SPAZZ Sweatin' 3: Skatin' Satan & Katon (Slap A Ha m) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Collection number three of oldies but goodies from the bay area's own lovable masters of goofball powerviolence/fastcore. Funny and fast and heavy and ridiculous. And they're beginning to rival Tupac for number of posthumous releases. Which in this case is not a bad thing.

SPAZZ Sweatin' II: Deported Live Dwarf (Six Two Five Thrashcore) cd 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Second, posthumous collection of stuff by the Bay Area's fastcore/powerviolence goofball legends.

SPAZZTIC BLURR s/t (Earache) cd 10.98
"Way beyond speed!! / Spazztic Blurr!!!! / There is no cure!! / For The Spazztic Blurr!! ... Let There Be Spazztic! -- Let there Be Blurr!"
Holy hell. We never thought that Earache would reissue this out of print record on cd! This 1988 LP of absurdist metal has been long sought after by Allan, 'cause he just loves the Spazztic Blurr song found on that classic Earache label "Grind Crusher" compilation. That song ("He-Nota-Home-Me-Marco") is found here along with 13 other examples of their brilliantly (?) mindless, stream of consciousness, dadaistic thrash songwriting. Ok, normally Allan doesn't approve of overtly silly joke bands. But these guys totally take their jokes into a shaggy dog realm of utter nonsequiturship. Lyrics about Burger King, boardgames, the Flintstones, the alphabet, hardcore punks and rappers...yes it's childish. But it's also 1988. And then there's the way they include descriptions of what's going on musically at each point in a song on the lyric sheet (some examples: "Distorted Guitar, Acoustic Guitar, Distorted Guitar, Acoustic Guitar...", "Total Speed Metal Ending", "Weird Effect", "Surf Part", "Isn't It Neat How This Songs Jumps Right In?"). They were probably a huge influence on John Zorn! Kinda like Dead Milkmen meets the Suicidal Tendencies, for fans of Ludichrist, Lawnmower Deth, S.O.D., 7000 Dying Rats, that sort of thing.
RealAudio clip: "He-Nota-Home"
RealAudio clip: "Def Metal"
RealAudio clip: "Mexicalli"

SPECTRAL INCURSION Anthology (Stormspell) 2cd 13.98
Talk about simultaneously awesome and obscure. Delving deep into '80s metal buried treasure, Stormspell's Days Of Yore division has come up with this double cd, rollercoaster ride of a reissue, that anyone into technical thrashing prog metal ought to utterly enjoy. It's from a Massachusetts band, Spectral Incursion, who never even released an album, just a bunch of demos and one ep. Way underground, mathy metallic music-making mania on display here, jawdropping and headbanging.
Unrestrained, raw and ripping stuff from young guys more concerned with coming up with cool new parts for their twisting, turning songs than in being popular. We're lovin' it. The jagged, splintered riffs and tricky time signatures multiply throughout these heavy, hectic compositions, with leads spiraling up alongside vocals that scream, soar, and roar. Each over the top track seems designed by/for the ADD afflicted, shooting off in a new direction every few seconds, yet not neglecting melody and a rock n' roll vibe. Intricate, eccentric, exhilarating - and we really like how the DIY-ness of this mitigates against any potential pretentiousness a la big time prog metal like Dream Theater. This really is some kids tossing their faves like Rush, Priest, Sabbath, Maiden, Slayer, and Fates Warning into a sharp-bladed blender on high. If you're a fan of such bands as Confessor, Atheist, Watchtower, Coroner, or Hellwitch, you should definitely check this out!
Disc one consists of demo tapes from 1988 and 1991, their four song ep from '88, and four tracks recorded in 2010 by the reunited band, doing old songs by pre-Spectral Incursion incarnation Graven Image, whose demos circa 1986-'87 occupy disc two, which also contains some video clips for your computer.
Super cool, constantly surprising, what this lacks in production polish they make up for in precision - and sheer insanity. As always, great to see a forgotten band this good (and gonzo) get their due. Complete with thick, slick cd booklet full of liner notes, lyrics, etc.
MPEG Stream: "The Other Side"
MPEG Stream: "Constant Velocity"
MPEG Stream: "Surgery"

SPECTRAL LORE II (Temple Of Torturous) cd 12.98
The first we heard from Greek one man ambient black metal horde was on a split with Swedish psychedelic black metallers Underjordiska, then offering a washed out black ambient counterpoint to Underjordiska's furious spaced out black buzz, so when we finally got this cd in, a digital reissue of a long out of print cassette, we were expecting another disc of washed out ambient blackness, and while there is a bit of that present, Spectral Lore knocked our blocks off with this collection of totally intense, outsider avant black metal buzz.
After a two minute intro of delicate acoustic guitar, SL explode into a 24 minute epic, all stumbling crunch and grind in the beginning, before slipping seamlessly into soaring majestic epic buzzing black metal. The drums and vocals mostly buried beneath the frenzied riffage, weirdly minor key, haunting and space-y but thrashing and black and grim, until the sound shifts, getting muddy and murky, a loping midtempo pound that quickly shifts again, and stretches out into some woozy psychedelic folkiness, all warm buzzing guitars and crystalline melody, soaring strings, totally tranquil and dreamlike, before exploding in another frenzy of tangled and gnarled blackness, and so it goes, slipping back and forth, until finally the guitars coalesce into some classic metal sounding melody, then a weirdly Viking sounding blow out, before fading out completely, leaving a long stretch of hushed gauzey ambience. Heck that track alone would be worth $13, there's more packed into that 24 minutes than most bands manage in records twice that long, but there's so much more.
The rest of the record is a balance between woozy melodic drift, and warped black heaviness, often the line between the two heavily blurred. Black buzz grows more and more indistinct until it sounds more like Nadja, a sort of shoegazey black drift, guitars unfurl, chords unfolding slowly one at a time, moody synthesizer strings drift over hushed minimal swirls of soft focus sound, guitars rumble and bombinate, building to soaring lysergic ur-drones, long stretches of muddy murk give way to crystalline sonic whispers, black metal roils and churns and explodes in streaks of near white noise, the sound and production constantly shifting, blistering and in-the-red one second, mumbled and washed out the next, the sound as much a part of the music as the music itself.
Far out and epic, psychedelic and spaced out, ambient and black, and so goddamn good...
MPEG Stream: "The Thorns That Guide My Warpath"
MPEG Stream: "Towards The Great Crossroad"
MPEG Stream: "Recoiling Beneath The Waves"

SPEED, GLUE & SHINKI s/t (Made In Japan Records) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Sniffin & Snortin (parts 1 and 2!), Run & Hide, Bad Woman, Don't Say No, Wanna Take You Home...sound good? Those are some of the song titles on this classic women-and-drugs obsessed dumbo-rock Japanese psych album. It stars guitar whiz and massive stoner Shinki Chen (also of Foodbrain and oodles of other obscure Japanese psych outfits), bassist Masayoshi Kabe (from Food Brain too), and singing drummer Joey 'Pepe' Smith -- a Vietnam vet whom you might know from the Filipino band Juan De La Cruz, whose album "Shake Your Brains" is one of the few that tops this for sheer truly stoned rock retardation (a good thing). Too bad we can't get those in anymore. But you'll hear at least one of their tunes on this, the second SG&S album, originally released as a double LP in 1972, which we happen to like even better than their 1971 LP "Eve" though Mr. Julian Cope made that one a "record of the month" on his website Head Heritage. Anyway we have this one, not that one.
Speed, Glue & Shinki, as you might imagine from their name, were a goddamn weird, messed up, completely wacked heavy psych/blues/prog band. So messed up that this time out, guest musicans wrote (and performed?) most of it! But it doesn't matter. And even when Joey plugs in a Moog synth to do a whole LP side devoted to the Sun, Planets, Life, Moon, and Angels, this never ever remotely gets pretentious and proggy (not that we don't like proggy). It just can't. Speed Glue & Shinki are primal, so primal, too primal. At least one track hints at the Stooges, some others Zeppelin, while the rest approximates a brain-damaged James Gang. Record collector types might recall the fancy, expensive Shadoks LP reissue that was available a couple years ago for about two seconds. We were enthralled with the lovely tiger cover art and the ridiculous rock and have been hoping ever since to bring in a cd version, and at last we tracked down a few copies that we had to order from Sweden, so act fast for your Speed, Glue & Shinki fix if you think you want it.
MPEG Stream: "Red Doll"
MPEG Stream: "Song For An Angel"
MPEG Stream: "Search For Love"

