CATHEDRAL VIIth Coming (Spitfire) cd 16.98
Cathedral. No, don't think light and airy, magnificent house of God. Think massive, weighty, and ancient -- lair of gargoyles, temple to superstition. Despite debuting with one of the heaviest slabs of doom metal heard in 1990 (Forest Of Equilibrium, which melded slowed-down Sabbath riffage, depressed prog-folk flutes, and gravelly vocals), the blokes in Cathedral soon took a tongue-in-cheek "stoner rock disco" detour for most of their career, only to regain their relevance with last year's seriously doomy comeback Endtyme. Now, VIIth Coming fortunately demonstrates that Endtyme was only a new beginning for the band. Straight out of the gate, opener "Phoenix Rising" gives notice that these guys mean business, that business is good, and that their business is, as you may have guessed, killing. The next cut, "Resisting The Ghost", is even faster (for them) and more furious. They still do slow, though, as the following track "Skullflower" demonstrates. It's monolithic '70s riffing and ultra-heavy doom groove all the way, pretty much the formula for the whole album. Sure, the keyboards and spoken-singing of "Aphrodite's Winter" come as a departure, but Cathedral for the most part walk the straight and narrow (left-hand) path here, avoiding the overt silliness and intentional kitsch of past Cathedral travesties. Compared to Endtyme, this does swing Sabbath-like a bit more, but without reverting to taking the piss like they did for so many years. No, they're now taking seriously their own talent for achieving atmospheres of heaviness and despair (even whilst rockin' the cowbell). Thank you Cathedral, for making it possible for an old fan to like you once again!
RealAudio clip: "Resisting The Ghost"
RealAudio clip: "Black Robed Avenger"

CATTLE DECAPITATION / ARMATRON / TICWAR 1 The Science of Crisis (Toyo ) cd 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Three-way split release, the second in this intentionally odd series on Toyo Records. SoCal grindsters Cattle Decaptitation start it off, followed by Nebraska spazzcore freaks Armatron. Finally, the disc is anchored with the approx. 20-minute long "Il Ritorno" from our very own Andee's new post- A Minor Forest band, here dubbed Ticwar 1 (making their first recorded appearance). After the fast/fun assaults of Cattle Decap. and Armatron, the Ticwar track seems (even more) glacially slow and immense. Their lengthy "Il Ritorno" composition touches upon lovely post-rock guitar strum, before lumbering into massive Sabbath / Monster Magnet inspired stoner rock riffing, the groove disrupted by Lesser-style digital glitch fuckery. Eventually it winds down into a gorgeous drone-coda. Experimental stoner rock? Post-metal? Can't wait to hear more (Andee? nudge, nudge). So, quite recommended.

CAUCHEMAR La Vierge Noire (Nuclear War Now!) cd ep 8.98
Some seriously kick ass true metal from the great white North, a Canadian modern true doom / speed metal hybrid fronted by none other than Annick Giroux, who most definitely knows a thing or two about metal, not only did she edit the awesome Hellbent For Cooking heavy metal cookbook, but she's also responsible for the legendary Canadian metal zine Morbid Tales!
Cauchemar perfectly captures the mood and vibe of classic seventies and eighties metal, equal parts NWOBHM riffery, witchy occult speed metal a la Acid and the epic true doom of groups like Pagan Altar. There's even a little Motorhead in there. The riffs are killer, the guitars loud and thick, the drumming powerful, the bass thick and slithery, but it's Giroux's vocals that really make this, sung all in French, haunting and powerful, reminding us of groups like The Devil's Blood and Jex Thoth, in fact ANYone that digs those groups should check this out for sure. But the thing is, the music here is so much more classic metal sounding. The opener is pitch perfect eighties speed metal, laced with plenty of doominess, epic and majestic and heavy as hell, while the second track slows it down for some seriously doom-ed crush, with a swirling psychedelic bridge, Giroux's vocals bewitching and demonic, the whole record sort of slips back and forth between pounding riffery, and plodding dirge, the vocals and overall seventies foresty vibe makes the whole record sound way more psychedelic than most new metal, definitely tapping into the classic Sabbath sound, and making this the sort of band that should appeal equally to the true metal massive, but also dabblers looking for tripped out psychedelic heaviness...
MPEG Stream: "Le Voile D'Isis"
MPEG Stream: "Magie Rouge"

CAUCHEMAR La Vierge Noire (Nuclear War Now!) 12" 12.98
This kick ass slab of witchy speed/doom metal now on vinyl as well!!
Some seriously kick ass true metal from the great white North, a Canadian modern true doom / speed metal hybrid fronted by none other than Annick Giroux, who most definitely knows a thing or two about metal, not only did she edit the awesome Hellbent For Cooking heavy metal cookbook, but she's also responsible for the legendary Canadian metal zine Morbid Tales!
Cauchemar perfectly captures the mood and vibe of classic seventies and eighties metal, equal parts NWOBHM riffery, witchy occult speed metal a la Acid and the epic true doom of groups like Pagan Altar. There's even a little Motorhead in there. The riffs are killer, the guitars loud and thick, the drumming powerful, the bass thick and slithery, but it's Giroux's vocals that really make this, sung all in French, haunting and powerful, reminding us of groups like The Devil's Blood and Jex Thoth, in fact ANYone that digs those groups should check this out for sure. But the thing is, the music here is so much more classic metal sounding. The opener is pitch perfect eighties speed metal, laced with plenty of doominess, epic and majestic and heavy as hell, while the second track slows it down for some seriously doom-ed crush, with a swirling psychedelic bridge, Giroux's vocals bewitching and demonic, the whole record sort of slips back and forth between pounding riffery, and plodding dirge, the vocals and overall seventies foresty vibe makes the whole record sound way more psychedelic than most new metal, definitely tapping into the classic Sabbath sound, and making this the sort of band that should appeal equally to the true metal massive, but also dabblers looking for tripped out psychedelic heaviness...
MPEG Stream: "Le Voile D'Isis"
MPEG Stream: "Magie Rouge"

CAVALAR As A Metal Of Fact (self-released) cd 10.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
We often talk about the pun as title, or the pun as name of your store. And how it's important that it is actually clever, and makes sense. There's a laundromat down the street from AQ called the Wash Quarters. We get it, headquarters, but you do your wash there, but it doesn't work. There's another laundromat in the neighborhood called the Washing Well! Now, that works, washing sounds like wishing. Same thing with local eyeglass emporium the Frame And Eye. Also sort of clever, I spelled eye, the whole thing like the King And I, but it just doesn't work. Now if they sold jewelry and were called The RING and I, or if they sold random crap and were called the THING and I... maybe it has something to do with rhyming. Anyway, this brings us to the debut from Portugal's Cavalar, titled As A Metal Of Fact. Well, you see what we're talking about. Remember the band TT Quick from the '80s and their record METAL Of Honor? Right. Exactly. Anyway, let's forgive these guys since English is not their first language, and besides, apparently most English speakers seem to enjoy names like the Wash Quarters and The Frame And Eye anyway. But the intent is clear. This is METAL, and the sort of true metal that is played with honor and pride. Actually, Cavalar fall a little more (heck, a lot more) on the Sabbath worshipping stoner rock side of things, which is no bad thing at all. We love Sabbath, and we love bands who sound like Sabbath. But Cavalar sound so much like the Sabs it's downright uncanny. A lot of it has to do with the vocals. in the pantheon of Ozzy-a-like vocalists, this guy's right up there with Steve Hennessey from sHeavy, sounding more like Ozzy than Wino, Magus of Witchcraft and Bobby Liebling of Pentagram all. We often wonder if these vocalists purposefully try to sound like Ozzy, but if that's the case, why do they end up in bands that sound so much like Sabbath? Probably the more likely scenario is that those kind of vocals work best in a heavy stoner Sabbathy rock band, thus they are quickly snapped up by bands looking for the perfect vocalist. So as long as you're not put off by some blatant Sabbath worship, then hell this record is a killer. Huge riffs, amazing drumming, groovy and doomy and catchy, and the vocals, a soaring Ozzy-like whine that fits like a glove. The one negative, bands like this should NEVER actually cover a Sabbath song (Cavalar cover "Hole In the Sky") because then it becomes painfully obvious just how much you owe to Sabbath, that your singer really isn't Ozzy, and demonstrates a little too clearly how fucking untouchable Black Sabbath really are. Regardless, fans of sHeavy, Witchcraft, Burning Saviours and the rest of the Sabbath minions will most definitely want to add this to their stoner doom arsenal.
MPEG Stream: "Rush"
MPEG Stream: "Deadman"
MPEG Stream: "New Empire"

CAVITY On The Lam (Hydra Head) cd 14.98
From the state that gave us President George W. Bush's presidency and our first taste of anthrax panic, comes sludgemetal masters Cavity and their new album for Hydrahead. Just like their past efforts, the sweet smell of Sabbath is strong, mixed with the crusty stench of metalcore violence ... heavy, swinging stuff for fans of feedback, vocal venom, and riff-bludgeon (a la fellow Southern doomsters Eyehategod). All the "stoner" rockers here at AQ give it the thumbs up.
RealAudio clip: "Cult Exciter"

