Stereotypes are such a crass and ugly thing. Used as a lazy and offensive descriptor of someone’s personality due to their nationality, they are something that should be abolished. The stereotypical view of Belgium and its people is one of being reserved and downright boring. How better to dispel that myth that with some high-velocity anarcho-Punk? Enter Cocaine Piss.Continue reading
Two icons of rock music who barely need an introduction are John Paul Jones and Thurston Moore. Jones of Led Zeppelin and Them Crooked Vultures fame and Moore, best known for Sonic Youth and black metal supergroup Twilight will hold a one-off concert in London at 100 Club, on 28th of March. They will be joined by acclaimed Jazz drummer Steve Noble. Dubbed in a post to Jones’s page, “A unique musical meeting of three of the most inventive performers of our time.” The event is a fundraiser to benefit [London radio station] Resonance FM. Tickets at the link below. Continue reading
In the era of DIY, the music industry has seen a lot of success from self-made acts. When you can run your own record label and put out a very highly praised debut, the bar is set pretty high for anything that follows. The UK’s own Asylums have done just that. They released their debut in 2016 with rave reviews and two years later they are following up with Alien Human Emotions (Cool Thing). This sophomore drop from the Southend natives uplifts the alt./art rock genre in a direction that intrigues a younger audience from the second it’s turned on.Continue reading
More than an odd Melvins comparison has been levelled at Montreal trio Big|Brave and indeed, the riffs within second full-length Au De La (Southern Lord) possess the squealing, throaty exhalations of Grunge. There is, however, a whole other weirdness going on here, which you might expect from a band just coming off a tour with Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Not least the trend-bucking omission of a bassist from the ranks…
Vocalist Robin Wattie is Björk as a native witch-woman, intoning melodiously then yelping like a possessed shaman whilst managing to retain that harmony. Those riffs, meanwhile, purveyed by Wattie and fellow guitarist Mathieu Ball, carry a Drone-like pace: squalling and whining on the pregnant-with-tension ‘Do.No.Harm.Do.No.Wrong…’, yet groaning under the monstrous feedback of ‘Look at How the World Has Made a Change’. The muscle-tightening edge is maintained by Louis-Alexandre Beauregard’s tribal resonance, powerfully leading each track to a crescendo of noise in an understated yet marked fashion.
Here, however, instantaneous drops to silence raise the hackles as much as the violent explosions of agony. Staccato opener ‘On the By and By and Thereon’ seemingly comes to a premature conclusion before kicking on again into a terrifying sequence of double-hammers. The sampled undercurrent of ‘And as the Waters Go’, meanwhile, is initially pierced by a single crash of rhythm guitar, Wattie’s steadily building vocal growing from a high incantation into a demented wail, the whole continually punctuated by brief zephyrs of calm which pounce upon the listener and chill the soul. Flashes of atonal lead and a pulsing coda bring to mind Sonic Youth on zopiclone, truly bewitching stuff that shreds the nerves while attempting to kiss them better.
The early, soft Psychedelia of closer ‘(re)Collection Part II’ gives way to Wattie’s languid howls, the subsequent near-unbearable intensity of moaning leads and rhythmic drums running through an a Capella Punk centrepiece to a Freeform frenzy and a delightful, Shoegaze finale. An exercise in barely-controlled expression, this is a fascinating album – at times stunning, at others beguiling, but always compelling – and one that ensures Big|Brave will force their way into your memory.
7.5/10
PAUL QUINN
It’s very rare in this game to be surprised. As in genuinely “Well, I wasn’t expecting that!”. Tribulation managed it earlier in the year, but very few do as expectation is there, or at least, a preparation for what a band is going to sound like. So, fair play to God Damn. The Midlands outfit aren’t the sort of band I usually go for, and Vultures (One Little Indian) isn’t the sort of album you’d normally associate with Ghost Cult, but the quality of their hybrid tunes stands out, which is why if even a little of what is written about it below piques your interest, dive in my friends.
The album kicks off with ‘When The Wind Blows’, a quirky Clutch groove that flitters into a raspy distorted vocal, before ‘Silver Spooned’ dances from a grungey intro then barrels into a lo-fi desert groove with dreamy melodies. ‘Shoeprints’ dances and swaggers, wide-legged, from sassy Monster Magnet territory, ending up in a dark, heavy powerful alleyway. ‘We Don’t Like You’ touches heavy psych, Nirvana juvenility and jangle, dark Seattle melodies and the very best of British alt rock, while the eight-minute ‘Skeletons’ has moving acoustics, world-weary vocals and expansive brooding fuzz.