SPEEDWOLF Bark At The Poon (Black Shit Noise Productions) cassette 4.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
They're called Speedwolf. Their demo tape is called Bark At The Poon. They have song titles like "Time To Annihilate", "DeathRipper" and "I Am The Demon". The inside cover features a pants down drummer, wearing a wolf headdress, on the can, rocking out. They're obsessed with football, their hometown the Denver Broncos (they not only thank John Elway, but they named one side John, the other Elway). The cover features a rad high school binder drawing of a crouched wolf in front of the full moon. Sounds goofy, and maybe it is a bit, but fuck do these guys slay. Or shred. Slay AND shred. Full on thrashing metallic madness, with a vocalist who sounds a bit like Lemmy, and with super catchy classic sounding thrash jams, the first of which sounds a little like aQ favorite Young Ones faux metal heroes Bad News fronted by Lemmy, but way heavier. The guitars chug and churn, the drums blast relentlessly, flurries of double kick laid beneath , the songs shift from full bore neck snapping frenzy, to loping hooky groove, to pounding almost doom, laced with some creepy samples, some killer riffs, and plenty of rad licks. Definitely on the punker side of thrash, with the vocals and some of the hooks reminding us of a way more metal Danzig, which is definitely not a bad thing. "I Am The Demon" is THE jam here, with its killer Danziggy chorus, its super catchy guitar harmonies and insane drum breakdown (complete with wolf howl at the end), these guys kick so much ass, heavy and hooky is a pretty unbeatable combo. If you're hip to the whole modern retro thrash revival, these guys will definitely hit the spot, and if there's any justice, they'll end up on some huge label rocking stadiums with dressing rooms overflowing with coke and booze and groupies, cuz this shit is so much better than 90 percent of the new thrash we've heard...
Way recommended. LIMITED TO 200, each one hand numbered.
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Demon"
MPEG Stream: "Speedwolf"

SPEEDWOLF Ride With Death (Hell's Headbangers) cd 12.98
There are different kinds of heavy for sure. There's the grim black corpsepainted buzzing heaviness, there's the lurching lumbering knuckle dragging doom sort of heaviness, there's also the face melting noise rock sort of chaotic heaviness, and of course there's the conceptual heaviness, like "ooooh, that's really heavy, maaaan", and there's about a million different sorts of heaviness in between, all strains, some heavier than others, but then there's the mightiest heavy of them all, just a classic, pure, heavy metal heaviness. Few bands can achieve that sort of heavy purity, a rare confluence of killer riffing, howling throat shredding (but still melodic) vox, blasting pounding drums, shredding guitar leads, hooks galore, catchy choruses, all woven into a metal blowout that causes immediate headbanging, that could start a pit in a stuffy office, the power of the riff, the power of real metal.
This is a power Denver's Speedwolf wield like a bloodied mace. Before we even get to the music, all the signs are there. They're called Speedwolf to begin with. Their record cover is a badass binder art / side of a seventies van black and white drawing of a huge scythe and hourglass wielding cloak-ed skull headed death, hovering in the sky above a gang of Speedwolves, wolf headed toughs on motorcylces, cruising down the highway, there's also a naked woman wearing the skin of a wolf, looking sexy and howling at the moon, their logo is a wolf pentagram, and they have song titles like "Up All Night", "Out On Bail", "I Can't Die", "Death Ripper", "Ride With Death", "The Reaper" and of course "Speedwolf" cuz any heavy metal band worth it's salt has a namesake 'theme' song. So yeah, all the signs point to pure heavy metal heaviness, and the sounds inside do not disappoint. We've raved about past Speedwolf records, they even played our South By Southwest showcase last time, and blew EVERYbody away, we have been dying for a proper full length ever since, and finally here it is, with a handful of our old favorites re-recorded, as well as a clutch of new jams, with a massive production, the sound is crushing, and the songs of course kill.
Like a supercharged Motorhead, or a tighter heavier Venom, or like a cranked and kick ass version of our faux metal heroes Bad News, these guys kick out the jams, relentless and punishing, furious and frantic, but at the same time with that weird sort of positive heavy metal party energy that few bands can conjure without diluting their heaviness. We were most excited to see two of our favorite Speedwolf jams revisited, "I Am The Demon", which still sounds like a more metal Danzig, and includes a drum solo, complete with cowbell (which shows up here and there elsewhere on the record, and is another signifier of pure heaviness!), and of course "Speedwolf" which after a creeping ominous almost Maiden-y intro, really does sounds like a Motorhead 45 at 78rpm, and the rest of the tracks too, everyone sounding like some lost early heavy metal classic, but delivered with a ferocity that is undeniable. These guys have been toiling away in relative obscurity, it's about time the rest of the metal world took notice, and bowed down before these masters of metal. And while the vibe is definitely speed/thrash metal, this totally destroys all those other retro thrash revivalists, and transcends any mere metal classifications, and ascends to some sort of true metal pantheon on high. Where they belong.
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Demon"
MPEG Stream: "Speedwolf"
MPEG Stream: "Death Ripper"
MPEG Stream: "Denver 666"

SPEEDWOLF Ride With Death (Hell's Headbangers) lp 22.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This recent more-metal-than-thou fave, NOW ON VINYL! Gatefold sleeve.
There are different kinds of heavy for sure. There's the grim black corpsepainted buzzing heaviness, there's the lurching lumbering knuckle dragging doom sort of heaviness, there's also the face melting noise rock sort of chaotic heaviness, and of course there's the conceptual heaviness, like "ooooh, that's really heavy, maaaan", and there's about a million different sorts of heaviness in between, all strains, some heavier than others, but then there's the mightiest heavy of them all, just a classic, pure, heavy metal heaviness. Few bands can achieve that sort of heavy purity, a rare confluence of killer riffing, howling throat shredding (but still melodic) vox, blasting pounding drums, shredding guitar leads, hooks galore, catchy choruses, all woven into a metal blowout that causes immediate headbanging, that could start a pit in a stuffy office, the power of the riff, the power of real metal.
This is a power Denver's Speedwolf wield like a bloodied mace. Before we even get to the music, all the signs are there. They're called Speedwolf to begin with. Their record cover is a badass binder art / side of a seventies van black and white drawing of a huge scythe and hourglass wielding cloak-ed skull headed death, hovering in the sky above a gang of Speedwolves, wolf headed toughs on motorcylces, cruising down the highway, there's also a naked woman wearing the skin of a wolf, looking sexy and howling at the moon, their logo is a wolf pentagram, and they have song titles like "Up All Night", "Out On Bail", "I Can't Die", "Death Ripper", "Ride With Death", "The Reaper" and of course "Speedwolf" cuz any heavy metal band worth it's salt has a namesake 'theme' song. So yeah, all the signs point to pure heavy metal heaviness, and the sounds inside do not disappoint. We've raved about past Speedwolf records, they even played our South By Southwest showcase last time, and blew EVERYbody away, we have been dying for a proper full length ever since, and finally here it is, with a handful of our old favorites re-recorded, as well as a clutch of new jams, with a massive production, the sound is crushing, and the songs of course kill.
Like a supercharged Motorhead, or a tighter heavier Venom, or like a cranked and kick ass version of our faux metal heroes Bad News, these guys kick out the jams, relentless and punishing, furious and frantic, but at the same time with that weird sort of positive heavy metal party energy that few bands can conjure without diluting their heaviness. We were most excited to see two of our favorite Speedwolf jams revisited, "I Am The Demon", which still sounds like a more metal Danzig, and includes a drum solo, complete with cowbell (which shows up here and there elsewhere on the record, and is another signifier of pure heaviness!), and of course "Speedwolf" which after a creeping ominous almost Maiden-y intro, really does sounds like a Motorhead 45 at 78rpm, and the rest of the tracks too, everyone sounding like some lost early heavy metal classic, but delivered with a ferocity that is undeniable. These guys have been toiling away in relative obscurity, it's about time the rest of the metal world took notice, and bowed down before these masters of metal. And while the vibe is definitely speed/thrash metal, this totally destroys all those other retro thrash revivalists, and transcends any mere metal classifications, and ascends to some sort of true metal pantheon on high. Where they belong.
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Demon"
MPEG Stream: "Speedwolf"
MPEG Stream: "Death Ripper"
MPEG Stream: "Denver 666"

SPEEDWOLF / THE HOOKERS split (Splattered!) 7" 4.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One more track from our new favorite retro thrashers, Denver's Speedwolf, whose killer demo tape is reviewed elsewhere on this list, which you should grab immediately before they're gone. Think classic thrash, but with some Danzig mixed in, as well as some Bad News (really!), hooky and heavy and pounding and frantic, and so fucking killer. Bad ass riffs, crushing drumming, throat shredding vox, and hooks all over the place. These guys should be HUGE.
Speedwolf share this single with long running rockers The Hookers, who we'd only heard once or twice before, but who prove to be a pretty epic match for the 'Wolf. We remembered them being more punk rock, and while this is till plenty punky, it's got a serious NWOBHM vibe. A little Iron Maiden, a little Venom, wild feral vocals, killer riffs, rad harmony guitars, and hooks that slay. Definitely gonna have to give these guys another chance and track down some of their full lengths.
Both sides rock AND rule, anyone into classic sounding heaviness NEEDS this (and the Speedwolf tape) BAD!
Super cool cover art, and limited of course, ONLY 500 COPIES, each one hand numbered...

