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album cover HIGGS, DANIEL (A.I.U.) Ancestral Songs (Holy Mountain) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Daniel Higgs is a very strange man. Or maybe we should say, Daniel (Arcus Incus Ululat) Higgs, Interdimensional Song-Seamstress, is a very strange man. His artwork is amazing and bizarre, Spock ears and eye-balled Christmas trees, emaciated figures riding strange hellish beasts, an amazing personal mythology represented as a menagerie of impossible and impossibly beautiful figures and beasts. His music seems to somehow embody the same mystery, a world that Higgs inhabits simultaneously to his presence in our own. That must be the only thing that can truly explain the man and his music. That he walks around, one foot in our world, of people places and things, the other in some kaleidoscopic world where sounds are tasted and sights are smelled, a synesthetic wonderland, that when translated and brought over to our plain of existence, appears distorted, twisted, haunting and hard to fathom. But at the same time imbued with some otherworldly warmth and a beauty that while alien, represents a higher state, maybe unreachable here. That is Higgs' gift. He is a traveler and a troubadour. He allows us to see visions, to hear musical mysteries. Through paintings, drawings, tattoos and especially music. From the moment we first heard his 'rock' band Lungfish we were smitten. Actually, the very first time we heard Lungfish was in a record store in another town, years ago. Our first thought was "What the hell is this?" But after several more songs, we were compelled to sheepishly approach the counter and ask the clerk what was playing. We bought it, and loved it. And maybe that's the magic of Higgs' music. It's esoteric and not always approachable. It takes some trust, a leap of faith, some sonic daring. But that faith is always repaid many times over. Outside of Lungfish, Higgs also plays in the Pupils along with his Lungfish bandmate Asa, a more intimate stripped down version of his rock band. The same cyclical riffs and chant like vocals, but all acoustic, and sparsely arranged. There is also his amazing sort-of Appalachian solo guitar work, and his very very strange solo Jew's harp recordings.
This disc is Higgs' first proper solo release and manages to tie up all his disparate sonic threads into one big gorgeous Gordian knot.
Several tracks sound like they could have come straight off the Pupils record. Simple, haunting acoustic guitar riffs, repeated and repeated until they becomes totally hypnotic, mantra like, with Higgs' gorgeous vocals over the top, a mix of old timey sea shanty and folk standard. The rest drift dreamily from sound to sound, like a sonic journey through the soul of the man. Gorgeous tangles of banjo or some banjo-like instrument drift amidst field recordings of birds (knowing Higgs it may have been actually recorded right there in the woods, although he has been known to travel with a portable recorder to capture whatever strikes his fancy) a steel string buzz, that wanders from near traditional sounding Appalachian twang to some sort of jaunty Celtic melody to brief melodic flurries, impossibly buzzy and blurry. Thick swaths of buzzing guitar swirl and squirm, doomy, melancholy melodies spread out over a machine like whir, sounding like a guitar being played like a bagpipe. While over the top drifts tiny tangles of steel string picking all drenched in strange FX and allowed to twist and distort, sounding almost the way a Jew's harp does when you change the shape of your mouth. And as if pre-ordained (which it most likely was), out comes the Jew's harp, but it sounds like no Jew's harp you've ever heard. Super brittle and distorted, like some sort of metallic marimba, or a Konono outtake broadcast via shortwave and played through a crappy transistor radio. A gorgeous buzzy abstract hoedown. Finally, the record winds up (most definitely not down) with a thick swirl of super lo-fi psych guitar freakout, the chords and notes bent and twisted, pitches slipping back and forth, overtones subtly shifting, notes colliding and exploding into little bursts of jagged buzz before settling back into a droning hypnotic thrum. Like some alien jig, if aliens had a practice space full of strangely tuned guitars and really loud amps with blown speakers. And again, it sounds like somehow Higgs figured out a way to hold the guitar up to his mouth and play it like a Jew's harp, the sounds changing shape as much as tone, a warm and fuzzed out smear of distorted buzz that washes over you, as does this whole sonic scripture, like a shower of rich wet soil and sparkling uncut diamonds.
MPEG Stream: "Living In The Kingdom Of Death"
MPEG Stream: "Thy Chosen Bride"

album cover HIGGS, DANIEL "BELTESHAZZAR" Metempsychotic Memories (Holy Mountain) cd 14.98
We'd be happy if Daniel Higgs would put out a new album every month. Every week, even. His songs can be long (up to 14 minutes on this disc's "Love Abides") but eventually they do end and we always want more more more. Because they are totally entrancing, his raw "Appalachian raga" folk picking style wending and winding while he chants his mystic lyrics repetitively, warbling with the outsider intensity of a Charles Manson... a dramatic delivery that eccentrically enhances the weird wisdom of his words, worth absorbing for their imagery even when their import is not immediately understandable. Well though he's not THAT prolific we're happy to have this new disc on Holy Mountain already, following Atomic Yggdrasil Tarot on Thrill Jockey earlier this year.
Metempsychotic Melodies (whatever that means, it seems like a good title for this!!) starts off with a stark and skillful instrumental, "Universal Salutation", which we're told was "recorded aboard the Starship Weep-For-Lucifer". Again, we believe it, that somehow makes sense. That leads into the aforementioned "Love Abides", an extended mantra for voice and banjo (in fact, banjo is the main instrument throughout), wherein Higgs sings lines like "Love is the secret seam between waking and dream / love is a breath that bears a boundless scream" and offers up further thoughts from his personal gnosis of love, notions guaranteed to never be repeated in any other "love song" ever!! Such as: "Love, like a basilisk hatched in the nest of a dove / love's got a bible it hides in the folds of a cloud" and "Love is your name when your name has fallen away / love tends the last dawning of the last day"...
As if allowing an interlude to let all that sink in, the third track "Leontocephaline Rhapsody" is a loping, psychedelic instrumental, a gentle jam densely droning and alive with electricity. Then comes the fourth and final song, "All Cherished Things", another display of Higgs' druggy, fascinating poetry. "There's a pearl in your head / the head between your double-head / it's flashing blue and red - hear it sing". He goes on to touch upon some favored themes, Christ, Krishna, coitus, his own dead body, love... Lyrics like "The skull at the foot of the cross is my own" could be creepy, or pretentious, as could be Higgs' unique vocal stylings, but no, not as far as we're concerned. Ok, maybe it is a bit creepy. He's on a wavelength that works (for him -- maybe no one else could pull this off). If Higgs had a cult, we'd seriously consider joining it...truly a treasure of the US indie rock scene, and one of the realest deals in the "acid folk" underground. We'll be spinning this highly recommended album with ceremonial regularity as it takes its honored place in our collection of his music, and of course our anticipation of his next set of shamanic sermons remains high.
MPEG Stream: "All Cherished Things"
MPEG Stream: "Universal Salutation"
MPEG Stream: "Love Abides"

