The crux of the idea behind Premonition 13 and what separates it from the slew of other Scott “Wino” Weinrich projects — especially on stage, as I myself saw at the Saint Vitus bar in Brooklyn not so long ago — is the interplay between Wino and fellow guitarist/vocalist Jim Karow. On the band’s debut full-length, 13, Karow‘s solos and vocals added much to the personality of the group and the record as a whole, however overshadowed he might have been by Weinrich‘s legacy and profile. More than that, on stage, those two jammed. I mean, they went for it, and thinking back on that show, that’s what I remember most.

This week’s Wino Wednesday clip, however, finds Premonition 13 at the abrupt end of their European tour as a three-piece with just Wino on guitar. Karow reportedly had to split back to the US on the double — and not knowing the situation there, I won’t speculate except to say I hope everything’s alright and that the group can get out again as a full band at some point if not sooner than later — and though a couple shows were canceled, they went through with Berlin, where they shared the stage with Fuzz Manta, Voodooshock and Burn Pilot at Cassiopeia on Dec. 6, 2011.

Some intrepid soul (presumably YouTube user jomawe74, whose account the clip was uploaded by) filmed the songs “Hard to Say” and “Deranged Rock ‘n’ Roller” with just Wino on guitar and vocals, and since the single guitar gives a rawer feel than those who saw Premonition 13 in its full incarnation on this tour might expect, I thought it might be cool to make a Wino Wednesday of it. Special thanks to Billy Brett who brought my attention to the following:

The other day in my post about Lord Vicar and Sigiriya being added to the London lineup (Roadsaw has also joined the bill — stoked), I mentioned that Elvis Deluxe also signed on to play the Berlin Desertfest — website here — as well. It dawned on me after that that I haven’t really had the chance to talk much about the Berlin fest.

That’s probably at least in part because I can’t go. Much as I’d love to take three weeks and dick around Europe going from show to show — sandwich the weekend of Roadburn with the two Desertfests — it’s just not feasible. I have a job, and without it, no money to do the dicking around already planned, so at some point, I need to go back to it. Too bad, given the lineup already announced (see above) and the reportedly more still to come.

In any case, Berlin Desertfest (put together by Sound of Liberation) has some cool stuff in the works, and I thought it would be a good time to find out more about it. Here’s the info I got sent, so that if you’re like me and unable to go, you can also be jealous of anyone who is:

We plan bands from all over the world: we still have quite a few to announce! It will happen on Thursday 19th April in Festsaal Kreuzberg / Berlin and in Astra Kulturhaus / Berlin on 20th and 21st April, 2012.

Orange Goblin will headline the 19th.
Motorpsycho on 20th and Colour Haze on 21st.

We also have a Theatre Bizarre planned with two movies: Fuzzomentary ( doc about Truckfighters band) + Black Mass Rising (visions of a bunch of bands from various genres about the thematic: darkness, mysticism and apocalypse).

Also a couple of artist playing acoustic as well as DJ in this small theatre. The place will be fully redecorated by artists to bring a special atmosphere to the Theatre Bizarre. Artwork exhibit is also scheduled, as well as a “hippie corner”: market with labels, artwork designers, food, craftsmen, etc.

I may have missed it, but perhaps there was some backlash to Berlin instrumental heavy proggers Rotor after their last album – some kind of, “Yeah, but there’s no way you can do that live,” that caused them to issue Festsaal Kreuzberg (Elektrohasch) in response. Okay, probably not, but either way, if there was any doubt to the natural feel of Rotor’s latter day studio output – thinking particularly of 2007’s 3 and last year’s ultra-progressive 4 – the live album certainly puts it to rest. A solid 45-minute set recorded in their hometown at the venue for which the album is named on Nov. 14, 2009, Festsaal Kreuzberg affirms the chemistry that has developed over the last decade-plus between the three members of Rotor. The nine tracks draw exclusively from 3 and 4 and sound crisp and clear but still definitively live, and the whole of Festsaal Kreuzberg has an organic flow that matches well the band’s balance between progressive structuring and riff-based heaviness. Fans and followers of Rotor who’ve never had the chance to see them live probably won’t find the whole of the experience replicated here – never having seen them (yet), I can’t say for sure either way – but for an instrumental band who has always shown it’s the music that matters, the music continues to be what matters on Festsaal Kreuzberg.