SPEKTR Cypher (Agonia Records) cd 16.98
It's been five years since we last heard from these French outsider industrial black metal weirdos, with their last record Mescalyne, which was as freaky and as fucked as the two preceding albums, all three of which we consider to be pantheon-worthy examples of confusional twisted blackness. We weren't sure what to expect from this new one though, a lot can happen in five years, but we've certainly seen other bands change a lot, and sadly, there does seem to be a tendency for bands' sounds to grow less weird with time, which who knows might be an inevitable side effect of getting better at recording, or playing, or just wanting more from music than making seriously twisted sonic shit.
Well, we should have know better than to worry about these guys, cuz it seems they're just as warped and damaged as before. In fact it took us a few minutes into the second track to truly be sure, the opener is all thick low end throbs, keening drones, tripped out effects, static and crumbling distortion, creepy samples, so we expected the second track to explode right out of the gate, but instead, it was more ambience, a creepy music box, lots of crackle and more static, and way down in the mix, what sounds like drums way off in the distance, shards of feedback, then the drums kick in, and it almost sounds like DJ Shadow or something, all distorted skitter over woozy samples, but then finally, BAM, the song splinters into twisted, inhuman industrial black buzz, lightning fast drumming that if it isn't a machine, the drummer is some sort of cyborg, the guitars warped and melty and psychedelic, the structure fractured and constantly shifting, not smoothly either, guitars cut out, stutter and burst back in, the sound swings wildly from lightning fast blast to stumbling doomy tangle, and back, the riffs, as in the past, are mangled and slippery, but here, the metal drops out again, and we're returned to that weird DJ Shadow music box thing, before again, bursting into more detuned black savagery, and so it goes, it's a ten minute track, and they cram a lot into it, lots of drones, and weird industrial breakdowns, there are hardly any vocals, but when there are, they seem to be just a wordless bellow, and that could be some weird guitar thing too, it's hard to tell, everything is chaotic and woozy, warbly and seemingly in constant collapse.
And while there's SO much going on, that we could pick each and every track apart, and describe all the twisted fuckery these guys conjure up, that first track definitely sets the template, with the long tracks super progged out experiments in avant blackness, that once again, set these guys SOOO far apart from the pack, this stuff is SO fucking tripped out and bizarre, and gloriously and fantastically idiosyncratic, it's hard to believe a regular band of dudes could conjure up something this bafflingly brilliant. The whole record is super glitchy, almost like the player is malfunctioning, but really it's all part of their warped master plan, that creepy crackly music box effect employed throughout, often the main black buzz riff, rendered as some disembodied old time melody, often under some sort of disembodied chugging, but somehow, always seeming to lurch back into twisted black aktion. More than half of the record seems to be spent exploring specifically non black metal weirdness, in fact five of the nine tracks are more sort of ambient explorations, textural experiments, and the songs proper are constantly in flux, again spending much of the time drifting, droning or creeping, but when they do launch into their black buzz, it's an alien strain that is pretty difficult to parse, so it's probably best to just let yourself get lost in Spektr's confusional black soundworld. Black metal record of the year so far for SURE.
MPEG Stream: "Teratology"
MPEG Stream: "The Singularity"
MPEG Stream: "Cypher"

SPEKTR Cypher (Agonia Records) lp 21.00
It's been five years since we last heard from these French outsider industrial black metal weirdos, with their last record Mescalyne, which was as freaky and as fucked as the two preceding albums, all three of which we consider to be pantheon-worthy examples of confusional twisted blackness. We weren't sure what to expect from this new one though, a lot can happen in five years, but we've certainly seen other bands change a lot, and sadly, there does seem to be a tendency for bands' sounds to grow less weird with time, which who knows might be an inevitable side effect of getting better at recording, or playing, or just wanting more from music than making seriously twisted sonic shit.
Well, we should have know better than to worry about these guys, cuz it seems they're just as warped and damaged as before. In fact it took us a few minutes into the second track to truly be sure, the opener is all thick low end throbs, keening drones, tripped out effects, static and crumbling distortion, creepy samples, so we expected the second track to explode right out of the gate, but instead, it was more ambience, a creepy music box, lots of crackle and more static, and way down in the mix, what sounds like drums way off in the distance, shards of feedback, then the drums kick in, and it almost sounds like DJ Shadow or something, all distorted skitter over woozy samples, but then finally, BAM, the song splinters into twisted, inhuman industrial black buzz, lightning fast drumming that if it isn't a machine, the drummer is some sort of cyborg, the guitars warped and melty and psychedelic, the structure fractured and constantly shifting, not smoothly either, guitars cut out, stutter and burst back in, the sound swings wildly from lightning fast blast to stumbling doomy tangle, and back, the riffs, as in the past, are mangled and slippery, but here, the metal drops out again, and we're returned to that weird DJ Shadow music box thing, before again, bursting into more detuned black savagery, and so it goes, it's a ten minute track, and they cram a lot into it, lots of drones, and weird industrial breakdowns, there are hardly any vocals, but when there are, they seem to be just a wordless bellow, and that could be some weird guitar thing too, it's hard to tell, everything is chaotic and woozy, warbly and seemingly in constant collapse.
And while there's SO much going on, that we could pick each and every track apart, and describe all the twisted fuckery these guys conjure up, that first track definitely sets the template, with the long tracks super progged out experiments in avant blackness, that once again, set these guys SOOO far apart from the pack, this stuff is SO fucking tripped out and bizarre, and gloriously and fantastically idiosyncratic, it's hard to believe a regular band of dudes could conjure up something this bafflingly brilliant. The whole record is super glitchy, almost like the player is malfunctioning, but really it's all part of their warped master plan, that creepy crackly music box effect employed throughout, often the main black buzz riff, rendered as some disembodied old time melody, often under some sort of disembodied chugging, but somehow, always seeming to lurch back into twisted black aktion. More than half of the record seems to be spent exploring specifically non black metal weirdness, in fact five of the nine tracks are more sort of ambient explorations, textural experiments, and the songs proper are constantly in flux, again spending much of the time drifting, droning or creeping, but when they do launch into their black buzz, it's an alien strain that is pretty difficult to parse, so it's probably best to just let yourself get lost in Spektr's confusional black soundworld. Black metal record of the year so far for SURE.
MPEG Stream: "Teratology"
MPEG Stream: "The Singularity"
MPEG Stream: "Cypher"

SPEKTR Mescalyne (Moribund) cd 13.98
In the AQ pantheon of fucked up freaked out damaged weirdo black metal, we're constantly having to re-assess which band or which record is truly the MOST fucked up, the most damaged. And it can change in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, deeper listening reveals some until now hidden reserve of completely what-the-fuck-ness in a record we already considered a classic, other times, a band who maybe was never all that weird, will unleash a new record that is utterly confounding, and the bands that tend to be our favorites, seem to keep pushing the limits of the genre, continually subverting the classic sound of black metal until it's all but recognizable. In many cases, we're surprised that some of those bands continue to be loved by metalheads. Necrofrost, Furze, Striborg, Blut Aus Nord, Dead Reptile Shrine, and of course Spektr, who with each new release, jumps right to the front of the pack. Mescalyne is no different.
Were this not a 4 song ep, we'd probably already be trumpeting this as black metal record of the year, and heck, we might as well proclaim it black metal EP of the year. Even considering that black metal is only one small part of their overall, twisted and blackened sound.
As always, very little information anywhere, just some cryptic photos, and the band introduced like this: "Thus, Speller are:". One member Hth, is credited with Infra B. Distrubance, lead and rhythm anomalies, programming, sampling and vox, while kl.K is credited with percussive manifest, sampling, programming, words of spell and vox. So with all that programming and sampling, you can safely assume, that the weirdness here has much to do with electronics and processing, but it's not as simple as all that. Spektr's vision is a gnarled chaotic tangle of impossible rhythms, backwards guitars, black ambience, and FURIOUS black buzz. It sounds a bit like someone computer was hooked up to the guys in Deathspell Omega, and was sucking various black bits from their bodies and electronically weaving them into some sort of blackened beast, hellbent on destroying the world.
A mad scientist, working with black metal, in some hidden fortress, creating some Frankensteinian buzzing behemoth, a lurching, skittering blown out riffed monstrosity.
The opener, "Hollow Contact", begins with dark ambient swirls, some industrial moan and creak, a bit of metallic drumming, giving way to an incredible fierce and in the red blast of black metal fury, the drums machine gun fast, the riffs so blurred and buzzy, they're almost a continuous drone, some weird dynamics, with the guitars flipped backwards, and then chunks of tangled arpeggiated woozy blackness sent drifting into the void.
The second track is just as strange, beginning with an almost typical black metal drum beat, but beneath a layer of what sounds like record crackle, static, and hiss, and all sorts of whirring buzzing ambience off in the distance, separated by thick blasts of nearly impenetrable black buzz, until the song splinters into a stuttering hiccupping stop start breakdown, all tangled warped guitar parts, backwards drums, tons of space, and that weird blast of gnarled twisted riffage punctuating the slow crawl. The third track is all ambient, a dark confusional sprawl of black whirs, and disembodied sounds, mysterious voices, which leads perfectly into the final track, the mellowest of the bunch, still with that same sort of unhinged Deathspell sound, but more spread out, more sort of Ved Buens Ende-y, a sort of post rock groove overlaid with those woozy guitars, and some haunting industrial ambience, finally erupting into some hyperspeed buzzing blackthrash, even then, constantly pulled apart into the opening guitar vs. drums dizziness, finishing off with a haunting minute of high end drone, and hushed, panicked whispering.
Words barely do this stuff justice. Listen to the sound samples. The sound of Mescalyne manages to be futuristic, and spaced out but still grim and black. Buzzy and brutal, but atmospheric and cinematic. This is the kind of fucked up forward thinking music, filmmakers should be using to score their films. Eyes closed, Mescalyne is a terrifying nightmare ride, through some hellish futuristic underworld, and needless to say another addition to the aQ fucked up black metal pantheon. And most probably, black metal ep of the year!
MPEG Stream: "Hollow Contact "
MPEG Stream: "Mescalyne"

