#kyuss — Public Fediverse posts

Asbury Park, New Jersey’s Solace observes their thirtieth anniversary this year, and to celebrate it, the quintet emerges to share fifth full-length, Fading Failing Ruin. After dropping debut Further in 2000 and follow-up 13 in 2003, Solace has adopted a lax release schedule, doling out two more platters in 2010 with A.D. and 2019 with The Brink. Between those two albums, Solace welcomed vocalist/keyboardist Justin Goins, drummer Timmy Gitlan, and bassist Mike Sica,1 leaving guitarists Tommy Southard and Justin Daniels as the threads of continuity. Despite the band’s longevity, Fading Failing Ruin is my first encounter with these Garden State stoners and their hypnotic grooves. Seven years after stepping up to The Brink, can Solace’s Fading Failing Ruin reach new highs, or does it just go up in smoke?

In my estimation, stoner metal simultaneously sprawls over an expanse of possibilities while often being limited by an overdrawn subject matter and blending into a cloud of faceless fuzz tones. Luckily, Solace has honed a singular identity and stands apart from contemporaries and genre-mates. Though they hail from Jersey, Solace adopts the southern charm of Corrosion of Conformity, instilling a folksy swagger to Fading Failing Ruin that feels genuine and expressive. Besides CoC, Solace rubs elbows with Kyuss’ mellower rhythms and Cathedral’s riff-heavy trudges without ever risking confusion with them. Over nine tracks, Fading Failing Ruin guides listeners through ‘apocalyptic, infernal, and end time themes’2 by way of ponderous riffs (and track lengths) drenched in delicious, southern-fried stoner doom.

Picking up where The Brink left off, Solace smacks you in the gob with their doleful guitar duo and slow-burn song structures. “Spiral Will” kicks off with a defiant lead that gives way to anthemic verses and a chorus I can’t seem to shake. “Beyond Below” and “Malengine the Scaffold” operate in a similar space, beginning with fuzz-soaked guitars that construct sullen layers as tension mounts until Solace unfurls slick variations and solos. “A God Changes His Plans” and “Culling the Herd,” the shortest songs on Fading Failing Ruin, afford opportunities for Solace to cut loose, pushing tempos higher and putting a heavier emphasis on guitar theatrics, which Southard and Daniels excel at. Goins, meanwhile, croons with conviction, landing somewhere between Live’s Ed Kowalczyk and Pepper Keenan. His vocals are a critical piece of Solace’s sound, and where original singer Jason’s vocals fit the band’s style early on, particularly the punkier forays of their first two albums, Goins adds a renewed vitality as the band focuses more on controlled pacing. Lastly, Gitlan and Sica’s rhythm section supports the band well enough, supplying the right backing without ever stepping into the spotlight.

Through sixty-seven minutes of stoner metal, Solace crafts distinctive songs that crackle and pop. Unfortunately, one glaring issue saps my enjoyment every time I listen, and its name is ‘bloat.’ Fifteen-minute “Wraths Object the Big Fall” is the biggest offender, and each time the song comes on, I find myself checking whether the music accidentally stopped, as it takes twenty seconds or so for any music to be heard. From there, Solace dithers for over six minutes before starting the song in earnest. I can’t for the life of me explain this build in a way that justifies the time, but after a handful of listens, I eventually began fast-forwarding the track to start at 6:43 or skipped it altogether. The rest of the song is solid, though still overlong, and similar issues creep into Fading Failing Ruin’s other compositions. Ultimately, Solace delivers under an hour of extremely strong riffs and music, yet in its current form, the album’s length extends past the quality of the product they peddle.

Still, Solace cultivates an engaging listen for the majority of Fading Failing Ruin, and thirty years in, they still have plenty of gas in the tank. Despite my complaint about bloat, I recommend giving Fading Failing Ruin a spin, whether you’re a fan of the genre or not. Big riffs and impassioned clean singing may sound like basic building blocks, but when they’re done this well, they stand out. So if your world goes to shit and life seems like a Fading Failing Ruin, go look for Solace.

Rating: Good
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Magnetic Eye Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: July 3rd, 2026

Asbury Park, New Jersey’s Solace observes their thirtieth anniversary this year, and to celebrate it, the quintet emerges to share fifth full-length, Fading Failing Ruin. After dropping debut Further in 2000 and follow-up 13 in 2003, Solace has adopted a lax release schedule, doling out two more platters in 2010 with A.D. and 2019 with The Brink. Between those two albums, Solace welcomed vocalist/keyboardist Justin Goins, drummer Timmy Gitlan, and bassist Mike Sica,1 leaving guitarists Tommy Southard and Justin Daniels as the threads of continuity. Despite the band’s longevity, Fading Failing Ruin is my first encounter with these Garden State stoners and their hypnotic grooves. Seven years after stepping up to The Brink, can Solace’s Fading Failing Ruin reach new highs, or does it just go up in smoke?

In my estimation, stoner metal simultaneously sprawls over an expanse of possibilities while often being limited by an overdrawn subject matter and blending into a cloud of faceless fuzz tones. Luckily, Solace has honed a singular identity and stands apart from contemporaries and genre-mates. Though they hail from Jersey, Solace adopts the southern charm of Corrosion of Conformity, instilling a folksy swagger to Fading Failing Ruin that feels genuine and expressive. Besides CoC, Solace rubs elbows with Kyuss’ mellower rhythms and Cathedral’s riff-heavy trudges without ever risking confusion with them. Over nine tracks, Fading Failing Ruin guides listeners through ‘apocalyptic, infernal, and end time themes’2 by way of ponderous riffs (and track lengths) drenched in delicious, southern-fried stoner doom.

Picking up where The Brink left off, Solace smacks you in the gob with their doleful guitar duo and slow-burn song structures. “Spiral Will” kicks off with a defiant lead that gives way to anthemic verses and a chorus I can’t seem to shake. “Beyond Below” and “Malengine the Scaffold” operate in a similar space, beginning with fuzz-soaked guitars that construct sullen layers as tension mounts until Solace unfurls slick variations and solos. “A God Changes His Plans” and “Culling the Herd,” the shortest songs on Fading Failing Ruin, afford opportunities for Solace to cut loose, pushing tempos higher and putting a heavier emphasis on guitar theatrics, which Southard and Daniels excel at. Goins, meanwhile, croons with conviction, landing somewhere between Live’s Ed Kowalczyk and Pepper Keenan. His vocals are a critical piece of Solace’s sound, and where original singer Jason’s vocals fit the band’s style early on, particularly the punkier forays of their first two albums, Goins adds a renewed vitality as the band focuses more on controlled pacing. Lastly, Gitlan and Sica’s rhythm section supports the band well enough, supplying the right backing without ever stepping into the spotlight.

Through sixty-seven minutes of stoner metal, Solace crafts distinctive songs that crackle and pop. Unfortunately, one glaring issue saps my enjoyment every time I listen, and its name is ‘bloat.’ Fifteen-minute “Wraths Object the Big Fall” is the biggest offender, and each time the song comes on, I find myself checking whether the music accidentally stopped, as it takes twenty seconds or so for any music to be heard. From there, Solace dithers for over six minutes before starting the song in earnest. I can’t for the life of me explain this build in a way that justifies the time, but after a handful of listens, I eventually began fast-forwarding the track to start at 6:43 or skipped it altogether. The rest of the song is solid, though still overlong, and similar issues creep into Fading Failing Ruin’s other compositions. Ultimately, Solace delivers under an hour of extremely strong riffs and music, yet in its current form, the album’s length extends past the quality of the product they peddle.