CAVITY On The Lam (Hydra Head) picture disc lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl, and a super swank picture disc to boot, here's Cavity's 2001 record, On The Lam. Cavity might now be better know for birthing both Floor and Torche, but these guys were killing it long before either of those bands began peddling their unique brand of pop flecked sludge bliss. And while Cavity were way less poppy, and way more sludgey, they did manage to pack their Sabbathy grooves and low slung chug with plenty of hooks. And as with all of the preceding Cavity records, the sweet smell of Sabbath is strong here, mixed with the crusty stench of metalcore violence ... heavy, swinging stuff for fans of feedback, vocal venom, and riff-bludgeon (a la fellow Southern doomsters Eyehategod). Most of the tracks meld noise rock crush with downtuned doom metal dirgery, into something crusty and explosive and heavy as fuck, but here and there, like on the title track, the band get all slithery and spare, unwinding almost grungy sounding bass-heavy moodiness, channeling a sound more like Green River or Agents of Oblivion, but that sort of rumbling smoldering brood always seems to lead right back into skull caving heaviness, which is where the band spend most of their time. The cool thing though, is that the sort of bassy brooding drift finds its way into even the riffiest and crustiest of jams, giving them a weird sort of vibe, that while not obvious, or really all that easy to define, is something few other sludge/crust bands can pull off. We love Cavity!
MPEG Stream: "Cult Excited"
MPEG Stream: "Boxing The Hog"
MPEG Stream: "On The Lam"

CAVITY Supercollider (Hydra Head) cd 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One of our suppliers found a few of these hidden in their warehouse someplace, sold 'em to us at a huge discount, we're not sure if it's even in print anymore. So if you didn't grab one of these already, now's the time!
With this 1998 album, Cavity's Sabbath-fried sludge from the swamps of Florida really earned them their rightful place in the pantheon of heaviosity peopled by the likes of the Melvins, Eyehategod, Boris, and Electric Wizard. We liked 'em already, but this record stood above and beyond. Sheer HEAVY pummel, riff repetition chug fulla feedback and nasty vocals. There's quiet respites now and then, making the monster riffage even more monstrous. Definitely the kind of thing that just takes you over, relentless, submersive, and hypnotic. So, we can't believe we never listed this before! It was a HUGE fave among a bunch of us here when it came out on Man's Ruin a few years ago. It's been sadly out of print ever since that label folded, but now Hydrahead has stepped up and reissued a remixed version, complete with new artwork/design and what appear to be 2 new tracks (but, one's missing - what happened to "Almost Blue"?). So apparently even if you have the Man's Ruin version, you've gotta buy Supercollider again. But this is one of those records you *would* buy again, it's that good! And if you don't have this already, and you like heaviness, GET IT. Cavity's best album (though their last one, On The Lam, was pretty great too). Thanks Hydra Head for giving us the chance to recommend this, again. [And thanks to that supplier for giving us another chance to recommend this, again, again!]
MPEG Stream: "Supercollider"
MPEG Stream: "How Much Lost"

CELESTIIAL Desolate North (Bindrune) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
There was a time where all you had to do was add umlauts to every vowel (heck how about a few consonants too?) to make your band name more evil. More mysterious. For glam rockers it simply meant changing s's to z's, BOYZ, TOYZ, NOYZE... oh and changing i's to y's, and double o's always helped... Bad Noose. But recently, there have been several examples of grim black and doom metal bands adding an extra 'i' for no apparent reason. When it was just French black metallers Mutiilation, we thought, okay, they're just French and little bit strange, or maybe it was a typo but they thought it was cool. We can dig that. But now with Minnesotan funereal doom lords Celestiial jumping on the double 'i' bandwagon, we're beginning to think something is going on. Something sinister. Er... siiniister we mean.
Anyway, we'll just have to keep our eyes peeled for more of the evil double 'i' but in the meantime, Celestiial has more than just the 2 i's going for them. They also have a gaggle of o's. that's right. Celestiial are definitely one of those bands who have earned the multiple o'd doooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom. They're in the tradition of bands like Skepticism, Thergothon, Disembowelment, Evoken, Winter and more modern practitioners of the ultradoom like Catacombs, Esoteric and the like, but Celestiial are no ordinary doom band, sure their songs are lengthy and glacial, guitars are nothing but black smears in a starless sky, the plodding drums are dropped reverently amidst a bleak and barren sonic landscape. Vocals growl and gurgle and float weightless like some dark wind. Celestiial's doom is even more spacey and blissed out than any of their influences. The guitars are thick and dense and tuned impossibly low, but they sound soft, like someone shaking out a huge black blanket and letting it settle over you, blocking out all light. The programmed drums are so dense with reverb, and the cymbals seem to sizzle endlessly, the percussion just turns into a wash of hiss and whir, that adds a strange fuzzy glow to the already murky and blissy sound. The other thing you can't help but notice, is the sound of nature, everywhere, in every song, crickets, wind blowing through the trees, frogs, whippoorwills, thunder, rain falling on leaves. You know how Skepticism sounds like it was recorded in a forest? This is like that too but it's not metaphorical, it really has forest sounds. It's almost like their is some black doom funeral procession, trudging through the forest, lit only by torchlight, the creatures of the night, gathered just outside the circle of fire. So intense and strangely serene, especially for a 'doom metal' record.
And the thing is it's not just for effect. Celestiial are from Minnesota and are quite possibly the first reflective, isolationist, naturist doom band ever. From the band's website: "Celestiial was created to mirror mysticism in nature. Its heart lies not in its medium but in its dreams. It is a reflection of astral light shown upon the earth--sinking into its soil--waiting and dreaming. It wishes to be the pulse of woodlands and water. Nothing more? Understand that funeral doom isn't always slow for the sake of being slow. It is slower than the beat of the human heart. Its pulse is dead. The pulse of CELESTIIAL aims at being completely parallel to continual motion in everything of this earth. From the seasonal changes to representations of myth."
Woah. But if you really listen, Celestiial's slow motion doom does sound perfectly at home amidst the sounds of nature. Like some living breathing shadowy doomic creature living among the insects and wild birds, lurking in tree tops and curled up upon soft piles of wet leaves. It's almost like a doom metal version of recent record of the week Osmose, by Ariel Kalma, but instead of synths and rainforests, it's doom and dark forests. And as if to further tie the music to the land, and the peoples of the land, Celestiial incorporate an unlikely selection of traditional instruments into their slow motion dirges, such as Celtic harp and Native American flutes.
All of that, strange instrumentation, nature sounds, the two i's, combine to make this wonderfully weird, hauntingly mysterious and quite possibly one of the dreamiest and most blissed out doom records ever!
MPEG Stream: "Haunting Cries Beneath The Lake Where Our Queen Once Walked"
MPEG Stream: "Lamentations In The Citadel Of God"

CELESTIIAL Desolate North ( Handmade Birds) lp 16.98
This crushing avant doooooom epic, finally available on vinyl, the latest release on new boutique vinyl label Handmade Birds, run by R. Loren of Pyramids, White Moth and Sailors With Wax Wings, and like the other HmB releases, some of which are already out of print, EXTREMELY LIMITED...
There was a time where all you had to do was add umlauts to every vowel (heck how about a few consonants too?) to make your band name more evil. More mysterious. For glam rockers it simply meant changing s's to z's, BOYZ, TOYZ, NOYZE... oh and changing i's to y's, and double o's always helped... Bad Noose. But recently, there have been several examples of grim black and doom metal bands adding an extra 'i' for no apparent reason. When it was just French black metallers Mutiilation, we thought, okay, they're just French and little bit strange, or maybe it was a typo but they thought it was cool. We can dig that. But now with Minnesotan funereal doom lords Celestiial jumping on the double 'i' bandwagon, we're beginning to think something is going on. Something sinister. Er... siiniister we mean.
Anyway, we'll just have to keep our eyes peeled for more of the evil double 'i' but in the meantime, Celestiial has more than just the 2 i's going for them. They also have a gaggle of o's. that's right. Celestiial are definitely one of those bands who have earned the multiple o'd doooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooom. They're in the tradition of bands like Skepticism, Thergothon, Disembowelment, Evoken, Winter and more modern practitioners of the ultradoom like Catacombs, Esoteric and the like, but Celestiial are no ordinary doom band, sure their songs are lengthy and glacial, guitars are nothing but black smears in a starless sky, the plodding drums are dropped reverently amidst a bleak and barren sonic landscape. Vocals growl and gurgle and float weightless like some dark wind. Celestiial's doom is even more spacey and blissed out than any of their influences. The guitars are thick and dense and tuned impossibly low, but they sound soft, like someone shaking out a huge black blanket and letting it settle over you, blocking out all light. The programmed drums are so dense with reverb, and the cymbals seem to sizzle endlessly, the percussion just turns into a wash of hiss and whir, that adds a strange fuzzy glow to the already murky and blissy sound. The other thing you can't help but notice, is the sound of nature, everywhere, in every song, crickets, wind blowing through the trees, frogs, whippoorwills, thunder, rain falling on leaves. You know how Skepticism sounds like it was recorded in a forest? This is like that too but it's not metaphorical, it really has forest sounds. It's almost like their is some black doom funeral procession, trudging through the forest, lit only by torchlight, the creatures of the night, gathered just outside the circle of fire. So intense and strangely serene, especially for a 'doom metal' record.
And the thing is it's not just for effect. Celestiial are from Minnesota and are quite possibly the first reflective, isolationist, naturist doom band ever. From the band's website: "Celestiial was created to mirror mysticism in nature. Its heart lies not in its medium but in its dreams. It is a reflection of astral light shown upon the earth--sinking into its soil--waiting and dreaming. It wishes to be the pulse of woodlands and water. Nothing more? Understand that funeral doom isn't always slow for the sake of being slow. It is slower than the beat of the human heart. Its pulse is dead. The pulse of CELESTIIAL aims at being completely parallel to continual motion in everything of this earth. From the seasonal changes to representations of myth."
Woah. But if you really listen, Celestiial's slow motion doom does sound perfectly at home amidst the sounds of nature. Like some living breathing shadowy doomic creature living among the insects and wild birds, lurking in tree tops and curled up upon soft piles of wet leaves. It's almost like a doom metal version of recent record of the week Osmose, by Ariel Kalma, but instead of synths and rainforests, it's doom and dark forests. And as if to further tie the music to the land, and the peoples of the land, Celestiial incorporate an unlikely selection of traditional instruments into their slow motion dirges, such as Celtic harp and Native American flutes.
All of that, strange instrumentation, nature sounds, the two i's, combine to make this wonderfully weird, hauntingly mysterious and quite possibly one of the dreamiest and most blissed out doom records ever!
MPEG Stream: "Haunting Cries Beneath The Lake Where Our Queen Once Walked"
MPEG Stream: "Lamentations In The Citadel Of God"

