The hope for a band to “return to their roots” is a phrase that has been thrown around so much in modern music, it has begun to lose its meaning. As with the roots of a tree, a band’s roots are always there, securing the foundation of their sound, no matter how many different directions it may branch out into.
As confessed in the song ‘Volcano Girls’ the seether is clearly Louise Post. Even after stepping out from behind the name Veruca Salt for Post’s debut solo album Sleepwalker (El Camino Media), the DNA of the band can be heard all over this album. The youthful enthusiasm that drove the nineties band still empowers this album, making it clear that she still has it.
Thirteen years later this band from Texas continues to evolve their sound. Now six albums into their career, they have not lost their taste for weirdness as their singer is quick to declare that it is “time to say goodbye to normal people “.
Founding Screaming Trees bassist Van Conner has died. He was just 55. No cause of death has been revealed. The news of his passing was announced in a Facebook post by Van’s brother, Screaming Trees guitarist Gary Lee Conner. You can see Gary Lee’s post below. Screaming Trees was the second band from the Connor brothers, who started as punks and lovers of Psychedelic Rock in the early 1980s, before co-founding Screaming Trees with singer Mark Lanegan and drummer Mark Pickerel. Lanegan died last February at age 57. The band would later become a breakout band from Seattle, in the “Grunge” explosion, along with Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Mudhoney, Melvins, and more. Screaming Trees album Sweet Oblivion catapulted the band with three hit singles, including “Nearly Lost You” – which was also on the Singles soundtrack, and led to the band touring the world and performing on Lollapalooza. RIP.
Released some twenty-five years into a career that saw them burst out of the east-coast hardcore scene in the mid nineties, Heavy Pendulum (Relapse Records) is Cave In’s seventh album, and is a landmark release for the band who sadly lost their bass player Caleb Schofield to a car accident in 2018. Schofield also provided many of Cave In’s heavier vocals, and his role in the band is assumed by close friend Nate Newton (Converge, Deathriders), and who also has a mean voice himself.
Bizarrely named Long Island quartet Moon Tooth’s new record Phototroph (Pure Noise Records) is a wonderfully eclectic one that mixes many disparate influences into one cohesive, and thoroughly absorbing, whole. From prog, rock, NWOBHM, and grunge to name but a few, Phototroph is a sprawling, unique and engaging offeringContinue reading
From the very first second of the new cut from A Deer A Horse, I was instantly transported. I was instantly back in high school riding a skateboard and skipping school to check out records with my bros. The tracks presented here are so reminiscent of the good old days of grunge and punk. The angst-driven lyrics; the minimalistic approach. I really got into the tones of the guitar. They are very cool and melodic which gives them their own awesome presence.
Do you like music that will make you happy? Do you want to head bang and pogo and raise a glass to your mates? Do you like singing at the top of your lungs in sheer unadulterated glee? Then Toxpack’s offering of Zwanzig. Tausend Volt (Napalm Records) is the album you have been waiting for. Zwanzig. Tousend Volt is fun, light-hearted, fast paced and utterly engaging.
Whenever the question of “who else deserved to be included in The Big Four?” raises its ugly head, New Jersey’s Overkill never find themselves too far from the conversation. Formed before the term thrash metal was even coined and named after the seminal second album by English noisy bastards Motörhead, Overkill began life as a covers band formed from the remnants of punk act, The Lubricunts. Having quickly gained a name for themselves with their self titled 1985 EP and full length debut Feel the Fire (Megaforce Records), it didn’t take Atlantic Records long to come calling, making Overkill one of the first thrash acts to sign to a major label.
The albums that Grunge legend Jerry Cantrell has released across his solo career and his mothership Alice In Chains always seemed to have an intertwined relationship. 1998’s Boggy Depot and 2002’s Degradation Trip seemingly attempted to fill the void left in the wake of Alice’s hiatus and Layne Staley’s passing while Alice’s comeback albums with William DuVall on board essentially felt like Cantrell albums with extra riffs. This symbiosis turned cyclical with 2018’s Rainier Fog, which shared quite a bit of noticeable commonality with Boggy Depot . So where does Brighten, his first proper solo album in nineteen years, fit into this dichotomy?