SPEKTR Mescalyne (Debemur Morti Prodcutions) 10" 15.98
Outsider black metal industrialists Spektr offer up their most recent record on vinyl for the first time, housed in a super thick sleeve, pressed on heavy heavy vinyl and of course INCREDIBLY LIMITED!!
Here's our review of the cd from last year:
In the AQ pantheon of fucked up freaked out damaged weirdo black metal, we're constantly having to re-assess which band or which record is truly the MOST fucked up, the most damaged. And it can change in the blink of an eye. Sometimes, deeper listening reveals some until now hidden reserve of completely what-the-fuck-ness in a record we already considered a classic, other times, a band who maybe was never all that weird, will unleash a new record that is utterly confounding, and the bands that tend to be our favorites, seem to keep pushing the limits of the genre, continually subverting the classic sound of black metal until it's all but recognizable. In many cases, we're surprised that some of those bands continue to be loved by metalheads. Necrofrost, Furze, Striborg, Blut Aus Nord, Dead Reptile Shrine, and of course Spektr, who with each new release, jumps right to the front of the pack. Mescalyne is no different.
Were this not a 4 song ep, we'd probably already be trumpeting this as black metal record of the year, and heck, we might as well proclaim it black metal EP of the year. Even considering that black metal is only one small part of their overall, twisted and blackened sound.
As always, very little information anywhere, just some cryptic photos, and the band introduced like this: "Thus, Speller are:". One member Hth, is credited with Infra B. Disturbance, lead and rhythm anomalies, programming, sampling and vox, while kl.K is credited with percussive manifest, sampling, programming, words of spell and vox. So with all that programming and sampling, you can safely assume, that the weirdness here has much to do with electronics and processing, but it's not as simple as all that. Spektr's vision is a gnarled chaotic tangle of impossible rhythms, backwards guitars, black ambience, and FURIOUS black buzz. It sounds a bit like someone computer was hooked up to the guys in Deathspell Omega, and was sucking various black bits from their bodies and electronically weaving them into some sort of blackened beast, hellbent on destroying the world.
A mad scientist, working with black metal, in some hidden fortress, creating some Frankensteinian buzzing behemoth, a lurching, skittering blown out riffed monstrosity.
The opener, "Hollow Contact", begins with dark ambient swirls, some industrial moan and creak, a bit of metallic drumming, giving way to an incredible fierce and in the red blast of black metal fury, the drums machine gun fast, the riffs so blurred and buzzy, they're almost a continuous drone, some weird dynamics, with the guitars flipped backwards, and then chunks of tangled arpeggiated woozy blackness sent drifting into the void.
The second track is just as strange, beginning with an almost typical black metal drum beat, but beneath a layer of what sounds like record crackle, static, and hiss, and all sorts of whirring buzzing ambience off in the distance, separated by thick blasts of nearly impenetrable black buzz, until the song splinters into a stuttering hiccupping stop start breakdown, all tangled warped guitar parts, backwards drums, tons of space, and that weird blast of gnarled twisted riffage punctuating the slow crawl. The third track is all ambient, a dark confusional sprawl of black whirs, and disembodied sounds, mysterious voices, which leads perfectly into the final track, the mellowest of the bunch, still with that same sort of unhinged Deathspell sound, but more spread out, more sort of Ved Buens Ende-y, a sort of post rock groove overlaid with those woozy guitars, and some haunting industrial ambience, finally erupting into some hyperspeed buzzing blackthrash, even then, constantly pulled apart into the opening guitar vs. drums dizziness, finishing off with a haunting minute of high end drone, and hushed, panicked whispering.
Words barely do this stuff justice. Listen to the sound samples. The sound of Mescalyne manages to be futuristic, and spaced out but still grim and black. Buzzy and brutal, but atmospheric and cinematic. This is the kind of fucked up forward thinking music, filmmakers should be using to score their films. Eyes closed, Mescalyne is a terrifying nightmare ride, through some hellish futuristic underworld, and needless to say another addition to the aQ fucked up black metal pantheon. And most probably, black metal ep of the year!
MPEG Stream: "Hollow Contact "
MPEG Stream: "Mescalyne"

SPEKTR No Longer Human Senses (aka Et Fugit Interea) (Appease Me) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally back in print and available again, the debut release from one of our favorite far out and fucked black metal bands EVER!! We made their more recent release, The Near Death Experience, our record of the week a while back, and their debut is just as good. Here's what we had to say about it when we first laid ears on this demented black gem:
Not a list goes by without a review declaring some record THE WEIRDEST EVER. So, okay, we can be a little hyperbolic at times, but it's just cuz we get so damned excited. But since we're always on the lookout for the weirdest records ever, it's not really all that strange that we might actually keep discovering some new weirdest record ever! They just get weirder and weirder. AND, as you probably could tell, it just so happens that we have a definite thing for bizarre black metal, the more fucked up and strange the better! And again, always being on the lookout for weirder and weirder metal records, we manage to stumble across quite a few. Recently we got a copy of a record by a band called Spektr, without a sleeve and a paucity of any useful information. But we were totally struck by its bizarre take on grim black metal, spending most of the record not blazing and thrashing, but instead, creeping through funhouse mirror ambiance, plodding mathrock doom, dreamy acoustic breakdowns, bizarre sound collages and lots of Jeck / Basinski style fuzzy smeary loops. Woah. Eventually we tracked it down, and learned that No Longer Human Senses had been released on the Appease Me label run by French black metal squad Blut Aus Nord! Not too long ago we reviewed the most recent release by Blut Aus Nord a bizarre and brutal, sprawlingly complex black metal record equal parts classic Norwegian style black metal, pummeling Industrial crunch a la Godflesh, creepy droning dark ambience and strange squiggly plain old weirdness. So when we discovered BaN had a label it made perfect sense that this Spektr record would end up there. No Longer Human Senses is definitely a black metal record, as is evidenced by the buzzing droning riffage and thrashing blast beats, some serious Darkthrone worship for sure, but that's really only a tiny piece of the whole picture. The bursts of black metal, marked by a particularly virulent strain of brutally brittle and harsh guitar sound, float through a twisting serpentine maze of random sound events, almost like a massive Christian Marclay installation. Haunting church organs, weirdly affected spoken word, all manner of creepy lilting melodies over lots of hiss and static and record crackle. Loops repeated over and over, but gradually decaying into stretches of fuzzed out shimmer, often erupting into bursts of super harsh black metal mayhem, only to fall apart moments later into a chaotic mess of buzzing, malfunctioning machinery, super distorted industrial sludge with more warbly minor key loops, all beneath thick waves of dense buzz and crumbling melodies, thick swaths of ambient blur and strange ghostly tinkles, peppered with brief snippets of classical music, found sounds, field recordings and random bits of sonic skree, the whole mess dropped into a swirly abyss of blackdrone and super creepy psychedelic ambience. This is one of those rare records that is so fractured and demented and wonderfully bizarre that is has you constantly checking to see what the hell it was you were listening to! Definitely one of our favorite new weird black metal records!
MPEG Stream: "II"
MPEG Stream: "III"
MPEG Stream: "IV"

SPEKTR No Longer Human Senses (aka Et Fugit Interea) (Panik Terror Musik) lp 22.00
Available on vinyl for the first time, the debut release from one of our favorite far out and fucked black metal bands EVER!! We made their more recent release, The Near Death Experience, our record of the week a while back, and their debut is just as good. Packaged in a super thick, super striking gatefold sleeve, all super minimal grey on black, and pressed on amazing, white, black and gray splatter vinyl! LIMITED TO ONLY 300 COPIES!!
Here's what we had to say about it when we first laid ears on this demented black gem:
Not a list goes by without a review declaring some record THE WEIRDEST EVER. So, okay, we can be a little hyperbolic at times, but it's just cuz we get so damned excited. But since we're always on the lookout for the weirdest records ever, it's not really all that strange that we might actually keep discovering some new weirdest record ever! They just get weirder and weirder. AND, as you probably could tell, it just so happens that we have a definite thing for bizarre black metal, the more fucked up and strange the better! And again, always being on the lookout for weirder and weirder metal records, we manage to stumble across quite a few. Recently we got a copy of a record by a band called Spektr, without a sleeve and a paucity of any useful information. But we were totally struck by its bizarre take on grim black metal, spending most of the record not blazing and thrashing, but instead, creeping through funhouse mirror ambiance, plodding mathrock doom, dreamy acoustic breakdowns, bizarre sound collages and lots of Jeck / Basinski style fuzzy smeary loops. Woah. Eventually we tracked it down, and learned that No Longer Human Senses had been released on the Appease Me label run by French black metal squad Blut Aus Nord! Not too long ago we reviewed the most recent release by Blut Aus Nord a bizarre and brutal, sprawlingly complex black metal record equal parts classic Norwegian style black metal, pummeling Industrial crunch a la Godflesh, creepy droning dark ambience and strange squiggly plain old weirdness. So when we discovered BaN had a label it made perfect sense that this Spektr record would end up there. No Longer Human Senses is definitely a black metal record, as is evidenced by the buzzing droning riffage and thrashing blast beats, some serious Darkthrone worship for sure, but that's really only a tiny piece of the whole picture. The bursts of black metal, marked by a particularly virulent strain of brutally brittle and harsh guitar sound, float through a twisting serpentine maze of random sound events, almost like a massive Christian Marclay installation. Haunting church organs, weirdly affected spoken word, all manner of creepy lilting melodies over lots of hiss and static and record crackle. Loops repeated over and over, but gradually decaying into stretches of fuzzed out shimmer, often erupting into bursts of super harsh black metal mayhem, only to fall apart moments later into a chaotic mess of buzzing, malfunctioning machinery, super distorted industrial sludge with more warbly minor key loops, all beneath thick waves of dense buzz and crumbling melodies, thick swaths of ambient blur and strange ghostly tinkles, peppered with brief snippets of classical music, found sounds, field recordings and random bits of sonic skree, the whole mess dropped into a swirly abyss of blackdrone and super creepy psychedelic ambience. This is one of those rare records that is so fractured and demented and wonderfully bizarre that is has you constantly checking to see what the hell it was you were listening to! Definitely one of our favorite fucked up black metal records ever!
MPEG Stream: "II"
MPEG Stream: "III"
MPEG Stream: "IV"