CENTURIONS GHOST Blessed & Cursed In Equal Measure (The Church Within Records) cd 16.98
Whoops, we've had this for quite a while, but forgot to list it! After two discs for I Hate Records, the third album from UK metalcore doomsters CG came out via The Church Within earlier this year (way back in January, right before CG went on tour in Europe with the mighty Saint Vitus). But it's never too late for doom. And if you're looking for a fix of somethin' heavy off of this week's list, of the downtuned sludge variety of heavy that is, this oughta do the trick. With chunky guitars, hoarse HC vocal shouts, and pummelling drums (from the guy who also plays in Lord Vicar), Centurions Ghost sound like they mean business, and it's a mean business indeed! While a tad bit more trad doom than the average Neur-Isis effort, their sludge is far from slo-mo. And though they can scare up some stonery atmospherics, they don't come off as being very "ghostly" despite their name - the rather lovely and arcane cover drawing by Sami Hynninen (aka Albert Witchfinder of Reverend Bizarre) belies the brutality of the music within!
MPEG Stream: "Powerful Sense Of Dread"
MPEG Stream: "Wizard Of Edge"
MPEG Stream: "Hyena Circle"

CENTURIONS GHOST The Great Work (I Hate Records) cd 16.98
We like the name this British doom metal band picked for themselves, it's making references to both ancient history and supernatural phenomena, and more importantly, sets one up for a story to be told... at least we're curious about who the centurion was and why they're now haunting the place. This, the band's second album for the doom-centric Swedish label I Hate Records (whose records we definitely -don't- hate, as recently reviewed and recommended offerings from the likes of Jex Thoth and Fall of the Idols should attest) doesn't answer those questions, but it does sound in keeping with the general spooky concept, though it's not as 'old school' doom as you might expect. With lurching riffs, rhythms like a Roman legion on the march, cathartic screams (a bit Neurosis some of this), it's heavy and doomy all right. It rages more than it plods, the pace here often fairly fast and thrashy, the vocals often anguished and angry.
Previously (in our review of their A Sign Of Thing To Come debut a few years back) we'd said that this band sounds a bit like a weird Cathedral and Celtic Frost hybrid. Now we'd say they've got a lot more noisecore in their doom. Tracks like "In Defiance", for instance, sound like Isis with a more classically metal approach to melody (and guitar leads) as well as a dose of hardcore brutality. Or we could say that this band has more in common with the likes of Village Of Dead Roads, Mouth of the Architect, and Today Is The Day than it does, say, Revered Bizarre or Gates Of Slumber.
MPEG Stream: "The Supreme Moment"
MPEG Stream: "Black Hearts Will Break"

CEPHALIC CARNAGE Halls of Amenti (Willowtip) cd ep 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
After the hyper onslaught of their recent masterpiece "Lucid Interval", this one-off experiment comes as a drastic departure for these grindmetalheads, though it's certainly in keeping with their allegiance to the sweet leaf! What do we mean? Well, "Halls Of Amenti" is but one 19 minute doom metal dirge, heavy on the DOOM. Downtuned slow motion sludge that would sit comfortably in your collection next to Thergothon, Skepticism or Esoteric! Think Sabbath or Candlemass or Trouble but slooooowwwwwed waaaaaaaay dooooooown. And fronted by a growling and shrieking death metal vocalist. Fans of the above mentioned bands as well as Corrupted, Boris, the Melvins and all things sludge should not pass this by. This beautifully packaged clear 3" cd is supposedly the first of a three part series.
RealAudio clip: "Halls of Amenti"

CHARNEL HOUSE Contagion (Sygil) cd-r 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Record number two from this mysterious blackened witchy doomdirge combo, an offshoot of similarly droney and doomy aQ faves OS. But we're beginning to think we might dig Charnel House more than OS. And it has a lot to do with the vocals, which we described in another review as "demonic priestess vocals", which definitely sums it up pretty perfectly. If that whole new wave of female fronted heavy rock bands (Blood Ceremony, Jex Thoth, Christian Mistress) is just to polished for you, then maybe Charnel House is what you're after, way more raw and lo-fi, bleak and blackened, primitive and noisy, the sound slipping easily from doomy abstract dirge, to churning blackened blast, the sound minimal, and cyclical, repetitive and trancelike, and then when the vocals come in, the sound is utterly transformed, into some sort of black forest ritual, some wild witchy incantation, hovering ethereal and angelic over the churn and chug and blast and buzz below. "Erosive" is the perfect example of CH's strange sound, the band locked into a tranced out repetitive blast, over which a second guitar chugs out a droney looped chord, lurching and lumbering, totally at odds with the manic blast below, the sound all on its own totally mesmerizing, but then every once in a while the vox drift in, and the sound becomes more blissed out, more abstract, the heaviness tempered by the spectral quality of the vocals. The music sounds like Ride For Revenge or some other strangely minimal black metal outfit, the vocals just take it somewhere else, this raw abstract black metal becomes some sort of otherworldly heaviness.
Elsewhere the record grows even more dramatic, with the band spitting out explosive gouts of wild chaotic heaviness, only to stop on a dime, leaving just the vocals and a simple rhythmic pulse (and a little hazy shimmer), to drift dreamily, before the band explodes back in. While elsewhere the band go slooooooow, transforming into a way more melodic Monarch, a dour slo-mo creep, again offset by those creepy, dreamy, haunting vocals. The production is a huge part of it too, sometimes murky and muddy, all the sounds muted and blurred into a near drone, while other times the sound is sharp and corrosive, changing the entire vibe of the song and the record. The more we listen to this, the more it reveals subtle details, headphones even more so, a dense, dark layered landscape of looped black buzz and haunted witchy mystery...
Housed in a cool, hand stamped, cardstock sleeve, with a huge printed full color poster / lyric sheet inside, each one hand numbered, LIMITED TO 250 COPIES!!
MPEG Stream: "Erosive"
MPEG Stream: "Accipiter"

CHE Sounds of Liberation (Man's Ruin) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Ex-Kyuss folk doing what comes naturally, that being heavy "desert-rock" stoner riffage. Quite competent of course. For fans of the big K, as well as Queens of the Stone Age. Head nodding if not head banging music.

CHERRY VALENCE Riffin' (Estrus ) cd 14.98
This album comes directly after my glorifying / praising review of their 12" on Flapping Jet in list #140. I said this full length couldn't come fast enough and BAM! It's here. I feel the same as I did two weeks ago, if not more so. This recording is as tight and energetic as the 12". Vocals with that perfect amount of grit and soul, blazing electric guitars, and their full throttle double-barreled drum attack. It was recorded by the flawless Tim Green at Louder Studios here in SF. Rock'n'roll revivalists The Cherry Valence bringing the 70's right to your doorstep with rock riffage a la MC5, Stooges, and Kiss. Hot!
RealAudio clip: "Can't Get Enough"
RealAudio clip: "Riffin"
RealAudio clip: "World of Trouble"

CHILDREN OF DOOM Doom, Be Doomed, Or Fuck Off (Emanes Metal Records) cd 14.98
These filthy French freaks are back!! A while ago we listed their self-released 4 song demo cdep, and it kinda became a minor sensation among AQ customers into, well, doom, but doom of the most psychedelically fucked, primitive rock 'n' roll variety. In that review, we mentioned "magical dirtbag psychedelic metal anarchy... wasted heaviness, psychomaniacal alcoholic sludge". And yeah, that, um, description would apply to this their debut full-length as well!! So queue up and get ready to guzzle CoD's high octane, wah wah crazed, Vitus-worshipping, greasy hippie biker brew.
Doom, Be Doomed, Or Fuck Off consists of six new songs, filling 42 minutes with this trio's unique, over the top onslaught of hypnotically crude riffage, distortion, widdly guitar, and wailing vox (not quite so strange as on the demo, but still...not normal). And these songs are fairly hooky, too. Drugged out and doomy, but rockin'. Also, they show some signs of musical progress since the demo (not that we were hoping for any!!), getting just a bit more sophisticated sounding in their playing and compositions. Maybe. One sign of this: according to the credits, somewhere, supposedly, there's even some saxophone on this disc!! Ah, must be in the final track, the album's longest, a 12 minute excursion into tripsville, called "...Mia's Desert...", Children Of Doom sounding more like Children Of Krautrock here, all cosmically synthed and sinister, though there is guitar fury unleashed around the halfway point... oh, and then, there it is, some melancholy saxophone over krauty drum beats, how 'bout that? An interesting and unexpected ending to this eccentric album, nice.
Also nice is the cover and other artwork here. We said before that CoD reminded us a bit of Julian Cope's Brain Donor band, and definitely JC would approve of the artwork on the lyric sheet/poster in the cd, a drawing with all sorts of psychedelic biker shit growing up out of an upsidedown helmet, one of those German WWII bucket style ones that outlaw bikers like to wear (if they're gonna wear helmets at all). And you'll be happy there's a lyric sheet, they're quite amusing, once again, a lot of talk about who they are ("we are evil, old school, and brutal") and plenty of swearing in the process. You gotta suspect it's all a bit tongue in cheek, but we're not gonna say that to their faces, you never know...
Oh, and the one song here sung in French, "1916", is not in fact a Motorhead cover, despite the title - though these guys are in their own way, a Motorhead for psychedelic doom lovers. And like Motorhead, they love their umlauts too (our website, having apparently been programmed by posers, won't support umlauts easily, so we left 'em off, but there's supposed to be one over the "o" in "or", of all words, in the album's title...).
MPEG Stream: "Mr. Nasty"
MPEG Stream: "Technophobia"
MPEG Stream: "Bottle Ben In The Streets"

