#oingoboingo — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #oingoboingo, aggregated by home.social.
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🔴 LIVE NOW ON VORTEX
📻 Vortex WaveSpiral 🌀 (Post Punk & Classical New Wave)
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🎵 Oingo Boingo - Only A Lad▶️ Écouter / Listen : VorteX [Radio]
https://lesonduvortex.net💬 Join us on Discord:
https://discord.gg/d82hJZBeDE -
40 years ago this week, "Just Another Day" by #OingoBoingo entered the #Top100 at 90. It peaked at 85 on 08 Feb 1986. Not as successful as their first hit, "Weird Science", this was their second and last trip up the charts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBPGOP78YTQ #1980s #MusicHistory #MusicVideo
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Oingo Boingo - Nothing bad ever happens to me
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LOL. "Ignore my prior paid opinions."
FBI Official Admits He Was Being Paid to Lie Before Trump Hired Him
https://newrepublic.com/post/204026/fbi-dan-bongino-admits-paid-lie-january-6-pipe-bomb -
AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Zakula – White Forest Reign Lullabies
By Dolphin Whisperer
“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”
It takes a bit of effort to assemble the fickle tastes of the Rodeö gang, as distinguished and willing as they may be. Now, I won’t say that the lure of a unsigned gem requires trickery, but with a band like Zakula, explaining their style straight doesn’t stand as an option. These Athenian speed demons slap the simplest of tags across their Bandcamp page: death metal, black metal, thrash metal. And frustratingly, that’s the truth too! But what does it mean? Chunky riffs that dance about flailing tempos with a dramatic vocal character? Kind of. How about sneaky lead melodies that tumble against bright synth crashes into whiplash thrash and manic shrieks? White Forest Reign Lullabies doesn’t make explanation easy, but Zakula does play metal with lots of twists. This is the kind of challenge for which the Rodeö crew—now with the recently demoted n00b Tyme in the mix—lives! And, also proof that they too are capable of enjoyment. – Dolphin Whisperer
Zakula // White Forest Reign Lullabies [October 25th, 2024]
GardensTale: Zakula was initially sold to me as weirdo black metal. Foul! This is clearly weirdo tech thrash, a niche I seldom dabble in. As such, I find myself more unmoored than usual, with my frame of reference limited to Stam1na and my meager exposure to Vektor, whose frontman I disliked for his vocals and dislike more for his abuse. But while a few comparisons can be drawn from Zakula to either, this is a different beast altogether. White Forest Reign Lullabies is fast as hell, frequently discordant, and seems designed to keep you off-balance. The guitars throw me off the least, somehow, though their rapid tremolos and triplets and trips up and down the scales require close attention. More unsettling are the hoarse histrionics that make up the vocals, which sound ragged and desperate and are played backward on at least one occasion, and the erratic drums that go from maddeningly consistent to plain mad. But it’s the electronics that send me over the edge. The dissonant slides and squeaks and blips have a panic-inducing effect that reminds me of VAK at about nine times the speed. Somehow, though, the Greeks pull it all together with some excellent songwriting, mixing manic melodic riffs and staccato drums in opposition without letting it all descend into nonsensical noise. Some of the tracks do swerve a bit much from one extreme to another and lose the cohesion, but more often than not this one’s one heck of a ride, full of surprises, technical wizardry, and all the drugs that are not good for you. 3.5/5.0
Felagund: I enjoy the Rodeö feature much more when I have something positive to say about the album we’re reviewing. And truly, how could I hate on the off-kilter package that Zakula has delivered? White Forest Rain Lullabies is the band’s sophomore outing, and they’ve embraced the well-trod kitchen sink approach. Sure, Zakula might arrive on a wave of thrash, but stick around and you’ll be accosted by an undertow of industrial, prog, black metal, and noise. As you struggle against the deluge, you may hear dashes of Coroner, Voivod, and even Oingo Boingo. There’s plenty of synths, light orchestration, squealing guitars, and highly augmented, blackened vocals that’ll pull you even further out past the breakers. Yet somehow, these zany Greeks pull it off. Whether you’re looking for crunchy thrash riffs (“Olethros,” “Children of Haze,”) frenzied, cacophonous noise (“Melancholy,” “White Forest Rain Lullabies”) or spacy synths (“Remains,” “Children of Haze”) Zakula delivers the goods both cohesively and effectively, something even well-seasoned musicians struggle to do. Unfortunately, in their zeal to cram more genres, instrumentation, and ideas into each song, Zakula has inadvertently delivered a record in dire need of some editing. On a six-song album, there are three tracks that clock in at or over eight minutes, and each would have been leaner, meaner, and more impactful with just two to three minutes shaved off. This certainly isn’t a deal breaker, but it does stifle the momentum of an otherwise promising album. Still, I’d recommend White Forest Rain Lullabies, especially to all you little freaks out there. 3.0/5.0
Iceberg: While I tend to follow the Germanic school of thought that order and structure rule supreme, I have a soft spot for unpredictable, chaotic music. Dolph has zeroed in on this personal weakness, and continues to poke and prod me with insanity I can’t help but love. Zakula barely manages to control their chaos across an impressive forty minutes of music with White Forest Reign Lullabies, throwing so many genres against the wall that I’d waste word count listing them here. From the deliriously quick, heaving chromatic leads of “Όλεθρος” to the relentless, across-the-bar ostinati of “Remains,” Zakula sinks their hooks into the listener and refuses to let go. Mid-album heavyweight “Melancholy” is a twisting nine minutes that feels much shorter than that, and it’s middle section is straight from a Twilight Zone soundtrack, successfully blended with speed metal bookends. Every time I’ve come back to this record I’ve found a new corner to explore, a new chromatic tremolo, a new electronic underpinning. The title track and “Ton 618” don’t hit quite as hard as their album-mates, and there could be a case for some more editing, but the amount of fat amongst these tracks is pretty minimal. White Forest Reign Lullabies marks a triumph for the Athenians, and I can easily see it increasing in score as it continues to worm its way into my brainstem. An absolute must for fans of extreme music that blows right past anything resembling a boundary. 3.5/5.0
