What a coincidence that Ancestors‘ new album, In Dreams and Time will be out just around when the band heads to Europe for appearances at Desertfest and Roadburn. Man, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear these things were planned out ahead of time. In any case, I’m very much looking forward to hearing how Ancestors follow-up last year’s excellent Invisible White EP (review here), the stylistic divergence of which was both unexpected and gloriously accomplished, particularly on the title-track.

The following PR wire info doesn’t exactly give the answer to that question, but it does add further intrigue in a quote from guitarist Justin Maranga. Check it out:

Los Angeles psychedelic prog-rock band Ancestors will release its new album In Dreams and Time on April 10 via Tee Pee Records. Recorded in east L.A.’s Infrasonic Sound (Queens of the Stone Age, Best Coast, Xasthur), the record showcases the band’s most accomplished music to date and a creative sound that morphs from thunderous cacophony to soul-searching peaks and valleys as towering riffs collide with bleak beauty and deep wells of light and dark.

“In Dreams and Time feels like the culmination of everything we’ve done so far,” says Ancestors guitarist Justin Maranga. “The record incorporates elements of everything that we’ve come to feel that Ancestors is, as well as new things that we’ve never tried. We’re hoping that it will tie together fans of our previous albums Neptune with Fire, Of Sound Mind and Invisible White who may or may not have connected one release or the other, while hopefully helping us reach a new audience. We’re excited about it.”

The track listing for Ancestors’ In Dreams and Time is as follows:
1. Whispers
2. The Last Return
3. Corryvreckan
4. On the Wind
5. Running in Circles
6. First Light

Ancestors have also announced the addition of new drummer Daniel Pouliot (Horse the Band, ex-Bleeding Kansas) to its ranks and have been confirmed for both the 2012 Desertfest and the 2012 Roadburn Festival, where the band will share the stage with Killing Joke, Michael Gira, Chelsea Wolfe and more.

As one might expect, Los Angeles rockers Caveman Voicebox don’t exactly play it subtle on their debut EP, Strippers, Mullets and Beer. Released through what appears to be their own Faceslapper Records in December 2011, the five-songer is a quick 15-minutes, and though there are few surprises sonically in that time – the longest song, the closer “Mindset,” caps at 3:20 – and though the first word on opener “Forsaken Place” is “whiskey,” Caveman Voicebox still are less sleazy than one might think going into a first listen. That’s either a positive or negative, depending on your personal taste, but with the Orange Goblin by way of Motörhead burl they offer instead, it’s hard to complain. The songs, written by bassist/vocalist Graham Wilson, are structurally simple but varied in mood and over fast enough to hold even fickle attention, and the vocals touch on melody without overdoing it or sacrificing a natural feel to get some kind of misguided commercialism. A song like EP centerpiece “After What She Said” strikes a decent balance between catchy hooks and riffy groove, and as far as straightforward American-style heavy rock goes, Caveman Voicebox give a strong first showing, if one perhaps overly mindful of the aesthetic concerns of their genre.

By that I mean that even unto its title, Strippers, Mullets and Beer seems to be reaching for a specific idea of what boozy stoner-style rock and roll is, rather than focusing itself on crafting the songs and worrying about where they fit genre-wise after the fact. The beer I’ll give you, but the strippers and the mullets? Well, maybe, maybe not. In that regard, “Mindset” is actually the strongest of the songs here. Although it doesn’t come close to the infectious octane of “Forsaken Place,” Wilson positions the EP’s final statement lyrically as a kind of insider nod to the heavy rock scene – “You’ve got the time and the money/Ain’t got the mindset” – and placed with self-awareness in a genre looking out, it works better than “’72 Nova,” which seems to turn a blind eye to its unoriginality rather than acknowledge it. We all know it’s not the first song ever written about a car and a girl, and where “Mindset” offers some personality on the part of Caveman Voicebox by saying in effect, “we know exactly what we’re doing and it’s all on purpose,” the earlier cut wants to pretend that’s not the case. It’s a kind of anti-pretense pretense, and it’s only not more of an issue than it is because of the strength of Wilson’s songwriting. Joining Alfred Cruz and Mike McKnight’s guitars is a bluesy slide guest spot from Eric Dover (Slash’s Snakepit) that adds character to the already barn-burning energy, and though the Doug Carrion (Descendants) production doesn’t quite beef up the guitars as one might think, the added feeling of rawness winds up an asset working in the band’s favor.

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I thought to honor the gorgeousness of the recently-unveiled packaging of the Wino/Conny Ochs collaboration — click the photo below to make it massive — we’d do some acoustic stuff this week. The clip at the bottom of this post of the Weinrich-original “I Don’t Care” and the Townes Van Zandt cover “Nothin’” was filmed at the Volcom (you might know them as the people who released the Premonition 13 album) store in Los Angeles way back in January.