Hand in hand with the alternative rock is a host of fuzzy doom, and it’s the amalgamation into stoner, alt noise, groove, rock and doom n’ roll via Sonic Youth, Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins and a host of other versatile references that makes this an interesting proposition. Vultures doesn’t just do one thing, except for be God Damn. They’ve successfully built themselves a whole new box, over to the side of all the normal boxes, and are all the better for it.
More than a hotch-potch of references from yesteryear, throughout they deliver on the song writing front too, even if they do self-consciously shy away from “the anthem”. There is more than enough to suggest a potential cross-over to more mainstream success in their future. Despite the lo-fi chops, God Damn could equally pulling in the plaudits at a Reading/Leeds type festival. Vultures should open some pretty big doors for them.
7.5/10
STEVE TOVEY
In an age where physical releases are going the way of the dodo thanks to the all-conquering march of the digital epoch, it’s heartening when new bands still care enough about their fans to not only produce something that buyers can hold in their hands, but also to put real effort into making each copy a thing of beauty. The self-titled debut album from Cleveland, Ohio based Hiram-Maxim comes complete with a 100-page art book courtesy of local graphic designer Ron Kretsch, and his disturbing black and white images are the perfect accompaniment to the thirty-seven minutes of sprawling, oppressive psychedelia that comprise this debut release.
Spread over four tracks, the music on Hiram-Maxim (Aqualamb) sounds mostly improvised, giving it a genuine feeling of unease as the four band members craft sounds that could be the soundtrack to undergoing a particularly intense k-hole whilst locked in a Salvador Dali museum overnight. The loose, free-form approach often gives way to violent bursts of noise such as on the brutally harsh ‘Can’t Stop’ which sounds as if Throbbing Gristle had been force-fed mescaline. Elsewhere, the tortuous waltz of album opener ‘Visceral’ at least makes an attempt to appear normal in a kind of Sonic Youth-gone-wrong manner while the sparse post-rock melodies and languid singing of ‘One’ fight for prominence with buzzing drone and dissonant drumbeats to create an atmosphere of bemused melancholy.
Offering so much more than your average meat-and-potatoes heavy band, Hiram-Maxim may not have a clue where their compositions are going, but the terrain they visit on the way is freaky and challenging in the way all good psych should be, and crucially never feels pretentious. If you fancy a ramble into dissonant soundscapes where anything could happen then give this impressive first effort a spin and tune your mind into something very strange yet oddly nourishing.
7.5/10
JAMES CONWAY
Former …And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead member Jason Reece is well known for being an Indie Rock enfant-terrible, destroying equipment and playing squalling discordant alt rock á la Sonic Youth. Yet with Midnight Masses, Reece has looked to produce more gentle, soulful material which still beats with the same black heart of his main act.
Manifesting in 2008, Midnight Masses have been labelled with many genres such as ‘Gothic Americana’ and ‘Grunge Gospel Folk Rock’. Truly there is no easy way to encapsulate this band into a catchy genre sound bite, and they are all the better for it. Singer Autry Fulbright’s take on his band’s multifaceted sound is “The sound of a city… In the middle of a desert” whatever that means.
Amassing over 14 members, Midnight Masses weave hazy psychedelic landscapes with some 1960’s atmospherics, Gospel vocal passages and Krautrock textures. Think Josh Homme, Neu! and Unkle jamming under an isolated desert sky and you’ll be close. As experimental as this all sounds, there are some very catchy tunes on Departures (Superball/Century Media),‘All Goes Black’ has a beautifully catchy chorus despite the melancholy overtones that permeate its every nuance. Since Fulbright wrote their debut to cope with the loss of his father, several other members of the group also experienced the loss of loved ones which accounts for the largely solemn feel.
Introspective and indulgent, painting with a myriad of styles Departures occasionally loses its way. When following the path of gothic alt rock on ‘Am I A Nomad’ or the surprisingly upbeat ‘Clap Your Hands’ provide a much levity from navel gazing to produce moments of true beauty. Undeniably talented, the overall impact is blighted by a lack of cohesion, leaving the mind able to wonder aimlessly when it should be focussed on the journey ahead.
Grief and loss have made some truly extraordinary records, yet the lack of clear direction towards either big city lights of earthy rural darkness leaves us somewhere in no man’s land.
