The Austrian Special - A focus on the non-metal music from Arnold's native land

One of my best online friends is from this mysterious country located near the Alps and we often share our local findings. He discovered Québec rock (Karkwa, Ponctuation, Galaxie…) because of me and I was pleased when he sent me a lot of Austrian suggestions. This is sort of related to my Local Sounds series but done with bands from cities located on the other side of the Atlantic ocean. Considering I don’t currently really have the means to visit Vienna or Graz, this exploration of Austria non-metal music will have to do for now. Summoning were the musical act I was thinking of when this country was getting mentioned but it’s always fun to expand our horisons. Let’s start.

Wanda-Amore (2014)
-Bussi (2015)

This quintet from the capital are one of the biggest bands in Austria right now and for good reason. Their blend of heartfelt rock integrates a lot of tasteful pop influences, folky overtones and even some Americana. Their singer, Michael Marco, has some roughness to his delivery, you can hear the fact that he’s a smoker though the German lyrics. Their indie pop with some slight symphonic arrangements is a bit too cheesy for me but you can hear that they’re deeply inspired by Bob Dylan’s electric material for some of their musical aspects. It’s old school pop, really but there’s this modern catchiness. They sort of remind me of Arctic Monkeys if they were not heavy at all. Interesting band, it’s refreshing to hear.

Witchrider – Unmountable Stairs (2014)
Josh Homme just turned 43 this week and he’s possibly the biggest influence here. The trio from Graz definitely dig the huge guitars of Queens of the Stone Age but they’re not a carbon copy of the seminal American band. They mix things up and add some occult rock to their huge and super catchy riff dirty rock fest. Signed on Fuzzorama records, Witchrider aren’t afraid to unleash the fuzz through their stoner rock and they even include some psychedelia to the mix. 

The song "Far From You" is particularly stellar. Legit band with super good vocals. All hail Austrian desert stoner rock!

Carousals – Unstable (2015)

This viennese quartet released their debut extended play last year and it’s a very enjoyable mix of post punk, indie rock and alt rock with a strong Sonic Youth influence. The riffs are loud and noisy and Sonja’s excellent vocals definitely recall Kim Gordon’s approach. Compared to a band like Savages, they take their time with those slow burning compositions full of distortion (like “No Good”). Great EP and I’m interested to hear their future material.

The Sado-Maso Guitar Club

-We Love You Too (2011)

-Sado Maso Guitar Club (2013)

Possibly my favorite band included in the folder than my friend Daniel sent me, SMGC are classic rock in the purest sense of the expression. They’re basically a modern version of the Rolling Stones and that’s a super good compliment. “Get the Sound” from their debut album has one of the best guitar melodies I’ve heard in a while and combined with the organ, it’s just an infectious and groovy bluesy rock tune. They worship the late 60s and 70s era of rock where things weren’t getting super yet and it was still highly mixed with folk, blues and singer-songwriter influences. They’re not reinventing anything but they do everything correctly and they’re just super fun to listen to.

Binder & Krieglstein 

-Alles Verloren (2007)
-New Weird Austria (2010)

Rainer Binder-Krieglstein‘s music is pretty unique and quite excellent. Combining ethnic music (arabic, german, austrian, gypsy) with soul, pop, electronic, reggae, hip hop, this project is all over the place in the best way possible. Mostly in German, the album has a variety of singers from soft female voices to deep male ones and it‘s literally insane. It‘s so different from what I‘m used to but I really enjoyed the wide array of sounds displayed by this Austrian producer, it may seem to be disjoncted but it‘s put together expertly.

Abbot – Between Our Past and Future Lives (2014) / 87%

NWOFHM #9: Fly, on your way, like a butterfly!

After three excellent singles, Abbot from Pori, Finland (home of Jussi Lehtisalo and his New Wave of Finnish Heavy Metal), released their first full length almost exactly one year ago and it's pretty damn cool. The quartet is certainly a peculiar beast and another strong player in the superb Finnish doom (well, they're barely doom but they still count!) scene. Definitely in the same vein as some of Lehtisalo's projects (similar to Pharaoh Overlord's trad metal albums or the rockier stuff Circle stuff), I really liked this weird record decorated with a glorious butterfly (I still don't understand the reference... if there's one!).

