REVIEW: SPRIGHTLY MOANS - DEMOS II

So, a sprightly moan sounds pretty sensual to me. “Moan” is one of those words that I immediately attribute to a sexual act, even though most of its supposed synonyms refer to vocal exclamations of pain or sadness. That might reveal excessive information regarding my coital preferences.

Sprightly Moans are a rock duo based in Austin, TX, where the motto “Keep Austin Weird” adorns countless T-shirts and the bustling music scene encourages experimentation. Sprightly Moans keep their sound based in the harder realms of garage rock, with Jeff Olson’s drums invoking the frantic percussive work of vintage James Gang or Bill Ward’s work with Black Sabbath. Carving out their own grungy, modern take on psychedelic hard rock, they explore the wilderness between chaotic power and gentle melody, falling somewhere between bands like The Golden Grass and Gozu. Sprightly Moans play music for beer drinking, high-fiving, and billiard disputes, capturing the raucous spirit of a bar at last call, with rhythms that roll with tumbleweed abandon and riffs that can punch holes through sheet metal. On Demos II, their sold-out limited edition follow up to the predictably titled Demos I, the duo share three tracks of amplified rebellion.

“Brinkmanship” kicks off the jam and bangs heads with heavy blues and Dave Wirth’s high-register slide guitar. The thundering drums provide a deliberate, swaggering tempo that feels like the epitome of cool-handed confidence. Although it’s a noisy, jagged musical arrangement, the song sports a smooth vocal hook, although the vocal volume does seem a bit high in the mix during the verses. “Twin Kilns” rocks loudly, with vocals that sway in a jet-stream breeze over the pulsing guitars and drums, reminding me of Canned Heat covering Mudhoney. The song has a tasty crunch to it, and seems in danger of derailing at any moment, providing a sense of danger before Olson and Wirth takes the reins back. I love music that teeters on the cliff ledge and regains composure, and this song dances on that precipice like it could perch their happily for years. “Dots and Dashes” rollicks with Pearl Jam’s Ten intensity, if their songs were crusted with bong resin and desert dust. It’s the best performance of the album and makes me eager to hear more from these trouble-makers.

Three songs may feel like an appetizer here, but I’m confident they’ll lead to an upcoming entree that should have fans of classic rock, heavy blues, and Slint-flavored noise to salivate. Give Demos II a listen over here, and enjoy Sprightly Moans bringing the volume and the groove:  http://www.sprightlymoans.com/music/

And join their Facebook family over at:  https://www.facebook.com/sprightlymoans

REVIEW: GOZU - THE FURY OF A PATIENT MAN

After recently catching Gozu at The Eye of the Stoned Goat festival at The Acheron, Small Stone Recordings were nice enough to send me their most recent album, The Fury of a Patient Man. Let me  be the first to tell you, an album title has seldom fit an album’s sound so well. Mixing explosive metallic riffs with the buzzed fuzz of stoner rock and one of the smoothest croons in loud rock, Gozu’s music absolutely sounds like a guy who’s most often composed finally unleashing his demons and frustrations. Luckily, the result isn’t a crime spree, but a collection of catchy hooks that walks that fine line between melody and aggression with grace and confidence.

“Bald Bull” features the croon I just mentioned, a weapon provided by Marc Gaffney, that approaches falsetto without ever seeming shrill. It’s the epitome of cool, and he helms the album with a rare quiet swagger. This song is the perfect introduction to Gozu’s brand of crunchy rock and captures their style in three and a half minutes that invoke both Fu Manchu and Eagles of Death Metal while remaining a totally separate, unique entity. The album is full of memorable cuts that use pop sensibility while never feeling formulaic. “Charles Bronson Pinchot” blasts with some of the heaviest moments on the album, and even dips into psychobilly (think: Reverend Horton Heat’s “Galaxy 5000”), “Traci Lords” delivers soaring guitars (provided by Gaffney and Doug Sherman) that crash into a haunting stretch of headbanging-inspiring distortion, and “Ghost Wipe” charges ahead with the unpredictable energy of Tomahawk, just amplified one hundred time louder.

