Witchcraft- The Alchemist

DOWNLOAD- The Alchemist (2007) released on Rise Above

About time I wrote a post about Witchcraft, after all they are one of my favourite bands and in my opinion the best musical output that my bullshit hometown has come up with . My friend walked past Magnus Pelander, singer and guitarist in Witchcraft, the other day and he had cut off his long hair. That made me a little sad to hear.  Well... hopefully his singing and guitarplaying wont be affected by it. Time will tell. I hope they will conjure a fourth album soon, it's about time.

The Alchemist however is fucken awesome and you should stop listening to whatever you might find worthy of your time if you haven't heard it yet. As on previous releases they are walking the thin line beetwen doom, stoner and hardrock. The doom riffs brought back from the 70's are still the backbone in the music. There's some diffrences though.  I think all Witchcrafts releases are analouge recordings, though this one has a much cleaner production than the previous two.  There's also a lot of instrumental mainly acoustic parts incorporated in many of the songs on The Alchemist. I liked the track Schyssta Lögner on the first selftitled album because it featured lyrics in swedish. They do this on The Alchemist as well in the song Leva.


I think I have the japanese cd edition of The Alchemist , it features a cover on Sweet Honey Pie as a bonustrack.

... Anyway Bobby Leibling, Rocky Erickson and Toni Iommi are all clapping their hands and so should you.

DOWNLOAD- The Alchemist

Entombed- Left Hand Path

DOWNLOAD- Left Hand Path (1990)

Well whats there to say that hasn't been said before...
This is the purest form of death metal.
Swedish Death Metal! Swedish buzzsaw evool!
This was the beginning of something great that put my homecountry on the (deathmetal)map and inspired so many bands to come.

Just wanted to point that out. I guess I was born 10 years to late to experience the hole thing, But Life Goes On.

Hats off !

MUSKELROCK PÅ TYROLEN!

FUCK YEAH! MUSCLES, ROCK'N ROLL, BEER!
muskelrock= musclerock
The festival tickets and train tickets are bought, so I'm going to attend the strongest festival in Sweden, perhaps in the entire world!

This is the first time in history Pentagram are performing in Sweden and I'm going to be there... that makes me feel. awesome. I'm going to see Bobby Leibling.
+ Ghost, Graveyard, Marulk, Lord Vicar and many more.

Svarti Loghin- Empty World

DOWNLOAD- Empty World

Svarti Loghin means "Black Flame" in ancient swedish. Thats cool. It has the right kvltitude

Whats less cool is that the band is often forced into the genre "depressive black metal", a genre thats become lame since it contains to many wristcutting selfcentered mediocre fuckwits (Xasthur, Lifelover etc not included). In my opinion Svarti Loghin sounds far to happy to be put into that swamp. In the hauntingly beautiful melodies of Svarti Loghin i find myself thinking of bands such as Alcest and Forgotten Woods.

Svarti Loghin's music is a wild blend of black metal and post-rock and I think I read somewhere that they themselves would like to add country music to that. Listen for yourself, Empty World. If you listen carefully you will notice that seven minutes into the song they're playing the melodie from "Here comes the Sun" by The Beatles.



Empty World is a solid debut album. I bought the first demo tape they made upon the release of Empty World and when i got the actual album i felt that i got exactly what i had been hoping for. They released a second album last year called "Drifting through the Void" i haven't had the time to check it out properly but from the little I've heard it's equally good to Empty world.

DOWNLOAD- Empty World

Black Pyramid- Black Pyramid

DOWNLOAD-Black Pyramid (2009)

Another great american stoner/doom band, from Massachussets . This debut is quite something it's going to be hard for Black Pyramid to top it.. because it simply jumps up and smacks you in the face. There's riffs and there's kick ass riffs. This album is a serenade in downtuned kick ass! Not doing it to get payd or laid, you get the feeling this is music made just for the sake of being loud and nasty.
Taste that crusty guitar sound, Visions of Gehenna!

Maybe there's a little Black Sabbath plagiatarism here and there, but i dont mind. I love that reverb on the lead guitar that really sucks you into the atmosphere. It's pretty obvious these guys new what they wanted the music to sound like. The production is perfect, nothing is overlooked. Vocals and bass are clearly audiable even though the guitars take up a lot of space.



I'm only going to bitch about one thing.. and that is the horrible packaging of the cd-edition i have. It's one of those ugly little papersleeves thats foldable. Looks almost like a promo copy. I strongly recomend you buy this album, the LP version!

