“The bio for Salvation, the new record by Sweden’s awesomely-named Stonewall Noise Orchestra, states that they are “influenced by 70’s [sic] groovy rock along with many other sources of inspiration.” More retro/stoner rock? With a vague disclaimer right there in the bio?! I find this troubling, at best.” Join Fisting that Andrew Guy as he reviews this stoner rock album from the land of meatballs, Swedish fish, IKEA, and Angry Metal Guy himself. Chaos ensues. Sort of.
Members of Enslaved and Sahg don’t always do hard rock side projects, but when they do, it fucking kills! Norwegian rock hasn’t sounded this good since….well, ever. Audrey Horne is the real deal and Steel Druhm is here to give you the spiel.
Steel Druhm is back with more crap you might have missed due to the many distractions of your busy lives. This time, it’s an all-acoustic set by members of Stratovarius and Sonata Arctica. What? You don’t like acoustic sets? What kind of metalhead are you???
More Finnish music you never heard of? Yep, and this time it’s vest metal! Seremonia brings you some doom rockin, acid ingesting, 60s influenced rock with creepy female vox and Finnish lyrics. If that patches your denim, then read on, flower child!
Few obscure, under-ground bands find the level of respect and reverence that San Francisco’s Hammers of Misfortune has. These avaunt-garde weirdos have been doing things their way since 2001 and slowly building appreciation and acclaim along the way. Deftly defying genre tags and easy (lazy) categorization by reviewers like myself, they’ve churned out a uniquely progressive amalgam of NWOBHM, folk, doom and ’70s rock. So unusual is their sound, the only truly comparable band is sister/brother act Slough Feg, with which they’ve swapped influences and members over the years. It’s a pretty safe bet if you like the Feg, you’ll dig what the Hammers are cooking too. Of the two, the Hammers were and are the weirder, more experimental outfit and under the leadership of guitarist/vocalist John Cobbett (ex-Slough Feg, ex-Ludicra), they’ve traveled some strange roads but always packed truckloads of melody and quirky charm. After an overly long wait since 2008’s Fields/Church of Broken Glass, we’re finally treated to their fifth album 17th Street and its a reassuring blast of sonic strangeness, musical eccentricity and refreshing innovation. Although not crushingly heavy or shockingly aggressive, its plenty metal, hugely melodic, catchy and most importantly, original! If that doesn’t sound good to you, go read my diatribe about black metal.
A wise and Angry Metal Guy once said (earlier this week) that “retro is the new new,” and the trends in the angry metal world are surely proving those prophetic words true. We are up to our collective arses in retro thrash, retro power and retro retro. While new is always great, even the “new” new can be mighty fine, as with the latest release from Sahg and this wicked mother, Return to Zero from Sweden’s own Spiritual Beggars. This is the seventh full length from Michael Amott’s long running side project and respite from the melodic death metal world and although it’s as retro as retro gets, this is one slamming, jamming slab of heavy stoner/doom rock n roll.