Alekhines Gun: If metal were a snack, White Forest Reign Lullabies would be the chunkiest of trail mix. Zakula assembles a brand of blackened thrash, piano, clean vocals, interludes, and electronica in an absurd, bizarrely effective middle finger to our stance at AMG Inc. that less is more. Do you love synth shreddage? Zakula pack in enough to make His Statue Falls blush and Fail Emotions suggest toning it down a bit. Do you love blackened thrash? White Forest Reign Lullabies pack in the spirit of Urn with pained vocals pulled straight from modern Asphyx, seeking to kick arse with beer and steel-toed boot. The sincerity behind the more metal riffs serves as a surprising counterpart to the instrumental excess on display here, keeping Zakula from being mistaken for a mere gimmick band. Look no further than the opening minute of “Melancholy” to realize this band is in no way here to mess around, even if it seems like they can’t commit to a style for long enough to do anything but. Some people will cry that this album lacks cohesion, identity, and focus, and those are people who don’t like fun. Your tolerance for this album will certainly depend on your joy for madcap zany ADHD (positive) song structures. But for those looking for a walk on the wild side, come enjoy some sweet Lullabies. Or as Zakula would ask, “How can less be more? That’s impossible!” 3.0/5.0
Thyme: Three years after their 2021 eponymous debut, Greek thrashers Zakula return with White Forest Reign Lullabies. From the first swift, surgically precise riff and chaotic keyboard run of opener, “Όλεθρος,” it’s clear Zakula is no straight-line descendant of the (some say tragically Overkill-less) Big Four — no sir. Zakula’s brand of blackened thrash has an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink quality to it that not only belies its genre tags but makes drawing valid comparisons difficult. If Mr. Bungle and Xoth paid Titan to Tachyons for a threesome, you’d at least be in the ballpark, as every second of this six-song, forty-minute tornado is engaging as fook. The songwriting, especially on the lengthier tracks (“Melancholy,” “Children of Haze”), showcases what Zakula does best. And that’s providing a wealth of melt-in-your-mouth goodness chock full of visceral riffs, Xothically spacy synths, and Schuldiner by way of Van Drunen1 vocals that imbue a particular deathly black menace to each of these thrashtastically jazzy (thrazzy? thrazztastic?)2 compositions. Full of twists, turns, and surprises designed to keep the listener guessing but never letting them get lost in the woods, White Forest Reign Lullabies is an album I strongly suggest you check out. At this rate, Zakula won’t stay Rodeö bait for much longer. 3.5/5.0
#AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #Asphyx #BlackMetal #Coroner #Death #GreekMetal #IndependentRelease #MrBungle #OingoBoingo #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #Stam1na #TechnicalThrashMetal #ThrashMetal #TitanToTachyons #Vektor #Voivod #WhiteForestReignLullabies #Xoth #Zakula
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AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Zakula – White Forest Reign Lullabies
By Dolphin Whisperer
“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”
It takes a bit of effort to assemble the fickle tastes of the Rodeö gang, as distinguished and willing as they may be. Now, I won’t say that the lure of a unsigned gem requires trickery, but with a band like Zakula, explaining their style straight doesn’t stand as an option. These Athenian speed demons slap the simplest of tags across their Bandcamp page: death metal, black metal, thrash metal. And frustratingly, that’s the truth too! But what does it mean? Chunky riffs that dance about flailing tempos with a dramatic vocal character? Kind of. How about sneaky lead melodies that tumble against bright synth crashes into whiplash thrash and manic shrieks? White Forest Reign Lullabies doesn’t make explanation easy, but Zakula does play metal with lots of twists. This is the kind of challenge for which the Rodeö crew—now with the recently demoted n00b Tyme in the mix—lives! And, also proof that they too are capable of enjoyment. – Dolphin Whisperer
Zakula // White Forest Reign Lullabies [October 25th, 2024]
GardensTale: Zakula was initially sold to me as weirdo black metal. Foul! This is clearly weirdo tech thrash, a niche I seldom dabble in. As such, I find myself more unmoored than usual, with my frame of reference limited to Stam1na and my meager exposure to Vektor, whose frontman I disliked for his vocals and dislike more for his abuse. But while a few comparisons can be drawn from Zakula to either, this is a different beast altogether. White Forest Reign Lullabies is fast as hell, frequently discordant, and seems designed to keep you off-balance. The guitars throw me off the least, somehow, though their rapid tremolos and triplets and trips up and down the scales require close attention. More unsettling are the hoarse histrionics that make up the vocals, which sound ragged and desperate and are played backward on at least one occasion, and the erratic drums that go from maddeningly consistent to plain mad. But it’s the electronics that send me over the edge. The dissonant slides and squeaks and blips have a panic-inducing effect that reminds me of VAK at about nine times the speed. Somehow, though, the Greeks pull it all together with some excellent songwriting, mixing manic melodic riffs and staccato drums in opposition without letting it all descend into nonsensical noise. Some of the tracks do swerve a bit much from one extreme to another and lose the cohesion, but more often than not this one’s one heck of a ride, full of surprises, technical wizardry, and all the drugs that are not good for you. 3.5/5.0
Felagund: I enjoy the Rodeö feature much more when I have something positive to say about the album we’re reviewing. And truly, how could I hate on the off-kilter package that Zakula has delivered? White Forest Rain Lullabies is the band’s sophomore outing, and they’ve embraced the well-trod kitchen sink approach. Sure, Zakula might arrive on a wave of thrash, but stick around and you’ll be accosted by an undertow of industrial, prog, black metal, and noise. As you struggle against the deluge, you may hear dashes of Coroner, Voivod, and even Oingo Boingo. There’s plenty of synths, light orchestration, squealing guitars, and highly augmented, blackened vocals that’ll pull you even further out past the breakers. Yet somehow, these zany Greeks pull it off. Whether you’re looking for crunchy thrash riffs (“Olethros,” “Children of Haze,”) frenzied, cacophonous noise (“Melancholy,” “White Forest Rain Lullabies”) or spacy synths (“Remains,” “Children of Haze”) Zakula delivers the goods both cohesively and effectively, something even well-seasoned musicians struggle to do. Unfortunately, in their zeal to cram more genres, instrumentation, and ideas into each song, Zakula has inadvertently delivered a record in dire need of some editing. On a six-song album, there are three tracks that clock in at or over eight minutes, and each would have been leaner, meaner, and more impactful with just two to three minutes shaved off. This certainly isn’t a deal breaker, but it does stifle the momentum of an otherwise promising album. Still, I’d recommend White Forest Rain Lullabies, especially to all you little freaks out there. 3.0/5.0
Iceberg: While I tend to follow the Germanic school of thought that order and structure rule supreme, I have a soft spot for unpredictable, chaotic music. Dolph has zeroed in on this personal weakness, and continues to poke and prod me with insanity I can’t help but love. Zakula barely manages to control their chaos across an impressive forty minutes of music with White Forest Reign Lullabies, throwing so many genres against the wall that I’d waste word count listing them here. From the deliriously quick, heaving chromatic leads of “Όλεθρος” to the relentless, across-the-bar ostinati of “Remains,” Zakula sinks their hooks into the listener and refuses to let go. Mid-album heavyweight “Melancholy” is a twisting nine minutes that feels much shorter than that, and it’s middle section is straight from a Twilight Zone soundtrack, successfully blended with speed metal bookends. Every time I’ve come back to this record I’ve found a new corner to explore, a new chromatic tremolo, a new electronic underpinning. The title track and “Ton 618” don’t hit quite as hard as their album-mates, and there could be a case for some more editing, but the amount of fat amongst these tracks is pretty minimal. White Forest Reign Lullabies marks a triumph for the Athenians, and I can easily see it increasing in score as it continues to worm its way into my brainstem. An absolute must for fans of extreme music that blows right past anything resembling a boundary. 3.5/5.0
