BEST OF 2012 ACCORDING TO TSTAT

I've been busy trying to mix my album, ok? It's hard. For me. It's hard because I don't have the slightest fucking idea what I'm doing. Did you know that the funny looking EQ waveform thingy actually has proper settings that can be adjusted using things like math and shit? Christ. All this time I was just dicking with it until it looked like a Geiger counter at Chernobyl. Anyways, I'm basically done now and probably ready to get this shit sent to James Plotkin for a wicked mastering. Also, my cousin/artslave Elena showed me some progress on the album art and it's looking sweet. Scummy and evil. So yeah, it's getting close to finished and I'm pretty excited.

In the meantime, here's a list of my favourite releases from 2012 that did get finished. Plus a little blurb about each and a link, if applicable. As usual, in no order.

1) MELVINS - THE BULL AND THE BEES "Featuring one of the best songs of their entire existence! Congratulations, 30-year old band!"

2) HIGH ON FIRE - DE VERMIS MYSTERIIS "Always a consistently good band but this one, in particular, is their best since Blessed Black Wings (my favourite)."

3) KILLING JOKE - MMXII "If you took the best songs off this and their last album and compiled them together, you'd be looking at a pretty untouchable classic (and also an additional album with a head-scratchingly high amount of filler)."

4) TORCHE - HARMONICRAFT "If Millencolin decided to be an amazing doom-metal band."

5) MELVINS LITE - FREAK PUKE "So weird how this band can keep rewriting the same riffs and have it be consistently awesome time and time again."

6) BARONESS - YELLOW & GREEN "I'd kind of written these guys off once I heard the Red Album but decided to give this a shot. Oops."

7) DEATH GRIPS - MONEYSTORE "This one is awesome. No Love Deep Web (also released this year) is my least favourite of the 3 full-lengths (despite the insane circumstances surrounding its release). And Ex-Military is still the best."

8) TEAM DOYOBI - DIGITAL MUSIC VOLUME I "Fantastic electronic weirdness. IDM done right."

9) SHAHMAN - BORED 7INCH "My new favourite Ottawa band. I go to their shows alone, largely due to the alienated nature of their songs. Just trying to do my part."
http://shahman.bandcamp.com/

10) REDD KROSS - RESEARCHING THE BLUES "I kind of fell in love with this once I heard what the album title was. Thank God it's also jam-packed with signature RK amazingness."

11) BELL WITCH - LONGING "A perfect doom metal antidote to the endless unremarkable onslaught that is 99% of all metal."

12) PS I LOVE YOU - DEATH DREAMS "Seeing what these 2 dopes actually looked like ALMOST ruined this whole thing for me."

13) HORSEBACK - HALF BLOOD "I was expecting a bunch of lovely guitar and piano ambience when I put this on, not stoner/doom....like....actual SONG songs with vocals and shit (interspersed with lovely guitar and piano ambience)."

14) LOCAL H - HALLELUJAH! I'M A BUM "I always have time for this band and they never disappoint with their Nirvana-through-a-Cheap-Trick-filter sound."

15) JK FLESH - POSTHUMAN "Somewhere between Grey Machine and late period Godflesh."

16) SNAKEDRIVER/LASER FLAMES ON THE GREAT BIG NEWS - SPLIT "2 fantastic bands on one album. Grindy sludge and Southern-fried stoner/doom. Nice pair."
http://mutantsofthemonster.bandcamp.com/album/snakedriver-laser-flames-split

17) BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW - COBRA JUICY "I didn't know this band existed until fairly recently. I miss out on a lot."

18) DEAD WRESTLER - 6 SONG EP "Another recent Ottawa favourite. Surf/jazz guitar with an almost Jesus Lizard rhythm section. No vocals."
http://deadwrestler.bandcamp.com/album/6-song-ep

19) KRALLICE - YEARS PAST MATTER "These guys seem to understand what all the worthwhile elements of black metal really are."

20) METZ - S/T "Weird, noisy rock songs. Very brief and very satisfying. This is what alt-rock is (not a bunch of fucking banjos, right?)."

21) LONGMONT POTION CASTLE - VOLUME 9 "This guy makes me cry tears of laughter every single time."
http://noisetent.com/DUCat.html

22) ALTARUS - AS ABOVE, SO BELOW "Progressive doom metal that just gets better and more complex as the album goes on."
http://altarus.bandcamp.com/album/as-above-so-below

23) BIIPIIGWAN - NIBAAK "Yet another (kind-of) Ottawa band. Furious sludge/grind meets AmRep style noise rock."
http://handshakeinc.bandcamp.com/album/nibaak

24) JODIS - BLACK CURTAIN "An amazing sound from James Plotkin and Aaron Turner. Somewhat doomish ambient/post-rock. Very different."

25) WIZARD RIFLE - SPEAK LOUD, SAY NOTHING "Like a version of Lightning Bolt that got tweaked in such a way as to be more pleasing to me personally. Not sure who to thank for that."

