LP Review: Let It Burn by REZN

Now this is just what we needed! It's been a pretty slow start to the beginning of 2017 for us guys at HP, we needed a bit of a wake up call to get our arses into gear, and it turns out that an almighty heavy slab of cosmic doom will do just the trick! Enter Chicago's REZN.

Coming across like a psychedelic Electric Wizard, REZN are making a huge noise on their debut full-length record; the guitars are tuned to their fuzzy maximum while the drums echo from the gut and the vocals drone into a tripped out phenomena. Opening track 'Relax' doesn't fuck about, and begins to pummel your senses from the start with its chugging stoner/doom riffs creating a wall of sound that will crush weaker individuals. Everything about REZN's sound is massive, the drum kit must need replacing after each set the way Patrick Dunn pounds away, but then at the flick of a switch they create delicate tripped out moments of hazy clarity, before you fall out of the sky and hit the ground with the massive riffs.

'Wake' creeps along like a Black Sabbath song that was dropped for being a bit too heavy, with lots of trippy vocals and bass lines that'll make you not even need those drugs to reach your astral plain of consciousness. But even in their quieter moments they can't stop themselves from being heavy as hell as the riffs and cymbals come crashing down once again. 'Dread' is the calm amongst the ongoing storm, a short instrumental moment of reflection on the havoc that has been caused so far. 'Rezurrection' comes across with elements of a Far Eastern space trip, standing the hairs on your neck on high as the band take you under their spell.

Let It Burn is an hour's worth of extraordinarily heavy cosmic doom that dips its toes into a lot of stoner and psychedelic elements with spectacular results. It crushes your soul, and that's all we can really ask for.

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King Buffalo: Live Review-Orion

I recently had the chance to catch up with our brothers from Rochester, New York, King Buffalo at Pittsburgh's own Club Cafe. Freeing myself from the mundane activities of a Tuesday evening for the enigmatic efforts of the New York natives I was treated to live cuts off of their freshman LP entitled Orion. A name fitting the spacey and psychedelic aura that has enshrined the trio since the falling of their 2013 Demo EP. If you have yet to spin said demo, do yourself a favor, scroll back a few words and click the link. Tunes like Pocket Full of Knife and Providence Eye don't just fall into your lap every day. The dreamy licks and spiraling rhythmic swirl of Providence Eye where near masterpiece material. Any fan of heavy psychedelia won't need too many spins to find that Orion is up to the task of satisfying those moist ears.

Orion delivers a psychedelic-punch that few modern day rock bands can deliver. Throughout the evening the Pittsburgh fans enjoyed Sean's guitar devotion and distortion pedal mastery which evoked a by-gone era of guitar virtuosos. Sure, there are tons of excellent guitar players out there, many that can incorporate the very same things with the right amount of distortion, but Sean and King Buffalo just let it come from the heart... and that my friends it what sets them apart. Scott and Dan's work pulse through the bodies very fibers, raising the hair on the sonically intoxicated listeners. Soaring higher, Orion's sub-structure of songs melds and fuses with one another building into an euphoric frenzy that complete the record. Subsequent listens only allow the listener to realize the immense growth King Buffalo have achieved throughout these recent years. Not only is it apparent throughout Orion, but even more so during a live set.

Orion is due out August 5th and can be purchased here. Pick up a copy and immerse your auditory cortex in King Buffalo's space-blues caravan or catch them on tour!

Members:
Scott Donaldson - Drums // Vocals
Sean McVay "Uranium Jesus" - Guitar // Synth // Lead Vocals
Dan Reynolds - Bass // Synth



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Song of the Day-Gnob-"Nomad"

"Nomad" is taken off of the recently released 3-song EP "Reverend Bill's One Way Trip". I'm not sure why more people haven't latched on to this band, but that is why we're here. This song is progressively layered with riff upon riff and eventually swirls into a dizzying trip filled with dreamy vocals, rabid drumming, hard-driving bass lines and searing guitar work. For more information, please check out the following links: Facebook | Bandcamp

New Band To Burn One To: RAMA

These Italians may have been around since 2011, but it’s only now that we can to hear what these years of practice and fine tuning have brought us, and it’s a desert-stoner-rock masterpiece in the waiting. The four guys from Turin, Italy, have recently released their debut three-song EP full of heavy drawn out psychedelic stoner riffs, combined with a delicate buzz saw drumming and mystical vocals that carry you off to a different plain, a much better place, of blissed out vibes and trippy attitudes.

These guys are more than just full of potential, they are the real deal, collating everything we love from a chilled out summer solstice day of head bangs and trips to astral plains, as well as worshipping the riff gods and solid song writing abilities, and perfecting every note, and throwing it directly at you. RAMA are something special indeed.