Alekhines Gun: If metal were a snack, White Forest Reign Lullabies would be the chunkiest of trail mix. Zakula assembles a brand of blackened thrash, piano, clean vocals, interludes, and electronica in an absurd, bizarrely effective middle finger to our stance at AMG Inc. that less is more. Do you love synth shreddage? Zakula pack in enough to make His Statue Falls blush and Fail Emotions suggest toning it down a bit. Do you love blackened thrash? White Forest Reign Lullabies pack in the spirit of Urn with pained vocals pulled straight from modern Asphyx, seeking to kick arse with beer and steel-toed boot. The sincerity behind the more metal riffs serves as a surprising counterpart to the instrumental excess on display here, keeping Zakula from being mistaken for a mere gimmick band. Look no further than the opening minute of “Melancholy” to realize this band is in no way here to mess around, even if it seems like they can’t commit to a style for long enough to do anything but. Some people will cry that this album lacks cohesion, identity, and focus, and those are people who don’t like fun. Your tolerance for this album will certainly depend on your joy for madcap zany ADHD (positive) song structures. But for those looking for a walk on the wild side, come enjoy some sweet Lullabies. Or as Zakula would ask, “How can less be more? That’s impossible!” 3.0/5.0
Thyme: Three years after their 2021 eponymous debut, Greek thrashers Zakula return with White Forest Reign Lullabies. From the first swift, surgically precise riff and chaotic keyboard run of opener, “Όλεθρος,” it’s clear Zakula is no straight-line descendant of the (some say tragically Overkill-less) Big Four — no sir. Zakula’s brand of blackened thrash has an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink quality to it that not only belies its genre tags but makes drawing valid comparisons difficult. If Mr. Bungle and Xoth paid Titan to Tachyons for a threesome, you’d at least be in the ballpark, as every second of this six-song, forty-minute tornado is engaging as fook. The songwriting, especially on the lengthier tracks (“Melancholy,” “Children of Haze”), showcases what Zakula does best. And that’s providing a wealth of melt-in-your-mouth goodness chock full of visceral riffs, Xothically spacy synths, and Schuldiner by way of Van Drunen1 vocals that imbue a particular deathly black menace to each of these thrashtastically jazzy (thrazzy? thrazztastic?)2 compositions. Full of twists, turns, and surprises designed to keep the listener guessing but never letting them get lost in the woods, White Forest Reign Lullabies is an album I strongly suggest you check out. At this rate, Zakula won’t stay Rodeö bait for much longer. 3.5/5.0
#AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #Asphyx #BlackMetal #Coroner #Death #GreekMetal #IndependentRelease #MrBungle #OingoBoingo #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #Stam1na #TechnicalThrashMetal #ThrashMetal #TitanToTachyons #Vektor #Voivod #WhiteForestReignLullabies #Xoth #Zakula
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AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Zakula – White Forest Reign Lullabies
By Dolphin Whisperer
“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”
It takes a bit of effort to assemble the fickle tastes of the Rodeö gang, as distinguished and willing as they may be. Now, I won’t say that the lure of a unsigned gem requires trickery, but with a band like Zakula, explaining their style straight doesn’t stand as an option. These Athenian speed demons slap the simplest of tags across their Bandcamp page: death metal, black metal, thrash metal. And frustratingly, that’s the truth too! But what does it mean? Chunky riffs that dance about flailing tempos with a dramatic vocal character? Kind of. How about sneaky lead melodies that tumble against bright synth crashes into whiplash thrash and manic shrieks? White Forest Reign Lullabies doesn’t make explanation easy, but Zakula does play metal with lots of twists. This is the kind of challenge for which the Rodeö crew—now with the recently demoted n00b Tyme in the mix—lives! And, also proof that they too are capable of enjoyment. – Dolphin Whisperer
Zakula // White Forest Reign Lullabies [October 25th, 2024]
GardensTale: Zakula was initially sold to me as weirdo black metal. Foul! This is clearly weirdo tech thrash, a niche I seldom dabble in. As such, I find myself more unmoored than usual, with my frame of reference limited to Stam1na and my meager exposure to Vektor, whose frontman I disliked for his vocals and dislike more for his abuse. But while a few comparisons can be drawn from Zakula to either, this is a different beast altogether. White Forest Reign Lullabies is fast as hell, frequently discordant, and seems designed to keep you off-balance. The guitars throw me off the least, somehow, though their rapid tremolos and triplets and trips up and down the scales require close attention. More unsettling are the hoarse histrionics that make up the vocals, which sound ragged and desperate and are played backward on at least one occasion, and the erratic drums that go from maddeningly consistent to plain mad. But it’s the electronics that send me over the edge. The dissonant slides and squeaks and blips have a panic-inducing effect that reminds me of VAK at about nine times the speed. Somehow, though, the Greeks pull it all together with some excellent songwriting, mixing manic melodic riffs and staccato drums in opposition without letting it all descend into nonsensical noise. Some of the tracks do swerve a bit much from one extreme to another and lose the cohesion, but more often than not this one’s one heck of a ride, full of surprises, technical wizardry, and all the drugs that are not good for you. 3.5/5.0
Felagund: I enjoy the Rodeö feature much more when I have something positive to say about the album we’re reviewing. And truly, how could I hate on the off-kilter package that Zakula has delivered? White Forest Rain Lullabies is the band’s sophomore outing, and they’ve embraced the well-trod kitchen sink approach. Sure, Zakula might arrive on a wave of thrash, but stick around and you’ll be accosted by an undertow of industrial, prog, black metal, and noise. As you struggle against the deluge, you may hear dashes of Coroner, Voivod, and even Oingo Boingo. There’s plenty of synths, light orchestration, squealing guitars, and highly augmented, blackened vocals that’ll pull you even further out past the breakers. Yet somehow, these zany Greeks pull it off. Whether you’re looking for crunchy thrash riffs (“Olethros,” “Children of Haze,”) frenzied, cacophonous noise (“Melancholy,” “White Forest Rain Lullabies”) or spacy synths (“Remains,” “Children of Haze”) Zakula delivers the goods both cohesively and effectively, something even well-seasoned musicians struggle to do. Unfortunately, in their zeal to cram more genres, instrumentation, and ideas into each song, Zakula has inadvertently delivered a record in dire need of some editing. On a six-song album, there are three tracks that clock in at or over eight minutes, and each would have been leaner, meaner, and more impactful with just two to three minutes shaved off. This certainly isn’t a deal breaker, but it does stifle the momentum of an otherwise promising album. Still, I’d recommend White Forest Rain Lullabies, especially to all you little freaks out there. 3.0/5.0