Although 4 was still months away from being released at the time this show was recorded, more than half the material comes from it in a five/four split with songs from 3. They open with “Drehmoment” from 4, the chugging riff of which builds and crashes with stylistic nuance, opening finally into a groove that’s a fitting launch point for Rotor’s set. One of 4’s overall strengths was its sense of atmosphere that came through even its heaviest moments, and Festsaal Kreuzberg loses some of that sensibility – being comprised of different material presented in a different order, it would have to – but the live energy is a more than fair replacement, and the audience rightly cheers as Rotor dives headfirst into the winding groove of “Hart am Wind,” from 3, which also precedes the title-track from that album. “Hart am Wind” breaks momentarily into a cleverly positioned quiet moment, seeming to come to an almost complete rest – though the bass and guitar are miraculously congruous – before picking back up with its heaviness. The momentum built carries through “3,” which was untitled on the album itself but appeared third on the track listing as it does here, and if there’s one frustrating aspect to Festsaal Kreuzberg, it’s that Rotor affect such a heady vibe that one really has to work to not be completely hypnotized by it. The fuzz bass and drum interplay beneath the guitar solo at the end of “3” is jazzed out in its intricacy, but the overarching groove remains paramount. Easy to miss, in other words, but worth not missing.

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In the latest newsletter for his label Elektrohasch Schallplatten, guitarist/vocalist Stefan Koglek of German heavy psych forerunners Colour Haze — in addition to announcing the new releases from Saturnia and Ararat — gives an update on the progress for his band’s long-awaited new album, She Said. The short version: We’re not there yet. It’s pretty much been a year since the mixing was to begin (10 months at least), and one can’t help but admire the band’s persistence in the face of what must be a frustrating-as-hell series of setbacks.

Here’s the update from Koglek, and here’s looking forward to She Said in 2012:

…Shortly after my October newsletter, after once again working through my old mixing console for another week, sorting ribbon cables, changing ICs, cleaning contacts and stuff, just when everything was finished and I was about to start mixing again, when the mixer sounded as good as never before and the very same day my technician told me “if something is broken, I can come until 10 am, then I’m in holiday for 3 weeks” — my old board had another minor breakdown, nothing big or unusual for an old desk, but all the work of the week before again was for nothing — I was fed up, I didn’t want to invest any more work in a mixer I didn’t want to keep anyway — I quit — and suddenly things came in move fastly so I had the opportunity to buy my dream mixing board brand new for a very good price, of course I had to get a bank loan and of course this is a huge investment which will need further additions next year to really finish everything — but finally setting up the studio basics properly, getting out of the improvised, under-construction state seemed to be the only possibility and starting fresh in a cleared up work surrounding was the only option — so we took a complete break in the production and made the effort to get our studio finally to the basic state where it always was meant to be — buying that new mixer and other needed items, planning, furniture, a new floor, complete rewiring — all a lot of complicated details and thinking, lots of people involved — next week, just before Christmas, we’ll set everything together and we’ll have a new start to finally get out of all the endless troubles and finish the album, hopefully… So please, again: patience : )

Good news today for anyone who’s going to be in London come next Easter. German heavy prog instrumentalists Rotor are the latest band to be added to the lineup of Desertfest 2012, a fraction of which you can see in the banner above. I’ll be having more on the fest as we get closer to next April, leading up to actually covering the thing when the time comes. Can’t friggin’ wait.

Here’ the latest from the Desertfest website:

Desertfest are proud to announce Berlin-based psychedelic, stoner groove beasts Rotor. They are joining the already amazing line up at Desertfest, and we are made up to have these guys back in the UK. They are going to be playing on Friday 6th April.

