It’s Monday again! And last week was filled with crap surrounding work and other obligations, it wasn’t a good week. Not at all. On every personal side conceivable. But there was one glimmer of hope and one point of heavy light. The music. All that heavy goodness! We did not manage to do much, but the stuff we did do, helped us deal with all that other stuff. I mean, that instrumentalHoly Tears album! Holy Tears ! Holy hell! Can’t stop spinning it. We also did a single premiere for that bluesy Void Commander song Sweet Depression thanks to Good Boy PR and Majestic Mountain Records. And then came Friday, the First Friday of the new month, and we got to do the April Doom Charts! I mean, and that, those three posts, thinking about it again, put a smile of my face! Makes me forget about the crap that happened. And makes me hope this week will be as good as last in terms of music… Hope yours was good and this one will be better!
I’m pretty sure there will be some Friday Freebie action over on the Doom Charts today! And over on Stoner HiVe!? Well, we have some Quick Fire Friday action! That’s right, a few selected words about something cool that has been spinning a lot over here… This time around, we do it slightly different, a shorter and perhaps sweeter version to give you all some new videos! Why not right?! And we know… There is so much out there, so much good and heavy stuff, and we just simply cannot ever do it all justice. But here it is… Another Stoner HiVe Quick Fire Friday! And it burns hot like molten lava!
Greenleaf – Avalanche
It went bang again some two days ago! For the new Greenleaf single and video was released back then. It’s called Avalanche and is the second single for the new album The Head & The Habit to arrive on June 21st through Magnetic Eye Records. Breathe, Breathe Out had that comedic video with the amazing shirts made by Tommi Holappa’s daughter. This one is sporting an official lyric video, with cool visuals and that almighty Greenleaf groove! Hitting you like an Avalanche!
Premiered on the legendary The Obelisk a day or two ago, it’s the new Geezer track and video called Acid Veins. It’s from the soon to be released, on the very cool Heavy Psych Sounds label, split album called: Interstellar Cosmic Blues & The Riffalicious Stoner Dudes. And that, my friends, is not a whole mouth full, it is also a freakin cool split album featuring ISAAK on the other side. Bam! Nothing more to say, except to state that it’s the Harrington groove blues boogie in full swing and we cannot stop spinning it!
Soon. Very soon. They will be blowing up your stereo with their slowcore magnificence on an album called A Run On Thin Ice. We’re talking about Bordeaux, France foursome Suif. And out now is the first single and video Hollow. Beautiful music with a beautiful video. Listen to Hollow and go follow… Suif…
Cold or was it a shiver of pain that ran through me? A cut in my finger, like from knife but now from a sound. Am I supposed to linger? Am I supposed to feel all this existential dread decent upon me? Gemini is the second single and live video from the new album Phantasm which will be released on May 3rd. The highly evocative post metal, black metal outfit from San Fransisco called Deliria implores some hardcore influences and a whole lot of atsmosphere! Making me wax poetic!
We jotted down a few words about the damn cool Stoned Again album about a month ago. It’s out on Future Primitive recordings now and Max Boogie Overdrive have now released a video for it’s title track! The full album Stoned Again album was already one big trip. Well, just watching the lovely video for the title track will get you high as well! A righteous trip!
After three days of Quick Fire Fun and a great four band concert night slash disguised as a birthday bash or the other way around, we are heading into a new week. Still buzzing from seeing Oakfarm, Desert Colossus, Cannabineros and Red Sun Atacama wreaking havoc in De Onderbroek in Nijmegen. And having a late celebration for Bismut’s very own Peter Dragt! Congratulations again Peter! And can’t wait to see al those of bands live once again, cause they were on fire!