CHILDREN OF DOOM Ride Over The Green Valley (self-released) cd 11.98
FINALLY back in stock!
As soon as we spied the cover art of this self-released cd from this obscure French doom (natch) trio, we knew it was gonna either be really awesome... or really terrible. We were hoping for awesome, though, some kind of magical dirtbag psychedelic metal anarchy that could live up the crude cartoonish line drawing of a skeleton biker riding through an apocalyptic landscape, with the band's tattooed skull logo floating in the air above him... As you can guess 'cause we then ordered a bunch and are highlighting it on our list, we think it was pretty rad indeed! Though, surely not for everyone. You gotta appreciate wasted heaviness, psychomaniacal alcoholic sludge... Named after Saint Vitus' most obscure, underrated release, it should be no surprise that C.O.D. sound a heck of a lot like Saint Vitus. But even more primitive and unpolished! They're a band that's being damn redundant when they title one of the four tracks here, "We Are Bestial And Raw". Other titles indicative of their mindset: "Hell's On Wheels", "Hangover" (a track which starts with a cheap clock radio alarm going off, a clever contrast to the tolling church bells most doom bands would use), and "Rusty World" (when he sings it, it sounds like "Fucking World", though - in fact every other word sung on this disc sounds like fuck or fucking, even when it's not). Speaking of the singing, the vocals are definitely strange, like there's something wrong with the guy (nothing to do with being French). But we like 'em. Everything here goes towards creating a messed up but hypnotic effect, the psychedelic distortion, the crude riffs, the crashing cymbals, the weird vocals, the demo production quality, the extended song lengths (it's 4 songs, as we said, but 32 minutes). In addition to those into Saint Vitus style doom (like Blood Farmers too) this might well appeal to fans of such acts as Brainbombs, The Heads, and Julian Cope's Brain Donor...
The only thing cooler than this, would be to have it on cassette... which it once was, but they only made 250 of those, and probably not many more of these!
MPEG Stream: "Rusty World"
MPEG Stream: "We Are Bestial And Raw"

CHORD Progression (Important) cd 14.98
The return of high concept ambient dronescapers Chord, a sort-of side project of post metal heavies Pelican. Chord, as their name implies, only ever play a single chord, each track a different one, this time around it's EbMaj9, Gm11 and D6. Sounds boring, but it really isn't, in fact probably most drone outfits play one chord their whole career, but this, this is something more, with each member contributing a note, the notes forming a chord, and all of them playing different instruments, different tempos and timbres, the guitars shimmer warmly, the piano (?), swirls and drifts in a sea of hazy reverb, there seems to be some burbling bass too, it's all woven into something lush and dreamy, hypnotic and mesmerizing.
When we reviewed the first Chord album, we pointed out that we had come up with the idea of a 'chord' band on our April Fool's list way back when, with SUNNO))), Earth and Boris each tackling one of the notes, to make a mighty E chord. We still like to think that's where they got the idea. We also mentioned the late great Physics, a San Diego supergroup who always played a C, long spaced out jams, with multiple guitar players, always C. But as we mentioned before, Chord is a much more thoughtful project, definitely on the nerdy side of the spectrum, I mean, they made a song called "EbMaj9", and the group is as much about concept for the players as it is about the sound, but whatever the inspiration, the resulting soundscapes play out like our favorite guitardrone records. Smoldering slow burning expanses of deep layered thrum, hazy, washed out drifts of abstract choral blur. Whereas the other record occasionally built into Sunroof!-worthy squalls, Progression seems to be much more minimal, hushed and restrained, the only deviation is near the end of the epic 40 minute "Gm11", where things get full on heavy, a crushing avalanche of crumbling, superdistorted, blur and buzz, before slipping into the final track, a surprising bit of twang flecked folkiness, wreathed in a hazy buzz, and underpinned by some FX shimmer, but otherwise, sun dappled and dreamy, and for the record, all in the chord of D6.
And speaking of single chords, the most recent Austerity Program, besides being an awesome record, did something similar, in that they only ever used one chord, for the whole record, the band was appalled that no one noticed, but it just goes to show you what someone can do with a single chord, making more with less, a concept that Chord also embody, especially considering their sound has most definitely blossomed into something much more than just a quirky concept. Really great. And WAY recommended for fans of Fear Falls Burning, Final, R.Y.N., Elm, RST, Vulture Club and other practitioners of guitardronedrift.
And just to make things totally confusing, the cd and the lp are TOTALLY different. Progressions is a single collection of songs spread out over both formats, so the record starts on the cd, and continues on the lp, the music on each exclusive to that format. So if you do want ALL of Progression, you have to buy both, although most folks would probably be fine with one or the other.
MPEG Stream: "EbMaj9 (Descent)"
MPEG Stream: "Gm11 (Pelagic)"

CHORD Progression (Important) 2lp 22.00
The return of high concept ambient dronescapers Chord, a sort-of side project of post metal heavies Pelican. Chord, as their name implies, only ever play a single chord, each track a different one, this time around it's EbMaj9, Gm11 and D6. Sounds boring, but it really isn't, in fact probably most drone outfits play one chord their whole career, but this, this is something more, with each member contributing a note, the notes forming a chord, and all of them playing different instruments, different tempos and timbres, the guitars shimmer warmly, the piano (?), swirls and drifts in a sea of hazy reverb, there seems to be some burbling bass too, it's all woven into something lush and dreamy, hypnotic and mesmerizing.
When we reviewed the first Chord album, we pointed out that we had come up with the idea of a 'chord' band on our April Fool's list way back when, with SUNNO))), Earth and Boris each tackling one of the notes, to make a mighty E chord. We still like to think that's where they got the idea. We also mentioned the late great Physics, a San Diego supergroup who always played a C, long spaced out jams, with multiple guitar players, always C. But as we mentioned before, Chord is a much more thoughtful project, definitely on the nerdy side of the spectrum, I mean, they made a song called "EbMaj9", and the group is as much about concept for the players as it is about the sound, but whatever the inspiration, the resulting soundscapes play out like our favorite guitardrone records. Smoldering slow burning expanses of deep layered thrum, hazy, washed out drifts of abstract choral blur. Whereas the other record occasionally built into Sunroof!-worthy squalls, Progression seems to be much more minimal, hushed and restrained, the only deviation is near the end of the epic 40 minute "Gm11", where things get full on heavy, a crushing avalanche of crumbling, superdistorted, blur and buzz, before slipping into the final track, a surprising bit of twang flecked folkiness, wreathed in a hazy buzz, and underpinned by some FX shimmer, but otherwise, sun dappled and dreamy, and for the record, all in the chord of D6.
And speaking of single chords, the most recent Austerity Program, besides being an awesome record, did something similar, in that they only ever used one chord, for the whole record, the band was appalled that no one noticed, but it just goes to show you what someone can do with a single chord, making more with less, a concept that Chord also embody, especially considering their sound has most definitely blossomed into something much more than just a quirky concept. Really great. And WAY recommended for fans of Fear Falls Burning, Final, R.Y.N., Elm, RST, Vulture Club and other practitioners of guitardronedrift.
And just to make things totally confusing, the cd and the lp are TOTALLY different. Progressions is a single collection of songs spread out over both formats, so the record starts on the cd, and continues on the lp, the music on each exclusive to that format. So if you do want ALL of Progression, you have to buy both, although most folks would probably be fine with one or the other.
MPEG Stream: "EbMaj9 (Descent)"
MPEG Stream: "Gm11 (Pelagic)"

CHURCH OF MISERY Boston Strangler (Kult Ov Nihilow) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Since we're listing the brand new Church Of Misery record, we thought we'd also mention that we managed to get a few more of this rarity back in stock, from the same label that brought us that new Boris 12"...
Cool 5 song collection from Japan's serial killer obsessed stoner sludge rockers Church Of Misery. The first four tracks were recorded over the last few years and of course concern all your favorites, the Boston Strangler, Ted Bundy, the Candy Man, and El Topo. Crunchy and fuzzed out loping stoner rock ala Fu Manchu, Nebula, Heavy Rocks-era Boris. Fucking great stuff. The fifth track is tagged on to track four and is ostensibly an improvisation, titled "Invocation Of My Demon Brother". Not sure if it's some sort of homage to Kenneth Anger, but to these ears it just sounds like more of that sweet sweet crushing tarpit sludge.
MPEG Stream: "Boston Strangler - Albert Deslavo"
MPEG Stream: "El Topo"

CHURCH OF MISERY Dennis Nilsen (Kult Of Nihilow) lp 22.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Okay stoner metal serial killer obsessives, you know who you are, even if you're loathe to admit it, time to rejoice as the masters of SKSR (serial killer stoner rock) return, Japan's Church Of Misery.
This ep focuses on UK killer Dennis Nilsen, a serial pedophile and killer, which prompted a conversation about what these guys would do when they ran out of killers to immortalize, but we were saddened to realize that it's pretty unlikely that will ever happen no matter how many records these guys put out.
But fuck it, you don't need to be obsessed with killers to dig this shit, just killer riffs. And the riffs as always are indeed killer. Huge bassy, sludgey, groovy, in fact the opening track on this 12" is so groovy it almost sounds like a more metal ZZ Top. Sabbathy to the Nth degree, lumbering rhythms that either plod or swing depending on the track, the vocals a growly croak buried way down in the mix, sounding not unlike Michael Gerald from Killdozer, super dynamic and stoned. Lots of break downs where just the bass and drums groove, before the riff swoops back in. Wild leads, lurching stop start bits,wild almost space rock outros, and of course, plenty of clips of Dennis Nilsen talking as well as various news reports. Technically this is a full length, even though the B-side is a single super extended stoner metal drug jam, and thus is only three tracks. Sabbath, Kyuss, Green Machine, Acrimony, Solar Anus, Ox, Bongzilla, if that stuff is your cup of THC laced tea, then you are definitely gonna want this.
Beautiful matte finish gatefold sleeves, and of course super limited, only 500 or 600 copies, and CoM records always go crazy fast.