This was just a couple weeks before Wino hit the road alongside Shrinebuilder bandmate Scott Kelly on an acoustic tour in support of Adrift and a split 7″ single between them, but I’d hardly call the performance rough. He nails the restless angst of “I Don’t Care” and manages to elicit whoops and yells from the crowd during “Nothin’” in the solo at the end. The energy is there, is what I’m trying to say.

And given the odd setting near a shirt rack and the clarity of sound and video for this clip, it was an easy choice. Enjoy “I Don’t Care” and “Nothin’” and the rest of your Wino Wednesday:

Aaron Edge has been in more bands than you and I can count — even if we use all our fingers together. One of those bands was Roareth, who just so happened to be the first band I ever released on The Maple Forum. Their Acts I-VI, which was excellent, is long gone, and so is the band, because that’s how it goes. Aaron‘s post-Roareth project, Swallowing Swords, is also already defunct.

But time marches on, and as Ozzy once taught us, the wicked find no rest. Relocated from Seattle to Los Angeles, Aaron Edge now resurfaces with Peril on the Sea, the latest in the long line. They’ve got a page on Thee Facebooks with a few songs of ass-kicking, undulating nautical doom. Well worth a look.

In the meantime, here’s the announcement Aaron sent over:

Aaron Edge (of 2 Men Dead, Brothers of the Sonic Cloth, Eshas, Genuine, Grievous, Harkonen, Hauler, Hellephant, Himsa, Iamthethorn, Les Gants, Requin, Roareth, Rote Hexe, Swallowing Swords, Swearengen, The Horde, Tsuga, West of Zero, etc.) has been writing and recording three EPs’-worth of heavy songs over the last two years, and the first has finally reached the light of day. All five tracks from the first EP, entitled Voyage, the First, have been uploaded to the Facebook page.

Check it all out, download all five songs for free…

If you like what you hear, please share the page/songs with others.

It’s not the greatest band name in the world. You might go so far to say it’s el terri-blay, but heavy rocking trio Free Range Humanz have bigger things on their mind than coming up with a catchy moniker, and whatever they go by, there’s probably a decent contingent of people who are going to call them “that new band with Ruben Romano in it” anyway.

Romano, of course, is the former drummer from Fu Manchu and Nebula. In Free Range Humanz, he’s joined by bassist Kenny Cunningham and guitarist Kurt Van Lifeson — who’s also credited with vocals, although in listening through the cuts on the band’s ReverbNation page, I’ve yet to hear any singing. Maybe they’re hedging their bets for later on. Smart play.

What’s already in the Free Range Humanz tracks is no small amount of Californian-style riffy groove. Cunningham donates choice fills to “Anchor” and “A Passage” as Van Lifeson‘s guitar leads the way through a slew of jams. They sidestep the rehearsal-room feel in this initial batch of tracks for the acoustic piano cut “The Dream” and a few others (there’s some dance music on there too; things get weird toward the end of the playlist). It’s a surprise given the lighthearted feel of the rest of the material, but it’s pretty clear all the way through that Free Range Humanz are still pretty nascent and exploring their sound.

For where that might lead them as much as for their pedigree, they’re definitely worth keeping on the radar. You can check them out on Thee Facebooks here or at ReverbNation, from whence these songs were snagged:

They are among the upper echelon of today’s heavy live acts, but that has turned out to be the undoing of each successive full-length from near-nomadic Los Angeles duo Black Cobra: The inability to stand up to the high standard set by the live show. And since Black Cobra have also spent a goodly portion of the last six years on the road, there has been less need to focus on the records, because, hell, those songs are going to be better live anyway. With Invernal, their fourth LP — second for Southern Lord behind 2009’s Chronomega – Black Cobra reach new heights of recorded intensity. A song like “Erebus Dawn” sees guitarist/vocalist Jason Landrian and drummer Rafael Martinez in complete mastery of their complex and tonally thickened thrash. Invernal is the kind of album for which hyperbolic exclamations of the word “insane” were made. It refines chaos into a laser-accurate attack and puts Black Cobra at the forefront of their class of risen riffers. It makes the last High on Fire album seem tired. I’m pretty sure if you asked it, it would bake you a pie. But even with all the über-effective bombast, tonal righteousness and clear growth from Chronomega and anything else that’s preceded in their discography, I’m not sure if Invernal stands up to what Black Cobra do live.

