ABRAMIS BRAMA
Dennis:
2006, the year of change for Abramis Brama.
First off; We did our final shows with our original drummer, Jansson.
Secondly; After turning stones we found a new skins-man in Trisse formerly of Grand Magus much to our enjoyment.
Thirdly; We did our first ever gig outside of Scandinavia on the infamous Roadburn Festival in Tilburg, Holland.
Fourthly; Started writing and recording new songs for the next [our fifth] studio album.
Fifthly; Mixing the recordings of the last 4-5 gigs we did with Jansson for an up and coming release of a live album due on march the 2nd this year.
- Generous Maria – "Electricism"
Great riffs, songs and arrangements, intelligent lyrics and vocal-lines, all performed by very good musicians. Superb. Favourite songs; "Ripe", "She's Got Plans For Me" and "Slit-Eyed Lizard."
- Cactus – "V"
30-odd years after the last album, Carmine got the band together and man do they rock. They've still got it! I was amazed by the musicianship and the songs. The new singer [Pete French is busy with the re-united Leafhound and the original singer, Rusty Day was shot in 1983] does the job more than well.
- Siena Root – "Kaleidoscope"
First full-length album with new female singer Sanya. Man, does this band have a way of discovering talents or what? She’s got the blues feel of a young Coverdale/Rodgers and delivers like she’s been doing nothing else. I cant wait 'til she's "in full bloom" and really feels at home on stage because then she’ll be fuckin' lethal. The music is what they've always delivered -70's hardrock, riff-based, with a gallon or two of psychedelica added and done well would say. Strange brew? Nope, works wonders for me.
ACID KING
Lori:
2006 was primarily a year of promoting "III" and playing live shows with our 2 amazing bass players Rafa Martinez and Mark Lamb. A year of getting connected to Japan for Acid King
- Acid King on Tour in Japan with Eternal Elysium!
Release of "The Early Years" on Leafhound Records out of Japan. A collection of the 1st 10" and the 1st Full Length CD originally released on Sympathy for the Record Industry.
A Year of Touring for Acid King - U.S Tour with Eternal Elysium and Black Cobra.
- Ludicra - "Fex Urbis, Lex Orbis"
- Black Cobra – "Bestial"
- Trouble – "Psalm 9" / "The Skull"
ALABAMA THUNDERPUSSY | ERIK LARSON
Erik:
2006 was a really busy year for me, but at the time if you had asked me what was going on, there wouldn't have been much to talk about if you know what I mean. Everything just kinda overlapped. In Alabama Thunderpussy world, the year started with ATP having to regroup, yet again, after the unexpected drug induced departure of our previous singer. Never daunted, we continued to write for our up coming sixth album "Open Fire" [march 6th 2007 release date on Relapse]. In fact, while we quietly put the word out that we were looking for a new singer, again, the down time worked in our favor, as we were able to really fine tune the album...
I guess I would say that we spent the better part of the first four months in the basement just playing for hours and hours. The hard work paid off though, come April / early May we had a new singer in Kyle Thomas and a new album that we were all really proud of. All the months of seeming drudgery now turned back to usual ATP workhorse propulsion, and we set up studio time for August into all of September.
Things were finally falling into place. Recording the record was so easy and smooth, it almost seemed like second nature. I think all those evenings in the basement, all the scrutiny, the demos after demos that were made, really helped us to just get in there and get it done. We also have been working with a new Enginear, Ian Whalen, who really seems to understand what we’re looking for. Doesn’t hurt that he plays bass in our longtime Richmond cohorts RPG.
With the album done, we focused our attention on getting all the other little production details done and to a weeks run of shows we planned for the end of October into November. It was really great to get back on the road and be playing live again after almost a year in the basement. As the year ended, we were still finalizing stuff for "Open Fire", ie: press photos, Video production planning, as well as writing more new material. As is the way with ATP we never stagnate.
Other cool things we contributed to along the way in 2006 included a track for the EYEHATGOD tribute record, and a track for the up coming Judas Priest tribute record; "God Song" and "Saints in hell" respectively. We recorded another cover while tracking the new album, which secretly might appear somewhere in the next year, we’ll see. 2007 will definitely be a crazy busy year for ATP, looking forward to it.