album cover HIGGS, DANIEL "BELTESHAZZAR" Metempsychotic Memories (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
We'd be happy if Daniel Higgs would put out a new album every month. Every week, even. His songs can be long (up to 14 minutes on this disc's "Love Abides") but eventually they do end and we always want more more more. Because they are totally entrancing, his raw "Appalachian raga" folk picking style wending and winding while he chants his mystic lyrics repetitively, warbling with the outsider intensity of a Charles Manson... a dramatic delivery that eccentrically enhances the weird wisdom of his words, worth absorbing for their imagery even when their import is not immediately understandable. Well though he's not THAT prolific we're happy to have this new disc on Holy Mountain already, following Atomic Yggdrasil Tarot on Thrill Jockey earlier this year.
Metempsychotic Melodies (whatever that means, it seems like a good title for this!!) starts off with a stark and skillful instrumental, "Universal Salutation", which we're told was "recorded aboard the Starship Weep-For-Lucifer". Again, we believe it, that somehow makes sense. That leads into the aforementioned "Love Abides", an extended mantra for voice and banjo (in fact, banjo is the main instrument throughout), wherein Higgs sings lines like "Love is the secret seam between waking and dream / love is a breath that bears a boundless scream" and offers up further thoughts from his personal gnosis of love, notions guaranteed to never be repeated in any other "love song" ever!! Such as: "Love, like a basilisk hatched in the nest of a dove / love's got a bible it hides in the folds of a cloud" and "Love is your name when your name has fallen away / love tends the last dawning of the last day"...
As if allowing an interlude to let all that sink in, the third track "Leontocephaline Rhapsody" is a loping, psychedelic instrumental, a gentle jam densely droning and alive with electricity. Then comes the fourth and final song, "All Cherished Things", another display of Higgs' druggy, fascinating poetry. "There's a pearl in your head / the head between your double-head / it's flashing blue and red - hear it sing". He goes on to touch upon some favored themes, Christ, Krishna, coitus, his own dead body, love... Lyrics like "The skull at the foot of the cross is my own" could be creepy, or pretentious, as could be Higgs' unique vocal stylings, but no, not as far as we're concerned. Ok, maybe it is a bit creepy. He's on a wavelength that works (for him -- maybe no one else could pull this off). If Higgs had a cult, we'd seriously consider joining it...truly a treasure of the US indie rock scene, and one of the realest deals in the "acid folk" underground. We'll be spinning this highly recommended album with ceremonial regularity as it takes its honored place in our collection of his music, and of course our anticipation of his next set of shamanic sermons remains high.
MPEG Stream: "All Cherished Things"
MPEG Stream: "Universal Salutation"
MPEG Stream: "Love Abides"

album cover HIGH WOLF Atlas Nation (Holy Mountain) lp 15.98
French one man psychedelic loopscaper High Wolf finds his way onto our pal JW's Holy Mountain label, and offers up another mesmerizing collection of collaged soundscapes and rhythmic mesmer, but unlike on past records where the High Wolf sound was dense, and noisy, a little chaotic, a Birchville Cat Motel like slow build to a dense layered soft cacophony, the sounds here are much more blissed out and dubby, very rhythmic with a bit of an Eastern vibe, the opening track especially sounds like a more lysergic Muslimgauze, with some sitar like buzz and tribal hand drums woven into the song's blurred soft swells and spidery melodies, it's easily the dreamiest thing we've heard from HW, and we definitely wish it had gone one way longer. The second track offers up more of the same, with a bit more effects, muted percussion, some warm fuzzed out shimmer, all in a haze of washed out effects, until the low end swoops in, thick and dense, synthy and warbly, a strange fuzzy pulse laid over that initial rhythm, a dark raga like kosmische sound that drifts and shimmers hypnotically until the song finally winds down.
Track three, "Raagini" begins all raga buzz, layered high end tones, but quickly blossoms into a sound more like the High Wolf of old, a gauzy expanse of mesmerizing buzz, but here the drones are laid over a strange sonar like pulse, which gives the otherwise nearly static buzz an otherworldly propulsion. "Kenya Sunset" is another one that starts off all Muslimgauze-y, looped and darkly rhythmic, ominous and cinematic, the surrounding sounds in constant motion, totally tranced out, the sort of thing we could listen to forever, but instead of going on forever, the song erupts into a wild psychedelic squall, that wraps itself around that pulsing rhythm, and rides it for the length of the track. And then finally, the nearly 14 minute "Haiti" smooths the looped rhythms into something much more abstract and droney, some spaced out psychedelic drift, that builds slowly into a warm washed out celestial swirl, all bleary and blurry and dreamy, but still shot through with some smoldering psychedelic guitar, the perfect closer to one of our favorite High Wolf records yet.
Includes a download coupon as well!
MPEG Stream: "Fuji Descent"
MPEG Stream: "The Dawn Of Man"

album cover INTERNATIONAL HELLO s/t (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98

album cover JULIE MITTENS, THE s/t (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Glorious fuzzed out howl, rather dark and desolate despite the warm and fuzzy sounding name. Well maybe fuzzy is right, the guitars certainly are... This is the first cd release (after some obscure limited edition vinyl and cd-r action) from this Dutch improvisational "free rock" power trio. It's no surprise that they've found a home on the Holy Mountain label, alongside the likes of Suishou No Fune, Zodiacs, Lichens, La Otracina, and the Davis Redford Triad, amongst others. It's definitely some Holy Mountain sounding shit! Mega-massive distorted whale call guitar explorations, displaying density and intensity on par with Japanese units like Keiji Haino's Fushitsusha. There's four lengthy tracks here, 66 minutes total time, studio-recorded but presumably live without overdubs, each one of them deserving of a serious "whew!" when finished. The wind-tunnel of feedback from the amplifier abusing guitarist is ably supported by the bassist's clouds of low-end tones and the percussionist's jazz-worthy, freely fractured drum kit hits, in a moody, never too busy interplay of paradoxically controlled chaos. It's channelled volume and energy, boring a hole in your skull through your ears to the part of your brain where you imagine John Coltrane's sheets of sound, stretched out and slowed down and ground up, electrified for guitar strings instead of sax... Whew! We like.
MPEG Stream: "December 12, 2006 #1"
MPEG Stream: "December 12, 2006 #2"