The difference between Invernal and everything else Black Cobra have done – and it’s a big difference – is I’m not sure it’s trying to. More than anything they’re released to date, Invernal finds Landrian and Martinez a mature studio act. They’re not just trying to compress their live show to disc, they’re making an album, and ultimately, that’s a huge part of what makes Invernal succeed as one of the best releases in 2011. The recording job of Converge’s Kurt Ballou does effectively balance their overwhelming crest with an appropriate amount of clarity (not too clean, but clean enough to appreciate), but even more than that, the principle change seems to have been in the overall goal and mindset of the recording. One can appreciate the album on its own terms and then look forward to the experience of witnessing the material live. There’s less pining involved, and I think that has to be thanks in part to the songs themselves. My chief complaint with Black Cobra from a songwriting standpoint has always been that the material doesn’t stand up to the experience of it – that is, you hear a Black Cobra song, feel like you’ve been punched in the face with awesome, and don’t remember a thing afterwards. Invernal changes that as well, with twists and turns and a genuine progression from track to track, beginning with opener “Avalanche,” on which Landrian approaches an Al Jourgensen-style verse vocal with both confidence and a sense of individuality.

His vocal shift – there are plenty of screams on “Avalanche” and elsewhere, so it’s not like he’s gone completely clean – is a natural progression from the last album and rightfully prominent where it needs to be in Ballou’s mix. The focus remains on the overall effect of the music, and Landrian’s chemistry with Martinez is palpable in how they interact on guitar and drums. As “Avalanche” transitions immediately into “Somnae Tenebrae” – the shortest song but for closer “Obliteration” – the band’s added focus on structure is made apparent: They wanted to start off pummeling, and their opening salvo does precisely that. “Somnae Tenebrae” isn’t Invernal’s most memorable track, but it does successfully convey Black Cobra’s “holy shit that’s heavy” live presence and offer some thrashing groove in its latter half. When it crashes, it gives a couple seconds for listeners to catch their breath, which is the perfect way to set up album highlight, “Corrosion Fields.” The interplay between the tracks feels more thought out than ever, if that hasn’t yet been made clear, but when “Corrosion Fields” kicks in following some sparse playing from Landrian and periodic crashes from Martinez, the focus is less on stepping back and examining the moves Black Cobra are making and more on “How do I make this as loud as possible as quickly as possible?”

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That Totimoshi guitarist/vocalist Anthony Aguilar was on the road when we spoke was no big surprise. The principal songwriter behind the Los Angeles (by way of Oakland) outfit’s six albums spends most of his time touring, whether it’s with his own band, or as guitar tech for the Melvins or tour manager for Neurosis, Shrinebuilder or Sleep. Many of the skeletal parts of the latest Totimoshi outing, Avenger, were written in transit — and maybe that’s behind some of the energy the songs just can’t seem to shake.

Avenger (review here) marks Totimoshi‘s first studio outing since departing from Volcom Entertainment, the imprint on which their last two installments — 2006′s Ladrón and 2008′s Milagrosa — were released, and while the 10 tracks continue the complex melodic development that songs from those records like “Dance of Snakes” and “Gnat” first began to demonstrate, there is an undeniable noise rock crunch in Aguilar‘s guitar as well that comes across right from the bluesy swagger of “Mainline” down through the grandiose epic “Waning Divine,” which features guest appearances from Mastodon‘s Brent Hinds and Scott Kelly of Neurosis. It’s a sound fit for the oft-groundbreaking At a Loss Recordings.

The drummer for the Melvins, Dale Crover, also shows up in the intro and elsewhere, but Avenger is much more than Totimoshi showing off the fact that they have cool friends. The chemistry between Aguilar and bassist/vocalist Meg Castellanos is pivotal to the album’s success, as is the input of drummer/vocalist Chris Fugitt, whose versatility in no small part allows the band to roam in the varied and genre-defying directions they do on a cut like “Rose,” which is just as exciting for its melodic apex as for its stylized heaviness. Having also been fortunate enough to see Totimoshi live supporting Avenger, and earlier in the band’s career, it’s apparent that they’ve hit new levels of creativity, confidence and mastery of their craft.

Totimoshi are, and always have been, beholden to themselves. That comes across as important to Aguilar in the following interview, and that he takes the time to consider his band’s place in the overall sphere is no great surprise considering the effort that goes into actually making the songs. In our phone conversation, he discussed the touring lifestyle, the tribulations surrounding the 2002 album, Monoli, working with Melvins producer Toshi Kasai on Avenger instead of Helmet‘s Page Hamilton (who helmed Ladrón and Milagrosa), the differences between headlining a tour and playing in a support slot, potential future directions, and much more.

Please find the complete Q&A after the jump, and enjoy.

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A much-needed dinner with The Patient Mrs. meant getting to the Saint Vitus bar after both Fashion Week and Bezoar played, which left Pigs and Totimoshi still to come on the bill for my second night in Brooklyn. This time, I rolled into the place like an expert, my awkwardly large camera bag on my shoulder, and set up shop at the bar for a homebrew before Pigs went on.

My positive first impressions the night before were confirmed when the bartender, instead of pretending to have never seen me before after a moment of recognition (as is the custom in the city), asked me, “Weren’t you here last night?” I said I was and a pleasant conversation ensued. Imagine human interaction. Very cool.

