With four years having passed since the release of the monstrous Black Mass, there's a few landmarks to clear up before we gleefully delve into their disturbingly-titled eighth studio effort, Time To Die. This marks their first release on the excellent Spinefarm record label after a lifetime spent building a presence on Rise Above, and with a running time of 65 minutes it's also their longest to date. Otherwise, it appears to be business as usual.

Still, despite all these firsts, it appears to be business as usual. There is still layer upon layer of dense sludge, wall to wall reverb, and that bruising, blackened tone they carry so well. Their standard thematic barracking still rises to the fore and their repeating riffs are jammed into oblivion. On the face of it Time To Die is one foul, gnarly and steady descent into the jaws of death.

The album comes bookended with the soothing sounds of a babbling brook and all seems well until the slow-wind up of those splattering guitars firing out with a dark purpose. Immediately, the repeating motif is established as snippets from news reports which drive home the band's modus operandus - it's a gimmick inspired by a combination of the tape-trading, underground music scene and the associated scare-mongering documentaries of Jus Osborn's youth. Very rapidly, the pit begins to open and Electric Wizard's sludge-packing, doom-and-gloom begins to pour out. Optimists should find some solace in the early lyric "We wanna get high before we die" - doesn't everybody, at least on some level?

You'd think the the evil contained in the words of the title-track might be the album's nadir. "Wake up baby, it's time to die" certainly strikes a chord as it describes the vindictive wish for your soulmate to be lucid when the time comes. However, just when you think the Wiz can't sink lower they do as they churn out the filthy noise-blender of a track, "I Am Nothing". Being force-fed this murderous distortion and blistered overdrive truly does invoke the emotions of being inside the shittiest of sewers. Vomiting from this sonic chaos frontman Jus conjures his most hangdog delivery, each syllable potent with the whiff of remorse and self-pity. The track simply climaxes in nothing less than a slowly dissolving explosion of thick noisome brain matter - chaotic, psychotic and gloriously hypnotic.

This first half-hour, covering just three tracks, leaves the band free to make briefer, less-intense explorations into the subject. There's the joy of hearing a small child gleefully exclaim "Almighty Satan, destroy those who love god", a chance to bliss out to the deconstructed freak-out "Funeral Of Your Mind", to trap yourself inside the monotonous crush of "We Love The Dead", or to rock out to the dual head-bobbing "SadioWitch" and "Lucifer's Slaves".

Dramatic, fertile and intensively personal, Time To Die sees Electric Wizard digging deep into their psyches to extract something so morbid as to feel obscene. Perhaps the album's final intonation should be translated as a warning - "When you get into these groups there is only a couple of ways you can get out... one is death, the other is mental institutions or, third, you can't get out".

John Skibeat

Band info: www.electricfuckinwizard.com
Label info: www.spinefarmrecords.com

John Skibeat is a self-described word monkey hampered by cravings for strong ale and stinky cheese. He continues to practice surgical dissection on most genres of music with the leftovers currently reaching publication at 'zines like Heavy Blog Is Heavy, The Line Of Best Fit or Ave Noctum. When not smacking seven bells out of various sizes of orb, he tumbles at johnskibeat, tweets @johnskibeat and blogs at, yes, you guessed it, johnskibeat.

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For their fourth full-length album, Norwegian stoner/heavy rockers Lonely Kamel went into the studio with a very clear idea of creating their most crude and stripped-down album to date and they succeed it. “Shit City” doesn’t sound simple or cheap in any way, but it does exude a raw and sleazy sound that totally benefits their brand of groovy and infectious stoner/psychedelic/heavy rock.
Scratch the Surface caught up with the band to talk about this new effort and where exactly is the shit city.

“Shit City” is your fourth full-length album and the press release mentions that you wanted to make it as simple and cheap as possible. Well, I wouldn’t call it exactly simple or cheap, but the album does offer some catchy tunes dirtier than the bathroom of a sleazy bar in Singapore. What was the vibe when you went into the studio for this new album?

Stian: hehe...dirty bathrooms are always good, sounds like we captured the feeling we were looking for. The vibe was good, except the whole band had the flu during the ten days in studio.

Lukas: Yeah but we nailed track after track, and the result was amazing. Shit City is raw and honest, everything recorded live in studio, except vocals, lead guitar and some percussion.

