Tree-tagging or other forest-based graffiti is a lost medium in these days of city-based arts. Fortunately, Belgian duo SardoniS are bringing back the bygone days of taking a permanent marker, jogging through the woods with a hood up and writing shit on fallen trees for hikers to see and probably be confused by later. Their video for the song “Entering the Woods,” from an upcoming album that may or may not share that title, keeps the band’s thrashy and aggressive edge while also being tonally pummeling.

SardoniS‘ prior offering and self-titled debut for MeteorCity, released in 2010 (review here), was a treat, and I look forward to hearing more of the follow-up, but for now, here’s “Entering the Woods”:

Hard-luck Belgian trio SerpentCult got together in 2006, following the unsightly demise of Thee Plague of Gentlemen, who weren’t bad except for the fact that it turned out their lead singer was a pedophile. Reasonably wanting to distance themselves from that, guitarist Frederic Caure, bassist Steven Van Cauwenbergh and drummer Frederik “Cozy” Cosemans stuck it out as SerpentCult and successfully released Weight of Light through Rise Above in 2008.

That record was fronted by Michelle Nocon, who also now is out of the band. So, on their new album, Raised by Wolves, SerpentCult have basically reinvented themselves — again — as a mostly-instrumental three-piece of sprawling and atmospheric doom. Raised by Wolves is SerpentCult‘s most honest and accomplished album yet, and it’s a testament to how strong the connection is between Caure, Van Cauwenbergh and Cosemans that they’d persist after losing two vocalists.

Raised by Wolves is out now on Listenable Records, who were kind enough to let me stream the all-instrumental and longest track from the album, “Longing for Hyperborea.” The song skillfully shifts through varied movements, but remains consistently morose throughout. It’s the sound of the defeat to which the band simply refuses to succumb. Hope you enjoy:

For more on SerpentCult, check them out on Thee Facebooks here, or hit up the Listenable Records website.

I don’t want to say I was prepared to be let down by Hypnos 69‘s maybe-final LP, Legacy, when it was released earlier this year on Elektrohasch Schallplatten, but basically I was. Nothing against the Belgian classic proggers, but in my mind, an album of the same quality as 2006′s The Eclectic Measure just wasn’t a fair expectation to put on a band. I mean, The Eclectic Measure was a landmark, a thing of beauty. A once-in-a-career achievement.

Spoiler alert for anyone who doesn’t yet know: They did it. Legacy is a better album than The Eclectic Measure. It’s more developed in every way — guitarist/vocalist Steve Houtmeyers proving to be as talented a singer as he is a songwriter and a soloist — and although even as I gushed all over the record in my review, I wasn’t sure if the songs therein would prove as memorable as those from The Eclectic Measure, Legacy has proven strong in this regard as well. I’m just as likely to hum a flute part as I am to sing a lyric. The blend of elements on a track like the 18-plus-minute closer “The Great Work” is nothing short of majestic.

It’s not that they’re genre-less, or not completely aware of the context in which they’re making music. It’s simply that Hypnos 69 are in a class of their own. Legacy is a staggering collection of songs. There are days when I feel like I’m too tired to listen to it because I won’t have the energy to fully enjoy the experience, but my own worthiness aside, the growing and morphing appeal of Legacy‘s rich melodies and complex arrangements only means that the pleasure in listening is going to increase with age. One of the year’s best and then some.

Otherwise known as the heaviest thing to come out of Belgium since Chimay blanc, the guitar/drum duo SardoniS (there’s one capital S for each band member) shared the following clip of a new song called “Emperor,” captured live in Westmalle — otherwise known as the home of one of the world’s seven true trappist breweries. Doom in the land of beer-making monks? You’re damn right I’m posting this video. Not sure when the album’s out, but enjoy this in the meantime.

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This is the mother of them all. Short of doing three songs in as many hours, which I could have done just as or even more easily, I don’t see how any audiObelisk Transmission could get heavier than this one. It’s just a little bit of an excuse on my part to have an easily accessible copy of Dopesmoker at all times, but with new music as well from Hypnos 69, a classic dirge from Teeth of Lions Rule the Divine and one of Boris‘ most avant garde moments, Transmission Zero Zero Nine is an absolute monster. I hope you dig it.

No need to hide the tracklist after a jump since it’s only four songs. Click the banner at the top of this post to get the file, or stream it on the player above. Here’s what we’ve got:

0:00:08 Sleep, “Dopesmoker” from Dopesmoker (Tee Pee, 2003)
There was no way I was going to make this podcast and not include this song. It’s the riff that launched a thousand clone bands, and Sleep‘s shining hour. Literally, an hour. Plenty of time to worship.

1:03:42 Hypnos 69, “The Great Work” from Legacy (Elektrohasch, 2010)
New music from these Belgian classic proggers. It’s the last cut on their new album, Legacy, and maybe their most aptly-titled song ever. Their sense of melody is second to none and the progressive elements in their approach have never shined brighter than they do here.