Just imagine if Neil Young went to Finland, stayed there for twenty years and decided that doom, stoner metal and southern rock were cool things instead of doing yet another Bob Dylan or Gordon Lightfoot homage recorded in a telephone booth by Jack White and you aren't too far from the actual truth given to you by Abbot. Their music is rooted in southern tinged doom but there's a big classic rock influence here, I'm sure your uncle who's into Lynyrd Skynyrd would like this record! While probably not as adventurous as some of their previous singles like “Into the Light” and its harmonica introduction or the long winded power of “Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson”, the album is weird in its own way with its mix of slower, blues tracks like the superb “Mr. Prowler Man” and speedier metal tracks like “Moonsnake Child”. It's something special but it remains surprisingly quite authentic and vintage and wouldn't sound out of place on a lineup with Kadavar. I do think they're better than most of the current vintage fad though since they have those bonkers elements often found in the Finland scene that I really cherish.

They also possess this sort of garage/alternative rock influence (not too far from Dinosaur Jr.) and that's adding another layer to their nuts salad. They have this sort of tangle fun found in late 80s college rock and this combined with their southern doom basis creates one hell of a mix. There's also a lot of sleaze and grease on Between... like on the cool “Grave Encounters” that makes you feel like you're in the bayou but in reality, you're naked in a sauna with four overgrown Finnish toddlers drinking endless bottles of Karhu. Jakonen's vocals have this nasal quality and I bet he plays Dylan and Young covers when he's with his dad or something. His delivery fits the huge bluesy guitar of Jussi Jokinen (apparently not the hockey player currently playing for the Florida Panthers) who's bludgeoning your skull with thick fuzzy riffs and feelsy solos without compromises. The album is a bit short (33 minutes) and 1 or 2 doomier and slower tracks would had been nice but the soulful closer “Keep On Moving” does the job wonderfully. I'd probably kill a bunch of butterflies to be able to see this band live, it's just really good music transcending generational gaps and it delivers on all front.

Abbot on Facebook 

Against Nature - The Anxiety of Influence (2007) / 92%

Baltimore & Brenner trilogy, part II: No problem

John Brenner reformed or took back the leadership of Revelation in 2007 after more than a decade under the mantle of Dennis Cornelius (Memory Driven, Place of Skulls) but this project was formed three years before that. At first, they were an offshoot of Revelation, a sort of kitchen sink for their weirder vibes since while their older brother can safely be categorized as progressive doom, they never got truly truly demented. They're one of those bands with such an extensive and varied discography that they're a bit scary to discover and embrace. Sadly, the band seems to be dead nowadays as Brenner has started a new charming project called Mole Hill that's continuing in the blues rock/classic rock steps Against Nature were taking since like five or six albums (2010 to 2012!). It's possibly for the best that the musicians are taking their time for a change.

They're not really going against their nature here (excuse the easy pun), it's really more an extension of their sound than a total turnaround into something else. This album is quite unique in their catalog since it's only composed of two very long tracks. Action at a Distance only contained three tracks but it's sort of instrumental ambient/space rock album so that's sort of an exception (a great one, if I may add). The songs are not vocal centric at all, there's barely any lyrics, I mean the first half of “Aporia”, the fist track is entirely instrumental. You're not expecting the vocals to come either, you're not like “ehhh, it's already been eight minutes and it's getting boring...”, no, no, no. They're so tight instrumentally that the vocals are almost unnecessary and they know how to fill a long song with a lot of creative songwriting. Also, let's be frank, John Brenner is first and foremost a guitarist, his vocals aren't quite good but he knows how to make them work when he uses them.