Stian: We've never used much money on recordings but it's not like we want it to sound crappy either. The press release thing was kind of a joke. But we like it raw and simple, and try hard to transfer some of the nerve and energy from our live performance onto the albums.

Thomas: Fact is we never had much money for recordings. Studio time in Norway is not cheap, so we try to spend as little time there as possible, hehe. We always record live, playing together in the same room. I think that's a big part of why we sound like we do. We practice playing together, jamming all the time to get the right groove in each song. That's important to us. In that sense we come prepared in the studio, record all four of us, and then we spend 3-4 days after to put up some vocals and guitar licks, just having fun.

Can you kind of describe the writing process for Shit City? Do write the songs collectively in the rehearsal room or you’re one of those bands that trade files/ideas back and forth via email?

Stian: Mail sucks! Internet sucks! hehe. Yeah, but ok, sometimes even we use it as a preference, but it's on the rehearsals it happens. Thomas has most of the ideas and presents them when we meet, and Lukas brings a lot of riffs as well. Some songs come from jamming, so we all contribute. We spend a lot of time working on the arrangements. And we never play a song someone dislikes.
Last November Thomas made a collection of some demos of our songs on his home recorder, the tunes he felt were most suitable for an album as a whole. Then we agreed on that and didn't look back. We worked our asses off on the arrangements and sound until we puked and almost hated each other.

Lukas: We worked on some old and some new ideas, jamming, trying different grooves and so on. Process went on for a few months. Then we dived into a studio to make the deadline for a release in late August, just before we hit the road.

It sounds like you are having a lot of fun on this new album. What did you get personally out of making this record?

Stian: I think studio sessions are some of the most fun and interesting parts of being in a band. To nail all these things we've been working on for so long, and get it on tape. The result is not always what we expected or what we had in mind but we spend a lot of time preparing the songs before studio, the goal is always to be as close to the original idea as possible. But it's been 3 years since we were in a studio so for me it was about time! Next album will not delay as long.

So where exactly is Shit City? Not Oslo I trust, it is considered one of the most expensive cities in the world.

Stian: Yeah of course it could be Oslo. Expensive does not necessarily mean good or not shitty. Money is shit. But it could also be another town, or a state of mind. We all have a lot of love for this hometown but it's also a lot of frustration. It's the famous ambivalent love/hate relationship people have for things, places and people in life.

What do you talk about lyrically on this album?

Thomas: When writing these songs, there was a lot going on in my life. A couple of years of ups and downs, and I think the songs reflect that from the sense of everything going to hell (is it over?) to rediscovering love (Falling down). Much like the meaning of the title. It's like a love/hate relationship to someone or something. Sometimes you hate something so bad, and the next day you love the same thing, realizing it's not the things that are changing, but you, your state of mind and how you feel inside.


Following the release of Shit City, you’ll embark on a European tour with label mates The Order Of Israfel. What can fans expect to see on this tour?

Stian: Expect what you always get! Lonely Kamel loves playing live, touring and hang out. We don't bring fireworks or lighting rigs, but we bring the blues, grooves and some bottles of booze!
And to be honest, I never heard The Order Of Israfel live, but their record kicks ass and there must be a reason they go on tour with Lonely Kamel

What type of venues and parts of the world do you like best for playing live?

Stian: Any type in any country. no rules, no peculiarities, no limitations - just music!

Find out more about Lonely Kamel and their awesome new album "Shit City" here: www.facebook.com/lonelykamel
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Well here's a debut album loaded with enough old school rock n' roll balls to get the geriatrics swinging their jeans, catchy and fresh enough to interest the doubting pop industry, and yet still darkly inventive enough to tickle the underbelly of the subverts. In turn, they lovingly tug once more at those emotional threads conjured by bands like Led Zeppelin, Fleetwood Mac and Cream. The inevitable result? Blues Pills are about to shift some units with this release.

Craftily divided into sections, each offering something interesting to focus upon, the album oozes star quality. Tracks 1 through 3 offer quick-change chord structures that ripple their way along a driving underscore which harries and hurries you along. Opener "High Class Woman" has a hard, rock-punching edge about it with fierce licks and strong hooks, whilst the excellent, groove-laden "Ain't No Change" and "Jupiter", with its mind-expanding middle-eight, ride along bluesier, walls of guitar fuzz that get you deep in the gut.