Iceberg: While I tend to follow the Germanic school of thought that order and structure rule supreme, I have a soft spot for unpredictable, chaotic music. Dolph has zeroed in on this personal weakness, and continues to poke and prod me with insanity I can’t help but love. Zakula barely manages to control their chaos across an impressive forty minutes of music with White Forest Reign Lullabies, throwing so many genres against the wall that I’d waste word count listing them here. From the deliriously quick, heaving chromatic leads of “Όλεθρος” to the relentless, across-the-bar ostinati of “Remains,” Zakula sinks their hooks into the listener and refuses to let go. Mid-album heavyweight “Melancholy” is a twisting nine minutes that feels much shorter than that, and it’s middle section is straight from a Twilight Zone soundtrack, successfully blended with speed metal bookends. Every time I’ve come back to this record I’ve found a new corner to explore, a new chromatic tremolo, a new electronic underpinning. The title track and “Ton 618” don’t hit quite as hard as their album-mates, and there could be a case for some more editing, but the amount of fat amongst these tracks is pretty minimal. White Forest Reign Lullabies marks a triumph for the Athenians, and I can easily see it increasing in score as it continues to worm its way into my brainstem. An absolute must for fans of extreme music that blows right past anything resembling a boundary. 3.5/5.0
Alekhines Gun: If metal were a snack, White Forest Reign Lullabies would be the chunkiest of trail mix. Zakula assembles a brand of blackened thrash, piano, clean vocals, interludes, and electronica in an absurd, bizarrely effective middle finger to our stance at AMG Inc. that less is more. Do you love synth shreddage? Zakula pack in enough to make His Statue Falls blush and Fail Emotions suggest toning it down a bit. Do you love blackened thrash? White Forest Reign Lullabies pack in the spirit of Urn with pained vocals pulled straight from modern Asphyx, seeking to kick arse with beer and steel-toed boot. The sincerity behind the more metal riffs serves as a surprising counterpart to the instrumental excess on display here, keeping Zakula from being mistaken for a mere gimmick band. Look no further than the opening minute of “Melancholy” to realize this band is in no way here to mess around, even if it seems like they can’t commit to a style for long enough to do anything but. Some people will cry that this album lacks cohesion, identity, and focus, and those are people who don’t like fun. Your tolerance for this album will certainly depend on your joy for madcap zany ADHD (positive) song structures. But for those looking for a walk on the wild side, come enjoy some sweet Lullabies. Or as Zakula would ask, “How can less be more? That’s impossible!” 3.0/5.0
Thyme: Three years after their 2021 eponymous debut, Greek thrashers Zakula return with White Forest Reign Lullabies. From the first swift, surgically precise riff and chaotic keyboard run of opener, “Όλεθρος,” it’s clear Zakula is no straight-line descendant of the (some say tragically Overkill-less) Big Four — no sir. Zakula’s brand of blackened thrash has an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink quality to it that not only belies its genre tags but makes drawing valid comparisons difficult. If Mr. Bungle and Xoth paid Titan to Tachyons for a threesome, you’d at least be in the ballpark, as every second of this six-song, forty-minute tornado is engaging as fook. The songwriting, especially on the lengthier tracks (“Melancholy,” “Children of Haze”), showcases what Zakula does best. And that’s providing a wealth of melt-in-your-mouth goodness chock full of visceral riffs, Xothically spacy synths, and Schuldiner by way of Van Drunen1 vocals that imbue a particular deathly black menace to each of these thrashtastically jazzy (thrazzy? thrazztastic?)2 compositions. Full of twists, turns, and surprises designed to keep the listener guessing but never letting them get lost in the woods, White Forest Reign Lullabies is an album I strongly suggest you check out. At this rate, Zakula won’t stay Rodeö bait for much longer. 3.5/5.0
#AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #Asphyx #BlackMetal #Coroner #Death #GreekMetal #IndependentRelease #MrBungle #OingoBoingo #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #Stam1na #TechnicalThrashMetal #ThrashMetal #TitanToTachyons #Vektor #Voivod #WhiteForestReignLullabies #Xoth #Zakula
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Oingo Boingo – Stay
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Christian nation, make us all right
Put us through the filter, and make us pure and white
My mind has wandered from the flock, you see
And the flock has wandered away from me
Let's talk of family values while we sit and watch the slaughter
Hypothetical abortions on imaginary daughters
The white folks think they're at the top; ask any proud white male
A million years of evolution, we get Danny QuayleFrom "Insanity" by Oingo Boingo, written by Danny Elfman 1994
#DanQuayle was the #JDVance of the day. We were scared that something would happen to President #GeorgeHWBush so that he would take over. Now what if Trump wins and then... oh perish the thought!
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***NEW EPISODE!!!***
Meet BRETT CLINE, owner of THE LOST CHURCH SAN FRANCISCO!
* his SoCal skating, surfing, punk, Taco Bell childhood
* discovering Oingo Boingo and alternative music
* making flyers and playing shows at UC Santa Barbara
* discovering and moving to San Francisco in the early NinetiesAll this and more up at the link in our bio. Also available wherever you get #podcasts.
📸 Jeff Hunt
#SouthernCalifornia #SoCal #TheOC #OingoBoingo #punkrock #skateboarding #surfing #music #musicians #UCSB #GratefulDead #London #SanFrancisco #storytelling #WereAllInIt
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***NEW EPISODE!!!***
Meet BRETT CLINE, owner of THE LOST CHURCH SAN FRANCISCO!
* his SoCal skating, surfing, punk, Taco Bell childhood
* discovering Oingo Boingo and alternative music
* making flyers and playing shows at UC Santa Barbara
* discovering and moving to San Francisco in the early NinetiesAll this and more up at the link in our bio. Also available wherever you get #podcasts.
📸 Jeff Hunt
#SouthernCalifornia #SoCal #TheOC #OingoBoingo #punkrock #skateboarding #surfing #music #musicians #UCSB #GratefulDead #London #SanFrancisco #storytelling #WereAllInIt
-
***NEW EPISODE!!!***
Meet BRETT CLINE, owner of THE LOST CHURCH SAN FRANCISCO!
* his SoCal skating, surfing, punk, Taco Bell childhood
* discovering Oingo Boingo and alternative music
* making flyers and playing shows at UC Santa Barbara
* discovering and moving to San Francisco in the early NinetiesAll this and more up at the link in our bio. Also available wherever you get #podcasts.
