Song of the Day-Deville-"Life in Decay"

"Life in Decay" is the first single taken off of the upcoming release "Make It Belong to Us" due out November 13, 2015 on Fuzzorama Records. The band is more determined than ever, and they prove it on this track filled with soaring vocals, off-the-rails energy and one hell of a killer riff.  For more information, please check out the following links: Facebook | Website

LP Review: 'Living Ghosts' by We Hunt Buffalo

Every once in a while you hear a band that completely blows you away, and like a rabid dog you obsessively seek out and devour their entire back catalogue without thinking about anything else. And it’s an awesome feeling. I can admit I had no clue who We Hunt Buffalo were before their latest album ‘Living Ghosts’ landed in my inbox (+ a side-note to all aspiring bands out there - YOUR BAND NAME MATTERS! I had to hear what We Hunt Buffalo sounded like...) ...but I now own all their material! Having built a solid reputation in their native Vancouver Canada, the three-piece have previously released a self-titled LP and two EP’s including ‘Blood From A Stone' (Review here), as well as supported the likes of Red Fang, Sleepy Sun, Band of Skulls, Chevelle, Danko Jones, Living Colour, and also direct support to Monster Truck on their Canadian tour. 

‘Living Ghosts’ is one hell of a chunky slab of heavy stoner rock. From beginning to end its packed full of fuzzed-up stomping riffs, pounding bass-lines and stadium-filing drums on tracks like “Back To The River’ and ‘Prairie Oyster' through to to the more spaced-out anthemic grooves of ‘Hold On’ or ‘Fear’. The album also has a real sense of the band fully flexing their songwriting skills, put together as an album rather than just a collection of songs. There’s an ebb and flow to the record, making it an experience to listen all the way through. No mean feat in the age of the mp3…

Forged in what feels like the vast expansiveness of the open roads of British Columbia, ‘Living Ghosts’ is an infectious and captivating record. It begs to be played at ear-splitting volume, to fully appreciate both the power of the production and song-craft. Having penned deals with Truckfighter’s label Fuzzorama Records (Worldwide) & New Damage Records (Canada), it seems these guys will be clocking up some miles travelling the globe in the months and years to come. I for one am gonna make sure I’m a part of it. If you like your stoner rock stadium-sized, check them out below. 

We Hunt Buffalo are:

Ryan Forsythe – Vocals/Guitar

Brendan Simpson – Bass/Vocals

Brandon Carter – Drums/Vocals

Follow the guys here - Facebook | Bandcamp

Song of the Day-We Hunt Buffalo-"Back to the River"

"Back to the River" is the first single off of the upcoming release "Living Ghosts". The album will be released on 25th September through Fuzzorama Records. For more details please check out the following links: Fuzzorama | Facebook | New Damage

Thursday's Triple Threat: Top Dead Celebrity, Geezer, Witchrider

Top Dead Celebrity – High Horse

The latest record from Salt Lake City’s Top Dead Celebrity is a ferocious beast, spewing out screeched hardcore vocals over a landscape of stoner/bluesy/punk songs, each one as effortlessly catchy as the last.

Opening with the bluesy riffs of ‘Ghost’, it’s not long before the guys kick start their assault on the senses with their own brand of rock, grabbing your head an shaking it until breaking point as the track continues to grow through levels of stoner, punk, with hints of a pop sensibility to boot. Top Dead Celebrity are a band to keep you guessing as to their next move, and they generally tend to creap up on you from behind with a blunt knife. A track such as ‘Runaway’ perfectly sums this aesthetic up by blending an aggressive six-minute song through practically every genre of music you’d care to endeavour without losing its identity as a rock song.

The rest of the record follows through similar channels of snarled aggression and catchy hooks, before the band throw a curveball with the spookily whispered ‘Pull The Knife’ carrying a Mark Lanegan Band style of musicianship, which proves a needed rest bite before the fuzzed guitar riffs of ‘The Closing’ throw the bricks back in your face, and the assault continues.

It’s going to be hard pushed to find a record with as many memorable hooks and choruses as this all year, and putting that alongside its brutality, the album is a benchmark to beat. With High Horse, these Utahans have ultimately created a great rock and roll record.

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Geezer – Gage

You know when a sound hits you, and it entwines itself around your very essence, matching its shape and flow with the contours of your body, a bluesy smoke-filled, whiskey flowing, primal sound which pauses your day for its duration? Geezer have created such a sound on their latest EP Gage, and it has the power to leave us transfixed, trembling in front of the speaker.

As the opening psychedelic blues riffs of ‘Ancient Song’ gently sway into your consciousness, you’re already drifting away on a smoke cloud of heavy blues jams, at peace, until frontman Pat Harrington’s vocals tear through you like a rusty cut-throat knife, wielding a sound of ancient wisdom and damning context. The musicianship of all the band is an impressive collective, soaked deeply in a Memphis vibe that can’t be faked.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that Gage was simply a gentle blues record as ‘Thorny’ delicately tickles your ears, but Geezer are a heavy blues band, and they bring the HEAVY when the phenomenal ‘Ghost Rider Solar Plexus’ kicks in with destructive fuzzy guitar riffs to melt the coldest of faces, blasting you through six-and-a-half minutes of sonic blues brutality.

The epitomised track on this EP, ‘Tales of Murder and Unkindness’, is a lengthy example of the range of musicianship that Geezer has to offer, steeped largely in a 1960/70’s hard psychedelic rock phase, with underlying blues riffs, and added stoner jams. Gage is a record which is heavy, not necessarily heavy in the sense of loud angry noises, but in its truest sense; deep layers of passion, soul, and grooves to make your soul shiver.

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Witchrider – Unmountable Stairs

With softly sung vocals masking over the top of driving stoner rock, it’s no real wonder that these Austrians are compared to QOTSA at almost every opportunity, and with the sound and promise that the later band had originally sparked, it’s as much of a compliment that Witchrider deserve.

Having signed with Fuzzorama earlier in 2014, their debut full-length Unmountable Stairs is greeted with much anticipation, of which the band carries with ease from the start. The band play a brand of fuzzy alt-rock that fits in with the hardcore troupe, as well as the poppier sensibilities of the genre. ‘OCD’ kicks things off with driving lo-fi riffs that yell out teenage angst, showing that these newcomers have something to say amongst their contemporaries. No matter how “pop” the sound becomes, theres always an underlying stoner riff and guitar lick waiting to burst out and remind you of just what the band truly have to offer (just listen to the climax of ‘Black’ for evidence).

Witchrider show that with fuzz music, you don’t necessarily have to be the loudest, or the most cut-throat, to excel: ‘SB’ is a soft grungy song that carries pounding drums throughout without needing to yell at you to grab your attention, while the title track is a space rock track Monster Magnet would stick on repeat. The Austrians can glide easily through many different genres with ease, making the record an exciting listen as there are no safety zones to fall into.

What Witchrider carry with them, forgetting all of their tags of alt-rock or mentions of pop and QOTSA, is potential. With their knack for being great songwriters, their preference for things on the stoner/fuzz side of the scale means that the band have the ability to take themselves onto truly great things. It all started with Unmountable Stairs.

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