Written by: Continuous Thunder
What do early 20th-century serial killers, the Spanish Inquisition, and John Milton’s Paradise Lost have in common? Well, a few things, but in this particular instance, they partially inspire the first full-length album from Manchester, New Hampshire’s Dust Prophet, One Last Look Upon The Sky. Of course, these are all very dark and heavy subjects, but I can assure you that the band brings the musical heft to do them justice. Indeed, a weighty and apocalyptic atmosphere permeates the entire album, from the ethereal and mysterious intro track, “A Storm of Time & Space Part 1,” to the crushing resolution of “Bury Me Before Noon.” And the essential ingredients, the waves that carry you from shore to shore on this journey, are the almighty riffs! Dust Prophet provides fuzz-laden, head-nodding vibes contrasted nicely with quieter, haunting passages. This dynamic range is exemplified on tracks like “When the Axe Falls” and “Bury Me Before Noon.” Furthermore, ambient touches and other clever arrangements by bassist and keyboardist Sarah Wappler truly elevate the compositions and set them apart. The appropriately titled “Song 4” is especially rewarding, with new layers and complexities revealing themselves through multiple listens.
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 Greetings, dear reader. It is once again listmas 'round these humble halls. Time, then, to look back the music that has defined our collective year. The non-exhaustive AOTY smorgasbord hath begun.
My personal EP and album lists shall follow in (less-than) good time, but before we get to that, the community speaks. This list is a collaborative effort, with ten distinct music writers, musicians, and fans lending a few words. Hopefully the variety of perspectives results in a list containing at least one or two releases that speak to you! This, of course, is far from exhaustive--indeed, every single one of ye could undoubtedly highlight a vast number of deserving albums not appearing here. A massive thank you is in order to everyone who contributed words and energy to this lil' project. As always, we couldn't have done it without ye! Please check out the writer's respective projects and links. This list constitutes the first five entries, with another five to follow. Read on! This year, in an attempt to cover more music that would all-too-oft slip through the very large cracks, we're trying something new and novel around these parts. Namely, we're gonna actually publish the little one-off reviews that were previously (and arbitrarily) deemed too short for publication. In that spirit, here's a mini-review of a swampy single worth checking out.  Written by: The Administrator There's a lot that I love about the intrinsic qualities of stoner doom, but perhaps my favorite aspect is the fairly constant relationship between quality and simplicity. More often than not, stoner music striving to complicate the formula loses me, whereas the tunes that stick to a core motif with a grimy dogged stoicism tend to win me over. Despite a catalog only boasting six tracks, Chatanooga's own Dope Skum fall soundly into the latter category. They know their strengths, they play to them. Their tracks aren't overly complex, and that's the damn point. This new single, "Folk Magic," is the first new music from the Appalachian trio since the release of their debut EP in 2020. While several of the tracks on that project felt slightly long, I quite liked Tanansi, and was excited to see something new from the Dope Skum camp hit the ol' inbox. And let me tell ye: if you're in the mood for some swampy fuzz, "Folk Magic" will hit the damn spot. This is a great track. Plain and simple. From a riffcraft perspective, the comparisons are honestly fairly endless, but in my mind, Dope Skum's approach particularly recalls the heft and organic appeal of Bongzilla. There's a tangible weight behind the bluesy central riff, a plodding-through-the-mire. An homage to a long Appalachian tradition of generational folk magic, the track itself has a very strong sense of place, pulling both from the grounded instrumentation and the atmospheric cicada-laden intro. The vocals, which are bellowed more than sung, stick to a single simple refrain of the track's title. It's a simple approach but, illustrating the aforementioned tenet, one that succeeds mightily. One does not need a hooky chorus when repeated howls of "Folk Magic!" serve, in and of themselves, as an earworm of significant proportion. I can only hope that "Folk Magic" serves as a harbinger of more great music from Dope Skum. Give it a listen and consider snagging it from bandcamp here! 
Written by: The Administrator
Doom and thrash might not be the most common (or expected) bedfellows, but there's a certain appeal to the confluence of, say, Motörhead's breakneck bombast and Sleep's fuzzy weight. On their debut 4-track EP–Thrice Majestic, for those taking notes–LA's own The Cimmerian taps into the implicit speedy thrust and plodding gravitas of component genre parts, riding the pendulum betwixt the two with a delightful barbarism. The tracks herein do an excellent job of maintaining variation in terms of sonic makeup, which makes avoiding a track-by-track analysis difficult. It also makes selecting a favorite track near-impossible, as everything feels fresh and essential to the overall picture. In that spirit, let's dive right in!
Every Friday, a wagon arrives at the Sleeping Village’s crumbling gates, stuffed to the brim with our sustenance. Today is the day we must offload all this new music, and so, in the process, we thought it would be worthwhile to share some of our choice picks from this veritable mass of fresh meat. This is what we’ll be--and have been--listening to today here at the Village HQ. We hope you join us in doing so!
On the docket for today, June 24th, 2022: PAGANIZER, Horned Wolf, Tabahi, and 10,000 Years
This year, in an attempt to cover more music that would all-too-oft slip through the very large cracks, we're trying something new and novel around these parts. Namely, we're gonna actually publish the little one-off reviews that were previously (and arbitrarily) deemed too short for publication. In that spirit, here's a mini-review of a sweet, sweet bandcamp find.