album cover KLANGMUTATIONEN Weibe Messe (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98

album cover LA OTRACINA Blood Moon Riders (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
Latest from these East Coast psych rockers, a group who once featured a member of another aQ fave, Titan, both bands offering up similarly spaced out prog psych heaviness. On this latest La Otracia disc though, the L.O. trio get even proggier and heavier, the first side is mostly a single sprawling jam, rife with wildly intense drum freakouts, soulful soaring distorted guitars, thick buzzing bass, all wound tight into some super propulsive metallic prog.
The band churn out some surprisingly heavy riffage and heart-of-the-sun psychedelia, slipping from full on blown out prog to long stretches of swirling space rock and thick wall-of-sound drones, the proggier parts laced with squiggly synths, fractured riffs, fluttering flutes, all locked into some seriously complex arrangements, a multi part epic that could have gone on for another several lp sides (and as far as we're concerned should have!) but instead gives way to a tripped out moody reverb soaked coda.
The flipside is not so incendiary, but still plenty heavy and psychedelic, from druggy glistening shimmer, into loping almost Polvo-y postrock, humid guitar buzz over distant abstract percussion, hushed muted thrum lurching into frenetic krautrockiness, ending with an awesome final track, a head spinning collage of super psychedelic backwards guitars over simple subtle drumming, another awesome track that could easily have spread out over another album side.
Total kick ass space psych prog nirvana, and as always, essential listening for fans of Earthless, Guapo, Dead Meadow, Acid Mothers Temple, Titan, Mammatus, Bardo Pond, Hawkwind, Monster Magnet and the drugged out, spaced out like.

album cover LA OTRACINA Reality Has Got To Die (Holy Mountain) cd 14.98
Brooklyn trio La Otracina have always been about the spaced out heavy jammy psychedelic proggy stoner riffed awesomeness. But now, with their third full-length Holy Mountain monument, they're REALLY starting to fuck shit up. Reality Has Got To Die is their most gonzo album yet, and definitely their most metal! Opener "Hail Fire" sets the scene, with singer/drummer Adam Kriney, tongue perhaps in cheek, rallying La Otracina's jackbooted troops to march forth and pillage some alien landscape, riffs stabbing down from on high like laser blasts from orbiting star destroyers. Melancholic neo-classical guitar melodies lend some pathos to the scene, but pretty soon La Otracina are retro-thrashing it up like Early Man at a kegger. That sort of behavior continues into the next cut, "Raze The Sky", which also manages to up the quota of sci-fi synths, AND throw in a bit of boogie, and visit the set of an Italian suspense movie... Then "Crystal Wizards Of The Cosmic Weird" launches. It's over ten minutes long and thus no surprise even more ridiculously proggy than what's come before, tossing in all that and more, sounding one second like Sleep, another like King Crimson. Clearly this record isn't for those who think bands should be restrained and tasteful in their application of whatever rad '70s stuff in their record collections turns them on. INDULGE! La Otracina aren't holding anything back, but they ARE making damn sure they're tighter and heavier and probably catchier than your band. Unless your band is, like, Pharaoh Overlord or Mammatus or Danava or something, in whose illustrious company La Otracina definitely belong.
But for every metallic part that sounds like it could be off an album by Early Man or The Sword, there's another trippier one that could be by White Hills, Acid Mothers Temple, or even Jonas Reinhardt. In fact, the title track, stretching out over almost 20 minutes, is definitely towards the kosmik krauty spacey psychy side of the La Otracina equation, complete with lengthy distorto-drone maelstroms, and even a drum solo! And when all is said and done, if you can imagine a New Age version of the Saviours you'd be close to a guess at what this record sounds like overall. Enough with the hypothetical comparisons, though, on Reality Has Got To Die these guys have almost moved beyond comparison, whilst making an album seemingly focus-group tested entirely at Aquarius Records. In other words, recommended!
The double lp version comes with mp3 download coupon. The cd version comes with the cd!
MPEG Stream: "Hail Fire"
MPEG Stream: "Raze The Sky"
MPEG Stream: "Mass Meteoric Mind"

album cover LA OTRACINA Reality Has Got To Die (Holy Mountain) 2lp 17.98
Brooklyn trio La Otracina have always been about the spaced out heavy jammy psychedelic proggy stoner riffed awesomeness. But now, with their third full-length Holy Mountain monument, they're REALLY starting to fuck shit up. Reality Has Got To Die is their most gonzo album yet, and definitely their most metal! Opener "Hail Fire" sets the scene, with singer/drummer Adam Kriney, tongue perhaps in cheek, rallying La Otracina's jackbooted troops to march forth and pillage some alien landscape, riffs stabbing down from on high like laser blasts from orbiting star destroyers. Melancholic neo-classical guitar melodies lend some pathos to the scene, but pretty soon La Otracina are retro-thrashing it up like Early Man at a kegger. That sort of behavior continues into the next cut, "Raze The Sky", which also manages to up the quota of sci-fi synths, AND throw in a bit of boogie, and visit the set of an Italian suspense movie... Then "Crystal Wizards Of The Cosmic Weird" launches. It's over ten minutes long and thus no surprise even more ridiculously proggy than what's come before, tossing in all that and more, sounding one second like Sleep, another like King Crimson. Clearly this record isn't for those who think bands should be restrained and tasteful in their application of whatever rad '70s stuff in their record collections turns them on. INDULGE! La Otracina aren't holding anything back, but they ARE making damn sure they're tighter and heavier and probably catchier than your band. Unless your band is, like, Pharaoh Overlord or Mammatus or Danava or something, in whose illustrious company La Otracina definitely belong.
But for every metallic part that sounds like it could be off an album by Early Man or The Sword, there's another trippier one that could be by White Hills, Acid Mothers Temple, or even Jonas Reinhardt. In fact, the title track, stretching out over almost 20 minutes, is definitely towards the kosmik krauty spacey psychy side of the La Otracina equation, complete with lengthy distorto-drone maelstroms, and even a drum solo! And when all is said and done, if you can imagine a New Age version of the Saviours you'd be close to a guess at what this record sounds like overall. Enough with the hypothetical comparisons, though, on Reality Has Got To Die these guys have almost moved beyond comparison, whilst making an album seemingly focus-group tested entirely at Aquarius Records. In other words, recommended!
The double lp version comes with mp3 download coupon. The cd version comes with the cd!
MPEG Stream: "Hail Fire"
MPEG Stream: "Raze The Sky"
MPEG Stream: "Mass Meteoric Mind"