Tracks 4 through 6 mark out a welcome change of pace which brings the stunning Joplin-esque vocal of Elin Larsen to the forefront. Strong without being butch, her delivery has a sweet, rasping quality, plenty of range and a fine grasp of when to stress a lyric and when not to. So whilst the flawed yet elegiac, slide guitar number "River" stands out proudest of all, sashaying along as she enunciates each vowel, it is the friskier, slow-quick-slow rhythm and cosmic power of "Black Smoke" which speaks most clearly to the heart as well as the soul. Tracks 7-9 begins the steady build back up to speed with the swing of "Devil Man" bringing some much needed fire, "Astralplane" loading up on blues, and Chubby Checker-cover "Gypsy" punching every majestic note out with joyous delight. Throughout these and into the album closer, the simple sustained sweeps of retro kingpins Graveyard (who they share a producer with) show their face placing that chronological marker upon the Swedish quartet.

Offering something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue, whatever your taste, this is an impressive debut that should, by all accounts, marry itself to your very marrow. I thought I had a cold, black heart, but suddenly I can feel the damn thing beating. I think I'm falling for Blues Pills... and hard.

John Skibeat 

Band info: www.bluespills.com
Label info: www.nuclearblast.com

John Skibeat is a self-described word monkey hampered by cravings for strong ale and stinky cheese. He continues to practice surgical dissection on most genres of music with the leftovers currently reaching publication at 'zines like Heavy Blog Is Heavy, The Line Of Best Fit or Ave Noctum. When not smacking seven bells out of various sizes of orb, he tumbles at johnskibeat, tweets @johnskibeat and blogs at, yes, you guessed it, johnskibeat.

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The "psychedelic stoner rock" description that this Bordelais trio have imposed upon themselves does little to actually describe their lightness of touch or just how inventive their songwriting can be. Soon to be released in the US (Europe had it back in April), Stranded In Arcadia contains tracks that sound like they've simply drifted in from the desert with deeply stylized, sultry vocals that place you in amongst the buzzing swarm of rich, tripped-out instruments competing for space. The majority of songs here reside within the stoned triangle of Kylesa, Fu Manchu and Band Of Skulls as the band seek to draw inspiration from everything in between and beyond.

From the off, there are big hits of Kyuss and Electric Wizard as "The Light Beyond" sets off pumping out a voluminous, elephantine bassline supplemented by floor-shaking fuzz and wailing vocals. Very quickly you'll hit the volley of catchy choruses and cutting vocal hooks like those that punch forth powerfully from "Hovering Satellites", "Holy Mondays" and "Join The Race".

Do look out for the sharp, bluesy groover "Circles". It's a unique track that goads the sweet dual vocal of Julien Praz and Jimmy Kinast into suddenly mimicking duos like those that appeared in The Animals or 60s-afficionados Arlo. The end result is unbelievably rich in colour, insistently introspective and comes complete with a mile-deep groove and a timeless, sun-kissed vibe. Elsewhere, there is an abundance of warbling pedal effects, "Arcadia" and "Beyond The Light", and glitching electronic techniques employed, most probably in what would have been an intensive session of post-production. These are the tracks that reveal the most about the band's intentions. They are clearly invitations to release your shackles and travel as far along their emotional journey as you dare.

There is an elegant simplicity to so many of these structures. The cosmos-stretching cursive sections and the repeating motif certainly allow the listener to fully explore the variety of spaces into which they are thrown. To that end, there are those who may find the music to be a little too repetitious, unnecessarily twee or, at worst, agonisingly self-indulgent (the stomping "Seen A Ghost" is a particularly tiresome prospect), but persevere and there is far more to marvel than to sneer at. It is certainly the case that those who drink deepest will undoubtedly feel the soothing qualities of this one part-doom, two parts-psych soup best of all.

John Skibeat 

Band info: www.facebook.com/marsredskyband
Label info: www.listenable.net

John Skibeat is a self-described word monkey hampered by cravings for strong ale and stinky cheese. He continues to practice surgical dissection on most genres of music with the leftovers currently reaching publication at 'zines like Heavy Blog Is Heavy, The Line Of Best Fit or Ave Noctum. When not smacking seven bells out of various sizes of orb, he tumbles at johnskibeat, tweets @johnskibeat and blogs at, yes, you guessed it, johnskibeat.