Still, Solace cultivates an engaging listen for the majority of Fading Failing Ruin, and thirty years in, they still have plenty of gas in the tank. Despite my complaint about bloat, I recommend giving Fading Failing Ruin a spin, whether you’re a fan of the genre or not. Big riffs and impassioned clean singing may sound like basic building blocks, but when they’re done this well, they stand out. So if your world goes to shit and life seems like a Fading Failing Ruin, go look for Solace.

Rating: Good
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Magnetic Eye Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: July 3rd, 2026

After 18 years and five full-length albums as frontman to The Lion’s Daughter, Rick Giordano decided “the daughter had to die so that the mother could live.” If that sounds morbid, it’s on purpose, as Giordano’s new project, Blood Mother,1 offers itself as a “score to your own personal horror film.” In forming this new project, Giordano further forges his musical independence, having previously divorced his music from the confines of a label (Season of Mist) for 2023’s Bath House. This allows him to create music that doesn’t fit neatly into any one category, and it makes sense that Blood Mother play an unconventional genre: post-metal. The question looms on Blood Mother’s self-titled debut whether Giordano is able to achieve success on his own terms.

Blood Mother hits plenty of experimental beats, blending atmospheric elements with bouts of impressive riffs. An early guitar riff on “Bonecanter” scratches the Kyuss itch, and his simple yet catchy approach to riffcraft shows up time and again throughout the record. Blood Mother keeps the songwriting simple, but it’s far from boring. Some of the riff-heavy portions sound reminiscent of The Lion’s Daughter, but Blood Mother is less heavy and less industrial. Giordano plays with guitar tones, mixing up sleek riffs, acoustic arpeggios (“Trail of Screaming Dead”), and plenty of heavy reverb à la Cult of Luna (“The Night Fires,” “The Wound of Heaven”). It’s not all about riffs, however. Blood Mother incorporate plenty of atmospheric techniques, including synths, to set up eerie, sometimes sinister moods—”The Night Fires” perfectly encapsulates this approach, beginning with unsettling synths before easing into an energetic pace. Natural sounds also make their way into the music, with crickets chirping at the start and end of “The Night Fires,” and birds and monkeys calling out on “The Wound of Heaven.” These flourishes add subtle touches to the sense of unease bubbling beneath the surface.

Giordano proves an adept songwriter, composing music that patiently builds up to a climax and tells a story. Blood Mother masterfully set the mood, be that the eeriness of “The Night Fires” or the Western, Wayfarer-esque feel of “Lost in Thunder.” But he also realizes mood isn’t enough, and that’s where the riff comes in, not to mention some impressive drumming from Ramsier. On the masterful “Trail of Screaming Dead,” Blood Mother methodically builds upon itself, beginning with organs, then jumping into lively drums and riffs, slowly adding new elements until some memorable tremolos bring the song to a conclusion. The music feels like gritty poetry, and the lyrics reflect this, written in poetic form and performed artistically in Giordano’s husky growls.

At just over 30 minutes, Blood Mother is a morsel rather than a full feast, and its conclusion leaves it somewhat wanting. Of the six songs that comprise that runtime, five of them are terrific pieces that eschew traditional structures, filling up spaces with music that can be thoughtful, deliberate, and sometimes exciting. On occasion, Blood Mother make some odd choices, such as synths in the final minute of “The Night Fires” that are deliberately jarring as they switch from one speaker to the other. Yet it’s the record’s finale, “Pulled Apart,” that doesn’t quite hold a light to the tracks that precede it. It still contains great ideas, including some nifty riffs and kitwork, but also some noises that just don’t blend into the music very well. It’s the one tune that doesn’t quite hit as hard as the others, and the concluding fade-out ends Blood Mother on an anticlimactic disappearing act.

For me, this was the perfect promo to match my mood. I wanted something that entertained without being formulaic. I wanted something that didn’t hit the usual beats, but wasn’t too weird. Blood Mother checks all those boxes. Sure, Giordano may have a few kinks to work out, but for a first-time striking it out (mostly) on his own, this is a pretty remarkable record, one that’s full of surprises and nuances that make for rewarding repeat listens.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Self-Released
Website: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: June 19th, 2026

After 18 years and five full-length albums as frontman to The Lion’s Daughter, Rick Giordano decided “the daughter had to die so that the mother could live.” If that sounds morbid, it’s on purpose, as Giordano’s new project, Blood Mother,1 offers itself as a “score to your own personal horror film.” In forming this new project, Giordano further forges his musical independence, having previously divorced his music from the confines of a label (Season of Mist) for 2023’s Bath House. This allows him to create music that doesn’t fit neatly into any one category, and it makes sense that Blood Mother play an unconventional genre: post-metal. The question looms on Blood Mother’s self-titled debut whether Giordano is able to achieve success on his own terms.

Blood Mother hits plenty of experimental beats, blending atmospheric elements with bouts of impressive riffs. An early guitar riff on “Bonecanter” scratches the Kyuss itch, and his simple yet catchy approach to riffcraft shows up time and again throughout the record. Blood Mother keeps the songwriting simple, but it’s far from boring. Some of the riff-heavy portions sound reminiscent of The Lion’s Daughter, but Blood Mother is less heavy and less industrial. Giordano plays with guitar tones, mixing up sleek riffs, acoustic arpeggios (“Trail of Screaming Dead”), and plenty of heavy reverb à la Cult of Luna (“The Night Fires,” “The Wound of Heaven”). It’s not all about riffs, however. Blood Mother incorporate plenty of atmospheric techniques, including synths, to set up eerie, sometimes sinister moods—”The Night Fires” perfectly encapsulates this approach, beginning with unsettling synths before easing into an energetic pace. Natural sounds also make their way into the music, with crickets chirping at the start and end of “The Night Fires,” and birds and monkeys calling out on “The Wound of Heaven.” These flourishes add subtle touches to the sense of unease bubbling beneath the surface.

Giordano proves an adept songwriter, composing music that patiently builds up to a climax and tells a story. Blood Mother masterfully set the mood, be that the eeriness of “The Night Fires” or the Western, Wayfarer-esque feel of “Lost in Thunder.” But he also realizes mood isn’t enough, and that’s where the riff comes in, not to mention some impressive drumming from Ramsier. On the masterful “Trail of Screaming Dead,” Blood Mother methodically builds upon itself, beginning with organs, then jumping into lively drums and riffs, slowly adding new elements until some memorable tremolos bring the song to a conclusion. The music feels like gritty poetry, and the lyrics reflect this, written in poetic form and performed artistically in Giordano’s husky growls.

At just over 30 minutes, Blood Mother is a morsel rather than a full feast, and its conclusion leaves it somewhat wanting. Of the six songs that comprise that runtime, five of them are terrific pieces that eschew traditional structures, filling up spaces with music that can be thoughtful, deliberate, and sometimes exciting. On occasion, Blood Mother make some odd choices, such as synths in the final minute of “The Night Fires” that are deliberately jarring as they switch from one speaker to the other. Yet it’s the record’s finale, “Pulled Apart,” that doesn’t quite hold a light to the tracks that precede it. It still contains great ideas, including some nifty riffs and kitwork, but also some noises that just don’t blend into the music very well. It’s the one tune that doesn’t quite hit as hard as the others, and the concluding fade-out ends Blood Mother on an anticlimactic disappearing act.

For me, this was the perfect promo to match my mood. I wanted something that entertained without being formulaic. I wanted something that didn’t hit the usual beats, but wasn’t too weird. Blood Mother checks all those boxes. Sure, Giordano may have a few kinks to work out, but for a first-time striking it out (mostly) on his own, this is a pretty remarkable record, one that’s full of surprises and nuances that make for rewarding repeat listens.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Self-Released
Website: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: June 19th, 2026

KYUSS
Blues For The Red Sun
2021 U.S. reissue

Monday morning.