album cover LA OTRACINA Tonal Ellipse Of The One (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
There's a lot of bands doing the '70s inspired instrumental jammy psych thing today... but this Brooklyn outfit, armed with guitars, bass, drums, synth, vibes, and upright bass, for sure does it RIGHT. Maybe no surprise, since La Otracina shares members with one of our instrumental psych/prog faves, space rockers Titan! If you like them, chances are you'll dig this... we'd also recommend La Otracina to fans of Earthless, Expo '70, Dead Meadow, Acid Mothers Temple, labelmates Om and Mammatus, etc.
Think post rock + pot and you'll have some suitably hazy idea of what this is all about. There's winding, wandering stuff here, exploratory, relaxed... as well as tracks that are rather more energetic and prog-tight. For instance, the 11-minute "Beyond The Dusty Hills (Cowboy In The Desert Part Two)" is one of the super stoned, drifting cuts, while the comparatively brief 6-minute "Nine Times The Color Red Explodes Like Heated Blood" is more propulsively muscular and Titan-esque, progressively riffed more rigidly than some of the other offerings here. Roiling and heavy, shimmering and lovely...the five tracks on Tonal Ellipse Of The One allow all those descriptors to apply, eventually.
Seems like we're always saying nice things about stuff on the Holy Mountain label, well, it's true -- Lesbian, Mammatus, Blues Control, those are just a few of the recent releases from up high on the Holy Mountain that we've been diggin' lately. Add La Otracina to that list! Let's hope HM can keep their excellent batting average up, we look forward to what's next...
MPEG Stream: "Yellow Mellow Magic"
MPEG Stream: "Nine Times The Color Red Explodes Like Heated Blood"

album cover LESBIAN Power Hor (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Black Metal. No, wait. Sludge-doom. Wait, no, it's post-rock. Huh? Seattle's Lesbian (who do themselves no favors with their dumb name, although they used to be called Lesbian Witch, not sure if that's better or worse) are, to us, pleasingly confusional and compelling when given a listen, their extended, epic songs -- 4 tracks in 1 hour here, folks -- veering from sheer metallic violence to moody melody to shoegazing stoner space-outs... it's like Wolves In The Throne Room one moment, Pelican or Isis the next. And it's great. Definitely another "heavy" winner from the eccentric Holy Mountain label, fresh from their successes with the likes of Om and Mammatus, two other question-mark-metal bands with heady, hypnotic abilities.
Their throat-torn vocals and the weighty riffage argue for Lesbian's status as metallers, while the many passages of quiet blissfulness reveal a surprisingly sensitive side, just as emotionally effective, each opposed aspect of their music enhancing the power and beauty of the other via Lesbian's devastating dynamics and psychedelic synergy. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Black Forest Hamm"
MPEG Stream: "Powerwhorses"

album cover LICHENS The Psychic Nature Of Being (Holy Mountain) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Robert Lowe, of the now defunct 90 Day Men, as well as part time member of TV On The Radio, delivers his first solo record, using the name Lichens, and creates a ghostly otherworld, using primarily his voice. That's right. An acapella record. Well, mostly. Lowe's haunting impressionistic vocals are drenched in reverb and sent drifitng into the ether, a soft fluttering falsetto most of the time, a low monk like chant at others, swooping through ominous minor key melodies, over simple sparkling guitar lines, wrapped in a warm and shimmery haze, over a bed of rumbling drones and occasional chiming percussion. Delicate crystalline soundscapes equal parts Pelt, Sigur Ros, Scott Tuma and Jewelled Antler. All three tracks recorded live with no overdubs, all completely otherworldly and breathtakingly lovely.
MPEG Stream: "Kirilian Auras"
MPEG Stream: "Shore Line Scoring"

LOBDELL, STEVEN WRAY Automatic Writing By The Moon (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
First solo album in the burgeoning career of guitarist and Holy Mountain hero Steven Wray Lobdell, best known for his work in the recent incarnation of seminal krautrockers Faust, as well as his bands The Davis Redford Triad and Sufi Mind Game. Oh, yeah, and he played on that weirdo Baseball Astrologer LP too. Like all those projects, this is as psychedelic as all get out, but not at all freaky, distorted and overdriven: rather, this is acoustic, folky instrumental stuff, including a beautiful cover of a tune by Chilean folkie Victor Jara as well as much cosmic improv. It's the combination of wondrous playing and studio overdubs and effects that play the tricks on your mind. Lovely & recommended.

album cover LOBDELL, STEVEN WRAY Live At Club Donut (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
This live show from an actual establishment called Club Doughnut, features Lobdell, sometime Faust member and head of the mighty Davis Redford Triad, all by his lonesome, with just an electric guitar but holy fuck can this man wrangle amazing sounds out of those six strings. From acid fried Eastern tinged raga, to super effected psych freakout, to massive walls of Skullflower like skree, to full on riff destroying sonic mayhem to warm rumbling ambience, all assembled from the unlikeliest guitar sounds, crumbling super distorted throb, crystalline angelic shimmer, and flat out head caving crunch. Fans of Jack Rose, Pelt, Skullflower, Total, and all things massive gorgeous guitar will be floored.
MPEG Stream: "Live At Club Doughnut 1"