📸 Jeff Hunt
#SouthernCalifornia #SoCal #TheOC #OingoBoingo #punkrock #skateboarding #surfing #music #musicians #UCSB #GratefulDead #London #SanFrancisco #storytelling #WereAllInIt
-
***NEW EPISODE!!!***
Meet BRETT CLINE, owner of THE LOST CHURCH SAN FRANCISCO!
* his SoCal skating, surfing, punk, Taco Bell childhood
* discovering Oingo Boingo and alternative music
* making flyers and playing shows at UC Santa Barbara
* discovering and moving to San Francisco in the early NinetiesAll this and more up at the link in our bio. Also available wherever you get #podcasts.
📸 Jeff Hunt
#SouthernCalifornia #SoCal #TheOC #OingoBoingo #punkrock #skateboarding #surfing #music #musicians #UCSB #GratefulDead #London #SanFrancisco #storytelling #WereAllInIt
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***NEW EPISODE!!!***
Meet BRETT CLINE, owner of THE LOST CHURCH SAN FRANCISCO!
* his SoCal skating, surfing, punk, Taco Bell childhood
* discovering Oingo Boingo and alternative music
* making flyers and playing shows at UC Santa Barbara
* discovering and moving to San Francisco in the early NinetiesAll this and more up at the link in our bio. Also available wherever you get #podcasts.
📸 Jeff Hunt
#SouthernCalifornia #SoCal #TheOC #OingoBoingo #punkrock #skateboarding #surfing #music #musicians #UCSB #GratefulDead #London #SanFrancisco #storytelling #WereAllInIt
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Melvin and The Melvins Rodeö: Melvin Ditches His Pills and Reviews Tarantula Heart
By GardensTale
“Melvin’s The Melvins Rodeö” is a time-honored single-instance tradition that won’t be repeated, unless it will. The doctor said — to no effect at all — that Melvin should take his prescription as usual and let one of his many writer personalities showcase the most underground of the underground—seminal co-founders of both grunge and sludge, The Melvins, whose legacy speaks for itself. This collectividual review treatment continues to exist to unite me, myself and Melvin in boot or bolster of the band who reminds us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of The Melvins. Melvin rides on.”
For over twenty albums The (the) Melvins has been distilling wild tones through rockin’ and trippin’ soundscapes. Through their forty-plus year existence, they’ve carved both essentials of the stoner/sludge sound—approximately 1991’s Bullhead through 1994’s Stoner Witch—as well as albums that, well, aren’t so great—arguably Prick, some early 00s cuts, a few really odd EPs and such… also arguably there’s just too much Melvins. But hey, what does that matter when guitarist/vocalist Buzz Osborne and drummer/sometimes bassist Dale Crover have been at it for this long, living their dream year after year. Participating in similarly weird acts like Fantômas, and arising from the ashes of messy punk bands Fecal Matter,1 Stiff Woodies,2 and Brown Towel, Melvins penchant for low rent good times is inbred and part of the charm. So where does that leave this 27th full-length studio release, Tarantula Heart? King Buzz himself claims that it’s unlike any other Melvins release to date, owing to a backwards way of writing where songs were cobbled together from improvised riffs and melodies. But what say us Melvins? Surely only Melvins can judge Melvins… – Melvin(s)
The Melvins // Tarantula Heart [April 19th, 2024]
Melvin: If you think about it, we’re all Melvins around here, and so the Melvining is finally upon us and our sweet new jam band is back and ready to rip some faces. Or whatever. Look, I get that Melvins are super iconic,3 but I’ve never offered a listen beyond just an “oh that’s a Melvin, I see” with a song here and there. So Tarantula Heart is quintessential Melvins, and that’s super rad, dude, because we’ve got ourselves some sorta arachnophobic blend of stoner rock, noise rock, sludge, and grunge. Take near twenty-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny,” which kicks off with a bright and shiny riffage straight outta Howling Giant4 before dragging the sound into a dark hole like a brown recluse yoinks its prey, complete with squelching and gore that you expect, sludgy riffing colliding with reverbed drawls only to be hit with psychedelic guitar and straight-up noise that sound like Swans’ The Seer. It’s a goddamn shame or maybe a blessing, because the following tracks simply do not live up to the hype, but that doesn’t stop “Working the Ditch” and “Allergic to Food” from being menacing sludgy bangers, or the spidery and dissonant “She’s Got Weird Arms” and “Smiler” from being like that guy who chooses the urinal right next to you. And like that guy, Melvins according to the Melvins is like that guy: awkward, jarring, and ridiculously uncomfortable. But you can’t help but look at that tremendous dong. 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Let’s get weird with The Melvins! The experimental composition method leaves something akin to a curated jam, parceled out into four tracks until the band got bored and lumped everything else into the nineteen minute opener. To pull this off you must be a band with decades of experience and a penchant for weird psychedelic shit. Good thing The Melvins fits that description! “Pain Equals Funny” is a grand journey with grandiose energy, but it’s surprisingly listenable for something so free-form. Founder, vocalist, guitarist and exploded hairdo Buzzo sneers and croons with good, sardonic spirit, and the amount of feedback-laden riffs lend a noise-like sense of grit to the experience. Putting the big jammy epic up front is a ballsy choice, but a smart one, as the lethargy that starts setting in by the end is counteracted by the high energy of the Tarantula Heart’s remainder. “Working the Ditch,” a dark and biting piece of nasty sludge, and the unhinged avant-punk of “Allergic to Food” are the highlights here, but every track is worth your time. In a way, Tarantula Heart is review-proof. The Melvins sets out to experiment and muck about a bunch, and whatever came out of that, the goal was already met. But if you allow yourself to release the reins entirely and ride the insanity, the result is much more enjoyable than I had expected. Kudos for the old coots! 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are a legendary institution in whatever niche you place them in. Be it experimental rock, sludge, grunge, stoner, or alt-everything, they blazed a wicked career of freakishness doing whatever they wanted without regard for commercial success. For Tarantula Heart, their 20th release (depending on how you count collaborations), the band decided to try an unusual approach to songwriting. The members each came up with ideas independently of one another and eventually came together to try to piece them into actual songs. That’s either a recipe for a musical tire fire or something truly ingenious. So which is it? In classic Melvins style, it’s a bit of both. As always, they challenge the listener. This time by opening with the nineteen minutes of “Pain Equals Funny.” It’s a weird, meandering song that tests the listener’s ability to sit still and it doesn’t fully work, but there’s a legitimately good eight or nine-minute song buried in the excessive drone, dissonance, and dead spaces. “She’s Got Weird Arms” sounds like Talking Heads got into the shrooms and then wrote a song with Oingo Boingo. It’s good, but super odd. Also repulsively attractive is the bizarre “Allergic to Food” which reeks of Butthole Surfers and even Beck. Closer “Smiler” is a sludge rock missile fired right at your bases and it hits hard. I want a whole album of this shit. I didn’t get it, but Tarantula Heart is more or less what you expect from Melvins. It’s all over the map, but the good outweighs the truly fucked up, barely. