I don’t know when Swedish rockers Deville will have their new record out, or even what it’s called, but the band has posted two minutes of audio from it on their Soundcloud page, so I figured I’d share. Let unpretentious European heavy reign:

With the release of their second LP today, Jan. 31, Virginia rockers King Giant enter into the lexicon of Southern heavy. The five-piece’s debut, Southern Darkness, was self-released in 2009 and was a ballsy excursion into mostly familiar territory of gruff riffs and heavy grooves, and though Dismal Hollow follows suit, it also finds King Giant a more cohesive, more individualized unit. Fortunately for all of us, they’re still heavy as hell.

And they’re not shy about it, either. Right from the start of “Appomattox,” the guitars of Todd “T.I.” Ingram and David Kowalski embark on a southbound journey of thickened metal. The groove is classic, the breath stank with beer, the stomp formidable in the bass of Floyd Walters III and Brooks‘ drumming, and amid layered acoustics, samples and swaggering leads, vocalist Dave Hammerly injects an early Danzig melodic cadence that only heightens the swampy vibe of the album.

In celebration of Dismal Hollow coming out on the band’s own Graveyard Hill Records in conjunction with The Path Less Traveled, I’m fortunate enough to be able to host not only a high-quality full stream of the record, and not only a few words from Kowalski about what went into making it, but also a giveaway for a vinyl/USB prize-pack that one lucky winner will be able to call their own! It’s like three posts in one. Here’s the stream:

And here’s the giveaway and Kowalski discussing the making of Dismal Hollow:

We made a conscious decision to just let the songwriting take its natural course. Anytime we tried to steer a song in a specific direction, it fell flat, and simply didn’t work.

With Southern Darkness, Todd Ingram came in towards the end to add his parts. So what he played was more reactionary to the music that was already there. With Dismal Hollow, we all wrote as a band, and consequently the lead parts blend more intricately with the rhythms and have more of a cohesive feel.

We spent a lot of time in pre-production, making sure that we all had our parts written before we went into the studio. We also recorded to 2” tape. There are places on the album where you can hear the tape hiss, but overall I feel that we achieved a really good organic sound. In the world of digital audio, it makes it really easy to not have to commit to takes, and to edit out every little sonic “imperfection.” But the imperfections are what gives an album character.

Southern Darkness was recorded over a long period of time with all of us recording our parts separately. Going into a studio this time around forced a time constraint on the band, and allowed all of us to be together while we were tracking, so there was definitely more of a camaraderie to the whole recording process.

PRIZE PACK:

A signed copy of Dismal Hollow in LP format, a King Giant patch for all you heshers out there, and so you can take your King Giant wherever you go, a copy of Southern Darkness AND Dismal Hollow on this badass USB drive from the fine folks at Power Tunes. That’s right you get a real deal Marshall KT66 power tube that has been modified into a USB drive. It even glows when you plug it in.

To win, enter your name, email and address in the form above and click “Send.” One winner will be selected, and as always, your information stays private and is deleted after the contest is over. The winner will be chosen on Feb. 7 and entries will be accepted until then.

For more on King Giant, check out their Thee Facebooks page, the album on iTunes, or their Bandcamp site, where Dismal Hollow will be available shortly. Power Tunes USB drives are made by Will Sprague (The Crimson Electric) and available via Thee Facebooks here.

For this week’s Wino Wednesday, I have the absolute thrill of hosting the first track premiere from Heavy Kingdom, the new collaborative album from Wino & Conny Ochs. Ochs, a German singer-songwriter whose aptly-titled Raw Love Songs was released last year by Exile on Mainstream, toured with Wino following the issue of his own acoustic debut, Adrift, and the two reportedly hit it off creatively as well as personally. As is often the case when it comes to Wino, an album was imminent.