1:21:53 Teeth of Lions Rule the Divine, “He Who Accepts all That is Offered (Feel Bad Hit of the Winter)” from Rampton (Southern Lord, 2002)
The lineup of Lee Dorrian (Cathedral), Stephen O’Malley (SunnO)))/Khanate), Justin Greaves (Iron Monkey/now-Crippled Black Phoenix) and Greg Anderson (Goatsnake) only put out one album under this cumbersome moniker, taken from a song title on Earth‘s Earth 2. It’s a good thing. I don’t think the universe could handle a second without ripping in half.

1:51:35 Boris, “Flood” from Flood (MIDI Creative, 2000)
Is that guitar forward or backwards? Both? I doubt anyone really knows what Boris are getting up to for the entirety of this song, Boris included. I remember interviewing drummer Atsuo Mizuno a couple years back and he looked at me like my head was on backwards when I asked about it. See if you can figure it out.

Download audiObelisk Transmission 009 here.

If this is going to be Hypnos 69’s legacy, so be it. After the Belgian psychedelic progressives put out The Eclectic Measure in 2006, I didn’t imagine they’d be able to top it, since the album had such an individual balance of quirk and sonic familiarity, taking elements of earliest King Crimson and melding them with the more straightforward early ‘70s British rock style, but on their new offering, Legacy (Elektrohasch Schallplatten), the four-piece lean heavily on the prog end of their sound and push even further into the unhinged creative. The album is seven tracks that play out over a staggering 72 minutes and can be equally potent either in one extended sitting or over the course of a few sessions. Several of these songs, including opener “Requiem (for a Dying Creed),” are like an album in and of themselves.

What’s increasingly come to make Hypnos 69 unique sound-wise is the band’s use of jazz structures and classic prog instrumentation – King Crimson’s sax, Jethro Tull’s flute, everyone’s mellotron, etc. – but the band fuses these aspects of their sound together with a driving rock that’s grown over time to be the expansive, encompassing presentation of Legacy. The album starts and ends with tracks both over 17 minutes long (who doesn’t love a long opener?), and though we’re treated to a variety of sounds and styles in between, somehow Hypnos 69 manage to remain Hypnos 69 for the duration. The guitars of Steve Houtmeyers (also vocals and theremin) would seem to lead most when playing leads (rather than riffs), but the material on the album is just as likely to be driven by sax, organ, flute, drums or bass. Parts come introduced by one instrument then echoed on another, giving the songs a structured, cyclical feel. Even on “An Aerial Architect,” on which Houtmeyers’ guitar runs in tandem with Steven Marx’s saxophone à la “21st Century Schizoid Man” – at least for part of the track – the interplay between instruments is tastefully and intricately composed. Often Houtmeyers’ leads seem restrained, not trying to do too much, to just play the notes that need to be played rather than give some needlessly showy display of technicality. That comes up on later outings like the airy “Jerusalem” or the aptly-named 18:27 closer, “The Great Work.”

Basically, what Hypnos 69 are doing on Legacy is taking the style of play they introduced on The Eclectic Measure (you could argue their jazzier side showed up on 2004’s The Intrigue of Perception, or that it’s been there since their 2002 debut, Timeline Traveller, and you wouldn’t really be wrong, but it’s a question of focus more than mere elemental presence) and setting it to a completely different scale. Even the subdued “My Journey to the Stars” presents growth in its soft, memorable vocal melody, and though drummer Dave Houtmeyers “sits out” the acoustic-led “The Sad Destiny We Lament,” he finds other work on various percussion and glockenspiel while Marx fills out the track with overriding synth and bassist Tom Vanlaer thickens up the bottom end. The percussive Houtmeyers gets his revenge on the 10:48 “The Empty Hourglass,” which is as driven rhythmically as anything Hypnos 69 has ever done, the band stopping and turning on a dime under the six-string Houtmeyers’ lead, only to have Marx do a call-and-response on sax with the vocals during the verses. If it sounds like there’s a lot going on with the band, song and album, there is, but Hypnos 69 manage not to overwhelm even at their busiest, though I’ll say that it’s inevitably going to take a couple listens before the full breadth of Legacy reveals itself to the listener. In both creative scope and sheer length, it is a massive undertaking.

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2:44PM: Train en route to Brussels: I went to Schiphol this morning to see if I could find someone from British Airways, and found when I arrived that there was no one to talk to. No counters open, nobody around, no helpful fake smiles. That, like Icelandic volcanoes, wasn’t exactly my worst case scenario, but it was certainly bummer enough.

I stood on line for the hi-speed rail and got into a conversation with a middle-aged husband and wife who were trying to get to I don’t remember where, when a young man said through an overmodulating boombox loudspeaker that all the international trains were booked through Wednesday. I no longer had it in my head to get to Paris since I was told by The Patient Mrs. that British Airways doesn’t fly out of there yet, not till May 3, apparently, but I decided to head for London instead, where at least I wouldn’t have to feel like a dick for not speaking the language (purely an internal thing; no one of Dutch descent has ever given me crap for being ignorant).