While all this was going on, I was staying busy with other musical projects as well. I'm not sure of the chronology here, so I'll just take it as it comes to mind. First off, as 2006 rolled around, the Birds of Prey record was done and in the can as they say. By the end of the winter the artwork was all done and the record was sent off to production. Officially released in late July on Relapse, I was super stoked about this record, not just because it was really fun to make, but because it was and is the most metal record I've been apart of. Being a huge metal head, that means a lot to me. All the guys involved in the record I consider good friends, and it was a blast putting it together.
There was talk, and even follow through with setting up some shows. Unfortunately when you put together a band of guys in other actively touring bands, things tend to fall apart.
With Summer in Europe with Baroness most of the fall and Dave out on tour with his group Municipal Waste, it just wasn't meant to happen. Yet. I’m hoping that we can all get together for some shows and a second record in 2007.
Around the time of the release of the Birds of Prey record, a split seven inch came out that I contributed a solo song to the B-side of a Son of Jor-El song. This was my first vinyl as a solo dude, so it's pretty cool for me as a avid record collector. My wife and I have thousands and thousands of LP’s and 7", and now I can add myself to the piles.
One of the many hats I got to wear in 2006 was that of Producer. In June I drove down to South Carolina to produce The Last Vanzant's album "American Blood". It was really fun getting those guys to try some different stuff, but in the end, the album turned out great and I brought the band up to Virginia to play with ATP at our hometown show with Kyle. They Slayed, as I knew they would. 2006 also saw me returning to my first instrument, drums.
In March I was asked to join a group of guys to play "Crust." After a few jam sessions, it was clear that we had something really cool happening, so not long into playing together we had 8 songs and decided to record them. Choosing the name Parasytic, we drove down to North Carolina in mid August and recorded those 8 songs with Vince Burke [Beaten Back To Pure]. We spent the rest of the year playing shows, mostly in basements, sharing the floor/stage with great bands and old friends like Kylesa / Buildings to dust / Happy Bastards / Kohu-63. The recording we did with Vince is slated to be released later in the spring 2007 on Despotic Punk records. You can hear a sample here.
Vince was the logical choice to record with since I had just completed another project with him Called Hail! Hornet. Again I played drums, Vince on guitar, T-Roy [Sourvein] on vokills, and Dixie Dave [Weedeater] on bass. We made that record in two weekends of blazing fast writing sessions, and are currently shopping that around for a release later in 2007. You can check out Hail! Hornet here.
And finally, 2006 also saw the release of the King Travolta record that I contributed vokills to one song [thanks Corey!] All in all, a pretty densely packed musical year for me. There was good reason for me to keep busy, even if I would have anyway, because my wife and I were expecting the birth of our son by years end, so I had to try to get as much done as I could. Well, it all seemed to work out, because the best thing that happened in 2006 was the birth of my son Stigandr Forest Larson on December 5th. Yep, 2006 was a very good year indeed.
AMENRA
Colin:
2006 saw the official release of our latest album, called "Mass III." The release party was quite an event
as The saint kwintenschapel was the dreamt environment for this... mass.
Unfortunately, our friend Kjm decided to leave Amenra -he set a step aside, so we could
continue the journey we all started 8 years ago. I still miss his
passion, and his precense amongst us while playing.
We met tons of cool people during our tour in France and the UK -lot's of them helped us out in a big way.
I hope they all realise as they mean the world to us. Playing Pukkelpop was all about being humble -and
staying so. Lot of cool stuff for 2007. I'm looking forward to it...
- Tool - "10.000 Days"
- Woven Hand - "Mozaic"
- Battle of Mice - "A Day of Nights"
ASTROSONIQ
Bidi:
2006 was, without a doubt, the most turbulent year in our band's
existence.
It all started with the signing of our international record deal with
Suburban Records for our 3rd full length album "Speeder People" We
received many amazing reviews in lots of big magazines. In fact, the
two biggest mags in Holland spoke literally of "a genuine masterpiece
in the history of Dutch rock music". I guess I don't have to explain
how pleased we were with that!
Then came our release party in our hometown Oss where we played for almost 2.5 hours in front of 400 crazy rockers. That was the beginning of a number of great gigs. I
still remember our very well appreciated show as headliner of the
completely packed pre-party of the Roadburn festival in 013/Tilburg.
Thanx to the Roadburn guys for this great opportunity. Then our night liner tour /
adventure in Germany was probably one of the best holidays in my life.