Time to get stoned out in the desert.

It’s all that Monday deserves.

Hands down the best record KYUSS ever made, and certainly a landmark influential record to all the heavy, riffy, stoner metal albums that came after.
A pivotal precursor to QOTSA.

#vinyl #vinylrecords #vinylcommunity #vinylcollection #retro #vintage #art #music #analog #kyuss #1990s #90s #90smusic #desert #stoner #metal

KYUSS
Blues For The Red Sun
2021 U.S. reissue

Monday morning.

Time to get stoned out in the desert.

It’s all that Monday deserves.

Hands down the best record KYUSS ever made, and certainly a landmark influential record to all the heavy, riffy, stoner metal albums that came after.
A pivotal precursor to QOTSA.

#vinyl #vinylrecords #vinylcommunity #vinylcollection #retro #vintage #art #music #analog #kyuss #1990s #90s #90smusic #desert #stoner #metal

John García y una posible reunión con Josh Homme y Kyuss: «Digan el lugar, digan la hora, y ahí estaré» | vía #NaciónRock

https://www.nacionrock.com/john-garcia-y-una-posible-reunion-con-josh-homme-y-kyuss-digan-el-lugar-digan-la-hora-y-ahi-estare/

#johngarcia #kyuss

In praise of #kyuss

The so-called "stoner rock" era was rife with great bands. I'd perhaps include the more-recent #fugazi band.

Nonetheless. #kyuss stood out for me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyuss

Not knowing any #German, I've since found out the band were called #Katzenjammer which I think literally translates as "the cat which moans". Is this correct? :)

Wikipedia suggests a similar translation, but is there some idiomatic term I'm not familiar with here?

In praise of #kyuss

The so-called "stoner rock" era was rife with great bands. I'd perhaps include the more-recent #fugazi band.

Nonetheless. #kyuss stood out for me.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyuss

Not knowing any #German, I've since found out the band were called #Katzenjammer which I think literally translates as "the cat which moans". Is this correct? :)

Wikipedia suggests a similar translation, but is there some idiomatic term I'm not familiar with here?

#IfOnly #QueensoftheStoneAge Awake? I actually liked early #QotSA even more than #Kyuss. Today, I see things differently, very differently. youtu.be/1HqTh0nd9GE #Music #Stoner #rock #alternative #DavidsMonthOfMusic

Queens of the Stone Age - If O...

#IfOnly #QueensoftheStoneAge Awake? I actually liked early #QotSA even more than #Kyuss. Today, I see things differently, very differently. youtu.be/1HqTh0nd9GE #Music #Stoner #rock #alternative #DavidsMonthOfMusic

Queens of the Stone Age - If O...

Take one to the mountain Take one to the sea Take one to the belly of the beast And the you'll take one with me Sudden? Sudden? Freezing in the fires #Odyssey by #Kyuss For me, it's a fantastic #soundtrack to the #Conan #comics that I'm really into at the moment. #music #comicsky #stoner #rock #crom

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:xdjqpqlccq57rplc6ulr73rp/post/3m77s4t3bq225

Kyuss - Odyssey (HQ+)

Stuck in the Filter: August 2025’s Angry Misses

By Kenstrosity

The heat persists, but now the humidity comes in full force as storm systems wreak havoc upon the coasts. I hide in my cramped closet of an office, lest I be washed out once again by an unsuspecting deluge. However, I still send my minions out into the facility, bound by duty to search for those metallic scraps on which we feast.

Fortuitously, most all of those imps I sent out came back alive, and with wares! BEHOLD!

Kenstrosity’s Galactic Gremlin

Silent Millenia // Celestial Twilight: Beyond the Crimson Veil [August 26th, 2025 – Self-Release]

Have you ever seen such a delightfully cheesy cover? Probably, but it’s been a while for me. I bought Celestial Twilight: Beyond the Crimson Veil, the second raw symphonic black metal opus from Finnish one-man act Silent Millenia, on the strength of the artwork alone. Little did I know that what lay beyond this crimson veil was some of the most fun melodic black metal this side of Moonlight Sorcery. The same low-fi roughness that personifies Old Nick’s work grounds Silent Millenia’s starbound songwriting as it traverses the universe with an energetic punch reminiscent of Emperor or Stormkeep (“Awaken the Celestial Spell,” “Daemonic Mastery”). To help differentiate Silent Millenia’s sound from that of their peers, a gothic atmosphere ensorcells much of this material to great effect, merging eerie Victorian melodies with galactic adventurism in an unlikely pair (“Enthrone the Spectral”). Swirling synths and sparkling twinkles abound as well, creating blissful moments of interest as frosty tremolos and piercing blasts take full advantage of the false sense of security those entrancing clouds of synthetic instrumentation create (“Benighted Path to Darkness Mysterium,” “Reign in Cosmic Majesty”). Simply put, Celestial Twilight is an unexpected gem of a symphonic black metal record, bursting with killer ideas and infinite levels of raw, unabashed fun. You should hear it!

Kronos’ Unexpected Unearthments

Street Sects // Dry Drunk [August 15th, 2025 – Self Release]

Dry Drunk sticks to your inner surfaces, draining down like cigarette tar along paralyzed cilia to pool in your lungs until the cells themselves foment rebellion. Once it’s in you, you feel paranoid, wretched, and alone. So it’s the proper follow-up to Street Sects’ visionary debut, End Position. Like that record, Dry Drunk plumbs the most mundane and unsavory gutters of America for a cast of protagonists that it dwells in or dispatches with a mixture of pity and disgust, with vocalist Leo Ashline narrating their violent crimes and self-hatred in a mixture of croons, shrieks, and snarls that cook the air before the speakers into the scent of booze and rotten teeth. And like that record, Shaun Ringsmuth (Glassing) dresses the sets with a fractal litter of snaps, squeals, crashes, gunshots, and grinding electronics, caked in tar and collapsing just as soon as it is swept into a structure. And like End Position, Dry Drunk is a masterpiece. The impeccable six-song stretch from “Love Makes You Fat” through “Riding the Clock” ties you to the bumper and drags you along some of the duo’s most creative side-roads, through the simmering, straightjacketed sludge of “Baker Act” to the chopped-up, smirking electronica of “Eject Button.” Swerving between addled, unintelligible agony and unforgettable anthems, Dry Drunk, like End Position before it is nothing less than the life of a junkie scraped together, heated on a spoon, and injected into your head. Once you’ve taken a hit, you will never be quite the same.

Thus Spoke’s Frightening Fragments

Defacement // Doomed [August 22nd, 2025 – Self Release]

There’s music for every vibe.1 The one Defacement fits is an exclusively extreme metal flavor of moody that is only appreciable by genre fans, made tangibly more eerie by their persistent idiosyncratic use of dark ambient interludes amidst the viciously distorted blackened death. Audiences—and reviewers—tend to disparage these electronic segments, but I’ve always felt their crackling presence increases the analog horror of it all, and rather than being a breather from the intensity, they prolong the nausea, the sense of emptiness, and the abject fearfulness of head-based trauma. This latter concept grows more metaphorical still on Doomed, where the violence is inside the mind, purpose-erasing, and emotionally-detaching. The ambience might be the most sadly beautiful so far (“Mournful,” and “Clouded” especially), and the transitions into nightmarish heaviness arguably the most fluid. And the metal is undoubtedly the most ambitious, dynamic, and magnificent of Defacement’s career, combining their most gruesome dissonance (“Portrait”) with their most bizarrely exuberant guitar melodies (“Unexplainable,” “Unrecognised”). Solos drip tangibly with (emotional) resonance (“Unexplainable,” “Absent”) and there’s not a breath or a moment of wasted space. Yes, the band’s heavier side can suffer from a nagging sense of homogeneous mass, but it remains transporting. While I can appreciate why others do not appreciate Defacement, this is the first of their outings I can truthfully say mesmerised me on first listen.