When Pigs got going, I made my way past Totimoshi‘s merch — in my mind saying, “I don’t need to buy the record right now,” as if it wasn’t inevitable — through the curtain and into the back room to watch their set. The trio is made up of guitarist/vocalist Dave Curran (Unsane, Players Club), drummer Jim Paradise (Players Club) and bassist/vocalist Andrew Schneider (Slughog, also producer for The Brought Low and countless others in and around NYC and beyond); all three Brooklyn locals. The sound was probably what you’d expect if you ever heard Players Club, resting on the spectrum between that band’s riffier, somewhat melodic take and Unsane‘s flat-out noise aggression.

They’ve been around for a bit, but it was my first time seeing them (quite a weekend of firsts I had), and I was eager to do so. The occasional interplay between Curran and Schneider on vocals did a lot to offset the visceral screams from the former alone, and Paradise proved to be yet third in the line of excellent drummers I saw this weekend at Saint Vitus — I’d soon add Chris Fugitt from Totimoshi to complete the list — and though the changes in approach between the songs were subtle, I got a sense of them just from hearing the songs live once through, which makes me suspect the material comes across even more diverse on record. As all three members of Pigs (plus Unsane‘s Chris Spencer, who was also at the show) are behind Coextinction Recordings, the avenue for hearing recorded versions seems obvious.

Last time I saw Totimoshi was circa 2008 at the now-kaput basement Club Midway in Manhattan. Like Pearls and Brass the night before, they’re a band I’ve been a fan of for years on top of years who’ve been largely underappreciated by those outside a limited critical circle. Unlike Pearls and Brass, though, Totimoshi never stopped. I did wind up buying a copy of Avenger, the new album, before they went on, and regretted it not for one moment after their set got going, as it’s where most of what they played was taken from.

Set-wise, they went no further back than 2006′s Ladrón — “Viva Zapata” and “The Dance of Snakes” were highlights — and of the newer cuts, “Mainline” proved the most immediately recognizable. As a special surprise, they included a cover of the Hendrix classic “Are You Experienced?” that set the song’s original swagger against Totimoshi‘s desert-inflected tonality. Guitarist/vocalist Anthony “Tonymoshi” Aguilar (no one calls him that that I know of, but being a fan of portmanteau, I’m trying to start the trend) convincingly delivered both the lines and blissed out leads of that song and of Avenger closer “Waning Divine,” cutting the song somewhat short at the end, but still giving enough of an impression for the crowd to get a sense of what Mastodon‘s Brent Hinds contributes to the album.

Bassist Meg Castellanos and aforementioned drummer Fugitt both contributed vocals to “The Fool” — the latter through a headset microphone that made him look a little bit like a motivational speaker — which proved even catchier in person than on disc. The body of Castellanos‘ Rickenbacker was roughly the size of her own torso, but she wielded it expertly nonetheless, her tone melding with Aguilar‘s own and her stage presence complementing his sometimes frenetic or spastic energy with a kind of subdued confidence as the trio plowed through the instrumental “Calling all Curs.”

For his part, Fugitt looked like a consummate professional. The drumming gloves might have helped, but in watching him play (and as I say, I’d already had a dose of killer drumming to compare), it’s not that he lacked conviction, but that he looked like you could have put any style of music in front of him and he’d have been able to play it just as well. I don’t know his history in terms of projects he’s been involved in, but it wouldn’t surprise me at all if he’s done session work. His style was creative and his playing so solid that it seemed like he’d have no trouble sitting down with anyone’s song, know it front to back in five minutes and play it with the abandon of a kid in the garage who thinks no one’s around.

As the third in the three-piece with founders Aguilar and Castellanos, he was more than good company to keep. Totimoshi‘s set seemed short (they cut the title track from Ladrón from their written setlist), but was wholly satisfying anyway, and for the second night in a row, I felt happy to have made the trip into Brooklyn. I don’t know when I’ll get back to Saint Vitus — I was a little tempted to show up on Sunday, just for the hell of it — but whenever it is, I’ll be glad to be there.

A couple extra Totimoshi pics after the jump.

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As they approach 15 years of existence in 2012, hard-touring Los Angeles trio Totimoshi return to the heavy crunch of their earlier albums on their sixth full-length, Avenger. 2008’s Milagrosa – produced by Helmet’s Page Hamilton and Toshi Kasai (the Melvins, Shrinebuilder) and released on Volcom – found Totimoshi heading in a more melodic direction, and while Avenger, which is out on forward-thinking underground imprint At a Loss Recordings, keeps some of that complexity, guitarist/vocalist Tony Aguilar’s tone is beefier and the three extra years of road-time he and bassist/backing vocalist Meg Castellanos have put in with drummer Chris Fugitt (who debuted with the band on Milagrosa) shows in the fluidity of their arrangements. Much of Avenger, which was produced by Kasai alone, traffics in the thoughtful and rhythmic melancholy for which Totimoshi have become most known, but the band are adventurous as ever as well, pushing forward into more open-toned sprawl here and there and going as far as to include guest appearances from Dale Crover (the Melvins, Shrinebuilder), Brent Hinds (Mastodon), and Scott Kelly (Neurosis).