A young man tapped me on the shoulder while I was chatting and asked me if I wanted to go to London. Coincidentally, in the book I’m reading now, a late-20s African freedom fighter has just made illegal passage into the UK, so the whole thing smacked on a level that Ricky – at least that’s what he said his name was – couldn’t understand. He offered me a train ticket that he couldn’t use for 50 Euros, and with literally nothing to lose beyond the money, which I’d have gladly spent even more poorly if given the chance, I took it. So here I am.

The ticket is a computer printout. He said he lived in The Netherlands but worked in London and made this trip all the time, had booked his spot well in advance, but that work had told him not to bother coming back for the time being. He even gave me a pen with his company’s name on it: S.T.W. BV Duiven. I didn’t ask what he did – nice pen, though – and I’m still not sure how his story made sense, but it was potential passage and he was only charging face value, so I took the ticket. I don’t know if it’s a real ticket or a fake one, but it’s all I’ve got and I figure if they ever come around to check it and find it’s a fake or it’s no good for whatever reason, I get off at the next stop, pay whatever fine I need to pay and, short the embarrassment, am ultimately no better or worse off than I was when I boarded: Still stuck. Fortunately I’m used to making an ass of myself, so that’s not really a problem.

So off I go, unless curtailed, to Brussels and then change trains for London. If it works, if it doesn’t work, I don’t care. Provided I don’t get pulled out of line at customs because my name doesn’t match the name on the train boarding pass, I should be fine. But yeah, that’s weighing on me a bit.

Even though there’s only half of what’s commonly regarded as a full band comprising the lineup of Belgian doomers SardoniS, you can’t argue with the mission of their self-titled MeteorCity debut LP. At their core, guitarist Roel Paulussen (also of Solenoid) and drummer Jelle Stevens seem hell bent on stripping stoner doom to its basest core and dwelling in the harsh reality of iceberg riffs and tectonic crashes. The album is instrumental, and rather than missing the vocals, the effect the nine songs have is one of unimpeded groove. In a genre where the riff is the central component anyway, SardoniS take it to the extreme. Not only is the riff central, it’s all there is.

There are some samples peppered in, and of course, there are the drums, but SardoniS is an anti-guitar-rock guitar rock album. By that I mean none of the tropes of traditional instrumental guitar rock show up: the lyrical solos, the wankery, the pure Satriani-ness are all as absent as a vocalist and bassist. What you get instead is the High on Fire thrash of “Thor” and “The Wolf’s Lair” (which follows the aptly-titled acoustic breath-catching moment, “More Severe Things Await”) or the unadulterated Black Sabbath “Black Sabbath”-ery of closer “It Walks the Mountain.” Nothing comes between the listener and the riffs. Certainly instrumental stoner rock isn’t anything new, but SardoniS tackle it from such a rudimentary stance that adding any frills seems unnecessary or almost silly.

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Everybody’s touring Europe these days. Of course, in the case of Belgian duo SardoniS (MySpace here), it makes sense to want to get paid in Euros. Actually, come to think of it, that makes sense for everyone. Good for SardoniS though, whose self-titled CD is out now on MeteorCity, getting out and doing the thing. According to the PR wire, they’ve got a slew of dates, and a CD release party with the increasingly ubiquitous Karma to Burn. Dig it:

The official SardoniS CD release party will take place on April 10 in Het Depot in Leuven (Belgium) in support of Karma to Burn and Year Long Disaster. Organized by Belgian bookers Orange Factory.

Also, SardoniS will be touring Europe with Dark Fortress and SerpentCult. The tour dates are as follows:

Feb 12 2010 – Muziekodroom – Hasselt (B)
Feb 13 2010 – Helvete – Oberhausen (D)
Feb 14 2010 – Rocket Club – Landshut (D)
Feb 15 2010 – Exit Chmelnice – Prague (CZ)
Feb 16 2010 – Arena – Vienna (A)
Feb 17 2010 – Dynamo Werk 21 – Zurich (CH)
Feb 18 2010 – Rock It – Aalen (D)
Feb 19 2010 – Eastclub – Bischofswerda (D)
Feb 20 2010 – Ostendfest – Oostende (B)
Feb 21 2010 – Willemeen – Arhnem (NL)

Ever since mentioning them in the Astra review the other day, I’ve had my mind on Belgian psych trippers Hypnos 69, and specifically their last album, The Eclectic Measure. Since it’s sunny in the valley for what feels like the first time in a year (though it’s not supposed to last), I thought I’d share this live clip of “The Point of No Return” filmed live in Leuven in 2007. They’re probably my second favorite act on Elektrohasch, which is saying something. Hope you dig it.