals a mix of heavy western doom and exotic eastern psych. Final track "Oasi" sees guest musician Omar Katan showing just why he is such a highly regarded percussionist, his hands, plus those of Carabante, beat out an impressive array of rhythms for Pozuelo and Giménez to decorate with subtle guitar/bass colourings and textures that take their influences from the more eastern reaches of the Mediterranean as well as reflecting the Moorish elements of Spain's past.

Bands that strive to create a perfect balance between doom and heavy psych often find the music they make either leans too far one way or the other and never quite finds that ideal middle ground where the two musical styles meet on an equal footing. This is not the case here, with "Mare Nostrum" MELTEM have made an album truly deserving of the term "psychedelic doom"

Check it out .... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

SILENT CIRCLE ~ BOTTOMLESS CREEK .... review

Way back when social media was still in its infancy you would often have to join a forum to discuss anything music related and it was on one of these forums that a discussion started about what it was that prompted a person to check out a new release by an unknown band/artiste prior to actually hearing said release. There were various answers but the one that stuck in Desert Psychlist's mind, and we have since adopted for our own searches, was that if a releases artwork featured a muscle car or was predominantly purple and black then it was worth checking out. It was by using this method that we discovered Silent Circle and their excellent debut EP "Bottomless Creek", ok its artwork may not feature a muscle car but it does sport the colours purple and black and it IS worth checking out!

They have just released their debut EP "Bottomless Creek" via Bandcamp and have a few photos posted on their Instagram page but sadly that is the extent of Desert Psychlist's knowledge regarding Finnish atmospheric doom outfit Silent Circle. No matter though as its the music that matters and these guys jam some pretty impressive grooves as the EP's opening song "Remains" will exemplify. Post -metal guitar textures introduce "Remains" accompanied by tribalistic drumming before the rest of the band join in and things take on a more low slow and heavy stoner doom dynamic, at this point you may be expecting vocals to enter that sit at the more guttural end of the vocal spectrum but what you actually get are lilting female tones that possess a floating quality, a perfect marriage of ethereality and heaviness. Next song "Beyond Our Age" does not muck about with pretty intros but instead crunches straight into a the songs slow and doomic main groove only upping the tempo of that groove to a more proto-paced tempo at the songs midway mark, the songs lilting vocals matching those dynamics by being mournful and longing in the songs slower passages and swooning and swaying in its faster middle section. Last number "Sunken" boasts a groove that sits somewhere between traditional doom and occult rock and features  ascending/descending vocal melodies and harmonies that despite the heaviness they are surrounded by give the song a feeling of spectral airiness. 

Arguments rage over what is considered doom and what is considered occult rock and you will not find any answers to that question here, what we can say though is that if the music Silent Circle present to us with "Bottomless Creek" is what you would consider "occult rock" then it is damn fine occult rock, if on the other hand you want to place what Silent Circle do musically in the "doom" box then it is also damn fine doom.

Check it out .... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

BLACK SPELL ~ INTO DARKNESS .... review

It has long been our suspicion that Italian bands Witchsnake, Sonic Demon, Demonio. Wizard Master and Black Spell are the work of a small revolving collective of musicians, Desert Psychlist has no proof of this but it does seem like the same names (or variations of those names) keep cropping up again and again and the fact that all these "bands" seem to have connections with the same merchandise outlets and labels does add fuel to that theory. Whether our suspicions are founded or not does not really matter as each of these "bands" make a noise that is very pleasing to the ear, a fuzz fuelled and distortion drenched onslaught of guitar riffs and solos underscored by thunderous rhythms. The subject of todays review concerns the last of those names Black Spell who have just recently released their new album "Into Darkness", an opus in possession of all the filthiness and nastiness we've come to expect from the Italian scuzz/acid doom scene but played at a more traditionally doomic gait.