The latter two show up on the stylistically out-there closer “Waning Divine,” which is Totimoshi’s most experimental excursion to date, trading in the comparatively straightforward and almost punk-ish drive of earlier cuts like the opening title-track (which follows a brief intro) or its chorus-centric follow up, “The Foot,” for a solid six-and-a-half-minute build capped by a solo from Hinds that’s well placed as the payoff for the whole of Avenger. All told, the record is just 42 minutes, but in that time, Totimoshi manage to work in a variety of moods. The aforementioned “Avenger” is about as pure as Melvins-worship can get (the two bands have toured together extensively over the years, and Aguilar techs for Buzz Osborne, so it’s an influence they come by honestly), and as Aguilar delivers the lines, “I have punch/I have kick/I will slash and wear your skin/I will teach you not to look at me” and threatens a feast of hemlock tea and strychnine meat in his characteristic snarl, the aggression is well met by his guitar work, Castellanos’ bass and Fugitt’s drumming. Immediately, Avenger presents the intensity of Totimoshi at their best – which is perhaps the element most absent from Milagrosa and the source of any comparison to the band’s older material – and from there, the band is able to capitalize on that momentum however they see fit.

Over the years, Aguilar has managed to turn his aforementioned snarl into a bona fide melodic approach, and one of the most effective aspects of Avenger is the balance it strikes between songwriting and its wheels-about-to-come-off feel. Fugitt is most at home in that element of Totimoshi’s sound – his fills on “The Fool” feel as though they could completely undo the song at any moment, but he’s never out of control. That song also shows the band’s grown capacity for melody and structure both in and out of its layered chorus, which sets up the punkish cabaret stomp of “Mainline” all the more effectively. Commencing with Avenger’s dirtiest riff and drunken bluesy sway, it moves into a solo to match, but then Fugitt steps it up on the drums and the half-minute delivers the title line with handclaps and one of Avenger’s most memorable flashes. “Calling all Curs” begins with Castellanos’ considerably-toned lead in and jams out a solid riff as the album’s only instrumental, but in the context of the record as a whole, it’s hard to see it as more than a cool groove and a stepping stone to side A closer “Rose.”

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Making their case in potent hooks and thickened newer-school riffing, Los Angeles trio Moab debut with Ab Ovo, a self-recorded full-length released via the ever-chic Kemado Records. The title, translated from the Latin, means “from the beginning,” and it’s appropriate enough for both Moab‘s first outing and the band’s approach to heavy rock, which takes what’s commonly thought of as the rudimentary basis of the genre and shapes it into a surprisingly individual form.

From the start of “So On,” which opens the record, Moab has a bizarre kind of cinematic feel to their songwriting. Guitarist/vocalist Andrew Giacumakis keeps mostly to a high register in his singing without veering into metallic silliness, and as Ab Ovo runs its course, his methods increasingly create their own context. The foundation of Moab‘s style — heavy riffs, hard-landing rhythms — is familiar enough throughout the ultra-Sabbathian verses of “Dimensioner,” but stylistic miles are traveled by the time “Lugh”‘s seafaring crunch or the bombast of “Fembot” take hold.

You could sit for days and trace the roots of the grooving swagger behind “Sated” or the unrepentantly wretched “More Love,” but Giacumakis — also Moab‘s principle songwriter and joined in the band by drummer Erik Herzog and bassist Casey Barclay — has Ab Ovo set with a definite progression in mind, and honestly, it’s more fun to follow it than analyze the footprints it leaves behind.

Giacumakis and Herzog are both former members of late-’90s indie outfit Buellton, and in the interview that follows, the guitarist explains his shift to a heavier aesthetic and discusses the recording and studio-building process that went into making Ab Ovo, what he learned about engineering from Matthias Schneeberger (who helmed Moab‘s demo, from which the cowbell-centric track “Dimensioner” is taken), the way the album crash lands into the two-part beast “Staring Wall,” and much more. Basically I thought the record was cool and figured a feature would be a good way to introduce people to the band.

Full Q&A is after the jump. Hope you dig it:

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Avenger, due out Aug. 16 on the influential At a Loss Recordings, is the sixth studio album by Totimoshi. Produced by Toshi Kasai (Melvins, Shrinebuilder), it follows in line with the Los Angeles trio’s recent excursions — 2008′s Milagrosa and 2006′s Ladrón — in expanding their already considerable melodic reach, but at the same time, harkens back to the rawer, heavier guitar-driven feel of their earlier work on 2003′s ¿Mysterioso?, 2002′s Monoli and the formative 1999 self-titled. It’s a shift many longtime followers (myself included) will welcome.