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: The band that arguably ushered in grunge, only to watch it die and have finely goateed vultures pick its bones, brings us their latest bag of tricks, and it wouldn’t be a new Melvins record without a healthy dose of “what fresh hell is this?” Tarantula Heart sits firmly in a jammy, noisy, sludgetastic sound world, and if wildly ambitious nineteen-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny” is any indication, has zero fucks to give whether or not you “get it.” Regardless of your experience with the band that was named after yours truly in the bathroom of a Thriftway, Tarantula Heart saves its rewards for the patient and open-minded listener. Lose yourself in the extended jams and hypnotic swirling of “Pain Equals Funny,” bob your head to the dual-drummer-drumming of “Working the Ditch,” and let your sanity melt away in The Twilight Zone-esque atmosphere of “She’s Got Weird Arms.” Sure the longform of “Pain Equals Funny” loses its steam more than once in its meanderings, and the material often feels more like improvised jams and not fully-clothed songs, but there’s a real charm to the devil-may-care attitude on Tarantula Heart. Fans of Melvins will continue to be impressed on the band’s 27th(!) record, and I think this one may make a few new converts yet. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are unmistakable in their craft, and this newest venture in its adventurous construction—spontaneously reconstructed jam-based songs—lands no different. Thick, crunchy riffs that swagger alongside rhythms with a psychedelic stumble, every moment of Tarantula Heart feels like a night lost to memory of a little too much to drink and not enough hours to blow it off. Ever warm and so carefully distorted, longtime fuzz-slinger Buzz Osborne worships amp noise and twangy march all the same. Sometimes the droning feedbacks that inspire bands like Boris last for minutes and minutes dissolving against phasing drum chatter and swooshing noise patches (“Pain Equals Funny”). At others, wailing, modulated lines screech in spite of double-drumkit marches and rollicking riff patterns sure to please fans of olde Melvins and emerging psych/stoner leaning rock acts like King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard alike. Whatever the case, an undeniable and persistent groove underlies every movement and helps long-form and short-form statements feel like one, well-worn cabinet-blowing performance. Cobbled of memorable phrases and improvised excursions, Tarantula Heart spins a web enough to catch, a glimmer enough to fascinate, and a vibe enough to settle in. Comfortable, composed, and loaded with practiced energy, Melvins at play continues to be worth a listen, even if their most groundbreaking work is far behind them. 3.0/5.0
#2024 #AmericanMetal #Apr24 #Beck #Boris #ButtholeSurfers #Grunge #HowlingGiant #KingGizzardAndTheLizardWizard #Melvins #Noise #NoiseRock #OingoBoingo #PsychedelicRock #Sludge #StonerRock #Swans #TalkingHeads #TarantulaHeart #TheMelvins
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Melvin and The Melvins Rodeö: Melvin Ditches His Pills and Reviews Tarantula Heart
By GardensTale
“Melvin’s The Melvins Rodeö” is a time-honored single-instance tradition that won’t be repeated, unless it will. The doctor said — to no effect at all — that Melvin should take his prescription as usual and let one of his many writer personalities showcase the most underground of the underground—seminal co-founders of both grunge and sludge, The Melvins, whose legacy speaks for itself. This collectividual review treatment continues to exist to unite me, myself and Melvin in boot or bolster of the band who reminds us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of The Melvins. Melvin rides on.”
For over twenty albums The (the) Melvins has been distilling wild tones through rockin’ and trippin’ soundscapes. Through their forty-plus year existence, they’ve carved both essentials of the stoner/sludge sound—approximately 1991’s Bullhead through 1994’s Stoner Witch—as well as albums that, well, aren’t so great—arguably Prick, some early 00s cuts, a few really odd EPs and such… also arguably there’s just too much Melvins. But hey, what does that matter when guitarist/vocalist Buzz Osborne and drummer/sometimes bassist Dale Crover have been at it for this long, living their dream year after year. Participating in similarly weird acts like Fantômas, and arising from the ashes of messy punk bands Fecal Matter,1 Stiff Woodies,2 and Brown Towel, Melvins penchant for low rent good times is inbred and part of the charm. So where does that leave this 27th full-length studio release, Tarantula Heart? King Buzz himself claims that it’s unlike any other Melvins release to date, owing to a backwards way of writing where songs were cobbled together from improvised riffs and melodies. But what say us Melvins? Surely only Melvins can judge Melvins… – Melvin(s)
The Melvins // Tarantula Heart [April 19th, 2024]
Melvin: If you think about it, we’re all Melvins around here, and so the Melvining is finally upon us and our sweet new jam band is back and ready to rip some faces. Or whatever. Look, I get that Melvins are super iconic,3 but I’ve never offered a listen beyond just an “oh that’s a Melvin, I see” with a song here and there. So Tarantula Heart is quintessential Melvins, and that’s super rad, dude, because we’ve got ourselves some sorta arachnophobic blend of stoner rock, noise rock, sludge, and grunge. Take near twenty-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny,” which kicks off with a bright and shiny riffage straight outta Howling Giant4 before dragging the sound into a dark hole like a brown recluse yoinks its prey, complete with squelching and gore that you expect, sludgy riffing colliding with reverbed drawls only to be hit with psychedelic guitar and straight-up noise that sound like Swans’ The Seer. It’s a goddamn shame or maybe a blessing, because the following tracks simply do not live up to the hype, but that doesn’t stop “Working the Ditch” and “Allergic to Food” from being menacing sludgy bangers, or the spidery and dissonant “She’s Got Weird Arms” and “Smiler” from being like that guy who chooses the urinal right next to you. And like that guy, Melvins according to the Melvins is like that guy: awkward, jarring, and ridiculously uncomfortable. But you can’t help but look at that tremendous dong. 