And Heavy Kingdom, which will be out on Exile on Mainstream Jan. 30 in Europe and March 13 in North America, captures the emotionality in both songwriters’ work. Most of its tracks are pretty bare-bones, however, so there’s an element of rawness that seems to convey the basic nature of the collaboration. They wrote them together, they play them together. Wino & Conny Ochs, as a unit, isn’t about showing off the prowess of one player or another, but about two artists who respect each other working in tandem to create something new and whole.

The album succeeds in that, and is at times almost embarrassingly honest. As a representation of the material as a whole, it’s fitting to unveil the title-track first, since it hones both that honesty and the rawness of approach that so much of Heavy Kingdom is built on. Like the collaboration itself, it deals in duality and effectively bridges seemingly disparate elements into something natural and engaging.

Please enjoy Wino & Conny Ochs‘ “Heavy Kingdom” on the player below:

Heavy Kingdom is due out Jan. 30 in Europe and March 13 in North America on Exile on Mainstream. Special thanks to Earsplit PR and Exile on Mainstream for letting me host the track. For more on the release, check out the label’s site here and Wino‘s official page. If you’d like to see a bigger version of the cover, click here. Happy Wino Wednesday.

Tomorrow, Jan. 24, Seattle noise rock four-piece Brokaw will issue their debut album on Good to Die Records. The eight-song release is only 27 minutes long, but there’s no question it’s anything but a full-length. True to the AmRep legacy that seems to have birthed it, Interiors does a lot with a little. By the time “Time Ain’t Now” comes on to send up ’90s-style sub-hip-hop rock late into the record, the intensity and rawness feel as much a part of the band as the guitars, bass, drums and vocals.

Those who’ve smelled the flower of disease might recall Brokaw bassist G. Stuart Dahlquist from his tenure in Goatsnake, or perhaps Burning Witch before that, or Asva‘s ongoing run. Brokaw is certainly a departure from any of those bands’ aesthetics, but there’s something characteristic to Dahlquist‘s bass as it plays off the bombast of Rich Medic‘s drumming and Rick Troy‘s guitars. Vocalist Mike Henderson is part Iggy Pop and part Page Hamilton, both early; he recites his lines in various slurs and shouts that always seem to fit the music happening behind, whether it’s the bass-rumbling of “Politicians by the Pool” or the churning riffy groove of closer “You Didn’t Invent Sex.”

Good to Die was kind enough to give me permission to host Interiors in its entirety for your streaming pleasure, and you’ll find it below, followed by some PR wire-type info about the release. Please enjoy:

The word “Brokaw” stirs up all kinds of connotations. There’s the stern voice of reason held by news anchor Tom Brokaw, the expressive and colorful guitar playing of former Come/Codeine member Chris Brokaw… and now, the sound of one of the meatiest and meanest rock groups to emerge from Seattle, Washington.

But what makes the band so vital and so compelling how obviously they gel both on record and on stage. The members of Brokaw have been playing together “on and off for a very long time,” says Dahlquist. “I have been playing music with Rick for around 35 years, the two of us have worked with Mike since meeting at music school in 1984, Rich has been in and out of the picture for at least 10 years. We’ve been friends for a long time and have a great chemistry together, we all love playing music and it comes easily for us.”

You’ll hear right from the start of the band’s debut LP Interiors, to be released this fall on the new Seattle label Good To Die Records. Recorded with Greg Norman at Electrical Audio in Chicago, Illinois, Brokaw fed off the live current that runs through the band and the studio. Their hyperdriven barrage of sound pulls from the influences of the Amphetamine Reptile family, while acknowledging a wide variety of interests like the freeform ’70s work of Miles Davis and the swing of cheeky, literate Britpop band The Fall.

Live, on record, and in person, Brokaw put their backs, their hearts, and their balls into everything they do. They don’t ask you to do the same, just to pay your respects and enjoy every sweat-drenched minute of it.

As much as the summer belongs to fuzzy heavy psych in my mind, the winter belongs to doom. The slow march to frostbitten oblivion. Darker, shorter days and that feeling that there’s no way out of the cold. Fuck yeah.