There are a few promising songs that have moments of brilliance but don’t fully click: “Disco Related Injury,” besides being my favorite song title in a long god damn while, wastes some killer opening and bridge stoner riffs with a weak chorus, and despite the fun clap-along percussion of “Salty Thumb,” the song never kicks into the next gear. The wild-card on this album is the 23+ minute closer, “The Ceaseless Thunder of Surf,” which rides its riffs like a wave and uses Barry Spillberg’s excellent drumming to escalate the potentially patience-testing song to an experience like a pleasant psychedelic trip on a beach after eating some exotic cactus meat. The song’s extended length is a risk that definitely pays off.

The Fury of a Patient Man is a versatile, dynamic release that displays significant songwriting ability and remains accessible while never betraying its roots as a heavy rock album. Gozu can groove with the likes of Acrimony and Queens of the Stone Age, who also took the foundations of stoner rock and injected the sort of personality and vitality that resulted in landmark albums for the genre. Gozu are absolutely worth your time and attention, and despite crafting songs with super-charged distortion and muscular riffs they’re never less than approachable. It’s the sort of music that acts like a gateway drug to welcome reluctant listeners to heavy music. Also, Gozu might be the band I would most like to watch a movie marathon with, starting with Escape From New York, then Serial Mom, followed by their namesake, and ending with something on the grand scale of the Bronson-starring Once Upon a Time in the West, to match their grandiose closing song. Their movie taste almost matches their musical talent, and that’s high praise from an elitist film school prick like me.

Check out The Fury of a Patient Man on Bandcamp here and purchase it for $10:  http://smallstone.bandcamp.com/album/the-fury-of-a-patient-man

Also, check out Small Stone for more awesome releases. They’re conveniently having a sale with selected $5 CDs right now, so load up on some good stuff:  http://www.smallstone.com/

CONCERT REVIEW: THE EYE OF THE STONED GOAT

The Eye of the Stoned Goat is a one-day concert event celebrating the stoner/doom/fuzz rock community with 7 hours of performances from a substantial lineup of talented bands. I attended the third installment in Brooklyn, NY, following two successful events in Delaware. Here are my increasingly-unsober notes regarding the show:

Saturday, July 27th. I’m walking through Bushwick, heading for The Acheron, a local venue that specializes in loud, heavy music, where I’ve seen amazing bands like Young and in the Way and Vaporizer. I’m drinking Jack Daniels Tennessee Honey mixed with a 20 ounce Diet Wild Cherry Pepsi on the glass-littered sidewalk of Morgan Avenue. Beggars can’t be chooser, motherlickers.

If I had any doubt who Brendan Burns was (the booker/creator of the concert series), all I had to do was look for the hardest working guy in the room. This dude was hustling task to task, from putting up last minute posters to managing merch tables to setting up equipment for the next band. I hope he had a few minutes here and there to enjoy the show, because he should be proud of the talent he assembled.

Band #1: Wizard Eye. I’ll admit, I prefer extreme vocals. I appreciate a good singing voice, but I love the menace of screaming or growling. Vocalist/guitarist Erik propelled their dirty riff rock with a hoarse howl that delighted my crusty ears. Their music felt like Church Of Misery if they had spent all their time smoking dope and watching science fiction instead of researching serial killers . With theremin flourishes and solid bass work from Dave (who looked like the Lorenzo Lamas of stoner metal), Wizard Eye were on point from the first appropriate squeal of feedback. Dave also insisted on adding one shorter song to the set to use the entire three minutes left available of their time spot, and I want to personally thank him, because “On the Banks of a River” pulsed with energy and ended the already spectacular set with a bold exclamation point. Also, Erik’s dreads are approximately 94 feet long.

Band #2: Geezer. In a Geezer press release it says they “wanted to bring the evil back to the blues, the devil’s music.” After seeing them live I can definitely attest that it’s music for troublemaking and last-call saloon fisticuffs. Chris Turco’s frenetic drumming and Pat Harrington’s leathery voice invoked reckless, outlaw blues rock that injected heavy riffs with trippy delta sliding guitar and truck-driving grit. This music had cheap whiskey and siphoned diesel on its breath and was looking to settle a few scores.

Band #3: Wasted Theory. Brendan Burns plays drums in this gruff outfit from Bear, DE, and joked with the crowd that they were playing songs from their “greatest hits” album for the night. To me they sounded like if Down was covering Ram Jam, mixing 70s swagger rock with groove-concocting metal. They’ve been around for a little over a year now and I think their inspired mixture of southern metal and northern mountain rock is all the evidence you need to battle any person claiming rock is dead.