ClarkKent’s Heated Hymns

Phantom Fire // Phantom Fire [August 8th, 2025 – Edged Circle Productions]

While I waded through the murky depths of the August promo sump, Steel implored me to take the eponymous third album from Phantom Fire. “The AMG commentariat love blackened heavy metal,” he said. I disregarded his advice at my peril, and while I ended up enjoying what I grabbed, it turns out this would have been solid too. Featuring members from Enslaved, Kraków. Hellbutcher, and Aeternus, Phantom Fire play old school speed metal that harks back to the likes of Motörhead and Iron Maiden’s Killers. Thanks to healthy doses of bass and production values that allow the instruments to shine, each song is infused with energetic grooves. The music sounds fresh, crisp, and clear, from the booming drums to Eld’s “blackened” snarls. Early tracks “Eternal Void” and “All For None” show off the catchy blend of simple guitar riffs and a hoppin’ bass accompanied by energetic kit work. While placing a somewhat lengthy instrumental track in the middle of a record usually slows it down, “Fatal Attraction” turns out to be a highlight. It tells a tragic love story involving a motorcycle with nothing but instruments, an engine revving, and some police sirens. The second half of Phantom Fire gets a bit on the weirder side, turning to some stoner and psychedelia. There’s a push and pull between the stoner and Motörhead speed stuff on songs like “Malphas” and “Submersible Pt. 2,” and this blend actually works pretty well. It turns out that they aren’t phantom after all—these guys are truly fire.

Burning Witches // Inquisition [August 22nd, 2025 – Napalm Records]

With six albums in eight years, Swiss quintet Burning Witches has really been burning rubber. While such prolific output in such a short time frame generally spells trouble, Inquisition is a solid piece of heavy/power metal. Burning Witches dabbles in a mix of speedy power metal and mid-tempo heavy metal, often sounding like ’80s stalwarts Judas Priest and Def Leppard. With Laura Guldemond’s gruff voice, they produce a more weighty, less happy version of power metal than the likes of Fellowship or Frozen Crown. While the songs stick to formulaic structures, tempo shifts from song to song help keep things from growing stale. We see this variety right from the get-go, where “Soul Eater” takes a high-energy approach before moving into the more mellow “Shame.” There’s even a pretty solid ballad, “Release Me,” that grounds the back half of the record. Songs of the sort that Burning Witches write need catchy choruses, and fortunately, they deliver. “High Priestess of the Night” is a particular standout, delivering a knock-out punch in its delivery. It helps that the instrumental parts are well-executed, from crunchy riffs to subdued solos to booming blast beats. Anyone looking for a solid bit of power metal that’s not too heavy on the cheese will find this worth a listen.

Deathhammer // Crimson Dawn [August 29th, 2025 – Hells Headbangers Records]

Celebrating 20 years of blackened speed, Deathhammer drop LP number six with the kind of energy that exhausted parents dread to see in their children at bedtime. This is my first foray with the band, and I am in awe of the relentless level of manic energy they keep throughout Crimson Dawn’s 39 minutes. If science could learn how to harness their energy, we’d have an endless source of renewables. The two-piece out of Norway channels classic Slayer on crack and even has moments reminiscent of Painkiller-era Judas Priest. They play non-stop thrash cranked to 11, with persistent blast beats and some dual guitar parts that leave your head spinning from the rapid-fire directions the riffs fire off in. The heart of the mania is singer Sergeant Salsten. His crazed vocals are amazing—snarling, shouting, and shrieking in a way that took me back to the manic pitch Judge Doom could reach in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? He sings so fast that on the chorus of “Crimson Dawn,” it sounds like he says “Griffindor,” which had me searching confusedly for the Harry Potter tag. This was probably my favorite song, not just because of the Griffindor thing, but because that chorus is so catchy. Either way, it’s tough to pick a standout track because they all grip you by the throat and don’t let go. Crimson Dawn is a ton of fun and a must listen if you like your music fast.

Grin Reaper’s Bountiful Blight

Kallias // Digital Plague [August 14th, 2025 – Self Release]

Machine gun drumming, spacey synths, Morbid Angel-meets-Meshuggah riffing, Turian-esque barking and Voyager-reminiscent vocal melodies…what the fuck is going on here? The only thing more surprising than someone having the moxie to blend all these things together is how well they work in concert. Kallias doesn’t hold back on sophomore album Digital Plague, and the result is a rocket-fueled blast through forty-four minutes of eclectic, addictive prog. The mishmash of styles keeps the album fresh and unpredictable while never dipping its toes in inconsistent waters, and staccato rhythms propel listeners through eight tracks without losing steam. As with any prog metal worth its salt, Kallias brandishes technical prowess, and their cohesion belies the relatively short time they’ve been putting out music.2 The mix is well-suited to spotlight whoever needs it at a given time, whether the bass is purring (“Exogíini Kyriarchía”), the drums are being annihilated (“Pyrrhic Victory”), or a guitar solo nears Pettrucian wankery (“Phenomenal in Theory”). The end result is three-quarters of an hour filled with myriad influences that fuse into a sound all Kallias’s own, and it’s one I’ve returned to several times since discovering (also, credit to MontDoom for his stunning artwork, which helped initially draw my attention). Check it out—you’ll be sick if you avoid this one like the Plague.

Luke’s Kaleidoscopic Kicks

Giant Haze // Cosmic Mother [August 22nd, 2025 – Tonzonen Records]

Whereas many of my colleagues are bracing themselves for cooler conditions and harsh winters to come, in my neck of the woods, things are warming up. While my own wintry August filter proved scarce, there was one particular summery gem to lift moods with burly riffs and fat stoner grooves. Unheralded German act Giant Haze seemingly emerged out of nowhere during a random Bandcamp deep dive. Debut LP Cosmic Mother channels the good old days of ’90s-inspired desert rock, featuring grungy, doomy vibes via a groovy batch of riff-centric, hard-rocking and uplifting jams, evoking the nostalgic spirit of Kyuss, Fu Manchu, Clutch and perhaps even a dash of Danzig. Punching out raucous, groove-soaked hard rockers with skyscraping hooks (“Geographic Gardens Suck,” “King of Tomorrow,” “Panic to Ride”), summery, funk–psych jams (“Sunrise”), and bluesy, punk-infused fireballs (“Crank in Public,” “Shrink Age”) Giant Haze get a lot of things right on this assured debut. The songwriting is deceptively diverse and punchy, bolstered by solid production, tight musicianship, and the swaggering, ever so slightly goofy vocal charms and powerful hooks of frontman Christoph Wollmann. Inevitably, a few rough spots appear, but overall Cosmic Mother showcases oodles of budding potential, an impactful delivery, cheeky sense of humor, and infectious, feel-good songcraft.