album cover LORDS OF FALCONRY s/t (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
This has a lot going for it. First off, they're called Lords Of Falconry, which is kinda cool. Lordly, even. And this, their debut full-length, comes to us via the also quite lordly Holy Mountain label, who have a pretty stellar track record as far as we're concerned. In fact, Holy Mountain probably has had a higher number of AQ Records Of The Week per capita than almost any other label. Furthermore, our discerning pal JW who runs Holy Mountain tells us that THIS is precisely the sort of thing he's always wanted to release on his label. So far, so good. Our appetites are whetted. And then, there's the music. ULTRA fuzzed, freaked out, high energy, heavy psychedelic guitar jams, to put it plainly. Can't complain about that, no siree. But (you knew there had to be a but), we do have one minor caveat for you potential emptors... it concerns the vocals. If this was all-instrumental, there'd be no hemming and hawing. But, some of the vocal stylings struck some of us as, well, a little bit goofy. Self-consciously "rawk" or something. You may not mind a bit, and we actually don't much either.
Anyway, it's hard to be picky about the vocals when Lords Of Falconry's guitars are blasting jet-engine like, turning the air into cottage cheese they way they used to do back in Blue Cheer's daze, the wild FX and throbbing distortion turning yr head inside out so your brain is being caressed and cudgeled by these riffs and rhythms without any help from your ears.
Recommended to folks who get off on bands like Julian Cope's Braindonor, DMBQ, Midnite Snake, The Heads, Hawkwind, High Rise, and other fuzz-laden, pedal-stomping, heavy-duty psychedelic throwbacks. And by the way, though Holy Mountain didn't tell us this, we're pretty sure that one of these Lords Of Falconry is in fact none other than guitarist Steven Wray Lobdell of Davis Redford Triad, Sufi Mind Game, and Faust fame! If true (it is), that explains a lot about this. The other dude in the band we believe to be one Sammy Adams, formerly the drummer for Fireballs Of Freedom. Talk about a power duo. So, despite a slight case of what we might call the Scissorfight syndrome, this gets a solid recommendation from us!
MPEG Stream: "Doomsday Legislation"
MPEG Stream: "Osirion"
MPEG Stream: "Scottish Chords"

album cover LORDS OF FALCONRY s/t (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
This has a lot going for it. First off, they're called Lords Of Falconry, which is kinda cool. Lordly, even. And this, their debut full-length, comes to us via the also quite lordly Holy Mountain label, who have a pretty stellar track record as far as we're concerned. In fact, Holy Mountain probably has had a higher number of AQ Records Of The Week per capita than almost any other label. Furthermore, our discerning pal JW who runs Holy Mountain tells us that THIS is precisely the sort of thing he's always wanted to release on his label. So far, so good. Our appetites are whetted. And then, there's the music. ULTRA fuzzed, freaked out, high energy, heavy psychedelic guitar jams, to put it plainly. Can't complain about that, no siree. But (you knew there had to be a but), we do have one minor caveat for you potential emptors... it concerns the vocals. If this was all-instrumental, there'd be no hemming and hawing. But, some of the vocal stylings struck some of us as, well, a little bit goofy. Self-consciously "rawk" or something. You may not mind a bit, and we actually don't much either.
Anyway, it's hard to be picky about the vocals when Lords Of Falconry's guitars are blasting jet-engine like, turning the air into cottage cheese they way they used to do back in Blue Cheer's daze, the wild FX and throbbing distortion turning yr head inside out so your brain is being caressed and cudgeled by these riffs and rhythms without any help from your ears.
Recommended to folks who get off on bands like Julian Cope's Braindonor, DMBQ, Midnite Snake, The Heads, Hawkwind, High Rise, and other fuzz-laden, pedal-stomping, heavy-duty psychedelic throwbacks. And by the way, though Holy Mountain didn't tell us this, we're pretty sure that one of these Lords Of Falconry is in fact none other than guitarist Steven Wray Lobdell of Davis Redford Triad, Sufi Mind Game, and Faust fame! If true (it is), that explains a lot about this. The other dude in the band we believe to be one Sammy Adams, formerly the drummer for Fireballs Of Freedom. Talk about a power duo. So, despite a slight case of what we might call the Scissorfight syndrome, this gets a solid recommendation from us!
MPEG Stream: "Doomsday Legislation"
MPEG Stream: "Osirion"
MPEG Stream: "Scottish Chords"

album cover MAMMATUS s/t (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Whoa, heavy!! This is a whole-body vibrating, brain-melting, serious amplifier worship ceremony! The first time I (Allan) saw these guys, last year sometime at the Hemlock here in San Francisco, I was blown away... I'd been told the were a heavy 'stoner rock' outfit from Santa Cruz and worth checking out, but I didn't realize they were gonna be quite so AMAZING. Hairy backwoods hippy dudes, the drummer wearing what looked to be a home-made Whysp t-shirt, guitars turning the air to cottage cheese a la Blue Cheer while creating a trance-zone worthy of Finland's Circle!! So good that I immediately bought the live cd-r they were selling... we were gonna try to get some for the store, in fact, but then we found out that local label Holy Mountain run by our pal JW was on the case already and would be issuing Mammatus's debut studio full-length album Stateside (with Rocket Recordings, home to the most recent UFOmammut, putting it out in Europe).
So yeah, heavy stoner rock this is, but waaay psychedelic and Hawkwindy, kinda like what maybe you thought Circle side-project Pharaoh Overlord was gonna (and sometimes does) sound like. Loud, massive and mesmerizing, swirling sludge psych! Their songs, often of epic length, are ever chugging skyward, dripping molten goo, full of feedback and fx. Their energetic riffage and warm drones are adorned by drifting vox (not unlike Dead Meadow, with whom they share certain proclivities) and fantastic, metallic, progtastic imagery. Take note of titles like "Dragon Of The Deep" (parts one and two!) and the Roger Dean-esque cover art by Arik "Moonhawk" Roper.
Further musical comparisions aren't hard to come up with -- Mammatus belong in the company of such bastions of cosmic heaviness as Sleep, Boris, YOB, UFOmammut, Earthless, old Monster Magnet, Acid Mothers Temple (at AMT's heaviest, like on Starless & Bible Black Sabbath), Tarantula Hawk, and even Amon Duul (especially on the druggy, krautrocky jam "The Outer Rim"). And of course they're now labelmates with OM, which also makes perfect sense. If you love many, or even just any, of those bands and the sounds they make, this comes highly recommended.
Time sensitive note: Mammatus are playing tomorrow, Saturday April 1st again at the Hemlock with AQ faves the Grey Daturas!
MPEG Stream: "The Righteous Path Through The Forest Of Old"
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Of The Deep Part One"