6.0/10.0
ROSS BAKER
Seminal 90s New York metal band Helmet is doing a UK tour this fall in celebration of the 20th Anniversary of their album Betty (Interscope). The band will play the album in its entirety, as well as other hits from their illustrious career. Coming from New York City in the same late 80s avant-garde music scene that gave us Swans, John Zorn, pre-metal White Zombie, Prong, Band of Susans, Sonic Youth, and Unsane; Helmet melded raw NYHC with the pummeling grooves of metal, but with the artistry and intelligentsia of post-No Wave aesthetics. Led by Page Hamilton, Following their stellar hit albums Strap It On and In The Meantime, Helmet released Betty to their highest charting success ever. The band also toured the world constantly and released videos for ‘Milquetoast’ (also heard in the movie The Crow), ‘Biscuits for Smut’ and the memorable ‘Wilma’s Rainbow’. In the process of becoming on of the most important bands of their time, Helmet helped influence the growing post-rock/post-metal genre that is still being felt today.
Helmet : Betty: 20th Anniversary Europe Tour Dates
11-Sep- Czech Republic Prague Lucerna Music Bar
12-Sep- Poland Krakow Fabryka
13-Sep- Poland Warsaw Hydrozagadka
15-Sep- Germany Berlin So36
16-Sep- Germany Leipzig Ei
17-Sep- Germany Munich Feierwerik
19-Sep- Germany Frankfurt Batschkapp
20-Sep- Germany Cologne Underground
21-Sep- Germany Hamburg Knust
22-Sep- Denmark Copenhagen Vega Jr
23-Sep- Norway Sandines Tribute
24-Sep- Norway Oslo Bla
25-Sep- Sweden Stockholm Debaser
27-Sep- Finland Helsinki Nosturi
29-Sep- Germany Bielfield Forum
30-Sep- Netherlands Groningen Vera
1-Oct- Netherlands Eindhoven Effenaar Kz
2-Oct- Belgium Brussels Ab
4-Oct- France Montbeliard Ateliers Des Moles
5-Oct- France Paris La Marouinerie
6-Oct- France Vennes L’echonova
7-Oct- France Bordeaux Le Krakatoa
9-Oct- Spain Barcelona Apolo 2
10-Oct- Spain Madrid Copernico
11-Oct- Spain Hondarribia Psilocybenea
13-Oct- Switzerland Zurich Plaza
14-Oct- Switzerland Geneva Usine
16-Oct- Italy Rome Circolo Degli Artisti
17-Oct- Italy Ravenna Bronson
18-Oct- Italy Romagnano Rnr Arena
19-Oct- Italy Cagliari Fabrik
21-Oct- Austria Dornbirn Conrad Sohm
22-Oct- Austria Salzburg Rockhouse
23-Oct- Austria Vienna Szene
24-Oct- Slovenia Ljubljana Kino Siska
25-Oct- Hungary Budapest Durer Kert
27-Oct- Greece Athens An Club
29-Oct- Uk Glasgow Cathouse
30-Oct- Uk Manchester Sound Control
31-Oct- Uk London Islington Academy
“We haven’t been doing any interviews, so it’s a miracle it’s been getting out there at all. Europe seems to be latching on to this record, so that is good.”
These are the first words Stavros Giannoplous said to me concerning the just released final album from bleak black metal super-group Twilight, III: Beneath Trident’s Tomb (Century Media). In addition to Stavros, the group is made up of underground metal luminaries like Wrest (Jeff Whitehead, of Leviathan, Lurker Of Chalice) Imperial (Neill Jameson) (Krieg, N.I.L.) and Sanford Parker (Corrections House, Minsk, Nachtmystium, Buried At Sea) and alt-rock legend Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth, Chelsea Light Moving). Steve was on tour with his main band, The Atlas Moth, but took time to chat with Ghost Cult back stage at The Sinclair, in Cambridge MA. He talked about the difficulty in finishing the album, some drama going on in the band, the idea of a whether a super-group can really work in this day and age, and working with Thurston Moore.
Right off the bat, he first touched on why Twilight is ending:
“The reason this is the final record is with all the negative shit that’s going down with Blake (Judd), I think it’s just best. Me and Jeff, Sanford and Neill are all really close friends. I have seen everyone, all but Jeff on this tour and we wanted to continue to make music. But at this point we are just mired in bullshit. Also before we started this band, before I even became involved with it there were no movies with sparkly vampires (laughs). Shit’s changed and it’s for the best. I was in Philadelphia just 48 hours ago and we were talking about doing something else eventually, so there is always a door open to work with Neill, Jeff, and Sanford again, just not under this name. We definitely won’t call it Twilight. I wouldn’t say its the total end of the band, but the end of this chapter with this band. We we very adamant about cutting the ties. Especially since Blake isn’t even on this last record.