CHURCH OF MISERY Early Works Compilation (Leaf Hound) 2cd 22.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Will the Japanese stoner sludge serial killer onslaught never end?? We sure hope not. We're finally able to list this double cd collection of old, rare, unreleased and out of print tracks from one of the heaviest bands in Japan. Corrupted may have the market cornered on sludge, and Boris definitely has the drone-dirge segment all sewn up, but that leaves Church Of Misery to duke it out with the equally brutal Green Machine for the groovy, druggy, sludge-y stonery BIG RIFF contingent. Early Works definitely helps the cause, with two discs bursting with splattery serial killer soundbites, plague-of-locusts riffery, skull crushing drumming, and a truly hellish howl of a lead vocalist. Plus unlike many of their metallic brethren, CoM can indeed SHRED, and whip out squiggly acid soaked leads at the drop of a hat, giving the proceedings a classic psych-rock / drug-rock feel, on top of the already suffocatingly heavy sludge already oozing from every crack. Disc one collects the long out of print split with sHEAVY, featuring odes to Manson, Charles Whiteman, and Jim Jones, as well as the Taste The Pain mini-album with songs about Dahmer, Graham Young, and Ed Gein, as well as an insane version of Iron Butterfly's "In A Gadda Da Vidda." Disc two collects lots of random compilation tracks including a Trouble cover, a Black Widow cover, a Death SS cover and an unreleased track. Church Of Misery are so amazing, it's too bad that their singleminded obsession with serial killers, and their continued use of serial killer soundbites keeps them from appealing to a wider audience. It is too bad, but who can argue? The music is strangely and perfectly suited to CoM's tales of murder and mayhem, victims and killers.
We still have a handful of other CoM releases, their latest The Second Coming and the limited The Boston Strangler, but not for long!!
MPEG Stream: "Spahn Ranch (Charles Manson)"
MPEG Stream: "Room 213 (Jeffrey Dahmer)"

CHURCH OF MISERY Early Works Compilation (Emetic Records) 2cd 13.98
Previously this was an import from the Japanese label Leafhound, sadly now defunct. But fortunately Emetic has just reissued it, domestically! Here's what we said about this essential anthology back when we first listed it in 2004:
Will the Japanese stoner sludge serial killer onslaught never end?? We sure hope not. We're finally able to list this double cd collection of old, rare, unreleased and out of print tracks from one of the heaviest bands in Japan. Corrupted may have the market cornered on sludge, and Boris definitely has the drone-dirge segment all sewn up, but that leaves Church Of Misery to duke it out with the equally brutal Green Machine for the groovy, druggy, sludge-y stonery BIG RIFF contingent. Early Works definitely helps the cause, with two discs bursting with splattery serial killer soundbites, plague-of-locusts riffery, skull crushing drumming, and a truly hellish howl of a lead vocalist. Plus unlike many of their metallic brethren, CoM can indeed SHRED, and whip out squiggly acid soaked leads at the drop of a hat, giving the proceedings a classic psych-rock / drug-rock feel, on top of the already suffocatingly heavy sludge already oozing from every crack. Disc one collects the long out of print split with sHEAVY, featuring odes to Manson, Charles Whiteman, and Jim Jones, as well as the Taste The Pain mini-album with songs about Dahmer, Graham Young, and Ed Gein, as well as an insane version of Iron Butterfly's "In A Gadda Da Vidda." Disc two collects lots of random compilation tracks including a Trouble cover, a Black Widow cover, a Death SS cover and an unreleased track. Church Of Misery are so amazing, it's too bad that their singleminded obsession with serial killers, and their continued use of serial killer soundbites keeps them from appealing to a wider audience. It is too bad, but who can argue? The music is strangely and perfectly suited to CoM's tales of murder and mayhem, victims and killers.
MPEG Stream: "Spahn Ranch (Charles Manson)"
MPEG Stream: "Room 213 (Jeffrey Dahmer)"

CHURCH OF MISERY Houses Of The Unholy (DIWPhalanx) dvd 30.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A killer live DVD from our favorite Japanese, serial killer obsessed, stoner groove doom lords, Church Of Misery. We've gone on and on in the past (and elsewhere on this list, their debut was just reissued) about how much we love these guys. Some impossible mix of Sabbath, Electric Wizard, Eyehategod, Antiseen and Boris. Heavy as fuck, groovy and spacey, blown out and super psychedelic. Live it's everything we would have hoped for. A band of crazy Japanese hippies in ripped concert shirts, bell bottoms, berets, dreadlocks, furry coats, big ol' silver rings on every finger, flying V's, on a tiny stage, heads banging, hair swirling, in a closet sized dark club, packed to the gills with a heaving, sweaty, head banging crowd. The sound is amazing. A truly MASSIVE guitar sound, huge blown out crumbling riffs, the band a whirlwind of lurching groove, and a bass player who wears his bass lower than anyone we've ever seen (even the Ramones!). SO low in fact, that the body of the bass is at shin level and he ends up sort of playing way up on the neck. Awesome! Three live shows filmed over the last two years, a handful of CoM classics as well as some free form freaked out space jams. Also included are videos for "Filth Bitch Boogie" and "I, Motherfucker" (best song title ever maybe), both look quite similar, filmed in creepy black and white, on fuzzy degraded film stock, haunting shots of two emotionless girls making out, dead bodies in forests, plenty of violence and gore (mostly perpetrated on the band themselves) and of course the band trudging through mysterious woods all very Sabbath-like. So cool.
Packaged in a blood red Japanese style DVD case. NTSC and ALL REGION!

CHURCH OF MISERY Live At Roadburn 2009 (Roadburn) cd 14.98
What do you get when you combine 4 hairy Japanese stoner dudes, an immense love of Black Sabbath, obsession with serial killers, and thee best heavy music festival that Europe has to offer? Church Of Misery Live At Roadburn 2009, of course!! Among our friends who regularly make the pilgrimage to Holland's annual Roadburn fest, the Japanese sludge merchants' several live performances there are legendary. Of course, the thing about Roadburn is they get bands to play who are great to begin with, and they tend to sound even better there... so for one to get singled out, gotta be amazing! Naturally, listening to this live album isn't the same as having been there. But it'll give you an idea, and any fan of CoM will be chuffed. 'Cause they did rip it up at Roadburn, and the recording is killer.
They do 8 songs, which tend to blend together here into one dope hazed, fuzzed out sludge fest, but actually represent two tracks from their most recent studio album Houses Of The Unholy, one from their 1998 debut ep Taste The Pain, one from 2001's Master of Brutality, three from 2004's The Second Coming, thus spanning their career quite nicely... and then they wind things up with their 11 minute long cover of "For Mad Man Only" [sic], a raving proto-metal classic from '71 by May Blitz also covered once upon a time by good ol' Fudge Tunnel, that's in fact how we first heard of May Blitz...
But anyway, yeah, CoM fans, get yourself to Roadburn next time they're playing, and in the meantime, jam out to this, sheer Sabbathoid stoner sludge, heeeaaavvvy and hairy and psychedelic, for sure! Also a good intro to this band for anyone uninitiated.
MPEG Stream: "I, Motherfucker"
MPEG Stream: "Shotgun Boogie"
MPEG Stream: "For Mad Man Only"

CHURCH OF MISERY Master of Brutality (Southern Lord) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The first actual full-length from these serial-killer fixated Japanese doom-mongers. Super sludgy psychedelic doom metal like a sloppy Sabbath with samples from documentaries about John Wayne Gacy and other famous murderers mixed into the musical mayhem. They actually sound less like Sabbath than a cross between Antiseen and Electric Wizard, as there's a garage punk element to this as well. There's only two songs on here not dedicated by name to a serial killer: "Green River" ('cause they never caught the guy, I guess) and "Cities On Flame" (an incongruous Blue Oyster Cult cover). Lastly, one must take note of the band's words on the back cover: "We hate the trend. We hate corporate attitude. We hate the word 'stoner'. Death to false stoners!! Let there be doom!!" Oh, one other thing: does EVERY metal band from Japan have to be compared to an atom bomb (like on the cover sticker here)??

CHURCH OF MISERY Master of Brutality (DIWPhalanx) cd 22.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Long overdue reissue of the debut full-length from Japan's serial-killer fixated Japanese doom-mongers, Church Of Misery. And when we say 'fixated' we mean OBSESSED. Almost every song either starts with or contains some kind of a soundbite from the evening news regaling the most recent atrocities committed by some killer, or an actual tape of an infamous murderer's wild rants and messianic ramblings. Each song is about (or at least based on) a specific serial killer, "Killfornia (Ed Kemper)", "Ripping Into Pieces (Peter Sutcliffe)", "Master Of Brutality (John Wayne Gacy)". Some folks (like Allan) find the serial killer angle a bit cheesy, but it's actually weirdly and perfectly aligned with the band's peculiar brand of downer doom. And as far as we're concerned, when we're talking epic stoner doom, few bands can touch Church Of Misery. Super sludgy psychedelic doom metal a bit like a sloppy Sabbath, heavy on the groove, HUGE riffs, raspy voiced vocals way down in the mix, a lurching drug drenched crunch, with blown out psychedelic leads, lots of wah wah, spaced out stretches of Hawkwindy ambience, super distorted bass rumble, and pounding furious drum dirge pummel. They actually sound less like Sabbath than a cross between Antiseen and Electric Wizard, as there's a garage punk element to this as well. There's only two songs on here not dedicated by name to a serial killer: "Green River" ('cause they never caught the guy, we guess) and "Cities On Flame", a killer (pun intended) if incongruous Blue Oyster Cult cover.
Plus who can argue with the band's credo, printed in big bold letters on the back cover:
"We hate trend. We hate corporate attitude. We hate the word 'stoner'. Death to false stoners!! Let there be doom!!"
Anyone who digs the rockier side of Boris (Heavy Rocks, Pink) owes it to themselves to check out Church Of Misery's massive, downtuned and druggy, sludgy and spacey, grinding and groovy, downer drenched DOOOOOM!!!
MPEG Stream: "Killfornia (Ed Kemper)"
MPEG Stream: "Ripping Into Pieces (Peter Sutcliffe)"

