Latest Reviews - October 22, 2017
The Striped Bananas
(Stone of Madness)
2017
Staff Rating: Turn this to 2.8 of 11
Genre: Psychedelic rock
Sounds Like: 13th Floor Elevators, Strawberry Alarm Clock
Ann Arbor Michigan’s The Striped Bananas have released their fourth album entitled
Stone of Madness. The album features classic psychedelic rock vibes with overtly simple song structure and somewhat painful vocals. Our interest weakened with each rotation. Our Rotation Racap will prov...
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Overstayer
(Death of the Party)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.4 of 11
Genre: Hardcore
Sounds Like: Every Time I Die, Transition, Earth Crisis
Nice clean, pointed hardcore aggression is what Overstayer exudes on their debut EP
Death of the Party. We have been longing for some new but reflective early 90s influenced hardcore. Overstayer delivers quality production and clarity in a punchy 12 minutes plus endeavor that appears to tak...
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Devils Hunt Me Down
(In Medias Res 1)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.6 of 11
Genre: Blues, Hard rock
Sounds Like: Spindrift, Soulsavers, Tom Waits
Seattle Washington natives Devils Hunt Me Down have released their third visionary and vibrant piece of work. What will hit you first is the distinct guttural bellowing vocals of Matthew Bentley within the first few seconds of "The Formula". What follows is an emotional blues gritty trip with divers...
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Valtozash
(Wizard-Bird)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 7.9 of 11
Genre: Jazz metal
Sounds Like: Glueleg, Trioscapes, Combat Astronomy
Call it horny metal or brutal jazz, Australia’s Valtozash puts together an entertaining 52 minutes of brass onslaught with their second release entitled
Wizard-Bird. The eight tracks are richly textured with a fair amount of contrast and chaos. The album maintains a steady flow of jaz...
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Ghost Toast
(Out Of This World)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.5 of 11
Genre: Progressive rock, Experimental
Sounds Like: Scale The Summit, Earthside
Ghost Toast hailing from Hungary have a very unusual Progressive rock album here. The foursome has found a way to broaden the horizons of this genre. As many instrumental progressive bands sound eerily similar, Ghost Toast throws in enough of their own elements to create a unique vision. For starter...
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Lares
(Mask of Discomfort)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.7 of 11
Genre: Doom, Death Metal, Psychedelic
Sounds Like: Herder, Cult of Luna, Oranssi Pazuzu
Let’s get right to the point, Lares totally blew us away on this debut EP. The band from Berlin throw a shit ton of various metal styles at us on
Mask of Discomfort. You’ll hear doses of Cult of Luna-like tripiness, fucked up psychedelic doom in vein of Oranssi Pazuzu and even s...
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Sun Frenzy
(Odd)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.4 of 11
Genre: Stoner rock
Sounds Like: Kyuss, Colour Haze, Floating Goat
Fuzzzzzz, that’s what Poland’s Sun Frenzy are all about. Their debut EP has that old stoner vibe in vein of bands like Kyuss and Colour Haze, yet they throw in a smidgen of punk attitude like Floating Goat. The trio do not hide theses influences as
ODD is clearly an homage to th...
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Blind Horse
(Patagonia)
2017
Staff Rating: Turn this to 6.1 of 11
Genre: Psychedelic rock, Blues
Sounds Like: Wolfmother, Bullet Boys, Bad Wizard
How does something go from utter brilliance to a spiral downward into the shitter? It is a phenomena we cannot quite figure out with Blind Horse’s sophomore release
Patagonia. In a nutshell, the album starts off with perhaps one of our favorite tracks of the year in "Patagonia". A fif...
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Great Rift
(Voodoo Woodland)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 8.8 of 11
Genre: Heavy rock
Sounds Like: Arbouretum, Freedom Hawk
Great Rift is a foursome from Austria that has just released a very impressive there song EP here. Their music infuses elements of classic heavy rock into a riff-heavy stoner album. These three tunes possess a foundation of blues rock that are layered with moments of stoner, classic, and even psyche...
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Drude
(ST)
2017
Staff Rating: Crank this to 10.1 of 11
| Editor's Pick
Genre: Sludge, Progressive metal
Sounds Like: ISIS, Cult of Luna, The Ocean
The three piece band from Indianapolis, Indiana have delivered a downright inspiring self-titled debut that is certainly in the running for one of our top albums of 2017. So inspiring that it has prompted a new review format that we are excited to unveil. Peeling back the onion to expose this very i...
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