The second album from Samsara Blues Experiment in as many years, Revelation and Mystery (World in Sound) takes a surprising turn in approach from their Long-Distance Trip debut, distilling the jams of the first record into more structured, song-based material. The tracks of Revelation and Mystery almost exclusively follow verse-chorus-verse patterns, and while part of the joy of listening to a song like “Singata Mystic Queen” from the prior collection was meandering along with it, Samsara Blues Experiment don’t completely lose sight of the journey in favor of the straightforward. Right from its start, Revelation and Mystery sees the four-piece layering guitar effects and infusing their parts with swirls and a spaced-out feel. It’s not that they’ve completely changed their methodology so much as they’ve shifted the balance within their sound. These structural elements were certainly present on Long-Distance Trip, but a cut like the semi-acoustic “Thirsty Moon” shows that Samasara Blues Experiment are able to work within these parameters to grow their songwriting. One gets the sense in listening to opener “Flipside Apocalypse” (which follows a 17-second nameless intro track) that this process is just beginning and that the band are still finding out what they want their sound to be, but that only makes Revelation and Mystery a more immediate, direct experience; the linearity of the album unfolding gradually as the songs move from the straightforward into the more sublimely jammed.

Fast-paced rumbling from the bass of Richard Behrens in the surprisingly punkish beginning of “Flipside Apocalypse” is an immediate clue to the changes the last year have brought about in Samsara Blues Experiment. The mood is more active, less calming and chilled out than last time around, and the guitars of Hans Eiselt and Christian Peters – who also handles vocals – seem to be more concerned with riffing out than stacking layers upon layers, though there’s some of that too, even as later in the song a riff straight out of the biker rock milieu shows up and carries the song through to its end. I don’t know if it’s the result in some change in the band’s songwriting process or just how things happened to come out this time, but the change continues through “Hangin’ on the Wire,” which is genuinely hooky and thoroughly in the realm of heavy rock. A crisp production during the solo section brings to mind some of Queens of the Stone Age’s finer moments, and drummer Thomas Vedder locks in with Behrens’ own excellent fills with a few of his own. Peters, though, emerges at the head of the song. His vocals confident and effected in equal measure, he works quickly to establish the verse and chorus patterns, both worthy of sing-alongs, so that by the end, “Hangin’ on the Wire” feels like its earned its handclaps, and though “Into the Black” starts out more ethereal, with extended solo sections and a long instrumental introduction, the shuffle soon takes hold and it proves to be more boogie than nod.

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German rockers Samsara Blues Experiment impressed with last year’s Long-Distance Trip (review here), and with their demo before that, and live this year as the last band I saw at Roadburn, so it’s not really shocking that their new album, Revelation and Mystery is met with some measure of anticipation. A proven track record that’s held up live goes a long way, and with some of the turns they make sonically on the new full-length, I’m glad to have been looking forward to it.

In a way, I expected the Berlin four-piece to go farther into the improvised-sounding heavy jamming that showed up on some of Long-Distance Trip, but they didn’t, really. If anything, Revelation and Mystery is more straightforward on the whole. Cuts like “Flipside Apocalypse” and the near-burly “Into the Black” have a pointed riffy thrust to them and clear adherence to structure all the way through. The band still jams and offers journeying psychedelia on the closing title-track and the preceding interlude “Zwei Schatten im Schatten,” but even “Outside Insight Blues” is more directed than its eight-minute runtime would lead you to believe.

This makes the album an even more exciting listen. The lineup from Long-Distance Trip has returned — guitarist/vocalist Christian Peters, guitarist Hans Eiselt, bassist Richard Behrens and drummer Thomas Vedder — and their time touring with the likes of Sons of Otis and on stage at festivals like the aforementioned Roadburn and Burg Herzberg has begun to pay off in the confidence with which they approach the surprisingly sunny “Thirsty Moon” and the ultra-memorable “Hangin’ on the Wire,” which is the track I’m lucky enough to be able to premiere on the player below.

I think you’ll find it’s a fitting example of Samsara Blues Experiment‘s heavy rocking side that mixes well with their psych edge. Dig it:

Samsara Blues Experiment‘s Revelation and Mystery is due out Oct. 31 on World in Sound. More info on the release is available at the band’s website and the label’s website. Thanks to Christian Peters for letting me host the track.

If you missed the previous announcement (I did, oddly enough), German heavy psych-outs Samsara Blues Experiment and Canadian über-stoners Sons of Otis are hitting the road together at the start of next month. By now, the former should be in — if not finished with — the recording process for their second album, which as anyone who heard their Long-Distance Trip debut knows, is good news.