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Let’s get weird with The Melvins! The experimental composition method leaves something akin to a curated jam, parceled out into four tracks until the band got bored and lumped everything else into the nineteen minute opener. To pull this off you must be a band with decades of experience and a penchant for weird psychedelic shit. Good thing The Melvins fits that description! “Pain Equals Funny” is a grand journey with grandiose energy, but it’s surprisingly listenable for something so free-form. Founder, vocalist, guitarist and exploded hairdo Buzzo sneers and croons with good, sardonic spirit, and the amount of feedback-laden riffs lend a noise-like sense of grit to the experience. Putting the big jammy epic up front is a ballsy choice, but a smart one, as the lethargy that starts setting in by the end is counteracted by the high energy of the Tarantula Heart’s remainder. “Working the Ditch,” a dark and biting piece of nasty sludge, and the unhinged avant-punk of “Allergic to Food” are the highlights here, but every track is worth your time. In a way, Tarantula Heart is review-proof. The Melvins sets out to experiment and muck about a bunch, and whatever came out of that, the goal was already met. But if you allow yourself to release the reins entirely and ride the insanity, the result is much more enjoyable than I had expected. Kudos for the old coots! 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are a legendary institution in whatever niche you place them in. Be it experimental rock, sludge, grunge, stoner, or alt-everything, they blazed a wicked career of freakishness doing whatever they wanted without regard for commercial success. For Tarantula Heart, their 20th release (depending on how you count collaborations), the band decided to try an unusual approach to songwriting. The members each came up with ideas independently of one another and eventually came together to try to piece them into actual songs. That’s either a recipe for a musical tire fire or something truly ingenious. So which is it? In classic Melvins style, it’s a bit of both. As always, they challenge the listener. This time by opening with the nineteen minutes of “Pain Equals Funny.” It’s a weird, meandering song that tests the listener’s ability to sit still and it doesn’t fully work, but there’s a legitimately good eight or nine-minute song buried in the excessive drone, dissonance, and dead spaces. “She’s Got Weird Arms” sounds like Talking Heads got into the shrooms and then wrote a song with Oingo Boingo. It’s good, but super odd. Also repulsively attractive is the bizarre “Allergic to Food” which reeks of Butthole Surfers and even Beck. Closer “Smiler” is a sludge rock missile fired right at your bases and it hits hard. I want a whole album of this shit. I didn’t get it, but Tarantula Heart is more or less what you expect from Melvins. It’s all over the map, but the good outweighs the truly fucked up, barely. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: The band that arguably ushered in grunge, only to watch it die and have finely goateed vultures pick its bones, brings us their latest bag of tricks, and it wouldn’t be a new Melvins record without a healthy dose of “what fresh hell is this?” Tarantula Heart sits firmly in a jammy, noisy, sludgetastic sound world, and if wildly ambitious nineteen-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny” is any indication, has zero fucks to give whether or not you “get it.” Regardless of your experience with the band that was named after yours truly in the bathroom of a Thriftway, Tarantula Heart saves its rewards for the patient and open-minded listener. Lose yourself in the extended jams and hypnotic swirling of “Pain Equals Funny,” bob your head to the dual-drummer-drumming of “Working the Ditch,” and let your sanity melt away in The Twilight Zone-esque atmosphere of “She’s Got Weird Arms.” Sure the longform of “Pain Equals Funny” loses its steam more than once in its meanderings, and the material often feels more like improvised jams and not fully-clothed songs, but there’s a real charm to the devil-may-care attitude on Tarantula Heart. Fans of Melvins will continue to be impressed on the band’s 27th(!) record, and I think this one may make a few new converts yet. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are unmistakable in their craft, and this newest venture in its adventurous construction—spontaneously reconstructed jam-based songs—lands no different. Thick, crunchy riffs that swagger alongside rhythms with a psychedelic stumble, every moment of Tarantula Heart feels like a night lost to memory of a little too much to drink and not enough hours to blow it off. Ever warm and so carefully distorted, longtime fuzz-slinger Buzz Osborne worships amp noise and twangy march all the same. Sometimes the droning feedbacks that inspire bands like Boris last for minutes and minutes dissolving against phasing drum chatter and swooshing noise patches (“Pain Equals Funny”). At others, wailing, modulated lines screech in spite of double-drumkit marches and rollicking riff patterns sure to please fans of olde Melvins and emerging psych/stoner leaning rock acts like King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard alike. Whatever the case, an undeniable and persistent groove underlies every movement and helps long-form and short-form statements feel like one, well-worn cabinet-blowing performance. Cobbled of memorable phrases and improvised excursions, Tarantula Heart spins a web enough to catch, a glimmer enough to fascinate, and a vibe enough to settle in. Comfortable, composed, and loaded with practiced energy, Melvins at play continues to be worth a listen, even if their most groundbreaking work is far behind them. 3.0/5.0
#2024 #AmericanMetal #Apr24 #Beck #Boris #ButtholeSurfers #Grunge #HowlingGiant #KingGizzardAndTheLizardWizard #Melvins #Noise #NoiseRock #OingoBoingo #PsychedelicRock #Sludge #StonerRock #Swans #TalkingHeads #TarantulaHeart #TheMelvins
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Melvin and The Melvins Rodeö: Melvin Ditches His Pills and Reviews Tarantula Heart
By GardensTale
“Melvin’s The Melvins Rodeö” is a time-honored single-instance tradition that won’t be repeated, unless it will. The doctor said — to no effect at all — that Melvin should take his prescription as usual and let one of his many writer personalities showcase the most underground of the underground—seminal co-founders of both grunge and sludge, The Melvins, whose legacy speaks for itself. This collectividual review treatment continues to exist to unite me, myself and Melvin in boot or bolster of the band who reminds us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of The Melvins. Melvin rides on.”