Hailing from the frozen recesses of Uppsala, Sweden, the appropriately-monikered four-piece Anguish make their debut this week on Dark Descent Records with the full-length, Through the Archdemon‘s Head, a collection of traditionally-paced doom that brings in elements of cultish and blackened metal, most notably in a pronounced Celtic Frost vocal influence, but in the music as well. It’s dark, and morose, and hopeless. Perfect for January.

In fact, if you suffer from seasonal affective disorder, I’m gonna go ahead and recommend you don’t stream the track “Lair of the Gods” from Through the Archdemon’s Head using the player below, because by the time you get to the second or third grunt, it might just be enough to make you jump out that window you’ve been eying all afternoon. Everyone else, if you’ve got any hope left to lose, this is about as good a way to see it go as I can think of.

Check out “Lair of the Gods” from Anguish, and enjoy:

Anguish is J. Dee on vocals, David and Kribbe on guitar and Ralle on drums. Through the Archdemon’s Head is available now on Dark Descent Records. For more info, check out the band’s page on Thee Facebooks or the label’s site.

The album came out last autumn in Europe, but is just today finally seeing its North American release, and to celebrate, Danish metallers Rising and their label, Exile on Mainstream, have been kind enough to let me stream the band’s debut full-length, To Solemn Ash, front to back. It’s a record that runs the gamut of modern heavy, sounding on a song like “Passage” as the poppiness of Mastodon‘s The Hunter might have had it not been so overly processed and reminding of Entombed‘s deathly grit on “The Vault.” The 10 tracks are catchy and heavy in equal proportion, balancing brutality and melody with precision and a feel that is neither amateurish nor contrived.

Interplay between bassist/vocalist Henrik W. Hald and guitarist/backing vocalist Jacob Krogholt is a central source of melody, the latter bolstering the rough, lower register of the former with harmonic shouting that fits well alongside the subtle complexity of the arrangements. Later track “Heir to Flames” works in Leviathan-esque acoustics, but by the time closer “Seven Riders” thunders its stop-start riff upside your skull, even the Torche-worthy chorus feels like one more tool serving to enhance the crushing sound.

Rounded out by Jacob Johansen‘s steady pulse on drums, Rising‘s first record is remarkably assured in its aesthetic, heavy as fuck and delivered with authority. Please feel free to find that out for yourself by streaming To Solemn Ash on the player below.

Introducing the band and the album, Hald says:

“Hello everyone! We are Rising, a heavy metal three-piece from Denmark. Back in October, we released our debut album To Solemn Ash in Europe via Exile On Mainstream. Now the time has come to make it available to the States. We are super excited about our album being released on another continent and hope to follow up with a tour one day. You can stream the entire album right here on The Obelisk. Enjoy and stay heavy on the heavy!”

Rising‘s To Solemn Ash is available now from Exile on Mainstream. For more info, check out the band’s site or the label’s store.

AKA “The One with Talking.”

Not that I think of my voice as some big draw or anything. I was in a band long enough to know it isn’t. But that’s me on there, and for the first time — possibly the last — I’m introducing tracks and talking about bands and their albums. I tried to keep it to a minimum, and was fairly successful in doing so. I hope you’ll bear with me; it was pretty fucking cold in my office this evening while I was recording my parts.

The theme of this month’s podcast is “The Best of Buried Treasure.” If you find yourself staring at that and wondering, “What the hell is ‘Buried Treasure’ supposed to mean?” then click here. It’s the category under which I post about record shopping, basically, and the places I buy stuff and whatever else might be related to that. I took tracks from releases I’ve posted about since starting this site and made a podcast out of them. Pretty simple.

A little while back, a comment was left somewhere on here that someone had never downloaded a podcast before because there was no speaking on them. It honestly never occurred to me that such a thing might have an appeal, and if it doesn’t to you, I apologize up front for my intrusion and assure you we’ll be back to normal next month. In the meantime, this. I said when I put up the first podcast that I reserved the right to speak over one in the future, so here we are.