album cover MAMMATUS s/t (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
NOW, AT LAST, ON VINYL!!! Here's what we said when we reviewed these AQ faves debut when it first came out on cd back in 2006:
Whoa, heavy!! This is a whole-body vibrating, brain-melting, serious amplifier worship ceremony! The first time I (Allan) saw these guys, last year sometime at the Hemlock here in San Francisco, I was blown away... I'd been told the were a heavy 'stoner rock' outfit from Santa Cruz and worth checking out, but I didn't realize they were gonna be quite so AMAZING. Hairy backwoods hippy dudes, the drummer wearing what looked to be a home-made Whysp t-shirt, guitars turning the air to cottage cheese a la Blue Cheer while creating a trance-zone worthy of Finland's Circle!! So good that I immediately bought the live cd-r they were selling... we were gonna try to get some for the store, in fact, but then we found out that local label Holy Mountain run by our pal JW was on the case already and would be issuing Mammatus's debut studio full-length album Stateside (with Rocket Recordings, home to the most recent UFOmammut, putting it out in Europe).
So yeah, heavy stoner rock this is, but waaay psychedelic and Hawkwindy, kinda like what maybe you thought Circle side-project Pharaoh Overlord was gonna (and sometimes does) sound like. Loud, massive and mesmerizing, swirling sludge psych! Their songs, often of epic length, are ever chugging skyward, dripping molten goo, full of feedback and fx. Their energetic riffage and warm drones are adorned by drifting vox (not unlike Dead Meadow, with whom they share certain proclivities) and fantastic, metallic, progtastic imagery. Take note of titles like "Dragon Of The Deep" (parts one and two!) and the Roger Dean-esque cover art by Arik "Moonhawk" Roper.
Further musical comparisions aren't hard to come up with - Mammatus belong in the company of such bastions of cosmic heaviness as Sleep, Boris, YOB, UFOmammut, Earthless, old Monster Magnet, Acid Mothers Temple (at AMT's heaviest, like on Starless & Bible Black Sabbath), Tarantula Hawk, and even Amon Duul (especially on the druggy, krautrocky jam "The Outer Rim"). And of course they're now labelmates with OM, which also makes perfect sense. If you love many, or even just any, of those bands and the sounds they make, this comes highly recommended.
MPEG Stream: "The Righteous Path Through The Forest Of Old"
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Of The Deep Part One"

album cover MAMMATUS The Coast Explodes (Holy Mountain) cd 13.98
Sometimes music is more than just pure sound, or the exposing of deep personal secrets and emotions, or even an homage to one's inspirations. Sometimes it's meant to tell a story... a vessel for a message. Then again sometimes music can combine all of those facets, AND MORE! Such is the case with Mammatus' sophomore effort, The Coast Explodes. On a purely sonic level, this record is absolutely amazing (we'll get there), but it's amazing on a conceptual level as well.
This record is the second installment of Mammatus' gradually unfolding tale of the battle between Light and Darkness. Goodly Light vs. the Evil of Man. Communion with Nature and the casting out of the corrosive agents of Man's doooom. The inhalation of divinity's smoke/breath... exhaling peace from every pore of the translucent flesh. Harnessing the power of Nature in your throat and fingers... swinging the sword to the heart of darkness. Bludgeon the dragon's foul heart! Mammatus is here to bare the Blade of Truth against nature's corrupters, and to ROCK against the cowardly haters of peace! Ahem, their "blade" is of course music, so lets talk about that for a sec.
This epic journey continues right where their self-titled debut left off. The first track "Dragon of the Deep part 3 (Excellent Swordfight)" is a continuation of the Dragon saga (the first album ending with "Dragon of the Deep" parts 1 and 2), and right off the bat you can hear the development. Holy shit! PROG!!!!! Where the last record was more of a trippy blend of hypno-kraut Can-ishness with the slaying heavitude of stoner lordz Sleep, this record somehow maintains that comparison and adds an incredible dose of YES! and YES!!! it rules! So the album starts with a creeping guitar drone, almost as if directly continued from part 2, before bursting in with a driving and hypnotic groove, a la Circle or the above mentioned Can, with little time change shreds at the end of each phrase (kinda proggy) and then suddenly the tempo breaks and we hear a killer stoptime, full-band SHRED! bringing us into another mesmeric groove with beautiful guitar leads soaring perfectly over the everchanging trance. The track builds and builds, ever climbing. Just when you think it can't get more ripping, another amazing riff is unearthed, the band playing so tightly we suspect they might share one cosmically unified mind. In tune with the alignment of the planets and such. All of this is building to something, you can feel it, when suddenly the song crescendos into a freeform cacophonous skronk! Cowbells, drums, and about 500 simultaneous guitar solos! FREAKOUT!
What emerges from this undulating swell is just about all a worshipper of heavy could hope for, an earth shaking riff with the first vocals of the record. Singer Nicky Emmert enters with his first cry to battle, calling us to raise the sword! The vocals are as trippy as ever, beautiful, as if sung from the back of a deep cave. This brutally sick aural climax ends almost as soon as it begins only to plunge axe first into the second track, "Pierce the Darkness", Starting with a gong crash and woodflute solo (!) then charging directly into another trance like groove. The vocals this time start right away, floating and glistening over the motorik pulse, again seemingly a call to arms. The track eventually develops into a blasting free time psychedelic guitar jam which then decompresses into some serious blissy drone.
And what happens next is one of the highlights of the record. The sound of synthesizers enter the drone and build up to a spine tingling harmonized guitar/Moog solo! You know the euphoric feeling you get when listening to shimmery synth part in Yes's "Close to the Edge", and the triumph in the pit of your stomach when Wakeman's church organ finally enters ("I get up, I get down")? A similar energy is in operation here. After this shining moment the song takes another turn towards the HEAVY and some kick ass riffage again fills the speakers. After a bit of strange synth tweakage, the mood of the album changes. Track 3, "The Changing Wind" is an all out drum circle folk jam! Acoustic guitars, propulsive hand drum rhythms, and another lilting melody from Nicky, praising mother nature and her unknowable ways. Hypnotic and blissful for sure. Suddenly the sounds of waves crashing and sea lions barking brings us seamlessly into the final movement, and title track, "The Coast Explodes". Starting with one of the catchiest "stoner" riffs we've heard for a long time. In fact this riff gets stuck in our heads for days at a time. So groovey and catchy, it makes the trees dance. Ahem. This song is a slow builder, rising subtly, and then dipping once more till it finally becomes an almost whisper. The vocals again invoking mother earth, sung in a beautiful falsetto. After this quiet respite the amps again get cranked to 11 and we are blessed with another monolithic slab of heaviness! So satisfying and perfect, it almost makes ya weep. At the end of this journey the chanting of some mythic and mysterious wizard is heard, as if belted out from the peak of a snow covered mountain, beckoning to the children of nature to rise up and join the crusade! The song then gently winds down and the whooshing sounds of the ocean again take over the mix, leaving the listener in a state of utter peace. SHIT! This album really takes you on some sort of transcendental adventure... We got lost there for a minute.
At the most basic level, Mammatus make some of the most inventive and inspired heavy music of our day. Combining diverse inspirations and molding them into something that comes across as totally genuine and pure, and of course TOTALLY RULING! Crushing and mesmerizing and beautiful all at the same time. The story behind the music makes the album all the more powerful. The listening experience of this record is akin to reading a super epic novel, one where the payoffs happen in all the right places. So duh, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!! For fans of Sleep, Yes, UFOmammut, Can, Circle, King Crimson, and all things heavy and trippy and shredding and rocking and ruling! And by the by, if you have not yet, catch them live for one of the best live shows ever! On tour now with Acid Mothers Temple in the USA!
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Of The Deep Part Three (Excellent Sword Fight)"
MPEG Stream: "The Coast Explodes"