Opening/title track "Into Darkness" begins with a dark atmospheric echoing guitar motif  before effects pedals are engaged and we are plunged into a world of distorted gnarliness worthy of Electric Wizard at their very best., all of which is accompanied by slightly sneery clean vocals telling us of "consuming numbness" and a "spirit of deception". before the song signs off in an onslaught of spiralling guitar. "The Omen" follows, its full on assault of crunchy chugging chord progressions and fuzz drenched bass is driven by uber busy drumming and is decorated in sleazy vocals but unlike its predecessor this song boasts a more stoner(ish) dynamic. There is no doubting the doom credentials of next track "Black Witchery" its mix of Sabbath and Wizard like proto riffage is twinned with a semi sung, semi-narrated vocal that references Succubus, and speaks of witches and "sons of the pentagram". "A Sinner's Hell" begins life experimental and slightly lysergic then erupts into a deliciously dank doom refrain replete with Iommi-esque guitar trills and string bends over a thunderous bass and drum groove that lets up only for a brief passage of eastern tinted heavy psych before sprinting for the finish line on another wave of gnarliness. The remainder of the album follows much similar paths with "Saturn's Death", "Winds of Doom" and "Dungeons of Death" all boasting a variety of heavily fuzzed and distorted refrains crunched out over punchy rhythms enhanced with swirling six string pyrotechnics and decorated with occult lyrical imagery. There are exceptions though with "Note For the Devil" allowing Black Spell to show us that they also have a bluesy side and the eerie "Enter the Shrine of the Black Gods" showing that if anyone out there is looking for someone to score a soundtrack for a horror movie then Black Spell might just be available for offers.

Whether Black Spell are part of a collective of musicians or they are a bona fide band does not detract from the quality of the doom they serve up with "Into Darkness", this is a scintillating fuzzed to the max collection of tunes that'll leave your ears ringing your head spinning and your face a melted puddle beneath your feet.

Check it out ..... 

© 2024 Frazer Jones

EL JEFAZO ~ COLISIÓN BRUTAL ..... review

Everyone's favourite Peruvian combo El Jefazo have been melting our faces with their instrumental grooves from as far back as 2014, admittedly the bands early releases, "Ensayo" and "El Jefazo" were a bit raw and a touch underproduced but you could hear the potential these guys had despite those short fallings. Then along came "Simbiosis" a far better produced album that showcased a mix of remixed/remastered songs from the previous albums plus a couple of new tunes, at last you could really hear these guys fly. After releasing a couple of one off tracks the band then put out "Tormenta Mental" a live album that showed that what these guys could now do in the studio they could also transfer to a stage environment. What we really wanted though was for these guys to hunker down and come up with a new album of fresh material.. and what we wanted they have delivered with "Colisi​ó​n Brutal", it's face melting time again folks!

"Colisi​ó​n Brutal" opens with "Metal y Melancolía" a seat belts on hard rocking jam that when its not pinning you to the wall with its scorching guitar work, whooshing synth textures and its full on and thunderous rhythms unashamedly utilizes elements of Deep Purple's "Black Night" in its main riff. "Zarpazo" is up next, a galloping behemoth driven hard by drummer Adrián Hinojosa and bassist Carlos French and decorated in broad and colourful guitar work courtesy of Bruno Sánchez. Title track "Colisi​ó​n Brutal" begins with various synth generated whoops and whistles underscored by furious drumming over which a quirky off centred guitar motif holds sway, however things take an unexpected turn at the halfway mark when French's grainy bass line signals a shift into a passage of psychedelic doom followed by a period of lysergic weirdness. "Perro Seco" is up next its doomic groove boasting an almost prancing gait into which Sánchez inserts deeply off kilter guitar textures and colours, well that is until we once again reach that magical halfway mark and things take on a more swaggering and bluesy hard rock dynamic. "Delta Acuárida" boasts a more four to the floor feel than its predecessors but much like those predecessors is not averse to going off-piste in places, especially in its Floydian flavoured middle section. Final track "El Veneno es la Cura" begins life tranquil and calm with gentle acoustic guitar trading off against its electric counterpart over lightly brushed and shimmering percussion, as the song progresses so does its dynamics with things getting slightly heavier but not dramatically so, in fact half the beauty of this song is in the anticipation of a heaviness that never quite arrives. 

Not everyone finds instrumental rock music to their liking but for those that do "Colisi​ó​n Brutal", with its scorching guitar work and off the beaten path rhythms, is a bona-fide box ticker that'll leave you drooling like a dog that's just found a bone.

Check it out ...

© 2024 Frazer Jones

DUNERIDER ~ LONG TRIP .... review

 

Those who follow these pages will know that when informing our readers of a bands line-up we usually write a musician’s name followed by the instrument/instruments he/she plays contained in brackets, well if we were to do that for today’s release we would have to write; Fred Dupré (everything) and that is because Fred Dupré IS Dunerider and Dunerider IS Fred Dupré. If you are a fan of music drenched in swathes of filthy fuzz and distortion then you are probably already familiar with Mr Dupré and his love of a fuzz pedal thanks to his previous Dunerider releases "RUIN" and "ASCEND TO THE VOID" but if you are not then new album "Long Trip" would be an excellent starting point to work your way back from.

