Nuclear Dog's Atomic Split: Colour Haze - "She Said" / Glowsun- "Eternal Season"

The  subjects of today's Atomic Split are both veterans of psychedelic metal music, Glowsun having released one full length album and an EP prior to September's release of "Eternal Season", and Colour Haze now releasing their tenth studio album, "She Said". While it's obvious that the latter are well established due in large part to their unique, intoxicating brand of psychedelic fuzz, after listening to the former's latest release there can only be confidence that they, too, should be well on their way to producing albums in the double digits just the same. The quality of the music today on Heavy Planet is blue crystal pure, and just as potent, infiltrating the very core of the pleasure receptors of your brain.

COLOUR HAZE - "She Said"

This band of three have always had the ability to produce an incredibly huge, full sound that belies their small roster, and here on number ten they once again reverberate through the universe with a force rivaling that of a supernova. Through ten albums Colour Haze's musical style seems to have progressed in parallel with  factors that are part and parcel of the aging experience. Many a young rock band, full of energy and enthusiasm, are able to produce high energy, high volume music, rich in scorching, searing guitars, hard hitting percussion, and driving, pounding bass notes, but as they age many of those bands tend to, not so much mellow out, as to expand their inclusions of various interesting sounds, incorporating new discoveries into the fold with the older established sounds, and perhaps experimenting with new influences that may not have made sense to them earlier in their careers. You could make a case the gifted musicians of Colour Haze have evolved in such a manner, producing music now that is never short on full out stoner fuzz and exquisite distortion, but is also intertwined with newness and innovation, amping up on sounds that perhaps are derived from jazz, soul, or other exotic styles. It is easy to hear the genius at play in this music, and just as easy to revel in its richness and power.

"She Said" is a double CD that includes many songs well over ten minutes in length. The songs are of a tried and tested structure while incorporating their latest evolution of sound, often beginning simple and soft and slowly building to majesty and power, a style that, while not exclusive to Colour Haze, has certainly been perfected by them, and again wielded here with perfect precision and grace. The opening track, the title track, is a perfect example of this, as is "Breath", the first track on CD2. A segue into something more traditional, and totally unexpected when listening through the psychedelic trip of the album song by song, is "Slowdown", the ironically named tune that is an uptempo, blitzkrieg assault of a rock song seemingly out of nowhere, nestled neatly in the middle of the bright and vibrant canticles of the remainder of the album.

It is a testament to Colour Haze's genius and passion for what they do when on ten albums they are consistent with their basic style of rock music, expanding on it enough for each release to make every album, each song, incredibly attractive and gratifying. They never have to resort to any gimmicks or trickery because their music has gotten stale . . . it has not grown stale. They don't have to worry about coming up with something artistically fresh and new . . . each album is fresh and new. They simply apply their genius and heart each time out and produce what is exemplary, dynamic, and enduring.

Band members:
Manfred Merwald - Drums
Phillipp Rasthsofer - Bass
Stefan Koglek - Guitar, Vocals

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GLOWSUN - "Eternal Season"

Glowsun, from Lille, France, are a three piece band that plays bigger than those numbers bely, with a larger than life sound, thick and juicy, chock full of beefy, gritty fuzz, pulse pounding percussion, and ten ton bass. Guitarist/vocalist Johan Jacob founded the band in 1997, and after picking up bass player Ronan Chiron and drummer Fabrice Cornille, began recording their first songs together, eventually producing an EP and the subsequent full length album, "The Sundering", which met with significant success.They were able to tour extensively throughout Europe with such heavyweights as Hypnos 69, My Sleeping Karma, and Dozer before returning to the studio to produce "Eternal Season".

Glowsun are the epitome of the epic stoner/psych sound while simultaneously creating a unique, indelible sound of their own, mixing bright, clean psychedelic intros and interludes magnified with low, loud distortion of guitar that carries the listener rapidly through an odyssey of many unique twists and inspiring turns. "Reverse", a prime example of their signature sound, introduces the listener/traveler to a wall of impenetrable fuzz before blending in with a magic carpet journey through space, time, and a sound continuum like none ever experienced. 

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