Band #4: Borracho. If you close your eyes and listen to this DC band’s heavy boogie rock you’d likely picture each performer playing with cigarettes dangling haphazardly from their lips, two inches of ash burning closer to the filter as they jam with both immediacy and a casual sense of cool. Reminded me of Orange Goblin if they were fronted by James Hetfield, but they also invoke the majestic riffs of vintage Sleep. This power trio played with a sneer and filled the room with fuzzed-out biker riffs so heavy they felt tangible.

Band #5: Lord Fowl. First time hearing this New Haven, CT band, and they delivered one of my favorite sets of the night. They had infectious toe-tappin’, head-bobbin’ rock’n’roll energy that charmed the audience with an all-out blast of heavy jubilation. Despite some technical difficulties they nailed the coked-up swagger and sex appeal of Aerosmith while combining it with the positive vibe of Valient Thorr, inspiring everyone in attendance to party and drink hard, but smile even harder. Absolutely a band to watch going forward, I could see these guys being perfect for a bill with The Sword.

Band #6: Supermachine. These guys are from Portsmouth, NH, a really nice little city on the border of Maine where I had an unfortunate vacation at the tail-end of a crumbling relationship. Despite those unpleasant memories, these guys play the sort of sky-punching heavy rock that punches your ears so hard it’s impossible to think about anything but the crunch of the guitars. David Nebbia has some serious pipes, reminding me in different songs of Faith No More-era Mike Patton or Chris Cornell. Jay Fortin also has a truly beautiful Gretsch White Falcon that I was immediately obsessed with. Even though I’m a (mediocre) drummer, I found myself whispering, “It will be mine. Oh yes, it will be fine.”

Band #7: Black Black Black. Tough to pin these local Brooklynites down, as far as how to describe their sound. In turns somber and melodic, then bombastic and aggressive, they seemed to specialize in hypnotic noise rock but showed immense versatility. Moments of post-hardcore ferocity mixed with droning guitars, they definitely showcased a deft ability to play with tone and offered a dynamic performance. They also did a shout-out to JJ over at The Obelisk, who I briefly met and deserves the attention. The Obelisk is an amazing resource for the heavy (and all it’s sub-genres) music community and I was glad to be able to tell him that in person.

Band #8: Gozu. I haven’t read an interview to confirm this, but I was hoping this band was named after the brain-ravaging absurdist weirdo film by Takashi Miike. Every song felt like a relaxing exhale of orange kush smoke while driving a rusted convertible through a desert. Marc Gaffney’s vocals float over the enormous wall of riffs, providing a sense of calm even while the music is heavy enough to crush small animals that wander in its path. Doug Sherman performed brilliantly on guitar, though I did write down in my beer-smeared notebook: “Guitar looks like it might have been made for a child, or an adult with tiny hands.” In retrospect, I think he just had the guitar strap adjusted to play the guitar higher. I was not particularly sober at this point.

Band #9: Lo-Pan. The show closed out with these dudes from Columbus, OH inspiring the first good-natured moshing of the day, possessing a few high-spirited fellas to shove each other around to their groovy riffs that are loud enough to shake the pillars of heaven (don’t they, Wang?). It’s more rare to find heavy music this appealing and approachable than it is finding a green-eyed Chinese virgin. If you haven’t seen Big Trouble in Little China and don’t understand the previous references you have my permission to go wrestle naked with the sewer monster lurking on the back of Jack Burton’s truck. Lo-Pan’s sound reminded me of early Incubus (when they were awesome) mixed with the buzzed groove of Clutch or Fu Manchu. The audience demanded an encore, and for good reason: These guys flat-out rock with what seems like effortless command. Tough to find a rock singer with a better croon than Jeff Martin, who set up in the back of the stage, behind the drums. Beginning to end, they dominated and capped off a mini-tour with Gozu by pulverizing the Brooklyn crowd.

It was a great night of rock’n’roll so loud and heavy it made my pathetic, naturally-hairless chest grow a torso beard. Many thanks to Brendan for all the work he put into the show, and to each band for delivering a memorable night of awesome performances. I am a huge fan of events that celebrate a sense of community and The Eye of the Stoned Goat is exactly the sort of show that promotes creative collaboration and camaraderie. See ya for installment number four, Stoned Goat.

Check out the official website, and if you’re lucky there might be some merch left. Those Stoned Goat concert shirts look amazing:  http://www.theeyeofthestonedgoat.com/