Partly buried vocals sung over lashings of fuzz and distortion in doom like settings is not a new phenomenon, Electric Wizard built their career around very much similar dynamics and if you are (like us) fans of the Italian acid doom/scuzz scene, where you are judged as much on the quality of your effects pedals as the strength of your grooves, then the fuzzed to the max sound Dupré brings to the table with his Dunerider projects latest release “Long Trip”  will be very much to your liking. There is however a major difference between those bands just mentioned and Dunerider and that is in the way Dupré will sometimes vary and temper his sonic onslaughts by bringing in, on songs like "Ride Eternity", "Long Way Get High" and "Wizard Valley", elements that are a somewhat trippier and slightly more spacious than those of his Italian counterparts. It must be said though that it is the full on doomic fuzz'n'roll of songs like "Death Trip", "Stone Rider” and "Hoping Quicksand" that really get the adrenaline flowing and make this album such a fuzzilicious listening experience.

Nasty guitar tones and thunderous punchy rhythms supporting clean slightly buried vocal tones is what to expect when hitting play on this ridiculously raucous collection of tunes, and hitting play on "Long Trip" is something you will want to do again and again and again

© 2024 Frazer Jones

WYNDRIDER ~ REVIVAL ..... review

For many of us the emergence of WyndRider as a musical force came as a bit of a surprise, one minute the band’s debut album "WyndRider" was just another new release in a list of hundreds of new releases on Bandcamp and the next it was being lauded across the underground scene's media outlets as some sort of new coming. The reason "WyndRider" garnered the attention it did was not due to some clever marketing or PR campaign it was because the sound the band made on that album resonated with all those who took a chance and pushed play. For us at Desert Psychlist its appeal stemmed from the fact that it took us back to a time in our scene’s history when bands like Witch Mountain, Blood Ceremony, Jex Thoth and The Devil's Blood were releasing one great album after another while also attempting to shatter the outdated notion that the female voice had no place in rock music (sadly a notion still not completely eradicated). Having released such a well-received debut the pressure was now on WyndRider to show the world that the recent praise heaped upon them was justified praise and that they were not just a one album wonder destined to soon disappear back into obscurity and the best way to do that was head straight back into the studio and make another album. That album is now out and if you bought into the bluesy proto-doom of “WyndRider" you are going to love "Revival" (Electric Valley Records).

WyndRider kick off their latest collection of occult themed musical imagery with "Forked Tongue Revival" a song that sits firmly in the canon of doom but also carries in its gait a very pleasing element of laid back bluesiness, a bluesiness that not only comes from singer Chloe Gould's powerful and slightly smoky vocal tones but also from the triumvirate of Robbie Willis (guitar), Joshuwah Herald (bass) and Josh Brock (drums) who when not laying down crunching proto flavoured riffs and rhythms are not too shabby at getting a little down-home and rootsy. If ever a song was destined to become a fan favourite then it has got to be "Motorcycle Witches" its 70's flavoured heavy rock refrains, driving rhythms and swinging vocal melodies are manna from heaven for anyone (like us) brought up on a diet of Black Sabbath, Budgie, May Blitz and others of that ilk. Third track "Judas" finds WyndRider successfully mixing low slow and heavy stoner with proto metal and more traditional doom to create a groove that feels like it is in constant flux yet in truth is fairly one dimensional, a feeling enhanced by Gould's vocal delivery which is pitched ever so slightly monotonic. The vocal bluesiness that tinted the albums opening track returns for "Devil's Den" and is twinned this time with blustering heavy'n'hard rock while the appropriately titled "Remember the Sabbath" ensures that we do by jamming a sedate and atmospheric groove that has Iommi, Butler and Ward written large all over it and sees Gould channelling a smoky and seductive version of Ozzy in her vocal. There is a touch of off-centred psych brought to bear on next track "Under the Influence" with Brock and Herald laying down a solid bedrock of thunderous rhythms for Willis to decorate with crunching riffs and searing solos, Gould ably filling the spaces in-between with a strong and distinctive vocal performance. Final song "The Wheel" retains the elements of psych utilized in the previous track but this time sets them in a more sedate and lumbering setting and adds into the mix a slurred vocal delivery and spoken prose to ramp up the atmospherics to the legendary eleven mark, well that is until the final third when out of the blue things take a strident turn and the band set off on a race to the finish line on a wave of chugging proto-doom.

Wyndrider's debut showed a band with the potential to go the whole way and become major players in this thing we call the "underground", their new album, "Revival", tells us they already are.

Check it out.....

 

© 2024 Frazer Jones