SPEKTR The Near Death Experience (Candlelight) cd 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Candlelight offered us the last copies of a few of their going-out-of-print titles at a big discount, so we picked up a couple old faves - this one, which was an aQ Record Of The Week when it came out, and Tectonics by P.H.O.B.O.S. - to relist for you at a very nice sale price, 50 percent off what we used to sell 'em for. So if you missed this before when it came out in 2006, you should grab it now. We only have a few...
There's a certain strain of black metal, that concerns itself more with black than metal, more with texture than heaviness, more with mood than any sort of musical rules. Those are precisely the sorts of black metal bands that send us spinning. Bands that transcend their genre, or are seemingly oblivious to the fact that they might belong to any genre at all. Such is the case with mysterious black metal outfit Spektr. We discovered their debut a couple years back and proudly proclaimed it THE WEIRDEST BLACK METAL RECORD EVER. Since then it's been practically raining bizarre black metal, Furze, Rehtaf Ruo, Dead Reptile Shrine, Hidden, Urfaust, Circle Of Ouroborus, all most definitely black, but each with their own take on what black metal means. And sounds like.
This new Spektr record, however, takes up right where the last one left off, and effortlessly outweirds them all. But their mission is not to be weird. This is not calculated, purposeful, ironic, or in any way untrue to their vision. And it's not that sort of damaged inept weirdness. The music is too dense, and complex and varied and lush and just too impossibly and truly weird to be anything but the musical expression of someone's twisted vision. It's like how truly insane people are the ones who don't realize they're insane. And Spektr are most definitely insane.
The cool thing about Spektr, is that they seem to be some sort of experimental ambient project, with occasional bursts of black metal, as opposed to the other way around. More than half the record seems to be made up of drones, and static and white noise and intercepted transmissions, short wave radio, found sounds, soft subtle rumbles and strange rhythmic interference. When the metal does kick in, it tends towards a seasick lurching midtempo buzz, a lumbering blackened beast, that sort of stumbles and careens wildly out of control, occasionally slipping into a galloping blast, but quickly settling back into a slow sort of lope. Their metal is just off kilter enough to balance their experimental tendencies, and Spektr don't shy away from busting out with a black blast for only a few second before getting back to the drone at hand. And oh the drones! The gloriously twisted ambience. So dense and multilayered. Creaking and crackling, swelling and slithering, often punctuated by industrial pounding, strange rhythms, glitchy hiccups and stutters, but just as often a smoldering warble, a low end dirge of glacial hum and creepy crawly gurgle and whir, voices drift up from the murk, as do strange song fragments and bits of malfunctioning electronics, it's like walking through some black skied wasteland, the ground strewn with all manner of debris, the air thick with smoke and ash, The view fuzzy and indistinct, distant tolling bells, cymbal sizzle that sounds like sprinklers in a moonlit field, all these bits of sound, these ambient fragments, woven together into a truly ominous world of dark sound, the background to a truly bleak and buzzy black metal framework. The more we listen to this, the less -weird- it seems, scary maybe, haunting, harrowing, dark, dreary, creepy, ominous, ghostly, unnerving, and mysterious most certainly, oh okay, and quite a little bit weird too.
A definite contender for our favorite new black metal record!
The disc also includes a video, playable on your computer, for a track not on the cd. And it's a strange one as you might expect. The music is all dark drones, with weirdly jazzy drums way up in the mix, shuffling over a fuzzed out Burzumic riff that sort of ebbs and flows, a fuzzy distorted wave. It never fully kicks in, but it never completely blisses out. It sort of teeters back and forth between dark jazz and glacial black fuzz. It's a little like a black metal post-bop Bohren, sort of. The track shifts partway through and becomes a strange sonic kaleidoscope of creepy orchestra music, garbled ambience and a haunting martial rhythm played on tympani's. The accompanying video is gorgeously grainy, all darkness and shadows, like some rare damaged print of a lost silent horror film, the film stock so degraded that various chunks of light and dark take on ominous shapes, the end result, the visual equivalent of an old crackly record. Totally mesmerizing.
MPEG Stream: "The Violent Stink Of Twitching Terror"
MPEG Stream: "His Mind Ravaged, His Memory Shattered"
MPEG Stream: "Whatever The Case May Be"

SPEKTR The Near Death Experience (Debemur Morti Productions) lp 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally on vinyl, 2006's The Near Death Experience from French industrial black metal weirdos Spektr. Outrageously deluxe packaging, super thick gatefold sleeve, printed inner sleeve, a huge 12"x12" booklet of art and photos, pressed on incredibly heavy white vinyl and of course VERY VERY LIMITED!!!!
Here's our review of TNDE when it first came out:
There's a certain strain of black metal, that concerns itself more with black than metal, more with texture than heaviness, more with mood than any sort of musical rules. Those are precisely the sorts of black metal bands that send us spinning. Bands that transcend their genre, or are seemingly oblivious to the fact that they might belong to any genre at all. Such is the case with mysterious black metal outfit Spektr. We discovered their debut a couple years back and proudly proclaimed it THE WEIRDEST BLACK METAL RECORD EVER. Since then it's been practically raining bizarre black metal, Furze, Rehtaf Ruo, Dead Reptile Shrine, Hidden, Urfaust, Circle Of Ouroborus, all most definitely black, but each with their own take on what black metal means. And sounds like.
This new Spektr record, however, takes up right where the last one left off, and effortlessly out-weirds them all. But their mission is not to be weird. This is not calculated, purposeful, ironic, or in any way untrue to their vision. And it's not that sort of damaged inept weirdness. The music is too dense, and complex and varied and lush and just too impossibly and truly weird to be anything but the musical expression of someone's twisted vision. It's like how truly insane people are the ones who don't realize they're insane. And Spektr are most definitely insane.
The cool thing about Spektr, is that they seem to be some sort of experimental ambient project, with occasional bursts of black metal, as opposed to the other way around. More than half the record seems to be made up of drones, and static and white noise and intercepted transmissions, short wave radio, found sounds, soft subtle rumbles and strange rhythmic interference. When the metal does kick in, it tends towards a seasick lurching midtempo buzz, a lumbering blackened beast, that sort of stumbles and careens wildly out of control, occasionally slipping into a galloping blast, but quickly settling back into a slow sort of lope. Their metal is just off kilter enough to balance their experimental tendencies, and Spektr don't shy away from busting out with a black blast for only a few second before getting back to the drone at hand. And oh the drones! The gloriously twisted ambience. So dense and multilayered. Creaking and crackling, swelling and slithering, often punctuated by industrial pounding, strange rhythms, glitchy hiccups and stutters, but just as often a smoldering warble, a low end dirge of glacial hum and creepy crawly gurgle and whir, voices drift up from the murk, as do strange song fragments and bits of malfunctioning electronics, it's like walking through some black skied wasteland, the ground strewn with all manner of debris, the air thick with smoke and ash, The view fuzzy and indistinct, distant tolling bells, cymbal sizzle that sounds like sprinklers in a moonlit field, all these bits of sound, these ambient fragments, woven together into a truly ominous world of dark sound, the background to a truly bleak and buzzy black metal framework. The more we listen to this, the less -weird- it seems, scary maybe, haunting, harrowing, dark, dreary, creepy, ominous, ghostly, unnerving, and mysterious most certainly, oh okay, and quite a little bit weird too.
A definite contender for our favorite new black metal record!
MPEG Stream: "The Violent Stink Of Twitching Terror"
MPEG Stream: "His Mind Ravaged, His Memory Shattered"
MPEG Stream: "Whatever The Case May Be"

SPIDERS Nothing Like You / Long Gone (Valley King) 7" 8.98
From the same label that brought us the recent Carlton Melton Handling Snakes 7", comes this, one of two new 7"s from Spiders (the other is on Kemado), a new group featuring members of Graveyard and Witchcraft, and whose sound is a witchy hybrid of the two, but taking that sound in a distinctly garagey, more classic rock direction.
Fans of the recent crop of female fronted heavy combos, Loon, Royal Thunder, Jex Thoth, The Devil's Blood, Christian Mistress, Blood Ceremony and the like, should definitely check out Spiders. Definitely less metal than most of those, but no less heavy, Spiders whip up some seriously old school witchy hard rock, lots of extra percussion on the A side, along with crunchy guitars, and some awesome kick ass vocals, the vibe is HUGELY seventies, a little classic rock, a little Southern rock, the song shifts gears about halfway through, trading the slither and swagger for some double time rocking replete with lots of dynamic breakdowns and some seriously kick ass guitar leads.
The flipside is even less metallic, but cranks up the seventies Southern Rock vibe big time, a garagey groove, the riffs dangerously Skynryd (not a bad thing), a distinctly Jefferson Airplane feel too, but the song super rocking, super heavy, and those vocals, and the main hook just sealing the deal.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!! Each cover beautifully silkscreened, hand numbered, and signed by the cover artist, includes a sticker as well.