To put my blathering aside for a minute, I actually think it’s a really cool mix of songs, and putting myself in, on the level of creating a flow, was an interesting challenge. That’s not to mention the technical concerns, which weren’t so much “a challenge” as “a pain in the ass.” Whatever. It’s done. I hope you enjoy. There’s some bootleg Sabbath and Kyuss, some Saturnalia Temple and Trouble and Fatso Jetson, and a bunch of other cool tracks. The advantage of having the podcast comprised of things I bought and was stoked to write about is that those two qualifications usually mean it’s pretty good.

Stream it using the player above, or download audiObelisk Transmission 023 by clicking the banner at the top of this post, or by clicking here. As always, the full tracklist is after the jump.

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Rest assured, I’m not trying to get away with anything here. Space is the Corpse of Time — the fourth album from Minneapolis, Minnesota, instrumentalists Zebulon Pike — was released a while back, and I’m not trying to pass it off as something brand new or something you probably can’t download by whatever means it is the kids are using these days. However, it being a self-release from the band, I thought it was still worth featuring here, and since it is out now, the best way to go seemed to post the whole record rather than a single track.

If you’re unfamiliar with Zebulon Pike, the prog-doom explorers formed in 2002 and are veterans of the old Emissions From the Monolith festival. A double-guitar four-piece, their sound hones in on elements of space rock, but the performances as captured on Space is the Corpse of Time aren’t loose in the way one might expect when thinking of modern instrumental heavy. Rather, songs like “Echoic Worlds” and the sprawling “Powers of the Living/Manifestations of the Dead” are always moving somewhere, however long they might rest on a single part or theme.

The music is evocative, and apart from the title track, long. Each of the other four cuts tops 10 minutes, and that’s par for the course for Zebulon Pike, who’ve been known to double that span on occasion. They use their time wisely, though, so that even as Tom Berg‘s bass rumbles in the final minutes of “Powers of the Living/Manifestations of the Dead,” it does so in a way that feels purposeful in creating an atmosphere and mood. Album opener “Spectrum Threshold” also boasts some effective doom chugging from guitarists Morgan Berkus and Erik Fratzke, and well-timed, adaptive drumming from Erik Bolen, so right away, the band lets you know you’re in more than capable hands.

So again, you don’t have to tell me, because I know Space is the Corpse of Time has been out for a while now. I just thought it was worth hosting the record for anyone who hasn’t yet had the chance to hear it, and if that’s you (and I suppose even if you’ve heard it and you’re listening again), I hope you enjoy:

Zebulon Pike‘s Space is the Corpse of Time is available now. For more info, check out the band’s website or find them on Thee Facebooks here.

One might look at II, the appropriately-named second MeteorCity full-length from Black Pyramid, as the closing of a chapter. The Northampton, Massachusetts, doom rock trio, who’d released a handful of singles and splits since their 2009 debut, parted ways in an undeniably ugly split with guitarist/vocalist Andy Beresky, in between recording and the release, which left both the album and the future of the band uncertain. For a minute there, Black Pyramid was done.

Drummer Clay Neely and bassist Gein have since regrouped under the Black Pyramid moniker and found venerable riffer Darryl Shepard (he of Milligram, Hackman and Blackwolfgoat, among others) to fill the vacated guitarist/vocalist role, and already they’ve begun to demo and record new material — it helps in that regard that Neely is also an engineer. But the songs on II still show the promise and the progress of the original trio, whose sound had become more melodically aware and sonically expansive. Their epic battle metal aesthetic will be familiar to anyone who heard the first album, but when they made II, Black Pyramid had grown within it and through it into something even more formidable than they were when they started out.