In case your day wasn’t “stoner rock” enough, get a load of this:

German heavy psych-outs Samsara Blues Experiment sent over notice that they’re set to begin work on their second album following this year’s hypnotic Long Distance Trip. In addition, they’ll also be at this year’s Roadburn Afterburner and they’ll be touring in March with Sons of Otis. One can only assume massive smoke-laden jams will ensue.

Here’s the news right from the band themselves:

Samsara Blues Experiment will start to record their second album in January 2011. Again there are six tracks to put on tape (okay it’s still a Mac ;-)…). Quite obviously there will be some epic stuff again. People who have met us on our last summer tour through Europe and on this year’s festivals might have an early idea of how the new songs will sound. The blues (in our name) might be given some deeper meaning this one also…

We will tour again in March 2011, this time we will support Sons of Otis on some “well-assorted” shows in Germany and Switzerland. Other gigs are being planned at this very moment and are being updated almost weekly.

Here’s a first bunch of coming shows:

14/01 GER Rostock – Café Momo
04/03 GER Dresden – Groovestation
05/03 GER Halle – Rockstation Hafenstraße *
06/03 GER Berlin – Wild at Heart *
07/03 GER Hamburg – Hafenklang *
08/03 GER Bielefeld – AJZ *
09/03 GER Stuttgart – 1210 *
10/03 SUI Geneva – L´Usine *
11/03 SUI Martigny – Les Caves du Manoir *
12/03 SUI Winterthur – Gaswerk *
09/04 GER Berlin – Burning Earth Festival w/Lonely Kamel, Stonehead and others
17/04 NED Tilburg – Roadburn Festival Afterburner
* w/ Sons of Otis

They’ve been in the business of instrumental stoner prog since 1998, and on their aptly-titled fourth album, 4, the Berlin trio Rotor (which might also be found written as RotoR) show no signs of slowing with age or growing lazy in their songwriting. If anything, 4 (released through Elektrohasch Schallplatten) is their most progressive offering yet, with quickly turning riffs and dynamics that run somewhere between raucous and tight-woven, the band themselves sounding remarkably crisp while forgoing almost entirely the bombast that’s associated these days with terms like “prog” and “stoner.” Though many would argue those words are inherently a contradiction, Rotor have no trouble putting them together to create an album that relies on overarching groove even as it indulges technical prowess.

You can hear it on a track like “Karacho/Heizer,” toward the end as the drums do a timing shift under an angular but still nod-worthy riff. Rotor sound confident in all aspects of their approach, and even in the brash starts and stops of “Derwisch,” on which the bass notably takes the fore, there is a balance to be found in what 4 offers. The band has grown over time to embrace their prog side more and more, but neither do they shy away from driving a riff home, as they do both on “Derwisch” and the less-overtly active later cut “Die Weisse Angst.” Guitarist/vocalist André “An3” Dietrich of countrymen noisemakers Dÿse shows up on the chemically-formulated track “An3R4,” donating one of the two vocal appearances to 4 and adding an aggression to the song that’s both surprising and a little undercutting of what Rotor does otherwise, but that’s an effective change from the rest of the record anyway.

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German psych rockers Samsara Blues Experiment are going to be touring Central Europe with Yawning Man, including a slot at the Stoned from the Underground fest. More info on that at the band’s MySpace, where you can also hear all of their debut full-length, Long-Distance Trip, streaming free of charge (the player is in the “Sounds Like” section — also on Lastfm.com). The above video for “For the Lost Souls” was shot on their US West Coast tour, and it looks like everyone was having a good time.

So that’s nice.

Well, it was a rough week here in the valley. Been sick for pretty much all of it, hits have been down, and I’m generally feeling bitter and out of sorts. A nice conversation with Gozu‘s Marc Gaffney was a well-needed pick-me-up this afternoon, and that interview will be up in a week or two. Beyond that, however, I’m about ready to cover my head with a pillow and move as little as possible for at least the next 24 hours.

That said, I’ll be at Eyehategod tomorrow night in Brooklyn. If you want to catch me, I’ll be the fat guy in sandals dragging around an I.V. loaded with DayQuil. Or maybe just the fat guy in sandals. Hard to tell how these things will pan out. Say hi either way and I promise I’ll do my very best not to be a prick.