ISAAK – HEY Heavy Psych Sounds – 2023 Rock, Stoner, Punk, Metal Rated: *****
We’ve all been there at one point in our lives. Zonked out in front of the television. Late a night, waiting for the fried stuff to be ready. Drinking that final drink. Or nursing one of those king hell hangovers, hoping that it will lift, if you just sit completely still and stare at that coma inducing screen in front of you. And for some weird reason, it is always stuck on tell sell or whatever home shopping network was available in your neck of the woods. And among the adverts, a wonderous knife that would slice and dice through everything, whatever stands in its way. And when you hear those cutting riffs, that high energy, fast paced, speed inducing rest of the new ISAAK album, you get why this is that first opening intro track. Off center to what the new HEY album brings you; it sets you up for that majestic run through the stoner rocking, stoner metal landscape. Formed around 2007 on the outskirts of Genua as Gandhi's Gunn, they renamed themselves ISAAK around 2012 and re-released the final Gandhi's Gunn eight-track album The Longer the Beard, the Harder the Sound a year later with four added tracks, two of which were covers. Vocalist Giacomo Boeddu and guitarist Francesco Raimondi are still present from that line-up, but bass and drums are provided by a new tandem. But even so, those punky stoner metal beginnings are still there for you to enjoy and still doused in a lovely layer of fuzz. And as with wine and age, there is more maturity in every composition. Just listen to spacious, dark, alt-rock third track Except, featuring Fabio Cuomo from Gotho, Elder and Fabio Cuomo’s own solo project and Bernardo Russo from YALDA and Berna. Seasoned in subject, the restraint in delivering the riffs and energy, shows the new line-up knows all about control and layering. For those harrowing howls sit exactly right in the mix, the subdued vocals later on as well. A wonderful composition start to finish, followed by the more speeding, barreling train track Rotten. Still retaining melodic parts, it’s that highly determined delivery that will hook you first, before getting you high with that big rise during the ‘choruses’. As ISAAK has always put a cover song on their previous albums, to honor their early influences, there is nothing unusual about the fact that we hear a song by punk band The Wipers this time around. ISAAK brings Over The Edge into the 21st century and gives it a new spotlight for this heavy rock generation, and they do that exactly right! Intense and groovy is Dormouse, grungy and monstrous is Fake It Till You Make It, where every hard rocking section seems to his own very slick energy. By the time the brooding, moody, almost prog sludge approaching final track Goodbyes Are Always Very Sad rolls over you, you cannot wait to hear that second, the title track HEY again with its boisterous huge high adrenaline push and explosive sound. And yes, before you do that, you will head off into the kitchen, get that knife out and make yourself another caprese sandwich or something else you can slice and dice like a maniac. Cause you just can’t stop eating… everything ISAAK!
This should have gone up yesterday. But as usual, life got in the way… The above list of bands and their respective albums have ben on heavy rotation over here. As well as quite a few others, cause we still cannot get enough of that Santo Rostro, Hail The Void, Acid King or the new ISAAK. And there are so many other albums about to be released that are equally stunning.. Incredible musical times we live in! It’s been spring time for heavy rock for a long time now, stoner, psych, prog and yes, the doom are all in bloom!
The Fizz Fuzz - Deserts, Mountains, Oceans Slush Fund Recordings / Taxi Driver Records – 2023 Rock, Desert Rated: ****
The new The Fizz Fuzz album Deserts, Mountains, Oceans will be arriving on March 14th and will surely transport some of you to a time when you were living your best lives. Even though you might feel a bit forlorn or desolate thinking about them... For Deserts, Mountains, Oceans has the ability to transport you to the time when you were in high school or university and has that indie, slacker vide as much as it brings you something sweetly and sweaty that hails from the desert, that sound you fell in love with some decades ago. Which might be logical to some, since The Fizz Fuzz duo consists of the married couple Dawn and Dandy Brown. And for those of you who followed the HiVe for a while, might know that one of my absolute favorite records is one made by Mr. Brown. It was his Orquesta Del Desierto project, and both those Orquesta albums are simply amazing and are on heavy rotation whenever the sun comes out. Some of that spirit naturally seems to waft over some of the tracks, closing track Billion for example. And one of the more slacker, indie inspired tracks is the one called Mad Jimmy. And all eight of the tracks on the album have this honesty and love about them. The first The Fizz Fuzz album Palmyra was released in 2020 and was aided by many of his artist friends, this time around we can still hear Steve Earle from the Afghan Whigs on drums. And since the Brown duo has a sweet spot for Italy and spend quite some time there, even recorded some of the album, they implored the help of ISAAK bassist Gabriele Carta. Oh and HEY, that Italian ISAAK, are about to release a damn good album called HEY on March 31st through Heavy Psych Sounds. But we shall get to that some other day, cause we’re here for Deserts, Mountains, Oceans and Carta and Earle giving the compositions its foundations… With guest spots here and there by Mike Reeder, Keith Murphy, and Mark Engel. But otherwise, it’s Dandy and Dawn, Dawn and Dandy. Complementing each other and giving each other the space and light to shine. There are solo tracks, backup vocals and an honest to god lovely duet called Disbelief. Soon they will head over to the UK for a few live dates, but otherwise Dandy Brown’s agenda is a difficult one, since there’s something Hermano coming up soon as well… As I’m sure you’re all aware of… Does this mean The Fizz Fuzz’s new album Deserts, Mountains, Oceans will get all the attention it deserves? Let’s hope so, for the two not only seem to have found each other, they also seem to have found the perfect way to deal with a lot of personal and shared history and translate it all into something universal. If this is The Fizz Fuzz and the way they will sound going forward, we cannot wait to hear more...