Spicie Forrest’s Foraged Fruit

Bask // The Turning [August 22nd, 2025 – Season of Mist]

Last seen in 2019, Bask returns with fourth LP, The Turning, a concept album following The Rider as she and The Traveler traverse the stars. They still peddle the unique blend of stoner rock and Americana Kenstrosity reviewed favorably in 2019, but 2025 sees them looking up for inspiration. The Turning incorporates a distinct cosmic bent (“The Traveler,” “The Turning”) and post-rock structures (“Dig My Heels,” “Unwound”). These augmentations to Bask’s core sound are enhanced by the masterful pedal steel of new official member Jed Willis. Whether floating through the firmament or tilling earthly pastures, Willis creates textures both fresh and intensely nostalgic. The infinite shifting vistas of The Turning’s front half coalesce into singular timeless visions on the back half, supporting its conceptual nature in both content and form. Like a combination of Huntsmen and Somali Yacht Club, Bask weaves riffs and melodies heard across the plains and through the void above with an unguarded authenticity felt in your soul.

Dolphin Whisperer’s Disseminating Discharge

Plasmodulated // An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell [August 1st, 2025 – Personal Records]

Stinky, sticky, slimy—all adjectives that define the ideal death metal platter. Myk Colby has been trying to chase this perfect balance in a reverb-wonky package with projects like the d-beaten Hot Graves and extra hazy Wharflurch, but vile death metal balance is hard to achieve. However, An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell contains a recklessly pinched Demilichian riffage, classic piercing whammy bombs, and spook-minded synth ambience that places Plasmodulated with an odor more pungent than its peers. With an infected ear that festers equally with doom-loaded, Incantation-indebted drags (“Gelatinous Mutation ov Brewed Origin,” “Trapped in the Plasmovoid”) and Voivod-on-jenkem cutaways to foul-throated extravagence (“The Final Fuckening”). An air of intelligent tempo design keeps An Ocean from never feeling trapped in a maze of its own fumes, with Colby’s lush and bubbling synth design seguing tumbles into hammering deathly tremolo runs (“Such Rapid Sphacelation”) and Celtic Frosted riff tumbles (“Drowning in Sputum”) alike, all before swirling about his own tattered, trailing vocal sputters. Steady but slippery, elegant yet effluvial, An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell provides the necessary noxious pressure to corrode death metal-loving denizens into pure gloops of stained-denim pit worship. Delivered as labeled, Plasmodulated earns its hazardous declaration. We here at AMG are not liable for any OSHA violations that occur as a result of Plasmodulated consumption on the job, though.

#2025 #Aeternus #AmericanMetal #Americana #AnOceanOvPutridStinkyVileDisgustingHell #Aug25 #Bask #BlackMetal #BlackenedDeathMetal #BurningWitches #CelestialTwilightBeyondTheCrimsonVeil #CelticFrost #Clutch #CosmicMother #CrimsonDawn #Danzig #DarkAmbient #DeathMetal #Deathhammer #DefLeppard #Defacement #Demilich #DigitalPlague #Doomed #DryDrunk #DutchMetal #EdgedCircleProductions #Emperor #Enslaved #Fellship #FinnishMetal #FrozenCrown #FuManchu #GermanMetal #GiantHaze #Glassing #Hardcore #HeavyMetal #Hellbutcher #HellsHeadbangersRecords #HotGraves #Huntsmen #Incantation #Inquisition #IronMaiden #JudasPriest #Kallias #Kraków #Kyuss #MelodicBlackMetal #Meshuggah #MoonlightSorcery #MorbidAngel #Motörhead #NapalmRecords #NorwegianMetal #OldNick #PersonalRecords #PhantomFire #Plasmodulated #PowerMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #RawBlackMetal #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #SilentMillenia #Slayer #Sludge #SludgeMetal #SomaliYachtClub #SpeedMetal #StonerRock #Stormkeep #StreetSects #StuckInTheFilter #StuckInTheFilter2025 #SwissMetal #SymphonicBlackMetal #TechnicalDeathMetal #TheTurning #TonzonenRecords #Turian #Voivod #Voyager #Wharflurch

Stuck in the Filter: August 2025’s Angry Misses

By Kenstrosity

The heat persists, but now the humidity comes in full force as storm systems wreak havoc upon the coasts. I hide in my cramped closet of an office, lest I be washed out once again by an unsuspecting deluge. However, I still send my minions out into the facility, bound by duty to search for those metallic scraps on which we feast.

Fortuitously, most all of those imps I sent out came back alive, and with wares! BEHOLD!

Kenstrosity’s Galactic Gremlin

Silent Millenia // Celestial Twilight: Beyond the Crimson Veil [August 26th, 2025 – Self-Release]

Have you ever seen such a delightfully cheesy cover? Probably, but it’s been a while for me. I bought Celestial Twilight: Beyond the Crimson Veil, the second raw symphonic black metal opus from Finnish one-man act Silent Millenia, on the strength of the artwork alone. Little did I know that what lay beyond this crimson veil was some of the most fun melodic black metal this side of Moonlight Sorcery. The same low-fi roughness that personifies Old Nick’s work grounds Silent Millenia’s starbound songwriting as it traverses the universe with an energetic punch reminiscent of Emperor or Stormkeep (“Awaken the Celestial Spell,” “Daemonic Mastery”). To help differentiate Silent Millenia’s sound from that of their peers, a gothic atmosphere ensorcells much of this material to great effect, merging eerie Victorian melodies with galactic adventurism in an unlikely pair (“Enthrone the Spectral”). Swirling synths and sparkling twinkles abound as well, creating blissful moments of interest as frosty tremolos and piercing blasts take full advantage of the false sense of security those entrancing clouds of synthetic instrumentation create (“Benighted Path to Darkness Mysterium,” “Reign in Cosmic Majesty”). Simply put, Celestial Twilight is an unexpected gem of a symphonic black metal record, bursting with killer ideas and infinite levels of raw, unabashed fun. You should hear it!

Kronos’ Unexpected Unearthments

Street Sects // Dry Drunk [August 15th, 2025 – Self Release]

Dry Drunk sticks to your inner surfaces, draining down like cigarette tar along paralyzed cilia to pool in your lungs until the cells themselves foment rebellion. Once it’s in you, you feel paranoid, wretched, and alone. So it’s the proper follow-up to Street Sects’ visionary debut, End Position. Like that record, Dry Drunk plumbs the most mundane and unsavory gutters of America for a cast of protagonists that it dwells in or dispatches with a mixture of pity and disgust, with vocalist Leo Ashline narrating their violent crimes and self-hatred in a mixture of croons, shrieks, and snarls that cook the air before the speakers into the scent of booze and rotten teeth. And like that record, Shaun Ringsmuth (Glassing) dresses the sets with a fractal litter of snaps, squeals, crashes, gunshots, and grinding electronics, caked in tar and collapsing just as soon as it is swept into a structure. And like End Position, Dry Drunk is a masterpiece. The impeccable six-song stretch from “Love Makes You Fat” through “Riding the Clock” ties you to the bumper and drags you along some of the duo’s most creative side-roads, through the simmering, straightjacketed sludge of “Baker Act” to the chopped-up, smirking electronica of “Eject Button.” Swerving between addled, unintelligible agony and unforgettable anthems, Dry Drunk, like End Position before it is nothing less than the life of a junkie scraped together, heated on a spoon, and injected into your head. Once you’ve taken a hit, you will never be quite the same.