After that we supported a lot of fantastic bands, some of which are
our personal faves. With Brant Bjork & The Bros we had a great
evening in Groningen, then we rocked the sold out Underground venue
in Cologne with Hermano. After that, we played probably our heaviest
set ever with our friends, the Dutch metal kings Gorefest, and then
had our 15 minutes of fame when we were invited to support Stone Sour
in front of thousands of kids.
We did a completely spaced out support show for the legendary Hawkwind in Haarlem and last, but not least, were finally able to open for one of our all time fave live bands
Clutch! We definitely played one of our best shows ever that night.
It was also our last show in 2006 and our bass player Erik decided
before the gig that he would leave the band because he didn't have
the ambition to continue playing live shows on this level. We will
miss him for sure, not only as a great musician but also as a friend.
After this sad news we are very glad to announce that a good friend
Robert-Jan Gruijhuijzen [RJ for short], the singer/vocalist of one of
the finest melodic rock bands in Holland The Liszt, will replace him
in the future. So Astrosoniq will continue their journey and we hope
you stay with us.
- Enslaved – "RUUN"
- Tool - "10.000 Days"
- Place of Skulls - "The Black Is Never Far"
ATAVIST
Chris:
2006 was quite an interesting year for Atavist. It started off a little uncertainly as we lost our drummer Jamie when he emigrated to the USA to marry his girlfriend. This meant that we had the difficult task of recruiting and training a new drummer. We contacted our now drummer Callum Cox when he was playing in his old band ".....asthetideconsumes" and asked him about joining the band, to which he agreed. We spent a few months learning the songs from the S/T and writing the new material for what will become in 2007 our second album "II: Ruined" [Which we recently recorded at State of Art Studios in Bristol].
Having a more solid line-up helped us to get back to playing some shows and learning to play together again as a unit. Our first gigs were a bit shaky but we eased back into it, playing some low key shows before coming back to a successful return supporting Ufomammut, Jesu and Cult of Luna as well as a few headline shows. Following the progress we had made we got in touch with Canada's Profound Lore Records about getting a USA release of our 2nd album. We recently sorted things out with them and things are now looking good for a joint Invada / Profound Lore release of "II: Ruined" in mid 2007.
Having hooked up with Profound Lore we got in touch with Aidan Baker [who plays in the band Nadja] about doing a collaboration album, much like the recent Sunn 0))) / Boris album, although I might add, before they announced its release. We also recently completed this album which is entitled "12012291920 / 1414101" and is a more ambient album than either of our previous works. This is over an hour of material culminated from a correspondence collaboration with Nadja and will be coming out in early 07 through Invada records.
We recorded "II: Ruined" in late November 06 and it has turned out to be one of the best works we have done as a band to date. As well as the album we also recorded and kept aside some tracks for various splits and compilations we are doing. There’s a track for a split 7" we are meant to be doing on Rise Above, a track for a split 12" with Black Sun, a track for a compilation and some covers for bonus tracks, including a Grief cover. All of which are now mixed and are awaiting mastering.
Looking forward into 2007 we are touring the north of the UK with Winters in Osaka in January and we have a whole lot of material to release so look out for it.
- Asunder – "Works Will Come Undone"
- Black Cobra – "Bestial"
- Drudkh – "Blood In Our Wells"
BLACK COBRA
Rafa:
We began touring the first week of April, 3 weeks before our first
full-length, "Bestial", was released on Ataloss Recordings in America and Delboy Records in Europe. We then continued into May by hitting the road with Torche and Akimbo and toured the US from coast to coast three times throughout the year.
In the summer we teamed up with Ataloss Recordings label mates Unpersons for three weeks for yet another coast to coast tour . In the month of September, Acid King and Eternal Elysium, from Japan, teamed up with us to do our final North American tour of the year. We then headed to Europe in November for our first overseas tour. Our label mates Blutch [Delboy Records] joined us on our first journey to Europe and the U.K.
2006 being our first year as a full time operating band, we will have played exactly
112 shows within the span of 8 months in 7 different countries. We would like to extend our
grateful appreciation to all the audiences, labels, promoters, agents, press personel, family, and friends that have helped us throughout the world during our first year of touring. Thank you all very much.
- OM – "Conference Of the Birds"
- Blutch – "Materia"
- Harvey Milk – "Special Wishes"
THE BROUGHT LOW
Ben:
I guess the big news this year in our camp was the long-awaited [at least on
our end hahaha] release of our 2nd album, "Right On Time", on Small Stone
Records. Other highlights included playing Emissions from the Monolith 8
and appearing on Small Stone's "Sucking The 70's, Back In The Saddle Again"
compilation.