Years of persistent touring with the likes of the Melvins and Helmet has tightened the chemistry between founding guitarist/vocalist Tony Aguilar and bassist Meg Castellanos – drummer Chris Fugitt came aboard in 2008 — and Avenger boasts both an individualized tonality and a distinctive crunch as a result. There are times where Totimoshi drive a riff so hard it’s like they’re trying to bury it, and they complement that ethic with a certain social awareness in their lyrics, adding contemplative heft to the fervor.

Totimoshi are long-underrated, and one hopes that with Avenger, they begin to get their due for the hard work they’ve put in. The album boasts guest appearances by Dale Crover (Melvins), Scott Kelly (Neurosis) and Brent Hinds (Mastodon), and should have no trouble winning favor from fans of those players. I was lucky enough to get permission to stream epically psychedelic Avenger closer “Waning Divine,” which features Kelly and Hinds both. You can check it out on the player below, followed by the dates for Totimoshi‘s upcoming North American run. Please enjoy:

Totimoshi North American tour dates:
08/04 Scottsdale, AZ Chaser’s w/ Greenhaven
08/05 Santa Fe, NM The Due Return
08/06 Denver, CO 3 Kings Tavern w/Ume, Self Service
08/07 Lincoln, NE Duffy’s
08/08 Dubuque, IA Off Minor
08/09 Milwaukee, WI Garibalid’s w/ Sleestak, Like Like the Death Deaths
08/10 Madison, WI The Frequency
08/11 Chicago, IL Ultra Lounge
08/12 Lansing, MI Mac’s Bar
08/13 Kent, OH Stone Tavern w/Rebreather, The Unclean
08/14 Toronto, ON Hard Luck
08/15 Montreal, QC TBA
08/16 Milford, CT Daniel St
08/17 Cambridge, MA O’Brien’s
08/19 Providence, RI TBA
08/20 Brooklyn, NY Saint Vitus
08/21 Baltimore, MD Golden West
08/22 Richmond, VA Strange Matter
08/26 Charlotte, NC Milestone w / Music Hates You
08/27 Atlanta, GA Drunken Unicorn w/ Zoroaster
08/28 Memphis, TN HiTone Cafe
08/29 New Orleans, LA Siberia
08/30 Houston, TX The Mink
08/31 Austin, TX Scoot Inn w/Vaz, Pygmie Shrews
09/01 San Antonio, TX Korova Basement
09/03 Tucson, AZ Vaudeville

There is nothing in the climate of their native Los Angeles that should have Ancestors so sad, but something definitely did the job. On their latest offering, the EP, Invisible White (Tee Pee Records), the five-piece run through three tracks in just over 29 minutes and present atmospheres as gray and melancholic as their artwork would indicate. As on their prior full-length, Of Sound Mind, the interplay of Justin Maranga’s guitar and Jason Watkins’ organ is essential to the sound, but where Ancestors has made a turn since their 2009 outing – and certainly since 2008’s more straightforwardly riffian debut, Neptune with Fire – is in where the progressions lead. Invisible White has more in common with Crippled Black Phoenix or Blood and Time than Sleep, and where the EP most succeeds is in the band’s making “Invisible White,” “Dust” and “Epilogue” grounded and memorable, based on structures that allow the rhythm section of bassist Nick Long and drummer Brandon Pierce to give solidity to Maranga’s, Watkins’ and Moog-er Matt Barks’ explorations.

This is especially true on “Epilogue,” which closes and – somehow fittingly – is nearly as long as “Invisible White” and “Dust” combined. Everyone in Ancestors contributes vocals but Pierce, and on Invisible White, the singing is at its most accomplished yet. Maranga is in the lead spot, but backed and harmonized with skillfully by Long, Watkins and Barks, and though his tonality and phrasing has an underlying element of the heavy stonerisms on which Ancestors cut their teeth, they sound like a completely different band than they did three years ago. It’s hard to get a sense through listening whether Invisible White is a declaration of future intent or a kind of touristic dabbling in influences outside the towering distortion that Of Sound Mind was beginning to pull away from.

Even in the context of the last album, it’s a jump from the heavy parts of “Bounty of Age” to the acoustic-led “Invisible White” or “Dust,” which is even more subdued, but Ancestors do it well, and after defying expectation with their second release – they probably could have put out six more albums that sounded just like Neptune with Fire and kept a solid fanbase – they once again surprise in how cohesive they sound in their progression. The word “visionary” sounds hyperbolic in a way I don’t mean it to be, but it’s clear Maranga and company came into Invisible White with some idea of the mood they wanted to set and how they wanted to do it.

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Ancestors kick ass, and I have yet to hear anything in their catalog to change my mind. The announcement just came in that the L.A. band will be issuing a new EP in June called Invisible White that will mark the recorded debut of Moog/synth specialist Matt Barks. The release is something of a surprise, but I can’t wait to hear what they’ve come up with this time around. Good band.