For over twenty albums The (the) Melvins has been distilling wild tones through rockin’ and trippin’ soundscapes. Through their forty-plus year existence, they’ve carved both essentials of the stoner/sludge sound—approximately 1991’s Bullhead through 1994’s Stoner Witch—as well as albums that, well, aren’t so great—arguably Prick, some early 00s cuts, a few really odd EPs and such… also arguably there’s just too much Melvins. But hey, what does that matter when guitarist/vocalist Buzz Osborne and drummer/sometimes bassist Dale Crover have been at it for this long, living their dream year after year. Participating in similarly weird acts like Fantômas, and arising from the ashes of messy punk bands Fecal Matter,1 Stiff Woodies,2 and Brown Towel, Melvins penchant for low rent good times is inbred and part of the charm. So where does that leave this 27th full-length studio release, Tarantula Heart? King Buzz himself claims that it’s unlike any other Melvins release to date, owing to a backwards way of writing where songs were cobbled together from improvised riffs and melodies. But what say us Melvins? Surely only Melvins can judge Melvins… – Melvin(s)
The Melvins // Tarantula Heart [April 19th, 2024]
Melvin: If you think about it, we’re all Melvins around here, and so the Melvining is finally upon us and our sweet new jam band is back and ready to rip some faces. Or whatever. Look, I get that Melvins are super iconic,3 but I’ve never offered a listen beyond just an “oh that’s a Melvin, I see” with a song here and there. So Tarantula Heart is quintessential Melvins, and that’s super rad, dude, because we’ve got ourselves some sorta arachnophobic blend of stoner rock, noise rock, sludge, and grunge. Take near twenty-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny,” which kicks off with a bright and shiny riffage straight outta Howling Giant4 before dragging the sound into a dark hole like a brown recluse yoinks its prey, complete with squelching and gore that you expect, sludgy riffing colliding with reverbed drawls only to be hit with psychedelic guitar and straight-up noise that sound like Swans’ The Seer. It’s a goddamn shame or maybe a blessing, because the following tracks simply do not live up to the hype, but that doesn’t stop “Working the Ditch” and “Allergic to Food” from being menacing sludgy bangers, or the spidery and dissonant “She’s Got Weird Arms” and “Smiler” from being like that guy who chooses the urinal right next to you. And like that guy, Melvins according to the Melvins is like that guy: awkward, jarring, and ridiculously uncomfortable. But you can’t help but look at that tremendous dong. 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Let’s get weird with The Melvins! The experimental composition method leaves something akin to a curated jam, parceled out into four tracks until the band got bored and lumped everything else into the nineteen minute opener. To pull this off you must be a band with decades of experience and a penchant for weird psychedelic shit. Good thing The Melvins fits that description! “Pain Equals Funny” is a grand journey with grandiose energy, but it’s surprisingly listenable for something so free-form. Founder, vocalist, guitarist and exploded hairdo Buzzo sneers and croons with good, sardonic spirit, and the amount of feedback-laden riffs lend a noise-like sense of grit to the experience. Putting the big jammy epic up front is a ballsy choice, but a smart one, as the lethargy that starts setting in by the end is counteracted by the high energy of the Tarantula Heart’s remainder. “Working the Ditch,” a dark and biting piece of nasty sludge, and the unhinged avant-punk of “Allergic to Food” are the highlights here, but every track is worth your time. In a way, Tarantula Heart is review-proof. The Melvins sets out to experiment and muck about a bunch, and whatever came out of that, the goal was already met. But if you allow yourself to release the reins entirely and ride the insanity, the result is much more enjoyable than I had expected. Kudos for the old coots! 3.5/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are a legendary institution in whatever niche you place them in. Be it experimental rock, sludge, grunge, stoner, or alt-everything, they blazed a wicked career of freakishness doing whatever they wanted without regard for commercial success. For Tarantula Heart, their 20th release (depending on how you count collaborations), the band decided to try an unusual approach to songwriting. The members each came up with ideas independently of one another and eventually came together to try to piece them into actual songs. That’s either a recipe for a musical tire fire or something truly ingenious. So which is it? In classic Melvins style, it’s a bit of both. As always, they challenge the listener. This time by opening with the nineteen minutes of “Pain Equals Funny.” It’s a weird, meandering song that tests the listener’s ability to sit still and it doesn’t fully work, but there’s a legitimately good eight or nine-minute song buried in the excessive drone, dissonance, and dead spaces. “She’s Got Weird Arms” sounds like Talking Heads got into the shrooms and then wrote a song with Oingo Boingo. It’s good, but super odd. Also repulsively attractive is the bizarre “Allergic to Food” which reeks of Butthole Surfers and even Beck. Closer “Smiler” is a sludge rock missile fired right at your bases and it hits hard. I want a whole album of this shit. I didn’t get it, but Tarantula Heart is more or less what you expect from Melvins. It’s all over the map, but the good outweighs the truly fucked up, barely. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: The band that arguably ushered in grunge, only to watch it die and have finely goateed vultures pick its bones, brings us their latest bag of tricks, and it wouldn’t be a new Melvins record without a healthy dose of “what fresh hell is this?” Tarantula Heart sits firmly in a jammy, noisy, sludgetastic sound world, and if wildly ambitious nineteen-minute opener “Pain Equals Funny” is any indication, has zero fucks to give whether or not you “get it.” Regardless of your experience with the band that was named after yours truly in the bathroom of a Thriftway, Tarantula Heart saves its rewards for the patient and open-minded listener. Lose yourself in the extended jams and hypnotic swirling of “Pain Equals Funny,” bob your head to the dual-drummer-drumming of “Working the Ditch,” and let your sanity melt away in The Twilight Zone-esque atmosphere of “She’s Got Weird Arms.” Sure the longform of “Pain Equals Funny” loses its steam more than once in its meanderings, and the material often feels more like improvised jams and not fully-clothed songs, but there’s a real charm to the devil-may-care attitude on Tarantula Heart. Fans of Melvins will continue to be impressed on the band’s 27th(!) record, and I think this one may make a few new converts yet. 3.0/5.0
Melvin: Melvins are unmistakable in their craft, and this newest venture in its adventurous construction—spontaneously reconstructed jam-based songs—lands no different. Thick, crunchy riffs that swagger alongside rhythms with a psychedelic stumble, every moment of Tarantula Heart feels like a night lost to memory of a little too much to drink and not enough hours to blow it off. Ever warm and so carefully distorted, longtime fuzz-slinger Buzz Osborne worships amp noise and twangy march all the same. Sometimes the droning feedbacks that inspire bands like Boris last for minutes and minutes dissolving against phasing drum chatter and swooshing noise patches (“Pain Equals Funny”). At others, wailing, modulated lines screech in spite of double-drumkit marches and rollicking riff patterns sure to please fans of olde Melvins and emerging psych/stoner leaning rock acts like King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard alike. Whatever the case, an undeniable and persistent groove underlies every movement and helps long-form and short-form statements feel like one, well-worn cabinet-blowing performance. Cobbled of memorable phrases and improvised excursions, Tarantula Heart spins a web enough to catch, a glimmer enough to fascinate, and a vibe enough to settle in. Comfortable, composed, and loaded with practiced energy, Melvins at play continues to be worth a listen, even if their most groundbreaking work is far behind them. 3.0/5.0
#2024 #AmericanMetal #Apr24 #Beck #Boris #ButtholeSurfers #Grunge #HowlingGiant #KingGizzardAndTheLizardWizard #Melvins #Noise #NoiseRock #OingoBoingo #PsychedelicRock #Sludge #StonerRock #Swans #TalkingHeads #TarantulaHeart #TheMelvins
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Ok ok pinned intro post time:
Hi, I'm Gwen, I make #fanvids over at @gwenfrankenstien
The #ofmd / #izzyhands brainrot is still my primary focus on this site but feel free to talk to me at any time about:
#Arthuriana
#BackToTheFuture
#ChroniclesOfDarkness especially #ChangelingTheLost
#CrimsonPeak
#Crochet & #Amigurumi
#DCComics (primarily between 1986-2011 but im loosely familiar with other eras)
#DianaWynneJones
#DoomPatrolHBO
#Dracula
#Frankenstein
#Hellblazer
#HitchhikersGuideToTheGalaxy
#IndieTTRPG
#Labyrinth1986
#OingoBoingo
#PhilOchs
#ReAnimator
#RogerCorman
#VelvetGoldmine
#VincentPrice
#VorkosiganSaga
#YoungWizards