Written by: The Administrator
People are always rattling on about the sophistication and the benefits of Spotify's discoverability algorithms, but I'm gonna be real for a second: if you are willing to put on a good pair of boots and go wading through bandcamp genres tags, you're inevitably gonna find some damn good shit. Case in point: today's album in question. I wanted some dirty stoner metal to sooth my troubled soul, and after a brief period of sifting, Electric Cult's appropriately entitled Fuzzeremony fell into my waiting arms. Sometimes it's simply that easy. On their second outing, Mexico's Electric Cult nail a delightful balance between scuzzy and fuzzy. Fuzzeremony consists of three tracks proper and a atmospheric intro, and across the album's swampy expanse, sasquatchian riffs and alternately melodramatic clean and throaty vocals plod a treacherous path through the murky mire. The doomy riffage is simple but catchy as all hell, and the rhythm section holds it down with a solid (and occasionally raucous) presence. The vocal refrains are relentlessly earwormy--take the wonderful chorus of standout track "Warlocks Of The Mangrove," which lends significant credence to the track's 6:46 runtime. The same catchy quality can be applied to closer "Rotting Beneath The Sun," which remarkably feels far shorter than its sizable girth might suggest. While the aforementioned tracks are highly memorable and maintain an energetic sense of momentum, "Temple Of The Crow" is slightly less successful in this regard. The riffs are hefty and the vocals aren't too shabby either, but the number of ideas presented simply aren't enough to carry the track for the entire length without distractions taking root. That said, the sheer quality of the bookending tracks lends Fuzzeremony, as a whole, a high degree of replayability. I've had this thing on repeat for the better part of two hours, and at this rate it has sufficiently oozed its way into my brain. In short? This particular bandcamp foray has been quite the success--Electric Cult hath been uncovered, and their prior EPs await my immediate attention. If you're in the mood for some stoner doom, you could certainly worship at a lesser altar. Electric Cult - Fuzzeremony was released April 30th, 2022 via The Swamp Records, Satan Monolithic Records, and Ruidoteka Records
This year, in an attempt to cover more music that would all-too-oft slip through the very large cracks, we're trying something new and novel around these parts. Namely, we're gonna actually publish the little one-off reviews that were previously (and arbitrarily) deemed too short for publication. In that spirit, here's a mini-review of a single worth checkin' out.
Written by: The Administrator
Fuzzy psyched-out stoner rock. I want it. I need it. Thankfully, AAWKS have delivered the goods on a silver platter, in the form of a fun new single preceding their forthcoming debut. "Space City" delivers exactly what it promises: Built on the back on the kind of trippy meanderings and monolithic fuzz we've only come to expect from the genre, this track doesn't stray terribly far from the classic Fu Manchu-ian school of thought. Notably, however, the hefty riffs aren't the only thing holding "Space City" together--like unto the masters of the craft, AAWKS inject their songwriting with healthy dose of melody and just enough psyched-out meandering to keep things from feeling, y'know, too grounded. "Space City" slows it down to a fairly plodding clip for a significant portion of the runtime, which is a smart choice, given the blissfully languid quality of the fantastic vocals. There's a sense of pure calm that ensconces the track as a whole. Indeed, this is the kind of music that practically demands the listener be A. chilled out and B. in the mood for some overt amp worship. While I do hope that the forthcoming full length demonstrates a modicum of variety across the breadth, this single is an excellent indication of AAWK's ability to write a high quality (and highly replayable!) stoner rock song. "Space City" bodes well for what's to come. Give it a listen below!
This year, in an attempt to cover more music that would all-too-oft slip through the very large cracks, we're trying something new and novel around these parts. Namely, we're gonna actually publish the little one-off reviews that were previously (and arbitrarily) deemed too short for publication. In that spirit, here's a mini-review of a Very Good heavy psych single.
Written by: The Administrator
Today's mini-review is brought to you by my noteworthy inability to get stuff done when I intend on getting it done. I first heard this stellar single by Kansas' own They Watch Us From The Moon upon release back in December of 2021, and it's taken a few months to muster the wherewithal to actually put my praise to text. I apologize to the band for my tardiness. In any case, we're here now. In a word (or rather two): holy fuck. "Return to Earth" is a magnum opus from a band that inevitably has another magnum opus in store. This 10-plus minute track is a stellar display of the mastery of craft They Watch Us From The Moon have accomplished in a relatively short time. Their heavy-psych-by-way-of-doom is heavy on atmosphere, and carries itself with a comfortable air that recalls the more cosmic sides of Slomatics and Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard, and perhaps a doomed-out interpretation of Meddle-era Pink Floyd. The multiplicity of vocal styles is a particular strong suit, with Luna Nemeses leading the pack with a simply delightful tone that sails comfortably above the instrumentation and various backing vocals. While spacious enough to leave the listener vaguely untethered, the track is ultimately grounded by the sheer catchiness of the refrain, which runs across the whole with a hypnotic consistency. While some may find the runtime excessive for the elements presented, I'm a huge fan of the borderline meditative environment that blossoms from the repetition of the stirring chorus, particularly in the back half. If this moon crew's next project contains tracks of this caliber, we're in for one helluva treat--which says something, considering how damn good 2020's Moon Doom! was. Bottom line? This is a stunning song, and if you enjoy stoner doom, heavy psych, or any related variations thereof, I can almost guarantee that you'll find yourself kicking back and throwing "Return To Earth" on repeat. 
Written by: The Administrator
Despite not having the largest back catalog or most widespread popularity, Wo Fat are one of those rare monolithic bands who deliver with such marked consistency that, as time goes on, their albums seem less like moments in a discography, and more like myths that comprise a greater lore. Their latest LP comprised of new material, 2016's Midnight Cometh, is no outlier. On this no-nonsense affirmation of their core aesthetic, swirling, psychedelic, and pseudo-hypnotic riffage paves the way through a chest-deep swampy ambiance. When I think "stoner," this album rises as a prototypical paragon of the sound and the style. Maybe I'm jaded for thinking it is such a prime exemplar, but so be it. This album simply reeks of smoke. It perpetually sits behind a hazy veil. This is stoner music of the highest order, plain and simple. |
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