Thus Spoke’s Frightening Fragments

Defacement // Doomed [August 22nd, 2025 – Self Release]

There’s music for every vibe.1 The one Defacement fits is an exclusively extreme metal flavor of moody that is only appreciable by genre fans, made tangibly more eerie by their persistent idiosyncratic use of dark ambient interludes amidst the viciously distorted blackened death. Audiences—and reviewers—tend to disparage these electronic segments, but I’ve always felt their crackling presence increases the analog horror of it all, and rather than being a breather from the intensity, they prolong the nausea, the sense of emptiness, and the abject fearfulness of head-based trauma. This latter concept grows more metaphorical still on Doomed, where the violence is inside the mind, purpose-erasing, and emotionally-detaching. The ambience might be the most sadly beautiful so far (“Mournful,” and “Clouded” especially), and the transitions into nightmarish heaviness arguably the most fluid. And the metal is undoubtedly the most ambitious, dynamic, and magnificent of Defacement’s career, combining their most gruesome dissonance (“Portrait”) with their most bizarrely exuberant guitar melodies (“Unexplainable,” “Unrecognised”). Solos drip tangibly with (emotional) resonance (“Unexplainable,” “Absent”) and there’s not a breath or a moment of wasted space. Yes, the band’s heavier side can suffer from a nagging sense of homogeneous mass, but it remains transporting. While I can appreciate why others do not appreciate Defacement, this is the first of their outings I can truthfully say mesmerised me on first listen.

ClarkKent’s Heated Hymns

Phantom Fire // Phantom Fire [August 8th, 2025 – Edged Circle Productions]

While I waded through the murky depths of the August promo sump, Steel implored me to take the eponymous third album from Phantom Fire. “The AMG commentariat love blackened heavy metal,” he said. I disregarded his advice at my peril, and while I ended up enjoying what I grabbed, it turns out this would have been solid too. Featuring members from Enslaved, Kraków. Hellbutcher, and Aeternus, Phantom Fire play old school speed metal that harks back to the likes of Motörhead and Iron Maiden’s Killers. Thanks to healthy doses of bass and production values that allow the instruments to shine, each song is infused with energetic grooves. The music sounds fresh, crisp, and clear, from the booming drums to Eld’s “blackened” snarls. Early tracks “Eternal Void” and “All For None” show off the catchy blend of simple guitar riffs and a hoppin’ bass accompanied by energetic kit work. While placing a somewhat lengthy instrumental track in the middle of a record usually slows it down, “Fatal Attraction” turns out to be a highlight. It tells a tragic love story involving a motorcycle with nothing but instruments, an engine revving, and some police sirens. The second half of Phantom Fire gets a bit on the weirder side, turning to some stoner and psychedelia. There’s a push and pull between the stoner and Motörhead speed stuff on songs like “Malphas” and “Submersible Pt. 2,” and this blend actually works pretty well. It turns out that they aren’t phantom after all—these guys are truly fire.

Burning Witches // Inquisition [August 22nd, 2025 – Napalm Records]

With six albums in eight years, Swiss quintet Burning Witches has really been burning rubber. While such prolific output in such a short time frame generally spells trouble, Inquisition is a solid piece of heavy/power metal. Burning Witches dabbles in a mix of speedy power metal and mid-tempo heavy metal, often sounding like ’80s stalwarts Judas Priest and Def Leppard. With Laura Guldemond’s gruff voice, they produce a more weighty, less happy version of power metal than the likes of Fellowship or Frozen Crown. While the songs stick to formulaic structures, tempo shifts from song to song help keep things from growing stale. We see this variety right from the get-go, where “Soul Eater” takes a high-energy approach before moving into the more mellow “Shame.” There’s even a pretty solid ballad, “Release Me,” that grounds the back half of the record. Songs of the sort that Burning Witches write need catchy choruses, and fortunately, they deliver. “High Priestess of the Night” is a particular standout, delivering a knock-out punch in its delivery. It helps that the instrumental parts are well-executed, from crunchy riffs to subdued solos to booming blast beats. Anyone looking for a solid bit of power metal that’s not too heavy on the cheese will find this worth a listen.

Deathhammer // Crimson Dawn [August 29th, 2025 – Hells Headbangers Records]

Celebrating 20 years of blackened speed, Deathhammer drop LP number six with the kind of energy that exhausted parents dread to see in their children at bedtime. This is my first foray with the band, and I am in awe of the relentless level of manic energy they keep throughout Crimson Dawn’s 39 minutes. If science could learn how to harness their energy, we’d have an endless source of renewables. The two-piece out of Norway channels classic Slayer on crack and even has moments reminiscent of Painkiller-era Judas Priest. They play non-stop thrash cranked to 11, with persistent blast beats and some dual guitar parts that leave your head spinning from the rapid-fire directions the riffs fire off in. The heart of the mania is singer Sergeant Salsten. His crazed vocals are amazing—snarling, shouting, and shrieking in a way that took me back to the manic pitch Judge Doom could reach in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? He sings so fast that on the chorus of “Crimson Dawn,” it sounds like he says “Griffindor,” which had me searching confusedly for the Harry Potter tag. This was probably my favorite song, not just because of the Griffindor thing, but because that chorus is so catchy. Either way, it’s tough to pick a standout track because they all grip you by the throat and don’t let go. Crimson Dawn is a ton of fun and a must listen if you like your music fast.

Grin Reaper’s Bountiful Blight

Kallias // Digital Plague [August 14th, 2025 – Self Release]

Machine gun drumming, spacey synths, Morbid Angel-meets-Meshuggah riffing, Turian-esque barking and Voyager-reminiscent vocal melodies…what the fuck is going on here? The only thing more surprising than someone having the moxie to blend all these things together is how well they work in concert. Kallias doesn’t hold back on sophomore album Digital Plague, and the result is a rocket-fueled blast through forty-four minutes of eclectic, addictive prog. The mishmash of styles keeps the album fresh and unpredictable while never dipping its toes in inconsistent waters, and staccato rhythms propel listeners through eight tracks without losing steam. As with any prog metal worth its salt, Kallias brandishes technical prowess, and their cohesion belies the relatively short time they’ve been putting out music.2 The mix is well-suited to spotlight whoever needs it at a given time, whether the bass is purring (“Exogíini Kyriarchía”), the drums are being annihilated (“Pyrrhic Victory”), or a guitar solo nears Pettrucian wankery (“Phenomenal in Theory”). The end result is three-quarters of an hour filled with myriad influences that fuse into a sound all Kallias’s own, and it’s one I’ve returned to several times since discovering (also, credit to MontDoom for his stunning artwork, which helped initially draw my attention). Check it out—you’ll be sick if you avoid this one like the Plague.

Luke’s Kaleidoscopic Kicks

Giant Haze // Cosmic Mother [August 22nd, 2025 – Tonzonen Records]

Whereas many of my colleagues are bracing themselves for cooler conditions and harsh winters to come, in my neck of the woods, things are warming up. While my own wintry August filter proved scarce, there was one particular summery gem to lift moods with burly riffs and fat stoner grooves. Unheralded German act Giant Haze seemingly emerged out of nowhere during a random Bandcamp deep dive. Debut LP Cosmic Mother channels the good old days of ’90s-inspired desert rock, featuring grungy, doomy vibes via a groovy batch of riff-centric, hard-rocking and uplifting jams, evoking the nostalgic spirit of Kyuss, Fu Manchu, Clutch and perhaps even a dash of Danzig. Punching out raucous, groove-soaked hard rockers with skyscraping hooks (“Geographic Gardens Suck,” “King of Tomorrow,” “Panic to Ride”), summery, funk–psych jams (“Sunrise”), and bluesy, punk-infused fireballs (“Crank in Public,” “Shrink Age”) Giant Haze get a lot of things right on this assured debut. The songwriting is deceptively diverse and punchy, bolstered by solid production, tight musicianship, and the swaggering, ever so slightly goofy vocal charms and powerful hooks of frontman Christoph Wollmann. Inevitably, a few rough spots appear, but overall Cosmic Mother showcases oodles of budding potential, an impactful delivery, cheeky sense of humor, and infectious, feel-good songcraft.