2007's looking good already with a re-configured maximum strength 3-piece
line-up, new songs and a new album starting to gestate and our return to
Texas after way too many years at this year's Small Stone South By Southwest
Showcase and possible Emissions 9 appearance. Thanks to all our friends and
fans for keeping us alive over the years.
- Radio Birdman – "Live"
- Dixie Witch – "Smoke & Mirrors"
- Boris – "Pink"
Also dug the new Colour Haze, Harvey Milk, Howlin' Rain, Comets On Fire [the
last 3 songs at least], Fresh Kills and Made Out of Babies CDs and I'm sure
that new Neil Young live record from 1970 is better than all of the above
but I haven't nabbed a copy yet.
CAUSA SUI
Jakob:
In 2006, Causa Sui went from being a new born side project, to becoming a real full-time band. Our debut album came out in late December 2005 and was well received everywhere we went during the year. We tried a little touring for the first time, and started recording our 2nd album in April. By July we had finished it, and played at the Stoned from the Underground-festival in Erfuhrt -so many great people down there. We have been getting into all different kinds of new music all year -it would be impossible to describe it all, but here are a few highlights:
- Serena Maneesh – "S/T"
In May, we played the Spot-festival in Denmark, which is like a suburban version of SXSW. We got to meet David Fricke from Rolling Stone Magazine, who was a fan of the album along with a lot of other people from 'the business.' It's not really our kind of thing to talk about music, though, so we went boozing and checking out the festival immediately. Serena Maneesh was playing in the evening -their debut album is a Swedish mixture of shoe-gazers My Bloody Valentine and classic psych-rock. Just the way we love it! The album is great, but live... there is no describing these guys. They look and sound like no other band, very unique and a lot more violent than their somewhat ambient album.
- Red Favorite - "S/T"
We played a 100% improvised concert in late December with Ron Schneiderman from weirdo-folk-drone outfit Sunburned Hand of the Man. The show was at Christiania -a weird mix of manic psych-jazz, stoner with mellow folk and drone mixed in, in front of a small audience. Ron runs the hyper-productive Spirit of Orr CD-R label, and gave us a bunch of releases after the almost two-hour-long, non-stop concert. Especially cool was an album called Red Favorite, it caught our immediate attention. It's a very warm blend of acoustic guitar, played with the vigor of 60's folk-legends John Fahey and Sandy Bull, blending in flute, strings and chimes for a wide display of just how much emotion can be generated with simple acoustic instruments. Meditative, beautiful and deeply psychedelic music for the soul.
- Colour Haze – "Temple"
On our tour of Germany in March, we went to Munich to play a concert with the amazing Colour Haze in their rehearsal room -none has done more to bring back the genuine spirit of rock than these
guys -the album Los Sounds De Krauts is a direct reason for us forming Causa Sui two years ago. When we went to Stoned from the Underground, we grabbed copies of their new album, and listened to it non-stop on the way home [around 9 hours of driving].
The album stands out from their previous stuff -it's much more compact in a sense. Some places, Stefan Kogleks' guitar playing sounds like early Santana, bringing in new rhythm and texture to the already wide Colour Haze-palette. Amazing stuff. We are also happy to announce that our new album "Free Ride", will be released through Stefan Koglek's Elektrohasch Records this spring. We're confident that this is the right plase for us to bring new music out to the people - pushing the boundaries and working together with the finest in the business.
CHURCH OF MISERY
Tom:
2006 was an interesting year for us for a couple of reasons. The first
being that we have a new guitar player in the shape of Tom Sutton from
Australia. Hoshi had to leave in March due to increasing family
commitments, but remains a close friend, and may do some design work for the
band in the future. Tom's a big-time Church of Misery fan, and a card
carrying Iommi disciple, so the transition has been really smooth.
Secondly, the band were lucky enough to be invited back for their second
UK/European tour, this time with Sourvein, and had the time of their lives.
Seriously, we were ready to marry those guys by the end. Hehe. Hideki
managed to sweat on more people than he's ever sweated on before, so
congratulations to him. A big achievment there. Thanks to everyone who came
to the shows. You made our days.
The band also played shows with Acid King here in Japan, and we also squeezed out some split singles and eps. Two singles with our brothers Sourvein, and an EP with Deer Creek from the US. All round, a fun year.