CHURCH OF MISERY The Second Coming (DIWPhalanx) cd 22.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
For all you Boris freaks and everyone who has been digging heavily on the recent Green Machine record, you may now prepare thyself for the return of Japan's stoner sludge, serial killer obsessed masters of crushing downtuned riffery Church Of Misery. Seven massive slabs of pounding, pummelling ultra heavy stoner groove. Crunchy and throbbing, pummelling and MASSIVELY HEAVY rock and roll. Fuzzed out, drugged out, super distorted and punishingly heavy. Quite possibly, you will have your stoner / doom metal credentials REVOKED if you don't pick this up. This time around, the subjects of CoM's worshipful sludge are Ted Bundy, Mark Essex, Andrei Chikatilo, Aileen Wuornos and more!
MPEG Stream: "I, Mother Fucker (Ted Bundy)"
MPEG Stream: "Soul Discharge (Mark Essex)"

CHURCH OF MISERY The Second Coming (Metal Blade / Rise Above) cd 12.98
Originally released in 2004, this long out of print (at least on cd), classic slab of serial killer obsessed, stoner sludge, downtuned heaviness from these Japanese doomlords finally gets a spiffy new cd reissue via Metal Blade!
Seven massive slabs of pounding, pummelling ultra heavy stoner groove. Crunchy and throbbing, pummelling and MASSIVELY HEAVY rock and roll. Fuzzed out, drugged out, super distorted and punishingly heavy. Quite possibly, you will have your stoner / doom metal credentials REVOKED if you don't go nuts for this, although odds are most of you already have a little thing for these freeks. As always, each song is based on an infamous serial killer, this time around, the subjects of CoM's worshipful sludge are Ted Bundy, Mark Essex, Andrei Chikatilo, Aileen Wuornos and more! And it's just as sonically depraved as that sort of subject matter demands. Churning riffage, knuckle dragging drum pound, howled vox, thick sinewy bass grooves, all peppered with plenty of ultra creepy samples and snippets from various newscasts, detailing the killers' grim transgressions, all set to some fantastically punishing, ribcage rattling, slo-mo lumbering Sabbathy swing.
Fans of Boris, Green Machine, Eternal Elysium, Bongzilla, Eyehategod, Sleep, High On Fire and other heavy groovies should already have a shelf full of CoM records, but if some reason they (you?!) don't this is as good a place to start as any...
MPEG Stream: "I, Mother Fucker (Ted Bundy)"
MPEG Stream: "Soul Discharge (Mark Essex)"

CHURCH OF MISERY Vol. 1 (Emetic Records) cd 15.98

CHURCH OF MISERY Volume 1 (Emetic) lp + 7" 24.00

CIRITH UNGOL Frost And Fire (Metal Blade) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
While supplies last, cheap copies of the first two Cirith Ungol classics, Frost And Fire (1981) and King Of The Dead (1984)! True heavy metal cult material here, epic, rockin' and Elric-style doomed.

CIRITH UNGOL King Of The Dead (Metal Blade) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
While supplies last, cheap copies of the first two Cirith Ungol classics, Frost And Fire (1981) and King Of The Dead (1984)! True heavy metal cult material here, epic, rockin' and Elric-style doomed.

CISNEROS, AL Dismas / Version (Sinai) 7" 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The very first solo record from Al Cisneros, he of stoner sludge gods Sleep, and minimal doom heavies OM, and the first release on his Sinai label, which might have you expecting a sweet slab of downtuned heaviness, or slo-mo bass heavy minimalism, and actually you wouldn't be far off. But this is not metal, or doom, or even rock, this in fact a straight up DUB record. We're not surprised, as Cisneros has been ordering dub records from us for a while, but fans of OM at least shouldn't be that surprised either, as that group's sound was definitely heavily influenced by classic dub. And while Cisneros' first stab at pure dub is pretty excellent, it's also not hard to imagine it being reimagined as a proper OM track, but here, it's all dub, low slung woozy bassline, spare simple rhythm, what sounds like tablas, the vibe a little bit Muslimgauze, a little bit King Tubby, the sound lush and thick, rife with sampled vocals, chiming melodies, dark, droney, druggy and seriously dubby, crank the bass and blast this through your system.
And of course it's a dub single, so the flipside is the 'version', most of the vocals stripped away, or doused in echo and delay and spent swirling into the ether, super minimal and mesmerizing, the focus on the groove of the bass, and the rhythm, totally heady and hypnotic, WAY too short on a 7", it's the sort of jam you want to stretch out forever. Here's hoping there's a dub full length in the future, but for now, grab one of these before they're gone, as they're extremely limited. Housed in a plain white sleeve.
MPEG Stream: "Dismas"
MPEG Stream: "Version"

CISNEROS, AL Teresa Of Avila / Levitation Dub (Sinai) 7" 7.98
Solo single #2 from Al Cisneros, mastermind of tranced out psych-doom outfit OM, and former bassist for late great stoner sludgelords Sleep, who has never been shy about his love of dub, that dub-love influencing the sound of OM more and more with every record. But these self released 7"s seem to be a showcase for Cisneros to experiment with making proper, classic sounding old school dub, and it sounds as good as you might think.
The A side here is a loping, looped sprawl of hypno-dub mesmer, that sounds more like Muslimgauze or African Head Charge (much like the OM dub remix 12"s reviewed elsewhere on this week's list). The melodies are woozy, Eastern tinged, the beat is a motorik, almost industrial sounding shuffle, the bassline languid and liquid, the A side here almost sounds like a single measure looped for the whole of the side, totally tranced out and circular, in fact it almost sounds like old classic Circle slowed away down, that same sort of head nodding murky groove. The flipside begins with a bit of ambient drift, but soon locks into a similar groove, the sound reminding us also of minimal techno / heroin house, but way more murky and hazy, clouds of swirling ambience shift slowly above that main loop that could go on forever, and for the length of these two sides nearly does.
Like the first single, absolutely recommended, and also like that single, VERY limited...
MPEG Stream: "Teresa Of Avila"
MPEG Stream: "Levitation Dub"

CLOACA Lassitude (Lone Vigil Recordings) cd 13.98
Lassitude is the very first release from the just launched UK label Lone Vigil, and is the debut of black industrial post metal doomlords Cloaca. Both the label and the band are fronted by Chris Naughton, he of doomsludge masters Atavist and neo pagan black metallers Winterfylleth, but Cloaca is a whole different beast than either of those two outfits, and while most descriptions peg Cloaca as 'experimental industrial doom', that might be a bit misleading. It might have you picturing a churning avant Godflesh or some sort of machinelike downtuned Swans, when in fact, the sound of Cloaca is much more organic, and much closer to the slow build post metal of groups like Pelican, Neurosis, Cult Of Luna, Snowblood, and Isis, the guitars lush and warm, the songs sprawling epics, with spiralling melodies, and dense tribal drumming, brooding and majestic, like a blackened Godspeed, building to explosive howled churning ultra metal blow outs, that transform into roiling chugging grooves, heavy and motorik and mesmerizing.
The songs spend much of their time drifting dreamily, spidery guitar melodies draped over loping post rock rhythms, and when they do get heavy, it's not always explosive crescendos, the band can lock into a riff and ride it out like some sort of black doom post metal Hawkwind, extended psychedelic cosmic metal jams that destroy, heaving hypnotically, thick sonic swells that churn and roil and eventually do explode into some serious heaviness, but it's not just big chords there either, the band get super dense and complex, start stop rhythms, mathy arrangements, thick and convoluted and so so heavy.
Throughout the record, Cloaca deftly flit from moody drift to soaring majesty, to metallic crush, wrapping impossibly hooky melodies and strange disembodied sampled voices around thick slabs of metallic hypnorock, a sound that's definitely hard to make your own, but these guys have definitely staked their claim on this chunk of epic brooding heaviness, that we would imagine few would be able to challenge.
Definitely essential listening for fans of Rosetta, Baroness, the Body, Grails, The Ocean, Angel Eyes, Tides, Souvenir's Young America, Mouth Of The Architect, Irepress, Indian, Conifer and other post metal alchemists...
MPEG Stream: "The Golden Path"
MPEG Stream: "Ghost Town"

CLOTTED SYMMETRIC SEXUAL ORGAN (CSSO) Are You Excrements? (Morbid) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This underground Japanese band surprised and delighted us with this crazy fuzzed-out stoner-rock meets grind metal release. Clotted Symmetric Sexual Organ (let's just call 'em CSSO) really kick 'em out, wallowing in total wahwah-happy heavy psych guitar overdrive. It's wild and distorted and super-energetic, a blend of '60s garage, '70s hard rock, and '90s noise-thrash. Forget Acid Mothers Temple, this is the real Japanese freak-beat! Indeed, CSSO could learn Kawabata Makoto a thing or two about over-the-top motorpsycho guitar. Imagine AMT or High Rise with a garagey Guitar Wolf edge, going nuts with that style of psychedelic freakout, then breaking into a speedy grind part with blast beats and cookie monster vocals! It's like a weird, wonderful mix of The Groundhogs and Napalm Death or something. When CSSO's stoner/grind rock attack isn't going full-tilt they throw in spacey sections of shoegazing drone tones, trippy electronics, and other cosmic krautrock inspired soundz -- sometimes sheer, blissful noise. Then it's back to the catchy rockin' stuff, like Hendrix gone grind. Like AMT or the Boredoms, they can be quite playful and confounding -- for instance, one song features what might be the world's longest fade-in, it's two minutes before you can really hear anything at all!
Partially 'cause this was so unexpected (we thought they might be a good but generic grindcore band) but also because it's so great, this just totally blew us away. A new favorite in the long line of genre-bending, rule-defying bands from Japan (Boredoms, Melt Banana, Boris, et. al.), and thus highly recommended!
RealAudio clip: "Cosmic Super Strong Odure"
RealAudio clip: "Living Dead A Go Go"
RealAudio clip: "Are You Excrements?"