While I go break out my copy of Of Sound Mind, here’s this from the PR wire:

Los Angeles-based psychedelic rock quintet Ancestors will release an EP of all new music titled Invisible White on June 21 via Tee Pee Records. The follow up to the group’s sophomore album Of Sound Mind, Invisible White marks the debut of new member Matt Barks on Moog / modular synthesizers and charts a new course for the band’s progressive, colorful sound.

“This record showcases another side of the band,” comments Ancestors guitarist Justin Maranga. “It’s a project that we’ve been talking about doing for a long time and with the addition of Matt to the lineup, we knew it would be a while before we were able to get the next full-length out, so we decided that now was a good time to do this. We went into the studio with rough acoustic skeletons of the songs written and essentially let the songs chart their own course. It was a really different approach for us, as we normally go into the studio knowing exactly what is going to happen.”

Invisible White was recorded at Los Angeles‘ Bright Street Recorders (Lykee Li, Sia, Grant Lee Phillips) on a 20-channel mixing desk formerly owned by James Brown. The songs on the EP feature a hybrid of orchestral and electronic instruments and assume an almost cinematic, film score feel augmented by guest musicians playing violin and vibraphone. Simultaneously playing to the strengths of psychedelia, prog and even rhythm and blues, the music retains Ancestors’ exploratory approach and adds a hauntingly emotional impact, pushing the band’s sound into interstellar overdrive.

Ancestors, Invisible White track listing:
1. Invisible White (7:22)
2. Dust (7:40)
3. Epilogue (14:07)

Without a doubt, they’re the most pivotal doom band of all time who aren’t also Black Sabbath, but until recently, Saint Vitus wasn’t any kind of household name, even among metallers. Their sound has literally taken a generation to become properly appreciated, and with a whole league of bands out there playing a traditional doom style based in no small part on trying to emulate them, not to mention their ongoing reunion and resurgence, Saint Vitus are finally getting the recognition they’ve long deserved. They’re bigger in 2011 than they’ve ever been.

The band formed as Tyrant in 1978, with Dave Chandler on guitar, Mark Adams on bass, Armando Acosta on drums and Scott Reagers singing. That would be the lineup as well when, after a name change, Saint Vitus issued their self-titled debut on Greg Ginn of Black Flag‘s SST Records in 1984. That lineup also recorded 1985′s Hallow’s Victim (just recently officially released on CD for the first time) and the same year’s The Walking Dead EP, but by 1986′s Born too Late, Reagers was out of the picture and replaced by The Obsessed‘s Scott “Wino” Weinrich.

Weinrich would record a total of three studio LPs with Saint Vitus — Born too Late, 1988′s Mournful Cries and 1990′s V — as well as the Thirsty and Miserable EP. Vitus put out C.O.D. with Christian Lindersson (later of Count Raven) on vocals in 1992 and reunited with Reagers for their final album before splitting up, 1995′s Die Healing, both on Hellhound Records.

2003 and 2009 brought reunions of the Weinrich-fronted lineup, and the latter seems to have stuck, despite the untimely 2010 death of Acosta, who’d already been replaced in the band by Henry Vasquez (Blood of the Sun) due to his failing health. With confirmation of a new studio album in the works and a high-profile slot on 2011′s Metalliance Tour, there’s no doubt that a lot of listeners are going to be exposed to Saint Vitus for the first time, either because they were too young to catch them originally or just missed out. Either way, we get the age-old question of where to start.

The debate has always been between Saint Vitus, the first album, and Born too Late, the first album with Wino, and rightfully so. Had Vitus released nothing but these two records in the course of their career, maybe they wouldn’t be heralded as the gods they are now, but they still would have been able to have a sizable impact on underground metal. Both albums are absolute classics in doom, and close to if not as essential for understanding what the essence of the genre is as Black Sabbath‘s Master of Reality or Volume 4, and that’s not a comparison lightly made.

So the scenario is this: You’re standing in front of the Saint Vitus section at your favorite record store (they still have those, right?), and you only have enough cash for one. You can’t decide. Sweat is pouring down your forehead. Oh, if only this place took credit cards! You need to choose. But which? Which will you get, Saint Vitus or Born too Late?

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If it wasn’t enough that it was The Patient Mrs.‘ birthday and I still got to go to the show, I knew walking into The Mercury Lounge that it was going to be a good night because the dude at the door said, “Hey man, I dig your beard.” Had it been anyone else playing that night, I might have just cut my losses and gone home right then, opened up my diary (or WordPress) and written, “Today was a good day.” Instead I celebrated with an $8 Sierra Nevada.