Spicie Forrest’s Foraged Fruit

Bask // The Turning [August 22nd, 2025 – Season of Mist]

Last seen in 2019, Bask returns with fourth LP, The Turning, a concept album following The Rider as she and The Traveler traverse the stars. They still peddle the unique blend of stoner rock and Americana Kenstrosity reviewed favorably in 2019, but 2025 sees them looking up for inspiration. The Turning incorporates a distinct cosmic bent (“The Traveler,” “The Turning”) and post-rock structures (“Dig My Heels,” “Unwound”). These augmentations to Bask’s core sound are enhanced by the masterful pedal steel of new official member Jed Willis. Whether floating through the firmament or tilling earthly pastures, Willis creates textures both fresh and intensely nostalgic. The infinite shifting vistas of The Turning’s front half coalesce into singular timeless visions on the back half, supporting its conceptual nature in both content and form. Like a combination of Huntsmen and Somali Yacht Club, Bask weaves riffs and melodies heard across the plains and through the void above with an unguarded authenticity felt in your soul.

Dolphin Whisperer’s Disseminating Discharge

Plasmodulated // An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell [August 1st, 2025 – Personal Records]

Stinky, sticky, slimy—all adjectives that define the ideal death metal platter. Myk Colby has been trying to chase this perfect balance in a reverb-wonky package with projects like the d-beaten Hot Graves and extra hazy Wharflurch, but vile death metal balance is hard to achieve. However, An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell contains a recklessly pinched Demilichian riffage, classic piercing whammy bombs, and spook-minded synth ambience that places Plasmodulated with an odor more pungent than its peers. With an infected ear that festers equally with doom-loaded, Incantation-indebted drags (“Gelatinous Mutation ov Brewed Origin,” “Trapped in the Plasmovoid”) and Voivod-on-jenkem cutaways to foul-throated extravagence (“The Final Fuckening”). An air of intelligent tempo design keeps An Ocean from never feeling trapped in a maze of its own fumes, with Colby’s lush and bubbling synth design seguing tumbles into hammering deathly tremolo runs (“Such Rapid Sphacelation”) and Celtic Frosted riff tumbles (“Drowning in Sputum”) alike, all before swirling about his own tattered, trailing vocal sputters. Steady but slippery, elegant yet effluvial, An Ocean ov Putrid, Stinky, Vile, Disgusting Hell provides the necessary noxious pressure to corrode death metal-loving denizens into pure gloops of stained-denim pit worship. Delivered as labeled, Plasmodulated earns its hazardous declaration. We here at AMG are not liable for any OSHA violations that occur as a result of Plasmodulated consumption on the job, though.

#2025 #Aeternus #AmericanMetal #Americana #AnOceanOvPutridStinkyVileDisgustingHell #Aug25 #Bask #BlackMetal #BlackenedDeathMetal #BurningWitches #CelestialTwilightBeyondTheCrimsonVeil #CelticFrost #Clutch #CosmicMother #CrimsonDawn #Danzig #DarkAmbient #DeathMetal #Deathhammer #DefLeppard #Defacement #Demilich #DigitalPlague #Doomed #DryDrunk #DutchMetal #EdgedCircleProductions #Emperor #Enslaved #Fellship #FinnishMetal #FrozenCrown #FuManchu #GermanMetal #GiantHaze #Glassing #Hardcore #HeavyMetal #Hellbutcher #HellsHeadbangersRecords #HotGraves #Huntsmen #Incantation #Inquisition #IronMaiden #JudasPriest #Kallias #Kraków #Kyuss #MelodicBlackMetal #Meshuggah #MoonlightSorcery #MorbidAngel #Motörhead #NapalmRecords #NorwegianMetal #OldNick #PersonalRecords #PhantomFire #Plasmodulated #PowerMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #RawBlackMetal #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #SilentMillenia #Slayer #Sludge #SludgeMetal #SomaliYachtClub #SpeedMetal #StonerRock #Stormkeep #StreetSects #StuckInTheFilter #StuckInTheFilter2025 #SwissMetal #SymphonicBlackMetal #TechnicalDeathMetal #TheTurning #TonzonenRecords #Turian #Voivod #Voyager #Wharflurch

I love(d) #Kyuss and early #QueensoftheStoneAge / #QotSA on record and live. Just watched some current live stuff etc. Holy shit, they've become so dull, irrelevant and crap. The #Metallica of #Stoner #Rock? #WTF - I don't need them anymore. Modern #deftones are innovation monsters… #music

No one will save your life So be prepared to die These politicians pull you under So say all of your prayers Or whatever gets you there If we go down, we'll lose all our rights #OpenHand • #PureConcentratedEvil #music #stoner #kyuss #qotsa #rock #alternative youtu.be/p0NqjLtOOEg

Pure Concentrated Evil

On 11 July 1995, stoner rock giants Kyuss released their swan song "And the Circus Leaves Town" before disbanding just three months later.

As the inventors of 'Desert Rock', their influence cannot be overstated, as their subsequent demise paved the way for guitarist Hommes's even more successful band, Queens of the Stone Age, who put their own twist on the sound in the decade that followed.

"DC, New York, and LA all had their scenes, and in the desert we had ours."

06. El Rodeo

#Kyuss

On 11 July 1995, stoner rock giants Kyuss released their swan song "And the Circus Leaves Town" before disbanding just three months later.

As the inventors of 'Desert Rock', their influence cannot be overstated, as their subsequent demise paved the way for guitarist Hommes's even more successful band, Queens of the Stone Age, who put their own twist on the sound in the decade that followed.

"DC, New York, and LA all had their scenes, and in the desert we had ours."

06. El Rodeo

#Kyuss

Oh yes - this, this, this. A thousand times this. #kyuss

Crystal Spiders – Metanoia Review

By El Cuervo

Out of the fertile grounds of North Carolina comes Crystal Spiders, spinning their latest auditory web entitled Metanoia. Metanoia follows two prior full-length albums and a musical tradition of gritty sounds from the American South. It’s steeped in this culture, hinting at a chewy blend of classic metal and the weightier grooves of stoner rock. Does it succeed in harmonizing these elements into a meaty whole?

Metanoia delivers a burly fusion of its heavy metal and stoner rock influences, blending the energetic jauntiness of ’80s heavy metal with the thick guitar tones of ’90s stoner soundscapes. Stoner grooves are the priority, even when paired alongside classic metal acrobatics. First impressions are solid, with the opening passages on “Torche”1 featuring leads that are good and occasionally wander into very good territory. An unexpected, trilling guitar layer around the mid-point contributes to the psych/stoner vibe, and a hearteningly soulful singer caps a track with sturdy bones. The production packages these elements into a pleasingly rustic aesthetic, sounding as if Crystal Spiders recorded live in a room together. It lands somewhere between Royal Thunder and Kyuss, but is executed with a classic metal sensibility.

Despite Metanoia’s sturdy bones, the body they support is sometimes flabby with a plain face. The songwriting suffers from noticeable bloat. With just seven tracks stretching to 44 minutes, the band isn’t afraid of length. But even your first exposure to the album on “Torche” feels a bit too long; its core lead is good, but not good enough to carry nearly six minutes. By the time you reach the almost nine-minute finale (“O.S..”), you might expect something exciting and climactic. Instead, the same core passage loops through the first half, with the song changing but not significantly for the remainder. Likewise, “Time Travel” keeps returning to the core passage in its first half, and I’ve passed my saturation point with it well before the end. After several minutes, it just sounds lethargic. Notwithstanding a handful of notable solos and transitions, the songs generally move slowly and repetitively between passages. Metanoia feels like 20 minutes of ideas stretched into 40 minutes of music.