DOWNLOAD-Black Pyramid

Elder- Elder

DOWNLOAD- Elder (2008)

Elder, well that certainly doesn't apply to the bandmembers. A bunch of lil' teens. Luckly for them age doesn't matter as long as you can handle your instrument skillfully.

What we got here is a decent piece of american stoner/doom. There's some serious Sleep worship going on here. Now, this might not be the best album I have heard but it's far from the worst. I think the problem with this selftitled debut is that Elder only managed to produce one real stand out track that sticks to your mind, The Riddle of Steel part.1. The other material on the album is good and never gets boring but it doesn't stick! Creds to the baseplayer though who does a really good job throughout the album.



Still I see potential in Elder considering how young they are. At the moment the band is on hold. Maybe their mums didn't approve of them dropping out of school to become rockstars. Lets say they start releasing new material sometime in the future then i think we might be up for a treat.

DOWNLOAD- Elder
Tracklist:
1 White Walls
2 Hexe
3 The Riddle of Steel pt.1
4 Ghost Head
5 The Riddle of Steel pt.2

Coven- Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reap Souls.

DOWNLOAD- Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reap Souls

I named my blog in homage to these people, this wicked Coven.
This album was released back in 69' and it sounds like an evil version of The Mamas and the Papas. Just look at that album cover! they have a plastic skull, black inverted crosses and that sinister look on their faces. This must have been seriously scary stuff back then.

The White Witch of Rose Hall

Coven was formed in Chicago in the late 60's when singer Jinx Dawson, to the left, was studying opera and the occult. She met Steve Ross and Oz Osborne who shared her diabolical interests and soon they were playing concerts with bands such as Jimmy Page's Yardbirds and Alice Cooper. Even so Coven has always remained fairly unnoticed, keeping their underground status intact. Maybe their lounge-satanist lyrics about witches, cults and plastic sacrificial knives have kept them off the public radar.

 

Coven's music is a real psychy rock trip! Jinx really developed some amazing vocal skills whilst studying opera. As stated above it sounds a bit like Mamas and the Papas, not so different from Jefferson Airplane. The difference i just that instead of doing the hole peace and love thing, Coven did the opposite.

DOWNLOAD- Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reap Souls
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Silvester Anfang- Sylvester Anfang II

DOWNLOAD-Sylvester Anfang II

These dutch bastards are something of the wierdest I've gotten my hands on for a while. I assume that they have taken their name from the Mayhem song Silvester Anfang featured on the Deathcrush ep. Apparently the band consists of members from a music collective.

Silvester Anfang's music isn't as dark as the album cover could lead you to believe. To my ears it sounds like they are blending psychedelic drone with krautrock. Sounds ritualistic, trance like... I'm not going to try to explain the music any further, you have to listen for yourself. Boom Van De Eerste Menstruate.


Live somewhere in Germany.

I must say I'm a big fan of the bands aesthetics wich i find cool and generally disturbing! I like that when you buy into a band you get a visual experience as well, through pictures, booklets and album covers.



DOWNLOAD-Sylvester Anfang II
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Sunno)))- Monoliths and Dimensions

DOWNLOAD- Monoliths and Dimensions

Sunn0))), pronounced Sun. These guys cant possibly have gone unnoticed for anyone who is into experimental music. Together with Earth they uphold the crown of drone in there frostbitten hands. You might say they are The Beatles of drone. The founding members Stephen O'Malley and Greg Anderson named the band after "Sunn0))) Amplifiers" as a sort of homage to the brand. Apart from playing in Sunn0))) they've been members of bands like Goatsnake and Burning Witch, they also run the esteemed label Southern Lords.



Monoliths and Dimensions released 2009 is their latest fullenght output. When i put this record into my stereo and raise the volym the floor is litteraly shaking. There is just so much going on from start to end. We get the usual elephant-heavy guitar riffs played at a snails pace. But apart from that there's choirs, creeking noises and at some points this horn comes in and makes you afraid that your speakers are going to crack.
Listen if you dare! Hunting and Gathering(Cydonia)
Guesting on the album we have Attila Cshiar of Mayhem who contribute with spoken word, really creepy stuff. The first three tracks are dark and haunting but the last track is kind of pleasent with some soft parts featuring a jazzy trumpet and a harp. If you never heard of Sunn0))) before then perhaps thats the song to start with.


You either hate them or you love them, it's as simple as that.