SPIERS, CRESTON (HARVEY MILK) Yesterday's Parade / The Time Has Come (Southern Shelter) 7" 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Shame on anyone who somehow managed to miss the acoustic Harvey Milk instore, with HM frontman Creston Spiers tackling stripped down Milk tracks, Leonard Cohen covers, heck, he even covered "Three Is A Magic Number" from Schoolhouse Rock. Well this one is for those of you who blew it, or for those of you who didn't but still need more.
A super limited yellow vinyl 7", the second and supposedly last pressing, 300 copies, already sold out, we have about 30, of Creston Spiers from Harvey Milk performing acoustic, two originals, both awesome. And both sounding like could-have-been Harvey Milk tracks, or obscure Leonard Cohen covers, anyone at the instore knows exactly what we mean, his voice and way with melody is so distinctive, and owes quite a bit to Mr. Cohen. On these two tracks, Spiers' vocals are rough and ragged but still melodic, accompanied by stripped down steel string guitar, spare and melancholy, with slightly off kilter arrangements, the tone mournful and melancholy. Barring a recording of "Three Is A Magic Number" you couldn't hope for more.
Pressed on thick clear yellow vinyl, housed in a clear plastic PVC sleeve, limited to 300 copies, out of print, this is most likely your last chance...

SPINAL TAP s/t (Polydor) cd 16.98
Spinal Tap's infamous "Smell The Glove" album now reissued and remastered, with 2 versions of "Christmas With The Devil" added as bonus tracks! An all-time classic, we don't have to tell you that. "Tonight I'm Going To Rock You Tonight", "Big Bottom", "Sex Farm" and all the rest never sounded better!

SPIRE s/t (Obscure Abhorrence / Art Of Propaganda) cd 9.98

SPIRIT CARAVAN Dreamwheel (MeteorCity) cdep 11.98
Not long after their excellent debut album Jug Fulla Sun, ex-Saint Vitus/The Obsessed frontman Wino and his new band (a.k.a. Shine) of stoner rock doomsters return with this equally smokin' 5-song ep. Great stuff. However, could the cover art be any worse?

SPIRIT CARAVAN Elusive Truth (Tolotta) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Here's the eagerly-awaited second full-length slab of doom-groove from legendary guitarist and vocalist Wino (aka Scott Weinrich) and his band of stoner rock saviors/survivors Spirit Caravan. Like their 1999 debut "Jug Fulla Sun", this builds on the sound of Wino's previous downer-metal outfit The Obsessed (and his experience singing for psychedelic-punk doom-lords Saint Vitus back in the day) for some decidedly heavy ROCK action by veterans who really know what they're doing.
RealAudio clip: "Black Flower"
RealAudio clip: "Elusive Truth"

SPIRIT CARAVAN Elusive Truth (Tolotta) lp 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Here's the eagerly-awaited second full-length slab of doom-groove from legendary guitarist and vocalist Wino (aka Scott Weinrich) and his band of stoner rock saviors/survivors Spirit Caravan. Like their 1999 debut "Jug Fulla Sun", this builds on the sound of Wino's previous downer-metal outfit The Obsessed (and his experience singing for psychedelic-punk doom-lords Saint Vitus back in the day) for some decidedly heavy ROCK action by veterans who really know what they're doing.

SPIRIT CARAVAN Jug Fulla Sun (Tolotta) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Scott "Wino" Weinrich (ex-Saint Vitus, The Obsessed) returns with his new stoner rock power trio (until recently, known as Shine). This, their debut full-length, was made possible by Joe "Wino's biggest fan" Lally of Fugazi's new label Tolotta. Doom, groove, riffs, Wino's trademark Ozzy-tinged vox: this is the real deal. On Allan's top ten for the year so far.

SPIRIT CARAVAN So Mortal Be (Tolotta) 7" 3.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Two new tracks from these stoner metal heroes. The A-side's "So Mortal Be" is typical rockin' Spirit Caravan fare, while on B-side "Undone Mind" bassist Dave Sherman takes over on vocals from Wino, his rougher, more wretched pipes fitting well with the song's doomier vibe. White vinyl by the way.

SPIRIT CARAVAN The Last Embrace (MeteorCity) 2cd 21.00
Joe Lally's Tolatta label sadly seems to have shuffled off this mortal coil (that's why we can't get those first two Dead Meadow albums anymore, too bad for new fans who came to that band via their debut on Matador this year) and Tolotta's flagship stoner rock outfit Spirit Caravan did the same, as well, with leader Scott "Wino" Weinrich moving on to new projects The Hidden Hand and Place Of Skulls, notching more bands on a resume that also includes The Obsessed and Saint Vitus. But demand remains for Spirit Caravan's two Tolotta albums so Meteor City has stepped in with this double cd that combines 'em into one neat package -- plus bonus material that makes this essential for completists even if they've already got the original albums. Perhaps Meteor City will arrange to do the same with the Dead Meadow discs? Hint hint. Anyway, if you're a Wino/Spirit Caravan fan who missed either Jug Fulla Sun or Elusive Truth, now you've got another chance. And in case you're unfamilar with Wino & co., but stoner-curious, here's a quote from our review of Jug Fulla Sun, which was definitely one of the top stoner rock releases of the past ten years: "Doom, groove, riffs, Wino's trademark Ozzy-tinged vox: this is the real deal." In addition to the two whole Tolotta albums, these cds include three totally unreleased songs, plus five 7" and comp tracks, and three demo tracks recorded by the band back when they were known as Shine.
MPEG Stream: "The Last Embrace"
MPEG Stream: "Powertime"

SPIRITU / VILLAGE OF DEAD ROADS split (MeteorCity) cd 14.98

SPIRITUAL BEGGARS Ad Astra (Music For Nations ) cd 16.98
The latest groove rock offering from ex-Carcass guitarist Michael Amott. No Carcass-y grind here, just swampy, grindy, bluesy stoner rock. But still heavy as fuck, with heaping helpings of Hammond organ ladled all over it.

SPIRITUAL BEGGARS Demons (Inside Out) cd 19.98

SPIRITUAL BEGGARS On Fire (Music For Nations) cd 16.98
'70s lovin', long-haired n' heavy (musically speaking, that is -- they look kinda skinny, actually) Swedes the Spiritual Beggars, whom you know as the "stoner rock" band of ex-Carcass, current Arch Enemy six-string wizard Mike Amott, introduce a new singer (the guy from Grand Magus, another one of what must be millions of Swedish stoner rock bands) with "On Fire". It's going to take a few more listens than we've had the chance to experience to determine if this new album is any kind of step up for a band we already like quite a bit, or just more of the same -- but so far, anyway, it seems pretty cool! The Hammond organ still throbs mightily, as they run through rockin' riff-fests and mellow, spacey psychedelic excursions. And the new guy's vocals are just fine, if a little cliched (their old singer Spice wasn't Spiritual Beggar's drawing card anyway). In the mood for a loud n' proud, modern-day take on Deep Purple and the like? This ought to fit the bill.
RealAudio clip: "Street Fighting Saviours"

SPIRITUAL BEGGARS s/t (Regain) cd 14.98
The rare first album by Swedish stoner rockers Spiritual Beggars finally reissued on cd with four bonus tracks! Not to be confused with fellow stoner rockers Spirit Caravan, Spiritual Beggars is the band in which ex-Carcass, current Arch Enemy six stringer Michael Amott gets his heavy '70s groove on. Fans of their other albums (like the mighty "Mantra III" and "Ad Astra") will want this of course, but those other albums are recommended for starters 'cause we really dig the Hammond organ action that's not yet a part of the Beggars' sound on this one, recorded as a pure power trio. But then again, that leaves more room for Mike's guitar. Swirling psychedelic stomp for fans of Kyuss, Monster Magnet, late-period Trouble, and the like. Also note the "Foxy Lady" cop on opener "Yearly Dying", and "Purple Haze" is clearly part of their vocabulary too.
RealAudio clip: "If This Is All"

SPIRITUAL BEGGARS / GRAND MAGUS split (Southern Lord) 7" 4.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Two excellent stoner rock groups go head to head on this split single: Mike Amott's much-loved Spiritual Beggars and newcomers Grand Magus.