It’s exciting to wonder what the new trio might come up with — and knowing how prolific the band has been in the past, it probably won’t be long until we find out — but in the meantime, II documents a lineup hitting what might have been their peak, and whatever may have happened to bring about an end to this era of the band, it’s great to know a new one has begun. Today I’m fortunate enough to be able to stream the track “Night Queen,” which I think sums up both the maturity and the heaviness of Beresky-fronted Black Pyramid.

You’ll find it on the player below, followed immediately by some PR wire details about the album’s release. Please enjoy:

New England doom rock trio Black Pyramid will release its long awaited sophomore album Black Pyramid II on January 31, 2012 via MeteorCity. Recorded “in the foothills of the Berkshires” at Black Coffee Sound (Elks, Elder) and mixed by Justin Pizzoferrato (Sonic Youth, Witch, Dinosaur Jr.), the record features nine tracks of the band’s self-titled “galloping war metal.” Black Pyramid II was mastered by Matt Washburn (Mastodon) and is “at times a bit more death metal and black metal influenced” than the band’s previous material.

“We’re incredibly proud of the sonic landscapes we were able to achieve with the new album,” said Black Pyramid drummer Clay Neely. ”It’s a clear successor to the debut album and we allowed ourselves to further expand into some uncharted territories. The recording of the record was an incredibly rewarding experience and we can’t wait to bring the show back on the road.”

Black Pyramid will also be playing the London Desertfest in April 2012. For more info on that, click here.

Some diligent internet research on Dwellers (and by that I mean looking up their ReverbNation and Bandcamp pages) will result in a couple tracks already available from their Good Morning Harakiri debut full-length. The album is also already available on iTunes for those inclined to download it there, and will be pressed to CD by Small Stone at the end of January.

It hasn’t yet been a full week since I reviewed Good Morning Harakiri, so I’ll spare the long-winded descriptions of how the album as a whole functions and just say that the pairing of former Iota guitarist/vocalist Joey Toscano with the rhythm section of bassist Dave Jones and drummer Zach Hatsis — both of post-metal unit  SubRosa — results in a unique mixture of riff-driven heaviness and thickened jam explorations. While this elements aren’t necessarily uncommon, Dwellers‘ blend of space and blues winds up being almost entirely their own.

Case in point, “Vultures” is the longest track on Good Morning Harakiri at just over 10 minutes. It’s got a bluesy semi-Southern riff and Toscano‘s vocals are graveled as they deliver the initial verses, but the song soon opens up to an expansive heavy jam with a waltzing progression that feels born as much from willful exploration as from its classic rock soloing.

Small Stone was kind enough to let me host “Vultures” for your streaming pleasure, and you’ll find it on the player below. Hope you enjoy:

Dwellers‘ Good Morning Harakiri is available now on iTunes through Small Stone Records, and is set for CD release at the end of January. The band will be playing Burt’s Tiki Club in their native Salt Lake City, Utah on Jan. 21 with YOB and Old Timer, and will also take part in Small Stone‘s annual showcase at SXSW in Austin, Texas, on March 16. More info on that is here, and you can check out Dwellers on Thee Facebooks here.

Agape is the third album from the German/French collaboration Lantlôs, which unites Markus “Herbst” Siegenhort of Herbst and Stéphane “Neige” Paut of Alcest in an emotional torrent of atmospheric post-black metal. Joined by session drummer Felix Wylezik, Lantlôs is more a band than ever on Agape, which follows 2010′s .Neon and has already seen its European release through Prophecy Productions, weaving swiftly through searing black metal and contemplative, evocative ambience.

Today I’m fortunate enough to be able to premiere the song “Bliss” from Agape — which you can stream on the player above — and on it you’ll find Herbst and Neige working in tandem to express a singular but complex emotional ideology. Herbst in the multi-instrumentalist role on guitar and bass, Wyleszik providing drums and Neige contributing distant but still prominent screams, the song begins with guitar before launching into its blasted-out aggression, which in turn gives way toward the midpoint (listen to the bass there; it’s in the background, but not to be missed) to soft piano and a jazzy drum beat.