DOWNLOAD- Monoliths and Dimensions
Tracklist:
1 Agartha
2 Big Church (Megszentségteleníthetetlenségeskedéseitekért)
3 Hunting and Gathering (Cydonia)
4 Alice
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The Cramps- ...Off the Bone

DOWNLOAD- Off the Bone

Decomposed zombie-swamp rock'n roll with that typical southern sound to it. The Cramps are amongst the originators of garage punk, blending punk and rockabilly. Also, they're often associated with the psychobilly genre on wich they were a big influence. The band broke up in 2009 when singer Lux Interior passed away, may he r.i.p.

Off the Bone is a compilation of early singles, b-sides and obscurities first released in 1983. There's also a couple of covers of songs by The Trashmen, Elvis etc. I'm going to try and sum up the album with a few words.
- Drugs, cadillacs are cool, rich people suck, look at me dancing, voodoo, I'm tired of being bored and my shitty job doesn't pay enough, leather sex.

Listen for yourself! Garbageman and The Crusher.


Longlasting members Lux Interior and Poison Ivy.

This album is probably best enjoyed driving a cadillac down a boulevard whilst throwing empty beer cans at rich people.

DOWNLOAD- Off the Bone
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The Sallyangie- Children of the Sun

DOWNLOAD - Children of the Sun

You know Mike Oldfield, the guy who made the soundtrack to The Exorcist? If you do so you might know of his sister Sally Oldfield as well! The Sallyangie is Mike and Sally when they were 16, before they got all famous and stuff.

I have the vinyl reissue of Children of the Sun, it was originally released back in 69'. It's a nice piece of british, hippie-ish contemporary folk. Both siblings sing, Mike handle the guitar and someone is making love to a flute. Sally's vocals really hit my soft spot at several occasions. I like the fact that the sound quality is far from perfect, it brings that warm feeling to the music.

Listen! Enjoy! Children of the Sun and A Lover for all Seasons


Siblings indeed.

Tracklist:
1 Strangers
2 Lady Mary
3 Children of the Sun
4 A Lover for all Seasons
5 River Song
6 Banquet on the Water
7 Balloons
8 Midsummer Night's Happening
9 Love in Ice Crystals
10 Changing Colours
11 Chameleon
12 Milk Bottle
13 The Murder of the Children of San Francisco
14 Strangers
DOWNLOAD - Children of the Sun
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Of the Wand and the Moon- Nighttime Nightrhymes

 
DOWNLOAD- Nighttime Nightrhymes

A cozy slab of neofolk from danish Kim Larsen's project Of the Wand and the Moon.The band is one of the leading names within the neofolk scene and has collaborated with other bands like Sonne Hagal and Forseti.

Nighttime Nightrhymes (1999) is the first release by OTWATM. Having listened a lot to his later material i think it's noticable that he has developed as a musican over the years adding more elements to the music. This is still a good album though. Kim works with a pagan theme, he wants you to worship the sun and dont neglect the summer solstice.

Listen to the Raven Chant.


Acoustic guitar, violin and whispering. I'm probably going to listen to this falling asleep tonight.

DOWNLOAD- Nighttime Nightrhymes
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Blackland- Extreme Heavy Psych

DOWNLOAD- Extreme Heavy Psych

Yepp Italy can make psychy doom metal to. Black Land remind me a bit of finish doomsters Reverend Bizarre, at least when it comes down to the riffs.

Extreme Heavy Psych is the bands second fullenght release and so far so good. I find the first half of the album to be a bit more dismal sounding than the second half. For example the song Life and Death has a typical doom metal sound whilst songs such as R'n'R Bite tend to be a bit more simple rock'n roll. The vocals are pretty damn good...


Magic combination of dreads and leatherjackets. Always hits the spot.

This album is easy to listen to, in a good way, nothing you have to spend hours on to really get into.
Check it out!

Tracklist:
1 Psych No.1
2 Black Wizard
3 Life and Death
4 Drowning Deeply
5 R'n'R Bite
6 Holy Weed of the Cosmos
7 From the black to the Rainbow
8 Victims of the Cast
DOWNLOAD- Extreme Heavy Psych
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November- En ny tid är här

DOWNLOAD- En ny tid är här...

This is something of a classic progg/swedish hardrock release. The first song "Mount Everest" actually hit the swedish top-charts some lifetime ago.. the odds for that happening today is 1/9999999 according to my calculations.

"En ny tid är här" translates into "A new time has come" and it was released in the summer of 1970. November's music is best defined as some sort of proto-hardrock with a touch of progg music. The band helped form what would become the swedish hardrock scene. Bands like Witchcraft and Abramis Brama have made tribute albums to these guys.

