“O Zorn! plays a fairly straightforward style with elements of stoner and post-metal. Texturally the band has some similarities with a simplified Mastodon, not in the least due to the somewhat nasal drawl of the vocals. The big differences are the structure and pacing. Shying away from progressive leanings, the music is staunch in its adherence to verse-chorus constructions.” Stone the crow (and rabbit).
“Transit Method delivers to us their newest amplified declaration, Othervoid. And it’s prog! Is that not what you expected? Truthfully, Othervoid carries prog rock that reminds me of stuff that doesn’t necessarily qualify as the most heady music—less 70s Rush and more 90s Rush if you catch my drift.” Mass prog transit.
The October Filter Report is here and we have some interesting things to break down for you. Get stuck!
“Last we met Howling Giant they were dueling with Somerset’s Sergeant Thunderhoof in groovy stoner split Turned to Stone Chapter 2: Masamune & Muramasa, which deserved a word, not a numerical score, to describe its quality. Howling Giant strung together a fun-loving single track with multiple movements, their meat-and-potatoes approach slightly outdueling da Hoof’s bombastic and flashy performance.” Howling at stones.
“I like metal to have an emotional heart to it. By this, I mean that, when I’m listening to a record, I want to feel that a band has poured some of itself into the music. Now, I get this is not for everyone and there is undoubtedly a place for straightforward riffs that one can just switch off and headbang to. That is not A Feast for Sorrow, the sophomore album from UK trio Urne, a band Metal Archives wholly inaccurately brands as “Stoner/Sludge Metal/Metalcore.”” Sorrow as fuel, pain as inspiration.
“Those familiar with Somnuri’s previous work can expect a similar Cobb salad of influences from early Mastodon to Helmet to savage NYHC. Somnuri and Nefarious Wave occasionally added passages of straight sludge doom in the vein of YOB, and the removal of these marks the largest shift in sound evident in Desiderium.” Sludge as a lifestyle choice?
“The time-dilating effects of the pandemic reveal themselves when considering Saint Karloff’s latest effort. Paleolithic War Crimes follows 2019’s Interstellar Voodoo, a platter that consists of a single forty-minute track. Interstellar Voodoo feels like it came out either two weeks or two thousand years ago; I can’t always tell which, but I swear I just read Steel‘s rave for the first time and filed the record away as one to dig into whenever that mythical chunk of free time presents itself. That album’s combo platter of songwriting brio and Sabbath-ian, Kyuss-ite riffage captivated our Hairy Knuckled Underboss. Four long years (that somehow also feel like four short weeks) later, Saint Karloff returns with a new batch of progressive occult rock.” Quest for stone fire.
“Despite a nagging sense that sludge, particularly of the progressive variety, has probably peaked for 2023, here I am, taking in another fetid puddle of progressive sludge, just in case I’m wrong. You never know, could happen. Denver, Colorado trio Vexing has been around since 2017, with only a demo and 2020 EP Cradle to its name. Now, however, the band is ready to drop its debut LP on a suspecting public. Suspecting because if you brand something as “progressive sludge,” it engenders certain expectations. Can Vexing confound these preconceptions on Grand Reproach?” Vex mix.
“Twenty-twenty’s follow-up, Phanerozoic II: Mesozoic | Cenozoic, dragged us through the Triassic and Jurassic periods, bringing us to our current epoch of existence—the Holocene. Ending that album with ‘Holocene,’ the closer stood out among the rest. Its lavish textures and feel-good beauty separated it from the violent cacophony of the back-to-back ‘Triassic’ and ‘Jurassic.’ An approach that the band takes for almost the entirety of Holocene. Switching gears ever-so-slightly to a softer approach, this new epoch in The Ocean’s journey embodies birth, growth, and life. But does Holocene capture the true spirit of this final leg? Is it worthy enough to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Phanerozoic I and Phanerozoic II? As with all great things, only time will tell.” World building.
“It’s been quite a while since I last reviewed anyone hailing from even close to my neck of the woods but, this week, I present for your perusal Servers. Hailing from Barnsley in South Yorkshire, UK, the band—the label blurb tells me they’re a quintet and then proceeds to name only three members—return with their fourth album, the follow-up to 2019’s Ad Nauseam. Servers take the title of The Vertical Plane from a book of the same name about the (apparently) infamous Dodleston mysteries in 1985.” To serve mankind prog.