I figured out the last time I was at the Mercury Lounge was a couple years back to see Dax Riggs, and though I expected my skin to be burned off in hipster hell, it wasn’t actually that bad. Well, maybe it was, but the last acoustic show I went to was Six Organs of Admittance, and the volume of that crowd was so loud it was offensive, and that definitely wasn’t the case here. I don’t care how ironic your flannel is so long as you’re there for the music and you’re not a dick about it.

Opening the show was Hunter Hunt-Hendrix of black metallers Liturgy doing a solo performance that turned out to be him, a looper, some vocal effects, and nothing else. His voice mimicked strings and he set up elaborate choruses of himself over the course of a couple separate pieces. It was brave, but probably not something that should be done for more than 10 minutes at a stretch, as after that the “What the hell am I doing here?” impulse kicked in and I went to the bar out front for another drink and to wait for Man’s Gin. People were in and out from the back room and I could hear just fine in case he, you know, took out a guitar or something. Nope. Semi-melodic moaning all the way.

The plan for the night was Man’s Gin, then Wino, then Scott Kelly, then Wino and Scott Kelly together, and it was a good plan by me. I dug Man’s Gin‘s Smiling Dogs record and was psyched to see the Erik Wunder-fronted outfit in their full-band incarnation after when I last caught them at Lit Lounge and it was just Wunder and standup-bassist Josh Lozano with percussion behind. Fade Kainer (Inswarm, Batillus) handled drums and Scott Edward guitar, and they were loose, but sounded good all the same.

They got a mixed reaction from the crowd, but it seemed more positive than ambivalent, which translates to triumph in Manhattan. Everyone in attendance who was conscious of their surroundings during the grunge era probably had a better idea of what they were going for than those who weren’t, whatever that says. Highlight of the set was the Neurosis-style drum jam at the end and “Doggamn.” Still waiting for them to do “The Ballad of Jimmy Sturgis” live.

It was a party when Wino took the stage, and that spirit continued through his set, numerous whoops and hollers coming from the crowd. Wino, up there by himself with just an acoustic guitar, couldn’t help but rip into a fuzzed-out solo about halfway in, but aside from playing them a bit faster (as he acknowledged he had a tendency to do in our interview), he was loyal to the versions of the songs that appear on his Adrift album. The split 7″ single he shares with Scott Kelly was mentioned as being for sale for just $5 — end of tour blowout price — and it seemed only proper to pick one up.

He covered Townes Van Zandt, as would Kelly when he took the stage later, but the highlight of Wino‘s set was probably “I Don’t Care,” which he prefaced with a story about being 15 and getting locked up in a Maryland juvenile detention center and writing the song then. It was one of my least favorite tracks on Adrift, but the performance live and the context made it a high point of the evening. I actually saw people dance. It happened.

The thing about Wino is that, even if he’s doing something else (i.e. playing acoustic), he’s a classic rock songwriter, and he can’t help but rock out. He brought the crowd along with him for the trip, and when Scott Kelly took the stage later, it was clear that, despite their apparent friendship and cohabitation in the supergroup Shrinebuilder, they’re two very different performers.

Scott Kelly plays s-l-o-w. He’s really, really good at it. The room — apart from one dude who decided it would be a good idea to accompany Kelly‘s guitar by banging on a cinderblock and eventually brought the show to a screeching halt — was dead quiet. So much so that Kelly remarked approvingly on it more than once (we did good!) as he went through his set of morose, low-key but still highly emotive songs. He covered his half of the split with Wino, taking three tries to get through the song because of the aforementioned cinderblock jackass, and by the time his version of “Tecumseh Valley” was done, my arrived-at conclusion of the evening became, “Well, I guess it’s time to buy a Townes Van Zandt record.” He made a pretty convincing argument.

I had been hoping for “Remember Me,” which originally appeared on Blood and Time‘s At the Foot of the Garden before Kelly re-recorded it for his last solo album, the brilliant The Wake. That was a no dice, but the new Shrinebuilder song Kelly brought Wino on stage to play, and the jam that ensued from there, was more than enough to make up for anything lacking. The crowd had thinned some by the time they were done, but not much, and those who were there were entranced by what they were watching. Wino took leads (higher in the mix, or maybe it was where I was standing) while Kelly played rhythms, and each guitarist seemed to enjoy most of all the chance to be on stage with the other. It was something I was glad to have witnessed when it was over.

Something I was less glad about was having lost the ticket from coatcheck. Whoops. It really is a wonder I’m not divorced by now. The Patient Mrs. and I stood, describing the contents of her coat pockets to the heavy-sighs of the girl at the rack, and eventually, we got her jacket and left. I don’t know if it was her best birthday ever, and I don’t know if it’s the only time I’m ever going to get to see Wino and Scott Kelly perform together in this fashion (they looked to be having a good enough time that I wouldn’t be surprised if they did it again at some point), but man, if ever there was a time I was happy to be in New York on a Saturday night, this was it.