album cover MAMMATUS The Coast Explodes (Holy Mountain) lp 14.98
NOW ON VINYL! Totally like it belongs. Here's our long-ass review of this great album:
Sometimes music is more than just pure sound, or the exposing of deep personal secrets and emotions, or even an homage to one's inspirations. Sometimes it's meant to tell a story... a vessel for a message. Then again sometimes music can combine all of those facets, AND MORE! Such is the case with Mammatus' sophomore effort, The Coast Explodes. On a purely sonic level, this record is absolutely amazing (we'll get there), but it's amazing on a conceptual level as well.
This record is the second installment of Mammatus' gradually unfolding tale of the battle between Light and Darkness. Goodly Light vs. the Evil of Man. Communion with Nature and the casting out of the corrosive agents of Man's doooom. The inhalation of divinity's smoke/breath... exhaling peace from every pore of the translucent flesh. Harnessing the power of Nature in your throat and fingers... swinging the sword to the heart of darkness. Bludgeon the dragon's foul heart! Mammatus is here to bare the Blade of Truth against nature's corrupters, and to ROCK against the cowardly haters of peace! Ahem, their "blade" is of course music, so lets talk about that for a sec.
This epic journey continues right where their self-titled debut left off. The first track "Dragon of the Deep part 3 (Excellent Swordfight)" is a continuation of the Dragon saga (the first album ending with "Dragon of the Deep" parts 1 and 2), and right off the bat you can hear the development. Holy shit! PROG!!!!! Where the last record was more of a trippy blend of hypno-kraut Can-ishness with the slaying heavitude of stoner lordz Sleep, this record somehow maintains that comparison and adds an incredible dose of YES! and YES!!! it rules! So the album starts with a creeping guitar drone, almost as if directly continued from part 2, before bursting in with a driving and hypnotic groove, a la Circle or the above mentioned Can, with little time change shreds at the end of each phrase (kinda proggy) and then suddenly the tempo breaks and we hear a killer stoptime, full-band SHRED! bringing us into another mesmeric groove with beautiful guitar leads soaring perfectly over the everchanging trance. The track builds and builds, ever climbing. Just when you think it can't get more ripping, another amazing riff is unearthed, the band playing so tightly we suspect they might share one cosmically unified mind. In tune with the alignment of the planets and such. All of this is building to something, you can feel it, when suddenly the song crescendos into a freeform cacophonous skronk! Cowbells, drums, and about 500 simultaneous guitar solos! FREAKOUT!
What emerges from this undulating swell is just about all a worshipper of heavy could hope for, an earth shaking riff with the first vocals of the record. Singer Nicky Emmert enters with his first cry to battle, calling us to raise the sword! The vocals are as trippy as ever, beautiful, as if sung from the back of a deep cave. This brutally sick aural climax ends almost as soon as it begins only to plunge axe first into the second track, "Pierce the Darkness", Starting with a gong crash and woodflute solo (!) then charging directly into another trance like groove. The vocals this time start right away, floating and glistening over the motorik pulse, again seemingly a call to arms. The track eventually develops into a blasting free time psychedelic guitar jam which then decompresses into some serious blissy drone.
And what happens next is one of the highlights of the record. The sound of synthesizers enter the drone and build up to a spine tingling harmonized guitar/Moog solo! You know the euphoric feeling you get when listening to shimmery synth part in Yes's "Close to the Edge", and the triumph in the pit of your stomach when Wakeman's church organ finally enters ("I get up, I get down")? A similar energy is in operation here. After this shining moment the song takes another turn towards the HEAVY and some kick ass riffage again fills the speakers. After a bit of strange synth tweakage, the mood of the album changes. Track 3, "The Changing Wind" is an all out drum circle folk jam! Acoustic guitars, propulsive hand drum rhythms, and another lilting melody from Nicky, praising mother nature and her unknowable ways. Hypnotic and blissful for sure. Suddenly the sounds of waves crashing and sea lions barking brings us seamlessly into the final movement, and title track, "The Coast Explodes". Starting with one of the catchiest "stoner" riffs we've heard for a long time. In fact this riff gets stuck in our heads for days at a time. So groovey and catchy, it makes the trees dance. Ahem. This song is a slow builder, rising subtly, and then dipping once more till it finally becomes an almost whisper. The vocals again invoking mother earth, sung in a beautiful falsetto. After this quiet respite the amps again get cranked to 11 and we are blessed with another monolithic slab of heaviness! So satisfying and perfect, it almost makes ya weep. At the end of this journey the chanting of some mythic and mysterious wizard is heard, as if belted out from the peak of a snow covered mountain, beckoning to the children of nature to rise up and join the crusade! The song then gently winds down and the whooshing sounds of the ocean again take over the mix, leaving the listener in a state of utter peace. SHIT! This album really takes you on some sort of transcendental adventure... We got lost there for a minute.
At the most basic level, Mammatus make some of the most inventive and inspired heavy music of our day. Combining diverse inspirations and molding them into something that comes across as totally genuine and pure, and of course TOTALLY RULING! Crushing and mesmerizing and beautiful all at the same time. The story behind the music makes the album all the more powerful. The listening experience of this record is akin to reading a super epic novel, one where the payoffs happen in all the right places. So duh, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!! For fans of Sleep, Yes, UFOmammut, Can, Circle, King Crimson, and all things heavy and trippy and shredding and rocking and ruling!
MPEG Stream: "Dragon Of The Deep Part Three (Excellent Sword Fight)"
MPEG Stream: "The Coast Explodes"