Pulling no punches, Stavros gave us an inside view of the events leading up to Blake’s departure from the group and the aftermath of trying to finish the record without him:
He brought in a couple of songs, but once everything went down, that was it. It was two songs and they made up a very short amount of the record. We were just, not wanting to deal with this anymore. He had pulled some really backhanded shit, and I won’t go into the details. The songs he brought in, we got rid of them and made it known that this was it. He’s got problems. Unfortunately at some point or another when you end up in a scenario when you are constantly getting shit on, whether it’s on purpose or not, or just happenstance, it doesn’t matter that someone is just fucked up. At some point or another, no matter how much you care about a person, you can’t deal with them business wise. When I met Blake, he was not as nearly as fucked up as he is now. People change that way. I absolutely wish him the best, and good luck to him.
We mused about the notion that by nature super-groups are not really meant to last. Stavros argued that it depends on the collection of artists in question:
“Look at even Down, right? That band put out one of the best fucking records I have ever heard in my entire life to this fucking day, and what did it take, 7-8 years before they ever put out another record. It was a while. It kind of all depends on the timing, I guess. With this particular group, there isn’t a live presence to our band, nor will there never will be. So I just can’t see it being in the forefront in out minds. See Imperial does stuff all the time. Sanford does production all day long, and also he has Corrections House now, which is almost like a full time band now. This is something like the flip side with a so called super-group where Corrections House can work. That is one of those things for instance for Bruce, where Yakuza and Bloodiest don’t work all the time. Sanford doesn’t have a full-time band. And both EyeHateGod and Neurosis tour limitedly. So these guys, that is the other side of coin of the super-group story. Like “Oh! Something like this works, because we had some free time.” Or we happen to have some free time. So for Twilight, particularly for our group, inevitably it would get longer between records, or maybe even never have another one. You never know.”
Since most of the remaining members of the group live far from each other in some cases, we asked about the creative process and how the tracking was all done: “Jeff was living in Chicago at the time, so he and I wrote the bulk of the record together. Actually all the guitar riffs that weren’t Thurston’s, were written by me and Jeff. And you know…we just added on top of it and added on top of it, and added on top of it. It’s much different than a band that is just in one studio. Thurston came in and did his parts. We could do all kinds of looping and other crazy shit. All of the sudden someone is banging on a jug of water, which is cool. The two records that we did together, we just settled into a certain vibe. That is just how it works. That is how we write music for that band. It kind of showed. The song structures definitely vary throughout any of the Twilight records, and we were pretty loose form wise, and we definitely got experimental with the writing.”
Century Media is doing a very nice, limited digipack release of the album along with other formats. We asked about the value of limited edition releases, and if other versions will be forthcoming.
“The vinyl is out. You know honestly as far as I know, there will only be the digipack and the vinyl forever. Because I didn’t do any more layout work than that. At the time everything was going down with Blake, everyone was mad at each other, not particularly us at each other, but more all of us at Blake. really. And so when that started happening, everyone stopped giving a fuck. And then our relationship with the A & R guy fell apart, so I had to take control of everything business wise and then I got busy with some other business opportunities too. I really didn’t have much help. And I didn’t really want to take the time to put together a booklet for a record that everyone had checked out on, since everyone was so mad. So there is not going to be more a limited release than there is now, but knowing Century Media, they will keep it in print anyway.”
Sometimes in the business of music the challenges come from outside of the band too, as Stavros learned: “I’ve always done all the business for The Atlas Moth. But this is like a machine. It’s the five of us, a well-oiled machine working together, grooving together and sharing the responsibilities together. I am not running the show here by any means. We’ve all worked our way up together, so we know how the inner workings of the band goes. But all of the sudden when it comes to being voted in as the guy to handle stuff, someone already had their hands in the pot mixing things up before me. So I was the guy that almost had to come in and clean it up. It was definitely a bit much for me, and I was already dealing with a ton of crap. The Atlas Moth will always be my first and foremost priority. So I was doing countless, worthless hours dealing with bullshit, doing stuff for a record no one seemingly gave a fuck about. I’m really happy everything came together, and we are all really proud of it. But at the same time, under the circumstances, you can hate something! (laughs) The things that bring up memories from the record, man, that could really piss you off. But in hindsight we are all still really stoked on it now that we’ve gotten a little hindsight. It’s been almost two years since we recorded it.”