If you’re reading, thanks for reading. If not, I hope whatever you’re doing instead is fun too. Enjoy the weekend.

Few bands’ demos struck a chord like Samsara Blues Experiment‘s did in 2008. The lush German four-piece — leader Christan Peters (ex-Terraplane) on vocals, guitar and sundries, Hans Eiselt on guitar, Richard Behrens on bass and recording engineering, and Thomas Vedder on percussive elements — produce a rich jam-based heavy psychedelia that echoes the creative freedom that birthed it. And yet, as we see in the interview with Peters and Behrens below, the process by which the expansive songs come together is nearly as complex and multi-layered as the tracks themselves.

Samsara Blues Experiment‘s recently reviewed full-length, Long Distance Trip, is set for release this year via World in Sound Records. The album contains the two songs that made up the demo, plus an assortment of new adventures just waiting to be discovered. Thanks to Peters and Behrens for the time and clearly-evident thought (and emoticons) they put into their answers for the Q&A, which can be found immediately following the jump. Please enjoy.

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I can?t figure out why none of the myriad stoner indies out there has jumped on Berlin?s heavy psych rockers Samsara Blues Experiment. The German four-piece have recorded their first full-length, Long-Distance Trip, and sent it over for some preview-type listening, and especially coming off the heels of their two-song demo — which itself was nothing to scoff at — it?s got the kind of trance inducing stoner feel that one would think labels would be all over. Tee Pee? MeteorCity? Hell, even Elektrohasch (although that one might even be too obvious)? These guys toured the West Coast of the US on their own dime! Far worse has been signed for far less. Won?t someone give a quality band a home?

The two tracks from the demo, ?Singata Mystic Queen? and ?Double Freedom? show up here, the latter closing the album with a stunning 22-minute sprawl and the former serving as the opening movement. Samsara Blues Experiment, like Los Sounds de Krauts-era Colour Haze before them, are just beginning to explore where they can go with their jams, utilizing both heavy riffing and mellow noodling to establish a flow both within each track and one to the next. Long-Distance Trip?s greatest asset might be its ability to pull listeners in and surround them with its encompassing feel. There?s nothing pretentious in it; these dudes are just having a good time and inviting you to trip out with them.

Long solos, wah guitar, adaptable drumming and sparse, far off vocals permeate the 13-plus minutes of ?Center of the Sun,? but Samsara Blues Experiment have more on offer than extended psych jams and apex builds. Shorter instrumental tracks ?Army of Ignorance? and ?Wheel of Life? serve as a respite from the longer material, spaced throughout Long-Distance Trip as if to provide the listener some breathing room. Both also take a slightly different approach musically, ?Army of Ignorance? beginning with a doomier, darker riff and ?Wheel of Life,? by contrast, offering four and a half minutes of acoustic guitar warmth. These two pieces help establish Samsara Blues Experiment as a band whose breadth is just beginning to show itself. They never take a turn that?s out of place and there isn?t much on Long-Distance Trip that bends the genre or remakes it in its own image, but if that?s a requirement for stoner rock, there?s a lot of acts out there who need to take a second look at what they?re doing.

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Despite both bands playing a modern and often staggeringly heavy form of progressive metal, I?ve always compared Germany?s The Ocean and Chicago?s Yakuza in terms of situation more than style. Basically, the deal is both bands offer parts that are ball-rattlingly heavy and few songs that are actually memorable the whole way through. Likewise, both bands have developed cult followings who would say I?ve got my head up my ass for thinking that. Maybe I do.

Regardless, my pre-listening impression (read: prejudice) of Pelagic/Metal Blade?s reissue of The Ocean?s 2004 full-length debut turned out to be pretty accurate. ?Gee, I bet this?ll sound kind of like The Ocean does now, but less fleshed out and more intense.? Sure enough, anyone who got bored or whose mind wandered during the ambient parts of 2007?s conceptually weighty sleeper hit Precambrian might have an easier time connection to the Fluxion material. It?s still some pretty heady post-metal, but not in the Neuro-Isis sense, and hearing the hunger in the songwriting of guitarist/vocalist/songwriter/percussionist/Pelagic label owner/sampler specialist Robin Staps gives the songs a perceptible immediacy that some of their latter material, while much grander in scope, could never replicate.

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