CLOUDS Legendary Demo (Hydra Head) cd 14.98
One of the Cave In dudes (guitarist Adam McGrath) goes nuts with hard rock/punk/psych/dub side project. Yes, that's what we just said. And name-checks Captain Beefheart and Frank Zappa in the thanks list. It's all over the place but actually pretty cool. In fact, it's one of those side projects that make you wonder why dude didn't save some of these ideas to spice up his main band's next album, y'know? Blowing off some creative steam on a "legendary demo" put together with some hometown friends is just psychologically easier we guess. So we're glad Hydra Head pressed this to cd, and even if you don't care about the proggy metalcore of Cave In you still might totally dig Clouds.
This starts off with a couple shitkicking tracks of behind-the-chicken-wire hard rock/metal with badass boogie '70s riffage and guitar wailing, a bit like Bay Area heroes Drunk Horse. As this goes on, a few short, sharp punk rock turns are taken, things quickly steaming back into the stoner rawk realm tho ("Party Grunge" being a minute-long, aptly titled blast from both angles). Penultimate track "Magic Hater" manages to segue from a hardcore intro into a freaked out, blues'd n' boozed Beefheart homage. That barely preps you for this album's psychedelic 20 minute finale, "Quartulli Dub", featuring Funhouse saxophone skronk, backwards guitars, and yeah, dubby rhythms and FX. By the time all's said and done, you'll realize your Comets On Fire albums have a new best friend.
MPEG Stream: "Mountain Jim"
MPEG Stream: "Quartulli Dub"

COFFINS Ancient Torture (Deep Send Records) 2cd 22.00
Ahhh Coffins. Japan's masters of primitive, dirgey, filthy, crusty death metal return with this massive double disc collection gathering up all the group's singles, splits and compilation tracks, including the tracks from their splits with Otesanek and The Arm And Sword Of A Bastard God, which we'd carried in the past. But besides those, we'd basically heard almost none of the rest of this, and like their records proper, this is some fantastically ruling heaviness, sludgey downtuned pummel colliding with classic old school death metal crush, resulting in a nearly two hour barrage of grunted and belched demonic vokills, pounding skull caving drum damage and of course plenty of sick, murky metallic riffing. The song titles alone tell much of the story: "Eat Your Shit", "Corpse Parade", "The Cracks Of Doom", "Abysmal Blood Sea", "Cremated Remains", "Wasteland Of Terror", "Decapitated Crawl", "Bonesawer", "Acid Orgy", we could go on but you get the drift, the music sounds exactly how it would have to to go with those titles, the sound slipping from dirgey doom sludge lumber, to stumbling blasting DM blowout, but even in dirge mode, the songs are peppered with frantic riffing and double kick drumming, and similarly, even when blasting away, the sound oozes and creeps, the band sounding like they could collapse at any moment and slip right back into a blackened tarpit creep. Way recommended for fans of Acid Witch, Decepitaph, Skeletal Spectre, Wooden Stake, Hooded Menace and other modern old school death metal outfits, as well as classic combos like Autopsy, Dismember, Hellhammer and the likeÉ
Comes housed in a massive 8 panel double digipak.
MPEG Stream: "Eat Your Shit"
MPEG Stream: "Corpse Parade"
MPEG Stream: "Offalgrinder"
MPEG Stream: "The Cracks Of Doom"
MPEG Stream: "Abysmal Blood Sea"

COFFINS / OTESANEK s/t (Parasitic) cd 15.98
We listed the lp version of this a list or two back, another killer slow and low matchup, this time it's Japan's doom sludge crustlords Coffins, versus Philadelphia's masters of doomic ultra slow motion trudge, Otesanek, but now we've got it on cd, so for those of you sans turntable, or those who prefer your brutality digitized, now's your chance...
Coffins blow through three tracks, spending most of their time pounding out downtuned nineties Earache style crust, like Carcass or Napalm Death or Discharge only at 16rpm, thick sludgy guitars seriously scary ultra low guttural vocals, blasting chaotic drumming, with all three tracks occasionally bursting into full on furious pummeling black thrash, but those blasts usually settle right back down into more lurching and pounding brutality (with a bunch of killer old school leads tossed in as well!). They even finish off with a Goatlord cover! How cult is that?
Otesanek counter with a seriously looooooooooong stretch of 3 rpm slow motion, glacial ultra doooooooooom. Think Khanate, Bunkur, Moss, but then think slower, meaner, maybe even weirder...
Guitars roar and then ring out forever, the buzzing crumbling riffage drawn out until the next crushing blow, huge drum plods are spaced miles apart, the vocals are sick and super harsh (one of the vocalists is a woman too, both sound demonic and fucking frightening!), angular grinding guitars, occasional stumbling chaotic drum fills, haunted tortured voices way off in the distance, bits of scrape and hiss, squealing feedback, all draped over Otesanek's grim bleak sonic landscape. This is about as slow and low, harsh and hateful, crushing and brutal as ultra doom can get before it just grinds to a complete halt. Awesome.
MPEG Stream: COFFINS "Evil Infection"
MPEG Stream: OTESANEK "Narcotic Hues"

COFFINS / OTESANEK s/t (Parasitic) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Yet another killer slow and low matchup, Japan's doom sludge crustlords Coffins, versus Philadelphia's masters of doomic ultra slow motion trudge, Otesanek...
Coffins blow through three tracks, spending most of their time pounding out downtuned nineties Earache style crust, like Carcass or Napalm Death or Discharge only at 16rpm, thick sludgy guitars seriously scary ultra low guttural vocals, blasting chaotic drumming, with all three tracks occasionally bursting into full on furious pummeling black thrash, but those blasts usually settle right back down into more lurching and pounding brutality (with a bunch of killer old school leads tossed in as well!). They even finish off with a Goatlord cover! How cult is that?
Otesanek counter with a sidelong stretch of 3 rpm slow motion, glacial ultra doooooooooom. Think Khanate, Bunkur, Moss, but then think slower, meaner, maybe even weirder...
Guitars roar and then ring out forever, the buzzing crumbling riffage drawn out until the next crushing blow, huge drum plods are spaced miles apart, the vocals are sick and super harsh (one of the vocalists is a woman too, both sound demonic and fucking frightening!), angular grinding guitars, occasional stumbling chaotic drum fills, haunted tortured voices way off in the distance, bits of scrape and hiss, squealing feedback, all draped over Otesanek's grim bleak sonic landscape. This is about as slow and low, harsh and hateful, crushing and brutal as ultra doom can get before it just grinds to a complete halt. Awesome.
Packaged in a super fancy, ultra thick, full color gatefold sleeve...

COFFINS / THE ARM AND SWORD OF A BASTARD GOD split (20 Buck Spin) cd 13.98
Geeze, that crusty doom label 20 Buck Spin puts out sooo much cool stuff we have trouble keeping up! Here's a split release we've had in stock since, uh, last summer, but forgot to list.
Coffins are of course the Japanese doomic death metal band that's been getting more and more popular lately (especially among the population of people wearing Celtic Frost or Autopsy shirts right at this very moment). On their half of this split, they churn out three brutal trax, including appropriately enough a Pungent Stench cover ("Bonesawer") in keeping with their old school death metal sickness. And I guess we hadn't ever looked at the credits before where it says who plays what in the band... doing so now leads to this terrible joke: Hey I didn't know You played drums for Coffins! hahaha.
On the other "side" of this, SoCal band The Arm And Sword Of A Bastard God, offer up their debut recordings, three songs of utter stoner death doom heaviness, sludgy with guttural vokills. Goes pretty well with Coffins!
Nicely packaged with rad cover art in an oversized folder thingie, a la stuff on aRCHIVE (or Half Makeshift's L'Anse Amort previous on 20 Buck Spin).
MPEG Stream: COFFINS "Mortification To Ruin"
MPEG Stream: THE ARM AND SWORD OF A BASTARD GOD "Annex Wasteland"

COFFINWORM When All Became None (Profound Lore) cd 13.98
We never really thought about Indiana as a hotbed for blackened doom-ed sludge, but all it takes really is one band to change that, and by the sounds of When All Became None, that band just might be Coffinworm, whose sound is equal parts Unearthly Trance and Eyehategod with a healthy dose of black metal mixed in. Crusty, filthy, raw, punk as fuck, but WAY metal, super dynamic and melodic, there's really not much to like here.
The first song alone, lays it all out for you, after a super aggro, stop/start intro, the band lurch into some seriously detuned doom, laced with howled vox, woozy spidery guitar melodies, and downtuned chug, before transforming into some midtempo melodic post metal, occasionally interrupted by blown out blackened blasts and stumbling doomic breakdowns. The vocals are incredible, a sort of crusty punk black metal hybrid, the guitars are thick and dense, the riffs epic and heavy, with plenty of groove, every song a swirling psychedelic cloud of sonic bong smoke, an ever shifting hybrid of doom metal, crust punk, sludge - but also a weirdly keen melodic side, that the band seems to try to be keeping in check, but it still seeps into all their songs, which is not at all a bad thing, but shit this fucked up and fierce, shouldn't be catchy to boot.
How about the warped lurching, melting guitar crawl of "Start Saving For Your Funeral", or the churning Cavity-like chug of "Strip Nude For Your Killer", or the almost stoner rock sounding crust of "Spitting In Infinity's Asshole", with its almost Electric Wizard sounding intro?
Fuck it, these guys rule. That's all you need to know. If the words crust, doom, sludge, black, psych, grind, churn, druggy, crushing, pummel don't already have you frothing at the mouth, then wethinks you just might be in the wrong review...
MPEG Stream: "Blood Born Doom"
MPEG Stream: "Start Saving For Your Funeral"
MPEG Stream: "Spitting In Infinity's Asshole"