One of the real bright spots of the record was working with Moore. Not only did the mainstream media latch on to the notion of him joining the band, the band was equally intrigued about working with him. A seemingly random sequence of events led to their collaboration:
“He came in for the second half of the session. We did two sessions and he came in for the second week. The Sonic Youth sound guy worked with Sanford in his studio in Chicago. He told us Thurston was really into black metal. This was around the time of the second record. And we said “Send some of this stuff to Thurston Moore and see what he thinks about it. And see if we wants to do a record with us.” And he did! (laughs) And I was like “Well I’ll be damned!” (laughs) “We’d better write a brand new Twilight record!” He was incredible. He was super rad to work with. He was totally mellow and great to work with. He totally knew his black metal. It was fucking awesome to be able to write a record with that dude. And also to watch him play and get that much closer to someone with a unique style, it was awesome. He was super awesome to work with. We talked about including him for future sessions, which I would love. He is just a music library. He is fucking incredible. I don’t know how that guy puts it all together in his head. He’s something else man!”
Keith “Keefy” Chachkes
Twilight has released a stunning effort in III: Beneath Trident’s Tomb; but that’s the good news. The bad news is it is also their last release.
III: Beneath Trident’s Tomb (Century Media) is a grand swan song of noisy, yet tasty and sludgy riffs, in a raw wall of sound courtesy of producer/guitarist/keyboardist Sanford Parker (Minsk, Corrections House). This is further enhanced by the addition of a guitarist who is known for making musical noise an art form – Thurston Moore – yes, of Sonic Youth. It may seem to be an odd pairing, but it does work, and it should. Sonic Youth carved their niche as avant-garde musicians with little regard for things such as standard tunings and playing it safe, and Twilight is cut from the same cloth…albeit the darker, more tattered edge of it.
Moore is but another notch in the belt of a band that has culled quite a roster of musicians over its 14-year existence. The lineup for this final release is rounded out by vocalist N. Imperial (Krieg), co-founder/drummer/bassist/vocalist Wrest (Leviathan), guitarist/vocalist Stavros Giannopoulos (The Atlas Moth/Chrome Waves). Their performances are as good as expected, but this record overall appears to be a cross between their 2005 self-titled release with its aggression and Black Metal lo-fi trappings, and their 2010 release Monument to Time End‘s gaze-y leanings.
‘Lungs’ opens the record with Black Metal screams through Parker’s atmospheric production and grinding riffage. ‘Oh Wretched Son’ is dissonant and driving, successfully combining Noise Rock with Death Metal. ‘Swarming Funeral Mass’ is a doomy affair, starting off sparse but later filling up like an angry well complete with metallic banging effects and dual screams. ‘Seek No Shelter Fevered Ones’ also starts of quiet but very quickly rears up into a powerful beast of a mid-tempo song. ‘A Flood of Eyes’ reminds me very much of Neurosis overall, which is never a bad thing, then it cranks up the Thrash, brings in the barreling double-bass and then brings it down to a mid-tempo trot, resulting in a very cool musical ride. ‘Below Lights’ closes out the record, starting out as a creepy industrial song, and ending as a very creepy Industrial/Death Metal hybrid that would the perfect soundtrack to the kind of nightmare that wakes you up in the middle of the night and prevents you from going back to sleep.
There is not a lot of speed on this record, but what it lacks in speed and blast beats it more than makes up for it in sheer intensity. There is a weight to this record that is palpable, and practically visual. It is very easy to allow your mind to go to very dark places as this insidious soundtrack blares itself into the cracks of your subconscious.
Sonically broad, cold and uncomfortable, calling it Black Metal is not completely accurate. Other Metal genres snake in and out, such as doom, thrash and death. “Experimental” is a word that I do not like to use because it implies a hesitation or an uncertainty. That is not the feeling I get from listening to this record. It is a carefully crafted slab of Metal that is intended to be powerful and unsettling, and it succeeds at both. To get the best idea of what you are in for, picture Tombs at its bleakest, or Neurosis Nat its angriest.
Co-founder Blake Judd (Nachtmystium) appears to have been involved with the writing and development of this record, but left prior to its release. Perhaps this ended a band whose existence was as unpredictable and shrouded in mystery as the music itself. It may never be clear whether Twilight was a black metal supergroup, a kult collaboration, a label-commissioned project or the madness of one man with friends who understood it. Whatever they were, they leave as an enigma with a righteous stain of sound to mark their departure into the ether.
9/10
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Lynn Jordan