SPIRITUS MORTIS The God Behind The God (Firebox) cd 15.98

SPITE EXTREME WING Magnificat (Beyond...Prod.) cd 14.98

SPITE EXTREME WING Vltra (Avantgarde) cd 14.98

MPEG Stream: "Traccia II"
MPEG Stream: "Traccia III"
MPEG Stream: "Traccia X"

SPLIT CRANIUM s/t (Hydra Head) cd 15.98
A few weeks ago we listed the debut, limited edition 7" single from Finnish/American hardcore hypno-punk supergroup Split Cranium. That was the teaser for this here Hydra Head full length, which includes that single's A side (the B side was a Daniel Menche remix) "Scepters To Rust", along with seven other (mostly) short sharp shocks of this band's noisy, gnarly, D-beat driven loud/fast attack. Featuring our pals Aaron Turner (Mamiffer, Isis, House Of Low Culture, etc.) and Jussi Lehtisalo (Circle, Pharoah Overlord, Steel Mammoth, etc. etc.) along with another of the guys who plays with Jussi in Steel Mammoth. Here's what we said about that track on the single: "Cranium splitting heaviness for sure. Pounding drums, kick ass riffs, massive HEAVY production, some seriously crusty punk blowouts woven into more metallic chug and crunch, peppered with wild squiggly metal shred freakouts, and bizarre echo drenched vocals, that make this sound very Circle-like indeed." Well, a Circle-like version of aggro crusty HC punk anyway (if you've got Circle's Panic cd from a while back, you've had a taste of this). And that pretty much goes for this whole album, starting from the 1:47 blast of "Little Brother", Split Cranium cranking out the raw distorted punkrock in race-to-the-finish, fist-in-your-face fashion. None of the first three tracks break the 2 minute mark, in fact, they get shorter and shorter. But then, with "Blossoms From Boils", the band starts to groove a little more, that's where the Turbonegro-doing-NWOFHM comparison we made in our 7" review comes in. They stretch that one out to almost 5 minutes, and as cranium-splitting headaches go, it's a darn catchy one. A couple tracks further along, we come to "Black Blinding Plague", a track that's about 50 percent just feedback, before the crush and churn and sore throat vokills come in and the party really starts. No wonder they got noisician/droneologist Daniel Menche to do that remix! (Though we wonder, was Merzbow not available?). And then a song called "Yellow Mountain" gets to gallopin', upping the "New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal" quotient while also bringing in some soaring, clean, chant-like vocals (mixed under/above the gruff shouty ones). Beginning to hear some early Circle here, circa Meronia, but more punked out for sure. That awesome headbanger is followed by the album's grand finale, the 8+ minute "Retrace The Circle". It takes the sound of "Yellow Mountain" and gets more epic and Isis-y with it, building into grand spaced out drone heaviness and ending with a totally distorted noise flourish. Wow. We're sold.
For a project such as this, with key members living many time zones apart, who probably spend more time emailing each other than they ever get to spend jamming together in the same practice space, it's damn convincing. But then, we'd expect nothing less from Jussi and Aaron, et. al. And while Circle and Isis fans should of course be interested in this, we feel Split Cranium is good enough to garner fans on their own merits. If we'd never heard of Circle or Isis or Steel Mammoth, we'd still be digging Split Cranium's freaked out HC.
Cd version comes in a nice oversized digipack sleeve, & there's also vinyl but we weren't able to get enough to list this week, hopefully more will show up soon...
MPEG Stream: "Blossoms From Boils"
MPEG Stream: "Scepters To Rust"
MPEG Stream: "Yellow Mountain"

SPLIT CRANIUM s/t (Hydra Head) lp 28.00
Finally, we have enough of these in their swank vinyl elpee incarnation to list!! Here's what we said about the cd version when we first reviewed it...
A few weeks ago we listed the debut, limited edition 7" single from Finnish/American hardcore hypno-punk supergroup Split Cranium. That was the teaser for this here Hydra Head full length, which includes that single's A side (the B side was a Daniel Menche remix) "Scepters To Rust", along with seven other (mostly) short sharp shocks of this band's noisy, gnarly, D-beat driven loud/fast attack. Featuring our pals Aaron Turner (Mamiffer, Isis, House Of Low Culture, etc.) and Jussi Lehtisalo (Circle, Pharoah Overlord, Steel Mammoth, etc. etc.) along with another of the guys who plays with Jussi in Steel Mammoth. Here's what we said about that track on the single: "Cranium splitting heaviness for sure. Pounding drums, kick ass riffs, massive HEAVY production, some seriously crusty punk blowouts woven into more metallic chug and crunch, peppered with wild squiggly metal shred freakouts, and bizarre echo drenched vocals, that make this sound very Circle-like indeed." Well, a Circle-like version of aggro crusty HC punk anyway (if you've got Circle's Panic cd from a while back, you've had a taste of this). And that pretty much goes for this whole album, starting from the 1:47 blast of "Little Brother", Split Cranium cranking out the raw distorted punkrock in race-to-the-finish, fist-in-your-face fashion. None of the first three tracks break the 2 minute mark, in fact, they get shorter and shorter. But then, with "Blossoms From Boils", the band starts to groove a little more, that's where the Turbonegro-doing-NWOFHM comparison we made in our 7" review comes in. They stretch that one out to almost 5 minutes, and as cranium-splitting headaches go, it's a darn catchy one. A couple tracks further along, we come to "Black Blinding Plague", a track that's about 50 percent just feedback, before the crush and churn and sore throat vokills come in and the party really starts. No wonder they got noisician/droneologist Daniel Menche to do that remix! (Though we wonder, was Merzbow not available?). And then a song called "Yellow Mountain" gets to gallopin', upping the "New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal" quotient while also bringing in some soaring, clean, chant-like vocals (mixed under/above the gruff shouty ones). Beginning to hear some early Circle here, circa Meronia, but more punked out for sure. That awesome headbanger is followed by the album's grand finale, the 8+ minute "Retrace The Circle". It takes the sound of "Yellow Mountain" and gets more epic and Isis-y with it, building into grand spaced out drone heaviness and ending with a totally distorted noise flourish. Wow. We're sold.
For a project such as this, with key members living many time zones apart, who probably spend more time emailing each other than they ever get to spend jamming together in the same practice space, it's damn convincing. But then, we'd expect nothing less from Jussi and Aaron, et. al. And while Circle and Isis fans should of course be interested in this, we feel Split Cranium is good enough to garner fans on their own merits. If we'd never heard of Circle or Isis or Steel Mammoth, we'd still be digging Split Cranium's freaked out HC.
Vinyl edition includes digital download code.
MPEG Stream: "Blossoms From Boils"
MPEG Stream: "Scepters To Rust"
MPEG Stream: "Yellow Mountain"

SPLIT CRANIUM Sceptres To Rust (Hydra Head) 7" 8.98
ATTENTION CIRCLE OBSESSIVES! And Finnish underground rock freaks, heck we might as well include Hydra Head nerds and Isis nuts, this one is for all of you. Well, seventeen of you at least. That's as many copies as we could get of the debut single from this new band featuring Jussi from Finnish hypnorockers Circle (among others) as well as Aaron Turner from Isis / Hydra Head Records, as well as one of the guys from Steel Mammoth. And considering that pedigree it sounds pretty much like you'd imagine. Or at least how you wished it would sound. Cranium splitting heaviness for sure. Pounding drums, kick ass riffs, massive HEAVY production, some seriously crusty punk blowouts woven into more metallic chug and crunch, peppered with wild squiggly metal shred freakouts, and bizarre echo drenched vocals, that make this sound very Circle-like indeed. Epic and melodic, a little like Turbonegro gone NWOFHM (that's New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal btw). A killer teaser for the upcoming full length.
The flipside finds the A side reworked by none other than noise maestro Daniel Menche, who takes all the punk and metal and blurs it and stretches it into smeared gristly walls of pulsing drone-noise, the various elements still present, but looped and layered and all tangled up into thick undulating sheets of white noise drenched rhythmic chaos, droned out and mesmerizing, the vocals in particular transformed into a haunting keening high end tone, woven into a hazy grey soft focus blurpunk drift. Super rad! And again SUPER LIMITED, not sure how many were pressed, but we got SEVENTEEN of them, and that's all we'll ever get, so get yourself one before they're gone!

SPOOKY THAT SUBLIMINAL KID, DJ & DAVE LOMBARDO Present Drums Of Death (Thirsty Ear) cd 16.98
Hmmm. Don't know exactly what to make of this. It's a sorta sci-fi themed mish mash of frantic beats, scratches, spacey fx and heavy guitars credited to the odd pairing of uber-intellectual DJ Spooky and Slayer/Fantomas drummer Dave Lombardo, with such equally unlikely guests as Chuck D, Dalek, Meredith Monk, Meat Beat Manifesto's Jack Dangers and Living Colour's Vernon Reid. Maybe the only question to ask is: how come Buckethead's not on this too? ...or Bill Laswell? Or Anthrax?? There's something very early '90s about this, and the trio of updated, electro-metallized PE raps that Chuck D contributes -- "Brother's Gonna Work It Out (2005)", "B-Side Wins Again (2005)", "Public Enemy #1 (2005)"-- just add to the deja vu. We mainly ordered this in 'cause the last unlikey Dave Lombardo fcvcollaboration (the one where he plays Vivaldi!) we encountered was actually weirdly cool. But this... not sure why it exists, exactly. Some parts are alright in and of themselves, but it doesn't seem to add up to anything other than a demonstration of the range of Spooky's Rolodex.
MPEG Stream: "B-Side Wins Again (2005)"
MPEG Stream: "Terra Nullius (Cyborg Rebellion on Colony Planet Zyklon 15)"

SQUEALER Made For Eternity (AFM) cd 14.98
German power metal that's just a little rougher, heavier, and ballsier than your general run of Helloween/Hammerfall clones. True, they've got catchy choruses and can write a great "pop" song, but they haven't forgotten that they're a heavy METAL band first and foremost. That said, just like on their previous album, they do a great Depeche Mode cover ("People Are People")! Like Iron Fire, a band that Allan and Andee thought would be too cheesy turned out to have a lot to offer. Plus, they're called SQUEALER! What a great name for a metal band, although it makes you think that their vocalist probably sings in a higher register than he actually does.