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If you count their early demos, Monster Magnet have been drawing in listeners for almost 25 years now. Early albums like Spine of God, Tab, and Superjudge are veritable classics of the stoner rock genre this Dave Wyndorf lead band helped to create. It wasn't until 1995's Dopes to Infinity and more so '97's Powertrip that Monster Magnet really saw commercial success. “Spacelord” from Powertrip even saw regular airplay on modern rock stations.

Powertrip may have been the peak of their commercial success but the four albums they have released since are still worthy of praise, which brings us to the band's ninth full-length, Last Patrol. Last Patrol marks the first album since Spine of God not to include long time guitarist Ed Mundell. In his stead Garrett Sweeny takes over lead guitars and even some sitar with Wyndorf and Phil Caivano tripling the axe attack. They pile on the layers in front of the rhythm section of bassist Chris Kosnick (Caivano handled bass duties in studio.) and drummer Bob Pantella.

Written during a one week period, Wyndorf's lyrics veil his personal feeling behind a sort of space opera. A soundtrack to tales from the greater universe and time. Wyndorf's vocal delivery is unmistakable and not without range. With everything from soft spoken word to yelling across nebulas, he conveys whatever feeling the lyrics call for. The same goes for the music as well. At times all you hear is a single note riff on an acoustic guitar while right around the corner is a raucous and dense wall of blissed out spacerock reaching for the stars in a swirling mass of psychedelia.

The title track is a nine-plus minute opus with hard driving riffs, spacey breaks, shifting moods, extra-solar solos and a totally tripped-out final couple minutes that would make the Bull God proud.

Save possibly the gospel infused “Hallelujah” and the cover of Donovan's “Three King Fishers”, Last Patrol sees Monster Magnet taking interstellar journeys with tracks that ebb and flow between riff-based verses and arena-size choruses. In addition to the psych bliss and stoner vibe permeating the album, Last Patrol feels very bluesy. From the acoustic parts to the guitar licks to Wyndorf's vocals and lyrics, the blues influence can't be shaken.

Every song on Last Patrol has its own character making for a dynamic listen. There are laid back parts with groove and louder, rockin' songs/sections that get you up out of your ejector seat. It's all very distinctly Monster Magnet. Diverse, layered, spaced and groovy, it sounds incredible. Wyndorf's a unique talent and Last Patrol should have people realizing that yet again.

Matt Hinch

Band info: www.zodiaclung.com
Label info: www.napalmrecords.com

Matt Hinch lives an unassuming life on the backroads outside Forest Mills, Ontario, Canada. He packs in as much metal as he possible can amid factory work, raising three daughters with his wife and working the land. In addition to Scratch the Surface Matt also writes for Hellbound, Ghost Cult Magazine, About Heavy Metal and his own blog, Kingdom of Noise. Keep up with him on Twitter @MetalMatt_KofN.

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Merely a few months following the release of their acclaimed second album ‘‘White Lightnin’, Germans psychedelic doomsters Obelyskkh

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We can’t talk about Vista Chino and their album 'Peace' without a little history. Drummer Brant Bjork, vocalist John Garcia and bassist Nick Oliveri comprised the band Kyuss with guitarist Josh Homme. Kyuss went on to practically invent, if not, at least define the stoner/desert rock genre. Following Kyuss’ split in ’95 the members carried on with other (high quality) bands. In 2010, Bjork, Garcia and Oliveri started performing under the name Kyuss Lives! with Bruno Fevery taking over the guitarist slot. When the time came to record new material, Vista Chino was born.

If you’re expecting 'Peace' to sound like a Kyuss album you’re not entirely wrong but not entirely right either. While it’s obvious that many of the same personalities participated in this album, Vista Chino stands on its own. By the time intro "Good Morning Wasteland" awakens into “Dargona Dragona” and its instantaneously infectious riffs, the listener is primed for Garcia’s inimitable vocals. The track does what it should, introducing what’s to come with a live, almost raw feel, fuzz-laden, overdriven tones and Fevery’s slick and soulful leads.

Those desert grooves and a red-eyed sensibility are carried throughout the album. The band’s chemistry is incontestable. Shorter tracks like “Sweet Remain” and “Barcelonian” pack a punch and contain just some of the lyrics that may or may not be related to the tensions with former Kyuss members. “They lost their souls/When they lost their way/And we fight to the bone/But the sweet will remain” and “Those days are gone when we slept upon the floor/And the desert was our home…I’m thinking about what you mean to me” suggest that “The war is finally over” (from “Planets 1&2”) and Vista Chino is forging ahead with brilliant results (and Mike Dean of C.O.C. playing bass live).