The trio composed of all three current Revelation members has obvious chemistry and so much talent. Bert Hall jr. is a terrific bass player, one of the best and most underrated I've ever heard, he's unreal. The bass is high in the mix since it's apparent that they preach at the altar of Rush and Geddy Lee every day. Brenner's vocals are clean, simple yet effective but yeah, his guitar riffs and solos are the real deal here. The dude knows how to write varied music with a lot of atmosphere while keeping things grounded and cohesive.

The Anxiety of Influence still has definite doom metal roots and it's perhaps one of their best albums I heard (I have yet to hear them all unfortunately, that's quite an endeavor). It's sort of a reconstructed traditional doom metal as it's using a lot of retro influences, there's even a big blues section in the second song (a prediction of things to come from the band) and there's lot of heavy prog too. The desert stoner rock sound is there even though they're from Maryland! I can hear some Kyuss as it's heavy bluesy metal/rock with a desolate vibe. Still, their sound isn't sad at all, it's groovy, almost joyful and with a lot of soul and passion. They finish the album on a very calm and serene note and it has some sort of dark beauty.

Sure, it's perhaps not the best album to start with Againt Nature because of its non traditional track-list. They have a bunch of shorter and streamlined progressive doom releases like Appease or Safe Dissonance which can serve as an introduction to the band but I believe this one of their finest releases. Against Nature is still quite unknown and it's a damn shame. They have a lot of extremely good material to check out. It's all on Bandcamp and it's cheap!

The album on Bandcamp

Wo Fat - The Conjuring (2014) / 85%

Deep Fried Doom with a side of blues

The boys from Dallas, Texas are back with their fifth album since their inception in the early 2000s and it's a fucking massive album. After their excellent 2012 album The Black Code which probably was the band at its peak, they really didn't have to change their sound for their new album since they reached a perfect understanding of it.

The trio led by Kent Stump rocks super hard and even though they're from the Obese nation of America, they're all pretty thin dudes. Pretty disappointing considering the name of the band but oh well, their riffs are greasy as fuck nonetheless. Musically, it's quite groovy and the guitar, bass and drums formula works well within their boundaries. The basis of their compositions is huge doom/stoner metal which is deeply rooted in southern American blues so you can definitely feel the melting sun of Texas on your forehead with these guys. The guitar playing of Stump is superb, he's delivering intense, heavy yet catchy riffs alongside long ass solos with a jam band feeling. There's a perfect harmony with the rhythm section composed of Tim Wilson and Michael Walter, the band has been playing together since the beginning and no lineup changes has plagued their unity (something unfortunately rare nowadays.)

Stump also sings but the vocals are far from being the focus of Wo Fat (damn, I like saying their name, it feels like eating a deep fried Oh Henry or something.) They could be an instrumental band for all I care and it won't change what I think of them (in fact, there's an instrumental version to be found!) The closer “Dreamwalker” is a seventeen minutes song so there's not a lot of vocals and nevertheless,  it's never boring. They always added subtle but enjoyable psychedelic elements that are only giving another layer of intricacy to the band. Their music can feel a bit overwhelming at times, it's full of emotions and grasping but the length is perfect for them, it's much more condensed than their two debuts (both like seventy minutes, that's just too much, brothers)

The vocals are sparse and nothing special overall. It's gnarly clean but drunken vocals. He's good enough for what they're doing but don't expect anything spectacular on that front. There's this huge blues influence such as in “Pale Rider From the Ice” with its slide guitar riffs and groovy, sentimental vocals. Their lyrics are pretty decent, psychedelic, metaphorical fantasy based themes are their forte for this one compared to the science fiction/pulp of The Black Code.

I can certainly fee the Kyuss influence here, it's crossing the stoner rock frontiers quite often and even though it remains a metal band, they're not that heavy. I'm sure that if I show Wo Fat to some old bluesemen, they'll dig them. There's this certain honesty about them that you can't simply can't fake.

Before the enjoyment of this album, you will need:
-A sixer of cheap watery beer.
-Some BBQed chicken and sausages with perhaps some Tex Mex food.
-Old Stevie Ray Vaughan and ZZ Top vinyls.

Wo Fat's Fatbook page