The build and climax that ensues from there is befitting the journey on which Lantlôs take the listener throughout the course of Agape, which like other Prophecy releases over the last couple years by bands like Alcest, Arctic Plateau, Les Discrets and others, pushes the boundaries of musical darkness and melancholy while also remembering that the core of a lasting song is its melody. Lantlôs does this and holds firm to its heaviness and abrasion as well, making it all the more impressive.

North American release is set for Jan. 7, 2012. For more info on Lantlôs, check out the band’s website. Prophecy Productions‘ catalog is available for viewing at this location.

You might notice that there’s no episode announcement at the beginning of the December podcast. No “Transmission zero two two.” The idea is that this audiObelisk Transmission is a direct extension of last month’s, so in order for them better to flow together as one larger unit, I left it out. I don’t think that’s a make or break thing for anyone who might be interested enough to listen, but I just didn’t want it to seem like I forgot.

In fact, if you’re interested in hearing it all as one piece, I went ahead and spliced the two podcasts together into one larger one. You can get that file by clicking here. Damn thing is huge. Just under six hours of music and 53 artists total. Yeah, I know I said I was going to do 26 in each installment — but when it came time to actually put this all together, I just had to include one to grow on. When you see what the last song is in the tracklist after the jump, I think you’ll understand why I couldn’t leave it out.

There’s a massive amount of stuff to hear before you get there, though, and as I said last time, this is just barely scratching the surface of what 2011 had to offer. If I included everything, it would be 2013 before I got the post finished. These are just selections from albums that, for one reason or another, stood out to me. I hope you dig it and that nothing not included here strikes as too egregious.

We left off last time with Grayceon, so it seemed right to start here with Rwake and continue along the path of forward-looking sludge. At the risk of patting myself on the back, there’s a really solid flow to these tracks, and a really solid flow between the two podcasts. Never having done something this big before, spanning two months like this, I think the results are about the best I could hope for. Again, I hope you agree.

Stream audiObelisk Transmission 022 on the player above, or download by clicking the banner at the top of this post or here to go to the Archive.org page where the file is hosted. Special thanks to everyone who sent in records this year, as there would be no podcasts without physical sources to draw from. Full tracklist with time stamps is after the jump.

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The cultish and furry-toned drone of Portland (and Idaho) foursome Uzala will be familiar to anyone pulled by the gravity of Megaton Leviathan‘s Water Wealth Hell on Earth, but on their self-titled debut vinyl/tape, Uzala are less concerned with expansive, infinite exploration than they are refining the process and cutting it into songs. Uzala‘s Uzala sounds open and rough in its production, but at the core there is a base of structure — it’s in there somewhere — that allows the noise a foundation to rest and build upon.

That winds up making a big difference as the album progresses. The lead vocals of guitarist Darcy Nutt provide an ethereal mood worthy of the latest incarnation of The Wounded Kings or Jex Thoth, but the black metal influences worked in by guitarist Chad Remains, who also provides backing screams behind Nutt‘s varied crooning on midsection songs like “Fracture” and “Wardrums,” put Uzala in a category more their own: definitively doomed, but working on an expanded definition of what that means.

At its strongest points, though, Uzala‘s Uzala is slow and classically menacing. Drummer Stephen Gere varies his tempo but seems to lumber no matter the speed, and bassist Nick Phit (ex-Graves at Sea, Atriarch) offsets the riffs with doomly groove, adding depth to the fuzz and reverb-soaked guitar lines and furthering the sense of ritual brought out in Nutt‘s singing.