Garcia exhibits fairly dynamic range, changing up his approach and even lets Bjork take the mic a bit on “Planets”. Oliveri and Bjork lock into those grooves and throw away the key, keeping that rhythm rolling with a swing and shuffle beside Fevery’s impressive guitar work. The more you listen, the deeper the melodies and flowing grooves penetrate to release a constant flow of serotonin.

The wicked trippy and blues-fueled closer “Acidize – The Gambling Moose” sums it up perfectly with the words “I fell from up above/into your arms, my love.” Vista Chino does feel heaven sent, doesn’t it? Kyuss fans rejoice. The band is back together (more or less).

Matt Hinch

Band info: www.facebook.com/VistaChinoMusic
Label info: www.napalmrecords.com

Matt Hinch lives an unassuming life on the backroads outside Forest Mills, Ontario, Canada. He packs in as much metal as he possible can amid factory work, raising three daughters with his wife and working the land. In addition to Scratch the Surface Matt also writes for Hellbound, Ghost Cult Magazine, About Heavy Metal and his own blog, Kingdom of Noise. Keep up with him on Twitter @MetalMatt_KofN.

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For what was originally a rebound fling for guitarist Michael Amott when he left Carcass in 1993, Sweden's Spiritual Beggars has turned into a fairly prolific band in its own right. The word “band” being essential to Spiritual Beggars, as Amott's cast of cohorts for the second LP in succession—bassist Sharlee D’Angelo (Arch Enemy), keyboardist Per Wiberg (ex-Opeth), drummer Ludwig Witt (Grand Magus) and vocalist Apollo Papathanasio (Firebird)—are far from henchmen hired to gratify the guitarist's ego trip. But, then again, Spiritual Beggars has never come across as such over its seven previous records.
This time around each member fully embraces their love for ‘70s hard and prog rock, with the classic glide ‘n’ slide of Rainbow, Whitesnake, Uriah Heep and Deep Purple drenching the twelve, multicoloured songs of ‘Earth Blues’. Also lurking within these songs are stunning individual moments of luminosity that avoid self-aggrandisation and substantially raise the calibre of each composition. Amott and Wiberg excel by adding both contemporary appeal and classic rock feel to their playing, as 'Sweet Magic Pain' and 'Hello Sorrow' showcase superbly. 'Hello Sorrow' opens with a signature Amott solo that wouldn't sit out an Arch Enemy track before taking off with an emerald riff ripped right out of Thin Lizzy's treasure trove, while Wiberg pounds the keys purple like Jon Lord, kicks out the boogie with Witt and D'Angelo on 'One Man's Curse', and dons Rick Wakeman's cape for 'Kingmaker'.
But as we all know when it comes to hard rock music of this style: the singer can make or break the band. Thankfully, Papathanasio sounds more confident than on 2010's 'Return to Zero' and his versatility and ear for a catchy melody looms large over the band's former singers; which is no mean feat. The man can channel John Lawton and Ronnie James Dio in the space of one song ('To Old To Die Young'), and whether the band is tossing out Sabbathian grooves ('Turn the Tide', 'Legends Collapse') or looking to the soul of the Delta blues at the beginning of 'Dreamer', Papathanasio's chameleonic pipes lead each changeover with panache. It's the unabashed joy of it all that makes for what is by far the best LP yet to be released under the Beggars banner. So if you want to hear what radio music sounded like back when people placed actual "musicians" on a pedestal, ‘Earth Blues’ really is essential listening.

Dean Brown

Band info: www.spiritualbeggars.com
Label info: www.insideoutmusic.com

Dean Brown is a metal scribe based in Ireland. He is currently a contributing editor to the North American cultural magazine Popmatters and he regularly throws words for a number of other reputable loud noise publications such as About.com/heavy metal, Soundshock.com, MetalIreland.com, MoltenMagazine.com, amongst others. He has a strong affinity for music that shakes souls and leaves debilitating tinnitus in its wake and such obsession has left him financially and medically crippled, but he wouldn’t have it any other way. Follow Dean on twitter @reus85

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