Harvey Milk - Life...The Best Game In Town

After releasing several albums in the 90s, Harvey Milk are celebrating their own renaissance by lauding the virtues of "Life...The Best Game In Town". Spearheaded by the alternately burly and angelic vocal stylings of Milk mastermind Creston Spiers, "Life" is both tumultuous and grueling, resonating with the glorious slow-motion radiance of Total Dirge Power. They've since been joined by Thrones legend Joe Preston.

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Megazilla - Please, Please, Sorry, Thank You

MEGAZILLA are a bass / drum duo from Texas that put most of the recent rudderless post-rock and stoner bands to shame with Joey Hook's nimble, tumultuous drum crashes and Corey Cottrell's stirring slacker vocals and nimble bass rifferama. "Puffy, Fuzzy Cheeks" is just ruthless, fuzz on top of fuzz, chords crackling almost to the point of total disintegration. "Grave Robbing in Texas" packs all the intensity of "Ozma"-era MELVINS. Speedier stuff like "Shanghaied" and "Gay is the New Straight" are insanely tight, crisscrossing and swerving close to the edge a la LIGHTNING BOLT. Perhaps the greatest compliment I can pay to this CD is to say that it doesn't sound like a duo band; I was convinced some sadistic power trio had attached electrodes to my brain until I checked out the liner notes. For those of you that need it me to get out on the runway with the lights, here it is: THE MELVINS and LIGHTNING BOLT are two quality bands. If you dig 'em, let MEGAZILLA kick you in the teeth for thirty minutes.

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The Devil and The Sea - Heart vs. Spine

Heart vs. Spine is a triumph of a debut record from start to finish. Everything about this release just punishes the senses with thick, memorable songwriting nailing it all together. TDATS are a tight unit in every aspect musically, with an ability to go from lean violent attacks to expansive, lengthier dirges without losing a bit of their edge and ferocity. I think this is a band that everyone is going to be hearing a lot more about in the near future. They’ve got all the chops needed to set the underground circuit on fire. Imagine a cross of Cavity, 16, Unsane, akimbo with just a slight pinch of early Mastodon and you’ll have an approximate mental portrait of the kind of damage this act dishes out. Heart vs. Spine is highly recommended on all counts.

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Akimbo - Elephantine

This is the first album I got from Akimbo, and so it will be the first I share with you. The album is very heavy with stoner doom guitars and slowing tempos. Often compared to early Cave-In and Botch, with influences from the Melvins and Black Sabbath. While not vocally related at all, comparisons to math-y Hot Snakes can also be made. Heavy in guitar riffs and anti-hardcore instrumental breakdowns, expect lightning tempo shifts and dueling single note guitar ditties. Its difficult the pin the band down into a genre completely but you can count on an extreme performance that grooves like rock.

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Black Elk s/t

The eponymous debut from Portland, Oregon's Black Elk is a raging, frothing-at-the-mouth eruption of damaged yet majestic destructo rock, seriously heavy and seriously catchy. A creeped out conglom of carnivorous charred hardcore punk, the sludgy power of primo Pacific Northwest tarpit rawk (think Karp, Melvins, and early Soundgarden as reference points), twitchy Midwestern noise rage somewhere between Am Rep circa-1991 and a more rabid Die Kreuzen, and a goatheaded psychedelic backwoods black mass/dance party risen to a fever pitch. Produced by Mike Lastra at Smegma Studios (Earth, Thrones, Jackie-O Motherfucker).

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