The album is limited to 333 LPs through At War with False Noise and on cassette via Witch Sermon Productions. I was lucky enough to be given permission to host the cassette-only bonus track, “Cataract” for your streaming, which you’ll find on the player below, followed by some PR wire info. Please enjoy:

At long last, the blistering debut recording from one of the most-talked about doom bands of the past year is nearly within our grasp! Boise/Portland vintage doom merchants Uzala have aligned themselves with At War With False Noise and Witch Sermon Productions to unleash their monumental debut. The self-titled album will be manifested in wax by At War With False Noise, while Witch Sermon will handle the cassette version (which will feature a special bonus track, “Cataract”). Featuring Nick Phit (formerly of Graves at Sea, Atriarch) on bass, Uzala‘s lineup is rounded out by drummer Stephen Gere, guitarist/hellish vocalist Chad Remains, and chanteuse & axe-slinger Darcy Nutt (a world-renowned tattoo artist and devastating talent).

The  album’s crushing, velvety fuzzed-out sound is attained by a Blake Green (Wolvserpent) production and mastering by long-time At War with False Noise cohort Andy Lippoldt of Persistence in Mourning. The simply amazing artwork was created by vocalist /guitarist Darcy Nutt, while layout and design was summoned by Stephen O’Malley.

The resulting drone is just a part of the scope of the project. For Boston-based artist Craig Colorusso, the idea is more about the experience than the aural result (though, granted, that and pictures is what we’re limited to here). His installation, Sun Boxes takes a collection solar-powered speakers, each of which plays a loop of part of a Bb chord, and puts them in natural settings.

Seems simple enough, but the individual loops run at different lengths, and since the nature sounds of wherever they’re placed inevitably factor into the overall experience of the work, as does the striking visual of the wooden boxes topped with futuristic-looking solar panels, it’s never the same twice. Colorusso has found a way to make the same elements work in a different way each time.

He started in the desert, but he’s taken Sun Boxes to sculpture parks in Maryland and his native Massachusetts as well, and even released a 7″ named the same as the installation, with the two sides “Frozen Pond” and “Grassy Field” featuring their respective environs. Though they’ll sound familiar to anyone who’s engaged themselves with drone before, the relaxing, subdued feel of the project comes through even just from the audio.

Colorusso — who has the 7″ available for purchase now on his website and is on Thee Facebooks here — was kind enough to let me host the tracks for streaming. You’ll find them on the player below, followed by some words from Colorusso himself. Please enjoy:

People often ask where all this came from. The short answer is… in November 2008, long time friend and collaborator, “Sexy” David Sanchez Burr called me up and said, “Yo! Make something solar. We’re going to the desert.” Then he hung up. Dave is the kind of guy when he’s on the phone you take the call. So, in June of 2009 we went to Rhyolite, Nevada, with Richard Voseller to a place called The Goldwell Open Air Museum. The three of us had a residency called “Off the Grid,” where we used sustainable energy to make art. Sun Boxes was my contribution.

The long answer is… I’m not sure. Although I would cite Dave as a catalyst the truth is I’ve been thinking about this a long time. 39 years of observations.

I really wanted make something people could feel like they’re part of physically. One of the things about Sun Boxes I love is as soon as you hear it or see it your in it. You decide how close you want get. I often find people on the edge of the array. I don’t like telling people what to do but I do encourage them to walk amongst the Boxes. It really sounds better in the middle of it all. I think it sounds best when you’re surrounded by the piece. Sun Boxes is loud enough to engulf the participant but quiet enough to allow ambient sounds of the environment to creep into the mix. Birds, traffic, wind, voices, feet crunching leaves, waves, all kinds of sounds sound very musical with Sun Boxes, even an ambulance full sirens.

It’s been a while, but the latest in the series of 2011 Roadburn audio streams comes from Toronto retro occultists Blood Ceremony, the flute-ifiied proto-metal of whom came to fruition earlier this year on their second album, Living with the Ancients. This stream was recorded live at Roadburn at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands. Here’s the link to listen:

Blood Ceremony live at Roadburn 2011:
http://3voor12.vpro.nl/speler/ondemand/45369911#ondemand.45369911

Thanks as always to Walter from Roadburn for letting me host the link. Blood Ceremony‘s Roadburn set was mixed by Danny Gras of Gomer Pyle and Space Jam Records.