Apparently if you're a bald guy of a certain build and you stand in
front of a club with your hands in your pockets, people will just assume
you're the doorman. If there was some advantage to kids warily pulling
out their IDs for me and punks-turned-yuppies condescendingly telling me
they're "on the list", I'd have some fun with this newfound knowledge; alas, all I gained was sympathy for the people who have to to this for real. (Fun
fact: a lot of door men in NYC are actually off-duty cops. Antagonize them at your own peril.)
I may be alone in remembering this, but there was a time
when there was a divide between "true" doom metal and its less heavy,
more hedonistic cousin stoner rock (probably due to the latter's
perceived commercial appeal). Some intentional Iommi-ing aside, The Atomic Bitchwax are definitely more "rock" than anything else. I decided within a few songs that their mugging wasn't for me and that their Thin Lizzy retreads were just as easily enjoyed
sitting down near the bar.
Karma To Burn is a name I've been seeing in print for close
to two decades, though I don't think I've ever actually heard their music. I mainly know them as the band that (allegedly) fired former Kyuss frontman John Garcia for (allegedly) sounding too much like Ronnie James Dio. [I can't
decide which part of that story I find funniest. Allegedly.] Though the
connection undoubtedly has served them well, their instrumental rock is doesn't have much in common with Kyuss. For one thing, they're more consistently heavy - caveman tom rolls and swinging beats behind
lumbering riffs, like a Sabbath-driven "Frankenstein". And god damn, that cowbell
makes me smile.
As I've written before, I find very little separates The Obsessed from Wino's other projects over the years; indeed, as the other members of this
incarnation (ha ha!) were both in Spirit Caravan, that project could have been
resuscitated just as easily (though "Spirit Caravan Plays Selections From The Obsessed Catalogue" doesn't have quite the same cachet). At the
end of the day, I was there for Wino himself, no matter what he calls the outfit he tours with or what material he plays.
I thought the last place I saw The Obsessed - outdoors, in broad daylight - was the perfect setting for their bluesy roots metal, but within the small confines of Saint Vitus, their music takes on a darker, more intimate feel. These songs have aged incredibly well; maybe it's because they always felt a little out of their time. As hardcore, thrash and grunge sprouted up around The Obsessed, they've always been out of sync with tastes both mainstream and underground (a hesher friend in college disparaged The Church Within as "southern rock", and passed it over to me without qualms). Not much has changed on that front; the new songs, including the presumptive title track "Sacred", are as much of a throwback as the rest of the band's oeuvre. No record label has attached itself to the new material yet, which explains why the band is touring in support of an album that's not out and has no official release date. But after watching kids half my age nod their heads reverentially to songs older than me, it's hard to imagine anyone letting a new Obsessed album slip through their hands. [There's always Bandcamp, guys.]
I thought the last place I saw The Obsessed - outdoors, in broad daylight - was the perfect setting for their bluesy roots metal, but within the small confines of Saint Vitus, their music takes on a darker, more intimate feel. These songs have aged incredibly well; maybe it's because they always felt a little out of their time. As hardcore, thrash and grunge sprouted up around The Obsessed, they've always been out of sync with tastes both mainstream and underground (a hesher friend in college disparaged The Church Within as "southern rock", and passed it over to me without qualms). Not much has changed on that front; the new songs, including the presumptive title track "Sacred", are as much of a throwback as the rest of the band's oeuvre. No record label has attached itself to the new material yet, which explains why the band is touring in support of an album that's not out and has no official release date. But after watching kids half my age nod their heads reverentially to songs older than me, it's hard to imagine anyone letting a new Obsessed album slip through their hands. [There's always Bandcamp, guys.]