SQUEALER Under The Cross (AFM) cd 14.98
Veteran German metal band Squealer (great name, huh?) are not too well known, but here at Aquarius Andee and Allan have somehow become fans of their unpretentious, solid speed metal. They're melodic and muscular, with a fairly tough sounding singer and a knack for catchy refrains. Better and heavier than a lot of more popular European power metal outfits (Gamma Ray, Helloween, Hammerfall, Edguy, etc.)! Their last two albums featured Depeche Mode covers (!) but this time they opt for even more unlikely cover material: reggae artist Johnny Wakelin's goofy '70s hit "In Zaire"! Silly, strange, and fun. Along with that, you get songs about everything from masturbating monks ("Painful Lust") to blind capitalist careerism ("Down And Out") to adult learning ("Out of the Dark"). Digipak w/ bonus track. Oh, and while we highly doubt that anybody from Squealer is reading this, if they are: Bring back the old logo, guys!
RealAudio clip: "Thinking Allowed!"
RealAudio clip: "In Zaire"

STALAGGH Nihilistik Terrror (Autopsy Kitchen) cd 13.98
We've had records from some hateful, extreme, heavy and truly black bands in the past but Stallagh definitely out-hate and out-black them all. Named for WWII concentration camps (the extra 'g' and 'h' stand for 'global holocaust'), this Dutch blackdoom industrialnoise horde, are often compared to Abruptum, for their extreme and ultra personal approach to music making, but they take it even a step farther. Not content with harsh hateful vocals, Stalaggh actively set out to recruit mental patients and convicted murders, by using connections working in mental hospitals and carefully planning their recording sessions to coincide with the two days a month patients are allowed to leave the hospital. Woah. The main vocalist featured on the first 30+ minute track (originally released as Projekt: Nihil) is a convicted murderer who stabbed his mother 30 times when he was 16 years old, and subsequently spent the next 11 years in prisons, juvenile detention facilities and mental hospitals. Apparently he suffered from an extreme aggresion disorder, anorexia nervosa and a host of other mental problems. During the recording sessions he indulged in very excessive self-mutilation while howling and wailing through all his hate and pain and fury. Sadly, he killed himself mere months after the recordings were made. The second half hour track (originally released as Project: Terrror) features vocals from three different mental patients, one female. Wow. That's some seriously intense and messed up shit for sure. A rare and maybe problematic instance of music that straddles that blurry line barely dividing art and exploitation, a stretching of the boundaries, an exploration of how far one can go to tap into primal emotions and create music that is emotionally pure, no matter how hard it is to listen to or understand. But the results do definitely convey that hate and despair and misery, which probably can only actually be attained by going to such great lengths. This stuff is so bizarre and so fucked up but somehow strangely beautiful as well. The sheets of noise smear and shift, occasionally attaining an almost drone like quality (albeit an extremely harsh one) .
Nihilistik Terrror is a massive, mind frying, soul shattering, freaked out, slab of droning, fuzzy, buzzy, whitenoise brutality, not black metal, not even metal really, more a sort of industrial noisescape, most definitely black, and bleak and harsh, but these are not songs, they are slow shifting sonic fields of squealing shrieking distortion, grinding ear shredding ambience, crunchy and gritty and NOISY! Definitely one for the extreme noise fanatics and lovers of the harsh and brutal, but black metallers who dug later Abruptum might check this out as well. There might be riffs here, maybe even songs, but if there are, they are buried under an impossibly dense ocean of sound, layer after layer of white hot noise and sonic sludge, all swirling maniacally around the terrified, vitriolic, angry, hateful, freaked out howls and screams of real human beings with truly damaged psyches. So intense!
Includes both original releases, remastered and sonically even more harsh and aggressive, with a previously unreleased bonus track.
MPEG Stream: "One"
MPEG Stream: "Two"

STALAGGH Projekt Misanthropia (Autopsy Kitchen) cd 11.98
WAREHOUSE FIND! Dug up just a small handful of these, the second disc from Dutch black ambient doom outfit Stalaggh, who in a nutshell, can be described as brutal, harsh, extreme and really fucking scary. Musically as well as in their modus operandi. Not content with coaxing the harshest of sounds from their instruments (there are instruments?) and emitting harsh demonic howls and hysterical maniacal shrieks themselves, these guys managed (through some dubious connections) to recruit a handful of inmates, in local psychiatric hospitals, to supply the 'vocals' and much of the artwork. And it sounds like it. Stalaggh's sound is a harsh swirling drone drenched freaked out noise, raw and hissy, loads of buzz and shriek and industrial whir, all whipped up into a dense stormcloud of sound, but it's the vocals that truly disturb, and this time they're everywhere, male, female, howling, moaning, weeping, wailing, sometimes barely audible, sometimes ferociously way up in the mix, always completely freaked out and brutally intense. This is like wandering through some old school mental institution, wandering the halls, all set to the sounds of SPK or Throbbing Gristle. This is the sound of human suffering, not just musically, but in every way, this is hate and confusion and misery and loneliness and sadness and despair and depression all channelled into a single 35 minute track. This record is sad and scary, and thus pretty fucking amazing.
It definitely takes a strong stomach, and a lot of mental resolve, and some seriously iron clad ears, but it ends up being worth it. Very little music is this raw and intimate and frightening and seriously scary. It's really pretty fascinating, as well as a little bit repugnant, definitely hard to listen to, but almost equally hard not to.
Limited to 1000 copies, each one hand numbered and the inside features a reproduction of a piece of artwork drawn by one of the mental patients.
[The digipaks are all a little worn on the edges, but that's how they all came...]
MPEG Stream: "Projekt Misanthropia (excerpt 1)"
MPEG Stream: "Projekt Misanthropia (excerpt 2)"

STALAGGH Pure Misanthropia (self-released) cd 13.98

STAR OF ASH Iter.viator (Jester) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

STARCHASER NETWORK s/t (Tarot Productions) cd 14.98
'80s retro sci-fi sexiness from these would-be Teutonic (actually Texan) clubgoin' droids known as Starchaser Network... two thirds of whom (Equitant and Proscriptor) are also key members of cult black metal thrash masters Absu!!! Actually that's not so strange, really, since we're already familiar with other Absu side projects that displayed far-from-black-metal tendencies. Absu drummer Proscriptor's solo recordings had their art-rock and new wave elements -- he even did covers of both Flock Of Seagulls and the Art Bears! There also has been two unusual offerings of Electro pastiche from Absu guitarist Equitant. Definitely if you dug those Equitant discs, you should check out Starchaser Network, whose influences are similar: Eno, Gary Numan, Kraftwerk, Pet Shop Boys, Egyptian Lover, Detroit Techno, etc.... yeah, apparently these guys were listening to more than just thrash back in the '80s. Thus all the darkly poppy, spacey-synthy, computer-grooved stuff here, with its decadent/deviant discotheque vibe.
We'd recommend skipping track one, "Sintro", though, as it is by far the weakest, mainly due to some unfortunately cringeworthy vocals. They should have left it off, rather than putting it first! The rest of the disc is better, and while much of this may quite well be a bit tongue-in-cheek, only on that first track does it seem like "the joke's on them". We wish that they would have included instead their rumored cover version of the theme from the the '80s TV show Knight Rider (which should give you some idea about where they're coming from conceptually!).
MPEG Stream: "Midnight Prowl"
MPEG Stream: "Nachricht"

STARCHILD / REBREATHER split (Twin Earth Records) cd ep 14.98

STARGAZER A Great Work Of Ages / A Work Of Great Ages (Profound Lore) cd 13.98
Another killer, baffling brilliant chunk of bizarre blackened death metal from Australia courtesy of Profound Lore, and as we've mentioned before, we're especially picky when it comes to death metal, so for us the more twisted and complex, damaged and demented the better, which is probably why we're digging this Stargazer record so much, probably helps to put it in perspective knowing that Stargazer just so happens to feature several ex-members of twisted costumed Aussie death metal weirdos Portal. Granted this is not nearly as noisy or twisted, but it does share a similarly off kilter approach to death metal.
The first track along manages to neatly summarize the Stargazer sound in less than 6 minutes, a flurry of frantic riffing, a burst of murky blasting chug, some tangled convoluted stop/start dynamics, howled vox, squalls of dizzying confusional death metal freakout, some wild squiggly leads, little bits of NWOBHM melody, some cool stuttery chugs, and wild frenzied drumming, weird bits of doomy half time plod, weird stretches of really loud rubbery bass, like crazy rapid bass solo style basslines, a cool classic metal breakdown that quickly gets all weird and twisted and tangly, laced with some surprising melody, and finally a weirdly industrial sounding finale, all low slung bass throb, peppered with wild bursts of drum/guitar dervish, that grinds to a halt, only to spit out one more surprise blast right before the finish. Holy shit. How can you not love this stuff?
The rest of the record follows suit, a super complex, but still melodic onslaught of furious grinding metal, of muddy murky blurred heaviness, pounding mathy proggy drumming, tangled warped melodies, very Eastern sounding at times, bits of classic metal, and of course bass, lots of bass, way up in the mix, woozy and busy, and adding a distinctly off kilter and atypical edge to the groups already twisted death metal sound...
Seriously kick ass stuff, we can't get enough, and we find ourselves listening to this over and over like crazy non stop, definite new metal favorite for sure...
MPEG Stream: "Red Antlered Radiant"
MPEG Stream: "Passing Stone - Into The Greater Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Formless Face Of The Timeless Faceless"