2007 will be a big one because we're planning to get our next full-length album out some time in the middle of the year. After that, there are tours planned, but that's all a big secret, so we're not going the tell you, so there. Ha!
So to all the true rock 'n' roll believers out there, stand up for the rock,
and we hope we can really give everyone something to get excited about this
year.
- Celtic Frost – "Monotheist"
Totally menacing, beautiful, and brilliant.
- Circulus - "Clocks Are Like People"
A mesmerizing album. You WILL smile.
- Krux – "Krux 2"
More genius from this unbelievably underrated band.
CIRCULUS
Michael:
Spring, a time for sowing...
We spent two weeks in New Rising studios in the countryside near Colchester recording our second album "Clocks Are Like People." Considering it was February the weather was pleasantly sunny so we spent many an afternoon spliffing away in a corn field. Earlier that month we played a few gigs in Italy. Venice inspired me to make seven golden Elizabethan space suits with super pointy gold shoes.
Summer, a time for making hay...
The only member of the band who really got to make hay on our festival circuit last summer was Victor Hugo, our bongo player. Whenever there was a nice girl around he'd nab her. He's returned home to Mexico now for visa reasons so maybe someone else can finally get a look in. There’s nothing worse than just one person in the band getting it constantly. I think the crumhorn is quite a sexy instrument but statistically this has proven to be wholly untrue.
Autumn, a time for harvesting...
One might say the crops failed this year. I've never been so broke in my life. It's all very well living the life of a minstrel but when you have to split gig fees seven ways there’s not much change left over from a ham sandwich by the end of it. The album didn't sell as well as we hoped but it's not surprising when you realise that for every one sold ten people download it for free.
Winter, a time for warming by the fire...
Sod sitting at home by the fire. Will Crumhorn, Victor Bongo and myself got ourselves a free passage to Miami, working alongside a mime troop during "Art Basel Miami." By the end of the week I was so bored I decided to become a hell raiser just to brighten things up. I was subconsciously testing my theory that you can generally avoid being arrested for misconduct in America by simply having an English accent.
We ended the year with a prog extravaganza at London’s super posh Purcell Room with Chrome Hoof. Don't miss next years!
CLUTCH
Neil:
2006 was a good year for Clutch. We started off the year in the U.K. with Corrosion of Conformity and Stinking Lizaveta. In March we went to Australia for the first time, followed in April by another first, our first gig in Moscow [or anywhere in Russia, for that matter]. Download Festival in June was tits.
We then spent most of the summer at home writing "From Beale Street to Oblivion." In September we went back out on the road with the Bell Rays and Year Long Disaster. October was spent in the studio with Joe Barresi recording the record. Wrapped it all up pin about 3 weeks. Looks like it'll be released 3rd week of March, 2007.
In November we were fortunate enough to open for Motorhead in the U.K., quite possibly one of our favourite tours we've had. We took a few weeks off in December and finished off the year doing some local gigs for local people. Good times.
- Mastodon – "Blood Mountain"
A challenging listen at first, but now hear it for what it is - sheer supertastic awesomeness. How do they do it?
- Five Horse Johnson - "The Mystery Spot"
These guys rip. We're gonna tour with them again in 2007, just you wait and see.
- William Elliot Whitmore - "Song of the Blackbird"
William proves without a doubt one need not use an amplifier to be heavy.
DANAVA
Dusty:
2006 was a fruitful year for us Danavas as we finally recorded and released our fucking album, thanks to the wonderful people at Kemado Records,who we consider to be the highest of highlights of our '06. Thank You to Johnny Jewel for all his hard work on said record!!!
Buck Rothy, who plays our drums, was happily married and is now expecting his first child! 2006 also brought us Rockwell, who we look forward to working with for some time. We thank our wonderful friends Snow Foxxes and Witchcraft for coming out on tour with us in '06!
We also recently discovered that we were voted "False Metal Album of The Year" by Decibel Magazine, who won our vote for Category of the Year, with Hipster Metal a close second!!! Being a ROCK band in 2006 is fucking hilarious!!!
Stay TROO, GRIM, THRASH, BLACK, DEATH, HEAVY, FALSE and
HIPSTER in 2007!!! Sheesh...
- Darkthrone – "The Cult Is Alive"
- The Hidden Hand – "Devoid of Colour"
- Possessed – "'Exploration"
Although rec. in '71, this album saw it's official release in '06 [Thank You Lee & Co.] and
is, for us, better than most stuff we've EVER heard.
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