COLD MOURNING Colder Than Thou (Buried By Time and Dust) 2lp 29.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The Buried By Time And Dust label, as their name implies, specialize (mainly) in digging up dusty old treasures from the vaults... of DOOOOM! In the past, they've brought us vinyl reissues by such doom metal legends as Witchfinder General, Pagan Altar, and Solstice.
This latest release digs even deeper into the underground. Cold Mourning were (are?) a bona fide cult doom metal band, from the '90s, based in the "misty and miserable" locale of Monterey, California. They released one full-length cd back in the day, Lower Than Low on Game Two Records, and also did a lot of splits, with the likes of While Heaven Wept, Officium Triste, and Twisted Tower Dire.
If you haven't heard of Cold Mourning before, you might still be familiar with their guitarist Angelo Tringali 'cause he's member of AQ faves Slough Feg (he replaced Hammers Of Misfortune's John Cobbett on second lead guitar some years back). While Slough Feg have their occasionally doomy moments, Cold Mourning are a much sludgier proposition, inspired especially by Saint Vitus, but more grim and freezing.
Their songs from the abovementioned splits are all found here, along with demos, previously unreleased rehearsal recordings, and more, circa 1995-'98, including their track "Boggy Creek" from the Miskatonic Records cd comp At The Mountains Of Madness.
True doom fiends will definitely want to get their doom on with Colder Than Thou. 'Tis for fans of Vitus as well as The Gates Of Slumber, for instance.
Deluxe gatefold double vinyl, packaged with an eight page booklet full of b&w live photos, demo tape covers, lyrics, etc. Suitably thick and heavy, LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!

COLD MOURNING Lower Than Low (Game Two) cd 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Indeed. The self-proclaimed California underground doom metal kings Cold Mourning present their first full-length cd release. Simple, slow, crushing stuff, almost more punk than metal (they even do a Discharge cover). Definitely one for Saint Vitus fans, although the vocals are a bit...rough. So if you're a stickler for good vocals, take a pass. But if sub-Sabbath heaviness is more your priority, go ahead and check 'em out.

COLOSSLOTH Antipathy (Doom-Mantra) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another entry in the ever expanding field of sound making we've dubbed doomdronedirge, from a group called Colossloth. It's a sound we've come to love, we just can't get enough of that creepy downtuned crawl, that sprawling rumbling ambience, it's doomy, but not metal, heavy, but not riffy, it's more like dronemusic infused with a degree of menace, an ominous blackness, think Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, Wicked King Wicker, R.Y.N., Amort, Haptic, Grief No Absolution, and yeah even SUNNO))) to a certain degree.
Colossloth add their own twist to the proceedings, injecting their sound with a hit of industrial ambience, and some haunting piano, the result is entrancing, totally bleak and beautiful, a single epic doomscape, split into two side long drifts, all simple looped pounding rhythms and layered feedback, laced with muted bits of crunch and whir, rumble and creak, while throughout, a piano plays out a mournful melody, strings are plucked, melodies surface and unfurl before slipping back into the miasma, a mysterious minor key sonic dirge, some sort of funereal martial industrial doom drone trudge, mesmerizing and cinematic, this would be the perfect soundtrack for some Italian horror film, with the main character, in some sort of fugue state, hallucinating, wandering through an old empty house and out into the black forest...
Gorgeous and creepy and intense, but also weirdly pretty, the hushed melodic creep constantly battling with the crunch and hiss of the gloomy industrial drift, woven into a perfectly ominous dirgedronedoomdreamscape. AWESOME.
LIMITED TO 300 COPIES!!!!

COLOUR HAZE Tempel (Elektrohasch) cd 16.98
Customers have been bugging us for a while now to track down some music from German psychedelic stoner rock outfit, and boy are we glad we did. Huge Hendrixian guitars, sun baked and lysergic, like someone snuck into Kyuss's old practice space and swiped THAT guitar tone, but then somehow managed to make it even MORE druggy and fuzzy. Furious blown out space rock jams, that are HUGE and THICK with snarling psychedelic guitars and pounding drums. But Color Haze balance these drug fueled freakouts with long stretches of jazzy shuffle, shimmering cymbals, muted riffing, simple throbbing bass, but it only sets you up to have you head caved in when the hammer falls. And fall it does, hard and heavy and so gloriously downtuned and freaked out.
And the Hendrix thing is actually not all that far off, we might mention Santana too. Color Haze are a weird mash up of epic heart-of-the-sun space rock a la Monster Magnet and Hawkwind, super overblown acid fried stoner rock a la Kyuss, but with plenty of that classic Hendrix guitar fuzz, and dreamily psychedelic Santanian stretched out jams.
Not sure exactly what it is about these guys, but when they lock into a jam, we get totally lost, completely carried away, and when the track finally winds down, we sort of shake our head, all bleary eyed, and try to remember where the hell we are and how we got there. Which probably tells you all you need to know about the potency of these super stoned, drug drenched, space rock freakouts for sure.
MPEG Stream: "Aquamaria"
MPEG Stream: "Fire"
MPEG Stream: "Tempel"

COMBAT ASTRONOMY Dreams No Longer Hesitate (Zond) cd 11.98
A couple years back, we raved about a disc called The Dematerialized Passenger, the first album from this unique band (or perhaps we should say project), remember? In case you don't, here's the deal: Combat Astronomy are a USA/UK collaboration, creating a crushing industrial/jazz/prog hybrid. Imagine Godflesh with a free improv horn section, saxophones squealing amidst the metallic riffage. Or Scorn taking a skronked-out stab at chamber music. Like their earlier release, this new Combat Astronomy opus is again laced with punishing, rigid drummachine beats, along with heavy, uber-low-end fretless bass shaking each song with doomic distortion. Which establishes an absurdly heavy context for sax, clarinet, flute and bassoon to freak out organically, like wild weeds creeping through cracks in giant slabs of concrete, on the floor of an abandoned factory somewhere.
But unlike their all-instrumental debut, this time Combat Astronomy have recruited a female vocalist, Elaine di Falco, who also plays some piano, to add yet another unusual dimension to their mashup of extremes, now reminding us slightly of James Plotkin's now forgotten post-Old project Flux. (Hmm, maybe Kayo Dot and later Ulver could be other comparisons now too.) If the addition of her vocals makes this a bit more overtly melodic, it's still no less extreme overall. And certainly just as intricate, her delicate vocal arrangements in themselves quite complex, multi-tracked, as on the urban R&B influenced (???? no, we're crazy) "Touch The Moon" and the album's whispery coda, "Ordinary Miracles". And the focus of CA is still on the ominous grooves, ambient electronics, and battling horn bleats... tracks like "Alive Inside Eternity" and "Sentinel" are lengthy epics (12:36 and 16:49, respectively) of serious beats and blats and skree, in the challenging, compelling, militant manner to which actually only Combat Astronomy can truly lay claim. The vocals, when present, then take it into another, equally unlikely, atmospheric realm of twisted prog-pop. Pretty darn cool!
MPEG Stream: "I Can't Breathe"
MPEG Stream: "Lightning In Her Eyes"
MPEG Stream: "Alive Inside Eternity"

COMBAT ASTRONOMY Earth Divided By Zero (Zond) cd 11.98
You don't really hear much about Combat Astronomy, except from us at Aquarius Records (do you?). Which is weird, 'cause this band should be a lot better known than they are, among fans of heavy and/or freaky music, considering they're already on their third (and a half, counting a split) cd release, one that has been long awaited, for a certain subset of AQ-customers in the know. For those not in the know, we'll say that basically CA sound like a Justin Broadrick or Kevin Martin industrial metal act (Godflesh or God, something along those lines) mixed up with freeform improv horn-skree, for results both brutal and beautiful. This band, or we should say this collaborative trans-Atlantic project, to be precise, is the unholy spawn of American sub-bass sludge technician Jamie Huggett and British improv reedsman Martin Archer (and friends). Thus they don't play live that often, which might have something to do with their low profile. They're self-described as an "intense hypnagogic industrial/jazz/prog/doommetal hybrid", and we can't think of any other outfit that better fits that mouthful. As we now know to expect, CA's new disc dishes out uber heavy doomic annihilation, bludgeoning with squelching bass and machine-like beats, the entire thing in fact percussive in its distorted rhythmic impact, amidst ominous organ and rising electronic drone. Yet CA also has a prog/classical side, thanks to Archer's woodwinds and also some female vocals, first introduced to this previously all instrumental act on their 2nd album Dreams No Longer Hesitate, returning here only wordessly, to eerie, avant garde effect. With that in mind, and all the heavy bass, Magma fans might find this to be their extreme sludge combo of choice. We'd also of course recommend Combat Astronomy to those who appreciate the likes of Painkiller, 16-17, Scorn, and even UFOmammut...
And Earth Divided By Zero might just be their best disc yet, keeping the expanded palette of sounds found on their last outing, but leaving aside that disc's occasional surprise explorations of vocal (prog) pop song-ishness, instead forging a more organic synthesis of what we REALLY dig about this unit, the grinding low end and squealing sax skronk, the heavy rhythms and atmospheric, ambient-ish interludes. Not that it's without melodic surprises, like how track two tries to lull us with a placid piano intro, shades of Bohren Und Der Club Of Gore... but soon enough the bass and distortion attack is back in force. Punishing, but such sweet punishment.
MPEG Stream: "Astralized"
MPEG Stream: "Parallax Of One Arc Second"
MPEG Stream: "Earth Divided By Zero Part 1"