By comparison, “Ignite” is immediately more urgent and entertaining as it speeds up to a canter with a nifty lead in its first verse. The dramatic flair of this riff is a welcome change and injects some drama that the rest of the record lacks. This song is the exception that proves the rule of bloated songwriting, as I enjoy the shortest track most. Similarly, the back half of “Time Travel” features an instrumental passage that speeds through a spirited lead with a more technical solo. The album proves more entertaining when it progresses past slower and mid-paced tempos. Beyond these satisfying moments, however, I struggle to highlight any other points of note. Music that stands out must overcome endless choice in a world with virtually limitless options available at a listener’s fingertips. Metanoia’s overall quality is such that it’s difficult to muster any more strengths or weaknesses.

I had a ten-day work trip between my first and last listens to Metanoia, so it had plenty of time to passively gestate. But in reality, I nearly forgot that this review was due; it’s just not a memorable or remarkable release, and hadn’t called to me once during that period. Despite the core strengths of the Crystal Spiders’ sound across their guitar leads and lively production, the bloated songs and solid-but-unexciting songwriting prohibit them from truly excelling.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: v0 mp3
Label: Ripple Music
Websites: crystalspiders.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/crystalspiders
Releases Worldwide: May 23rd, 2025

#25 #2025 #AmericanMetal #CrystalSpiders #HeavyMetal #Kyuss #May25 #Metanoia #Review #Reviews #RippleMusic #RoyalThunder #StonerMetal

Fundador y líder de Queens of the Stone Age, fundador, también, de Eagles of the Death Metal, parte del súper grupos Them Crooked Vultures y ex guitarrista de Kyuss. Hoy, 17 de mayo, cumple 52 años Josh Homme. ¡Feliz #CumpleañosRockero para él! 🥳🤘🏻🎸🎂

#JoshHomme #QueensOfTheStoneAge #EaglesOfTheDeathMetal #ThemCrookedVultures #Kyuss

Fundador y líder de Queens of the Stone Age, fundador, también, de Eagles of the Death Metal, parte del súper grupos Them Crooked Vultures y ex guitarrista de Kyuss. Hoy, 17 de mayo, cumple 52 años Josh Homme. ¡Feliz #CumpleañosRockero para él! 🥳🤘🏻🎸🎂

#JoshHomme #QueensOfTheStoneAge #EaglesOfTheDeathMetal #ThemCrookedVultures #Kyuss

#justlisten to #FatsoForgotso by #Kyuss

https://song.link/i/207923870

#StonerRock #DessertRock

Memories in my head from a short but fantastic gig of #QOTSA in Stadtpark #Hamburg years ago ❤️

#justlisten to #Hurricane by #Kyuss

https://song.link/i/207923862

Working in the #Garden, listening to good #Music, #Life couldn't be better 😊

#StonerRock #DessertRock

#justlisten to I'm Not by #Kyuss

https://song.link/i/207923818

#StonerRock #DessertRock

#justlisten #DemonCleaner (Edit) by #Kyuss

https://song.link/i/207923769

#StonerRock #DessertRock

#kyuss not #QotSA! #Music

RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:2lmhwpospn5uzu6asebaokyf/post/3llgn5zpwzs25

Jetzt erstmal wieder ordentliche Mucke auf die Ohren
#kyuss #welcometoskyvalley
Ein Meilenstein des #stonerrock Hammer Scheibe kann ich immer wieder hören.

Blues for the Red Sun #nowplaying #Kyuss

Blues for the Red Sun #nowplaying #Kyuss

🤘

Incredible band. Incredible album.

#kyuss #nowplaying

Dat je eigenlijk weg moet van achter de pc maar in een enorm lekkere muziektrip zit. In dit geval #kyuss op standje 11. #kyuss #greenmachine

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#MetalInjection
10 Bands That Broke Up Way Too Soon

https://metalinjection.net/lists/10-bands-that-broke-up-way-too-soon

#Kyuss #Siege #GlassCloud #Hellhammer #DeadwaterDrowning #diSEMBOWELMENT #Beecher #AIIz #Carnage #Thergothon

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#MetalInjection
HERMANO (Ex-KYUSS) Streams New Single, Announces First Release Since 2007

https://metalinjection.net/video/hermano-ex-kyuss-streams-new-single-announces-first-release-since-2007

#Hermano #Kyuss

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#BraveWords
Today In Metal History 🤘 July 11th, 2024🤘 RAZOR, BONHAM, BON JOVI, ROBERT PLANT, KYUSS, MOTÖRHEAD

https://bravewords.com/news/today-in-metal-history-july-11th-2024-razor-bonham-bon-jovi-robert-plant-kyuss-motorhead

#KeithAlexander #DanielStewartMacMaster #ThomasErdelyi #JohnLawton #RichieSambora #DavidCarlo #RickyWarwick #GerryFinn #RobertPlant #TonyIommi #GlennHughes #JasonBonham #JohnBonham #TommyRamone #LedZeppelin #UriahHeep #LucifersFriend #Bonham #BonJovi #Kyuss #Motörhead #Razor #StrappingYoungLad #MötleyCrüe #TonyIommi #GlennHughes

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#MetalInjection
STÖNER (Ex-KYUSS) Pays Tribute To KYUSS With A Cover Of "Green Machine"
Who better to do it than Brant Bjork and Nick Oliveri?

https://metalinjection.net/new-music/stoner-ex-kyuss-pays-tribute-to-kyuss-with-a-cover-of-green-machine

#STÖNER #BrantBjork #NickOliveri #Kyuss

🔊 #NowPlaying on #KEXP's #VarietyMix

Kyuss:
🎵 Green Machine

#Kyuss

https://open.spotify.com/track/6nxHMqTNKWlQnx5AFxz1iX

https://hellvetika.bandcamp.com/track/green-machine
#Bandcamp

#TheMetalDogArticleList
#BraveWords
Today In Metal History 🤘 June 28th, 2023🤘METAL CHURCH, SATYRICON, ROBERT PLANT, AC/DC, GRAVE, OZZY OSBOURNE

https://bravewords.com/news/today-in-metal-history-june-28th-2023metal-church-satyricon-robert-plant-ac-dc-grave-ozzy-osbourne

#MetalChurch #Satyricon #RobertPlant #ACDC #Grave #OzzyOsbourne #KISS #BillyIdol #Lordi #JonLord #KimMitchell #Stryper #Queensryche #OzzysOsbourne #Kyuss #Widowmaker #Throwdown #Sodom #SevereTorture #Agathodaimon #Darkane #Sirenai #Impiety #Manegarm #Beastwars #BloodyHammers #CroMags #GenerationAxe #HeIsLegend #Majesty

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#MetalSucks
Ex-Kyuss Frontman John Garcia Reveals He and Mastodon’s Bill Kelliher Have Started a Band
This could be one hell of a collab.

https://www.metalsucks.net/2024/05/16/ex-kyuss-frontman-john-garcia-reveals-he-and-mastodons-bill-kelliher-have-started-a-band/

#JohnGarcia #Mastodon #BillKelliher #NewBand #Kyuss #DesertRock #StonerRock #SludgeRock

Γλυκύτατοι Masters of Reality επιστρέφουν αναπάντεχα με καινούρια μουσική μετά από 15 χρόνια και με ανακοίνωση νέου επερχόμενου άλμπουμ! Ενημερωτικά για τα συμφραζόμενα, οι MoR είναι η μπάντα του Chris Goss, του τύπου που ήταν ουσιαστικά υπεύθυνος για τον τερατώδη και σήμα κατατεθέν ήχο κάποιων Kyuss...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecslvsERpcA
#music #μουσική #ERisNowPlaying #newreleases2024 #kyuss #alternativerock