If you're into the progg and rock music that came out of the 70's then you really should check this out! As stated above, it's a real classic!

DOWNLOAD- En ny tid är här...
Tracklist:
1 Mount Everest
2 En annan värld
3 Lek att du är barn igen
4 Sekunder (Förvandlas till år)
5 En enkel sång om dig
6 Varje gång jag ser dig känns det lika skönt
7 Gröna blad
8 Åttonde
9 Ta ett steg in i sagans land
10 Balett blues
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Marulk- Marulk

DOWNLOAD- Marulk

Aah the smell of freshly pressed vinyl! there's nothing quite like it. Almost like the smell of a freshly pressed book.. just a little more subtle and awesome.



Well what I'm snorting over is the debut album by the swedish psychedelic hard rock trio Marulk from Gothenburg. Marulk plays music in the same vein as Witchcraft, Abramis Brama and Magnolia and are signed on awesome Transubstans Records.

There's a huge hype around Graveyard in Sweden right now after the release of their Hisningen Blues, wich i find quite strange since most people never payed any attention to this genre before. But who knows maybe Marulk is lined up for the hype as well?
Anyway the album contains nine quality songs, so far some of my favourites are Nosferatools and I see you in my dreams.

If you like proggy psychedelic rock like me, or just jumped onboard the Graveyard hype and is exploring the genre.. well then this is your next thing to bite on.

DOWNLOAD- Marulk
Tracklist:
1 Daylight & Rain
2 Följer Ett Spår
3 Hey Sister
4 The Alarm
5 Is This Home
6 Nosferatools
7 I See You In My Dreams
8 Slumber Waltz
9 Potemkin
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A lil' Rawk'n Roll Tip

Lets say you're a bit bored and need some kick-ass psychriffed music to cheer you up. Then tune in on these.

The Flying Eyes – Don't Point Your God At Me
Sleep – Dragonaut
Orange Sunshine - H-theme
Baby Woodrose – Baby Blows Your Mind
Goatsnake - El Cyote
Black Land - Life and Death

The Wounded Kings- The Shadow over Atlantis

 
DOWNLOAD- The Shadow over Atlantis

Droning forth a doomy experience. English countryside and doom metal has always gone hand in hand and The Wounded Kings is just another example of this. The Shadow over Atlantis is their second album and i have armed myself with one of the limited 500 vinyl copies of it.

This is everything doom metal should be. Downtuned guitars slowly bursting out of the depths of a distorted ocean, slow beautiful howling solos emerge from a whirling maelstrom and behind this scenery of sound the singer is pulling off some mad vibrato-vocal technique.

The music in itself would have been enough to make The Wounded Kings a really decent band, but the singer turn them into something special. Here's an example- Baptism of Atlantis check it out!



The Wounded Kings signed on prominent swedish label I Hate for the release of The Shadow over Atlantis. A lable specialising in doom and trash metal that also support other good acts such as Black Oath, The Gates of Slumber and Jex Thoth. If you like these bands then you should check out The Wounded Kings as well.

The Shadow over Atlantis goes on for about 40 minutes and my favourite tracks include Sons of Belial, Baptism of Atlantis and the instrumental track Deathless Echo.

Tracklist:
1 The Swirling Mist
2 Baptism of Atlantis
3 Into the Oceans Abyss
4 The Sons of Belial
5 Deathless Echo
6 Invocation of the Ancients
DOWNLOAD- The Shadow over Atlantis
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In Gowan Ring- The Glinting Spade

DOWNLOAD- The Glinting Spade

This thing was really hard to get my hands on for a reasonable price, I ended up paying quite a bit for it.
-Totaly worth it though-
In Gowan Ring is the ongoing folk project of american Jon Michael going under the pseudonym of B'eirth, the project first saw daylight in the mid-90's and is associated with the neofolkscene and contemporary folk scene.

The Glinting Spade is a real bard's tale, imagine Simon and Garfunkel's song "Scarborough Fair" then imagine an album with seven songs equally good to Scarborough Fair. That is what you get here, add to that some psychedelic influences in songs such as "Cipher's String on the Tree in the Dream of the Queen".


B'eirth

My favourite track on the album is To Thrum a Glassy Stem.
Left low in sanguine laughter
in a bed the soft of heather
Stashed in the branches breach

This is an album you could listen to at any time. Studying, going for a walk or just relaxing. Brings some peace and comfort to the soul. Any fan of any type of folkmusic should be able to enjoy this release.