album cover MONOSOV, DJ ILYA AND THE 21 CENTURY PUNKS New Music (Holy Mountain) 12" 13.98
It seems Ilya Monosov has been letting down his hair of late and going sonically all out (or all in?), and following his muse wherever it might take him, creating a varied and vast array of wild and wonderful sounds.
From his Gainsbourg inspired solo outing on Language Of Stone to his latest 12" of tropical fucked up late night sleeze offered up by The Shining Path, these wildly disparate and super passionate sounds feel light-years away from his earlier, much more academic leanings. These four songs, clocking in at about thirty minutes total, find Ilya completely on fire! The opener "Always Look To You (Extended Mix)" is a motorik burner full of fiery Suicide-isms and a very Wooden Shjips like groove. Next comes "Tropical Relaxation", a dark and infectious prog-like jam rife with otherworldly sounds that unravel into a hypnotic chaos that we could lose ourselves in forever.
The B side opens with "Belly Womb" a dissonant track would feel right at home on an early Matmos record, referencing the more fucked up side of Excepter/Black Dice. The record closes with "Unnatural Ways" which sounds like some late night DJ fading in and out of records by Master Musicians Of Joujouka, Throbbing Gristle, Sun Ra and Cabaret Voltaire. We can't stop playing this 12", so full of vibrant color and bombastic energy while hitting all its idiosyncratic targets so right on!
MPEG Stream: "Always Look To You (Extended Mix)"
MPEG Stream: "Unnatural Ways"

album cover MONOSOV, ILYA Sailor Man (Holy Mountain) lp 15.98
Latest from Ilya Monosov, a one time member of psychedelic outfit The Shining Path, as well as one half of the Monosov Swirnoff duo (along with Irwin's brother Preston), we weren't sure what to expect, but somehow this really wasn't it. That said, we're digging it a lot. The sound is still psychedelic, but it's almost like a classic rock sort of psychedelic, urgently strummed acoustic guitars, crunchy riffs, big drums, even some tambourines, wheezing organs, some rad wild super distorted leads, really, in some way, this could be some classic slab of old school hard rocking psych, EXCEPT for the vocals, which transform this into something else entirely. Not sung, or crooned, but more sort of spoken, delivered in a seriously creepy, whisper, we thought maybe it was just an affectation on the first track, but the vocals are like that throughout, a sort of gruff Tom Waits sung/spoken rasp, ominous and a little bit sinister, all over barrelhouse piano, classical guitar, buzzing rumbling strings, horns and various percussion, dreamy female background vocals, druggy effected 12 string guitars, plenty of fuzz, what sounds like maybe a Theremin, and really, the music sans vocals is all shades of the Doors, and Santana, and War, and Big Star, and Crazy Horse and the like, but then those vocals change everything, and really, that's gonna determine how much you dig this. We're digging it quite a bit.
Includes a download coupon as well!
MPEG Stream: "All Day All Night"
MPEG Stream: "Bird"
MPEG Stream: "Sailor Man"

album cover MOON DUO Silver Bells / Winter (Holy Mountain) 7" 6.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Just in! 2nd pressing, now on red instead of green vinyl! If you've still got the holiday spirit, and haven't grabbed one yet, now's your chance before they're gone again...
Along with the recently reissued 12" of holiday faves by Wooden Shjips, WS mainman Ripley Johnson gets similarly festive with his WS offshoot spacekraut combo Moon Duo, which finds Johnson and his partner Sanae Yamada tackling one Christmas classic, and another obscure winter themed cover.
Up first is "Silver Bells", which we had heard described as "Silver Bells meets Silver Machine", but barring the swirls of reverb and the echo-ey vox, the band play it pretty straight, offering up one of the poppiest bounciest jams we've heard from these two. The perfect hazy blur of wasted Christmas cheer for sure.
The flipside finds the band tackling a fairly obscure Rolling Stones track, titled appropriately enough, "Winter", from the Stones' Goats Head Soup record, no one here remembers what the original sounds like exactly (the label describes it accurately as a 'deep cut'), but in the Moon Duo's hands it just becomes another gorgeously washed out smear of spidery glistening guitars, whirling gauzy keyboards, and tripped out reverbed vocal mumbles, all drifting in a wastedly warbly haze, that reminds us way more of the Velvets than the Stones.
A little spacey, a little krautrocky, a little dream poppy, a little Christmasy, but as always, droning and druggy and divine...
MPEG Stream: "Silver Bells"

album cover OM Conference Of The Birds (Holy Mountain) cd 14.98
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
Their debut last year, Variations On A Theme, was heralded by many as the second coming of Sabbathy stoner/doom legends Sleep. No surprise, considering that Om consists of two thirds of Sleep, and pretty much sounds like two thirds of Sleep too. Same low-end bass (Al Cisneros), thundering drums (Chris Hakius), and druggy, chant-like vocals (Al again, stepping up to the mic). All that's missing is the guitar (Sleep guitarist Matt Pike is busy with High On Fire right now). We gave that album the thumbs up, won over by the psychedelic trance-like heaviness of their jams and their mantrically soothing yet (to us) unintentionally amusing singing, which made us giggle 'cause it just never let up, delivering endless deadpan lyrics of cosmic hippy nonsense in a zoned-out monotone. We don't want to say it was so bad it was good, 'cause it really wasn't bad, but there was some of that kind of bad/good alchemy going on. And we ended up lovin' it.
And of course, the resemblance to old faves Sleep helped too.
Now Al and Chris are back with the second Om opus. It's simultaneously a heckuva lot like their debut but even better somehow. Productionwise, yes. And also perhaps 'cause while the two-piece line-up on Variations sounded like Sleep without the guitar, and maybe (heck, definitely) would have been even better with a guitarist, now they've made that lack of guitar seem more the ways things should be, by getting more and more hushed and spacious and mimimal here, thereby making it seem like just bass and drums is enough, not like something's missing. They've made a virtue out of a necessity, realizing that by really adopting a "less is more" aesthetic they'd be playing to their strength. And it works. Listen to it straight through (you'll want to... it's two tracks, about 33 minutes) and you'll find it quite floatational, even without chemical assistance. This riff-repetitive spaceout drone dirge drug is all you need. And Al's lyrics remain occultic, obtuse and slightly absurd, giving this the effect of a hypnosis tape meant to help build your vocabulary (along with heightening your conciousness). He uses such everyday words as "clesiast", "epison", "aurican", "tunnement", and "agurate". It's heavy rock that requires a heavy dictionary to decipher!
So if you liked the first OM, you'll love this. And if you weren't sure before, definitely check this one out. As with their first album, file with Sleep's Jerusalem, Electric Wizard's Supercoven, and UFOmammut's Godlike Snake.
OM....OM... OM . . . O M . . . .
MPEG Stream: "At Giza"
MPEG Stream: "Flight Of The Eagle"

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