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Wiht - Harrowing of The North EP Review

This is one you don't see often, a real "zombie" EP- a newer record from a group recently folded with some bonus material!Wiht was a delicious little doom outfit which toured with everyone from Orange Goblin to Yob. A distinctly dark and texture rich record originally released as a 2 track album, this particular incarnation includes a 3rd, unreleased, bonus (End of the Reign)

1. "The Harrowing of the North"- 8 movements sonically depicting William the Conqueror's conquest of northern england. Excellent. This track is texturally magnificent, a range of ambient textures slowly mesh into winding and blistering distorted behemoths. Delayed contours shifting into beastly waltzes of doom, conjured sounds in 3/4 are pachyderm heavy. Swirling chorused/delayed shoegazing occurs in wild swirls until death-marches before turning into swaying ambient piano and beautiful layered synthesis. This great slow wave of death fades into a Pike-worthy battle command. The thing to note is how much time this band takes to really build each part, nothing feels rushed, but it sways in such an even manner - it's not long for the sake of being long, the intent is clear: it does not drag!

2."Orderic Vitalis"- Opened with down right disgusting bass-tones, the piece launches straight into a demonic sounding minor riff, the tension curls into eerie reverbed guitar lines that whisper and act as atmosphere as the bass drones. The band continues to flirt with lush reverb and delay, stopping in-between to place perfectly accented distorted riffs. A large canvas is drawn upon which the bass pounds the listener as long delayed guitars pierce through the foreground. The flirtation with a 6/8 polyrhythm occurs and the groove divides and freaks the listener. The guitar is both a mix of shoegazing fuzz and doomed out low-end in the tone department. A continuous build of ominous tension from the guitars whirls into delayed and reverbed-weirdness and grain until collapsing into a symphony of sine-waves and simple synthesis acting as a beautiful counterpoint to the range of contrast created prior.

3."End of the Reign"- Heralded by whispering ambient textures, thunder rumbles, industry, whistling wind-like feedback, and altered piano, the tune surges into a pounding d-beat style rhythm, before catapulting itself into a distorted sabbathian-romp. Sweltering into echoing, post-rockish guitar, the piece swells into a harmonized pentatonic gripping classic-rock inspired chord progression. The psychedelic echoed guitar is inescapable and gloriously wet. An excellent unearthed track.

For those of you interested, this trippy gem of a record has been reissued with the bonus track by Devouter Records here. 

The record is streaming on SoundCloud here

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Radar Men from the Moon - Echo Forever

Howls that reconcile themselves in obsidian corridors, the fretting dragged out death that lurks in the domain of clasps made for iron breathed-beasts. Or rather the concentration of one's consciousness in the unconscious creates echoes that rattle in-between. The creatures that dwell in the reverbations are consciousness fluxuations- That strange pseudo-psychedelic set of sentences is the only verbal way I can enunciate the groove driven echo-washed splendor that is Radar Men from the Moon.

1. "Echo Forever"-  A staunch modulation drenched piece which climaxes in an intense clashing of distortion and freakdom.

2."Atomic Mother"- This piece is marked by a pounding mid-tempo psychedelic rock beat and evokes the sound of She Loves Pablo and Kyuss, a notably desert vibe is felt. Shimmering chorused out guitars dote final build-ups and punctuate the dynamics.

3."Dance of Black and White paint"- Ominous delayed guitar that evokes Vini Reilly and early Pink Floyd manifesting itself in to layers upon layers of chorus and vibrato. It spins itself into a tripped out death-march!

4."Darkness"- Where the drummer really shines. It starts with a faced paced drumbeat and quiet echoing guitars. The dynamics are captured wonderfully as you really feel the push when the guitar drops into a fuzzed out wall of power. It lulls itself back and forth between swirling grooves and distortion-soaked power leads. The last riff lends it to the Sabbathian fervor of yesteryear as it caps a gargantuan sonic landscape.

5."Heading for the Void"- A repeating tritonal drone, switching  itself on ends of grooving modulation clean parts and violent distortion. It finds itself enveloped in a fuzzy climactic battleground of riffage.

6."Where the Earth meets the Sky"- Birthed in phaser sounds and lending itself to a freakish shuffle interpretation, it eventually winds up in a driving lift-off rock beat that evokes the sounds espoused by Hawkwind.

7."Avant-Garde Luxury"- A mish mosh of obscure strange noises flipping themselves into an unabashed heavy dose of prog-rock excess punctuated by post-rock minimalism. 11 minutes of ambient groove mastery.

Remember kids, when going to the moon always pack a light bong and watch the gravity. Give the Radar men from the moon a spin today.

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