DOWNLOAD- The Glinting Spade
Tracklist:
1 Two Wax Dolls
2 To Thrum a Glassy Stem
3 Cipher's String on the Tree in the Dream of the Queen
4 Bow Star
5 A Bee at the Dolmen's Dell
6 Arrowsmith's Fire
7 Milk Star
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Agalloch- Ashes Against the Grain

DOWNLOAD- Ashes against the Grain

Released in 2006 Ashes against the Grain is Agalloch's third fullenght album and it's all about the atmosphere on this one. Agalloch is one of those bands who like to blend different genre's into a tasty fruitsallad that in this case is made up of black metal, post-rock and folk music.

In my opinion this is Agallochs best album up to date, their latest album being a huge dissapointment for me. Agalloch have their way of creating majestic scenerys with melodies. They may not be the most technically driven band in the woods, the drummer certainly never does anything outside the box, but the melodies and the haunting clean vocals create pure magic .Though i find this album to be a bit more agressive and down to the earth than their previous "The Mantle"  it takes me a lot further than any of their earlier releases. I swear if you listen carefully you can really hear the waves dashing against a rocky shore on the song "Not Unlike the Waves".

My favourite part of Ashes against the Grain is the closing epos "Our Fortress Is Burning" consisting of three tracks. The first being a folky tune, the second a mainly electric ode in melodies and the third just atmospheric noise.
Ashes against the Grain is usually what i put in the stereo on a gloomy rainy day.
DOWNLOAD- Ashes against the Grain
Tracklist:
1 Limbs
2 Falling Snow
3 This White Mountain on Which You Will Die
4 Fire Above, Ice Below
5 Not unlike The Waves
6 Our Fortress is Burning ... I
7 Our Fortress is Burning... II- Bloodbirds
8 Our Fortress is Burning...III- The Grain
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Yob- The Illusion of Motion

DOWNLOAD- The Illusion of Motion

Now here's a piece of intense sludge/doom. This is the kind of album you want to turn the volum up on til you drive your neighbours mad.

We got heavy profound riffing, hoarse screaming and some really wierd clean vocals that seems to blend in with the guitars. The first song on the album "Ball of Molten Lead" is a real killer, you can listen to it here! As always when it comes to doom all the tracks are really long, but I'm content with saying that the music never turn to boredom. Much due to the fact that the band is constantly incorporating some new element in the music.

The last closing track on the album is a 26 min epic masterpiece, i started my morning with having breakfast and listening to it. Kind of set the tempo of this day.. slow.

 
It's a genuinely good album that deserves your attention. Listen to it and prepare for quite a trip.
DOWNLOAD- The Illusion of Motion
Tracklist:
1 Ball of Molten Lead
2 Exorcism of the Host
3 Doom #2
4 The Illusion of Motion

Blood Ceremony- Blood Ceremony

DOWNLOAD BLOOD CEREMONY
What do you get if you combine Black Sabbath riffs with a Jethro Tull flute? then add some female vocals that belong back in the 70's.
The answer is simple, you get Blood Ceremony!

Blood Ceremony are one of the latest bands to be signed to the highly respected Rise Above Records label, a label that specializes itself in doom metal and doom rock. They are really on the fast track to a great muscial career and are now present with there second fullenght release.

This post though is about their first selftiteled release. I've had the cd edition of it for a while and it's awesome. What makes Blood Ceremony stand out in the croud are the fantastic vocals and the flute, both handled by female frontman Alia O'Brien. Alia's vocals actually remind me a bit of Jefferson Airplane's singer. In my opinion there's not a bad track on this album. From the haunting opening track "Master of Confusion" to the mad flute sessions in the last song "Hymn to Pan". And the lyrics..

Here's a sample, how could you not love this!?
The season of the witch is autumn long
Weird silence falls upon the throng
They smoke black drugs with Saturn's bong
And blast our mind with evil song


The band

Alia O'Brien

I really want to see Blood Ceremony live! got really dissapointed a while back when they cancelled a gig in Sweden i was hoping to attend.
Anyway.. if you are looking for a slab of doomy occult rock, look no further Blood Ceremony is on the menu.
and yeah i shouldn't forget to tell they're canadian.
DOWNLOAD BLOOD CEREMONY
Tracklist
1 Master of Confusion
2 I'm coming with you
3 Into the Coven
4 A Wine of Wizardry
5 Rare Lord
6 Return to Forever
7 Hop Toad
8 Children of the Future
9 Hymn to Pan
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