HONOURABLE MENTIONS

JAPANDROIDS - CELEBRATION ROCK
CONVERGE - ALL WE LOVE WE LEAVE BEHIND
OM - ADVAITIC SONGS
MY SLEEPING KARMA - SOMA
BLACK BREATH - SENTENCED TO LIFE
BORIS & JOE VOLK - SPLIT
KTL - V
PALLBEARER - SORROW AND EXTINCTION
MASERATI - VII
BOB MOULD - SILVER AGE
DINOSAUR JR. - I BET ON SKY
ECHO LAKE - WILD PEACE

I gave that Swans album a shot but it just didn't do it. I've given all their stuff a shot, actually, and the only one that really sticks is the Cop/Young God album (which I absolutely love). But seriously, why Swans? Why now? Someone should tell Einsturzinde Neubauten or Chrome to release an album next year. They might get to headline Coachella.

Studio 2012: Update 1 okTOBer dooooom

2 studio sessions so far. One for drums and one for re-amping guitars. The rest of the sessions took place here at my place. Randomly and sporadically from 2007 til a few months ago. 7 songs total. No more older songs in the vault after this. My next release will be made up of all current material, most likely. Anyways, nothing to do now but mix. I'm psyched to be working on this stuff in October. This weather is perfect. Gets my creative juices flowing. Killing Joke - Fire Dances on repeat.

THE BEAST HAS ARISEN....

Oh hi. No updates since the spring? Oopsies. I've been busy doin' nothin. But I've got songs written. 7 for the next release which shall be my first proper full-length. Tracking starts on the 1st of October at Apartment 2 Studios with Topon Das, my heavy metal colleague and favourite guy to complain about shitty metal bands with. In the meantime, I have to learn the drums for these annoying songs and possibly even teach myself how to properly blast a beat. That's proper as in Scum-era Mick Harris ND style. Not the way you youngsters go about it with all your "tricks". So yeah, updates to come (unless I get really lazy and don't bother posting updates). Follow me on Twitter @SUNTelescope. I'll post pics from the studio there maybe. In the meantime, have sex with each other.

THAT'S HOW KIDS DIE. interviews TSTAT

Well, here it is. My very first interview under the guise of TSTAT. Grazia multo to Josh Haun, he who is the brains behind the very funny and thought-provoking metal-blog known as THAT'S HOW KIDS DIE.

CLICK HERE FOR THE INTERVIEW

Here's what I've been enjoying lately....

MERDARAHTA & DOOM MANTIA

2 big deals to discuss here.

First off, the second installment of MERDARAHTA is now available. That word roughly translates to a FUCK THE FACTS side project/recording collective type thing. Very much in the same spirit as SUNN O))) in that the core line-up are the various members of FTF with the bed tracks being farmed out to a lucky few guest musicians (myself being counted amongst the lucky). Both releases are available their bandcamp page and are well worth a listen/download. My suggestion? Download it. Wait til nighttime. Then put the kettle on, brew up your favourite tea, press play on the MERDARAHTA and have it be the soundtrack to reading of a massive entry on Wikipedia. The various botched attempts at the making of the film DUNE or maybe the various MASS-EXTINCTION EVENTS that have occurred throughout the history of this dumb planet. CLICK HERE FOR THE MERDARAHTA BANDCAMP!

Secondly, a very in-depth and insightful writeup for SUMMER DARKYARD by Marilena Moroni who writes for the excellent metal-blog DOOM MANTIA. Marilena has been very supportive of my TSTAT stuff in the past and continues to do so with this article. The day this was posted, my bandcamp stats took a HUGE spike, so there you go. Awesome. CHECK IT OUT HERE

MORE REVIEWS of SUMMER DARKYARD + LAUDERDALE

SUMMER DARKYARD is featured in the most recent collection of THE SODA SHOP's Bandcamp recommendations. That's gotta account for at least a few listens. CLICK!

METAL PSALTER - Very insightful review. Completely unsolicited too! That's my kinda review. CLICK!

COMING THROUGH THE TREES - Comparisons to Darkthrone, Sabbath, The Smiths and a little shit-talking as well. CLICK!


Also want to provide a link to another band I play in. LAUDERDALE! New to GRINDCORE KARAOKE. Features DAVID HALL of HANDSHAKE INC. and TOPON DAS of FUCK THE FACTS. Free download, of course! GRAB IT!

ALASKAN/THE SUN THROUGH A TELESCOPE COLLABORATION NOW AVAILABLE

The song I worked on with Ottawa sludge/doom mongers ALASKAN is now available, as planned, on a split 12 inch with Texas post-rockers CO-PILOT. You can stream both songs on THE TREATY OAK COLLECTIVE bandcamp page. That would be the Texas-based label that's putting out the vinyl. I'm pretty happy with the way the ALASKAN song turned out. My contributions amount to a bunch of drones, some Casio keyboards and some backup vocals. The song is a crusher, with or without my input. Check it out if you've got about 8 minutes to spare.

Click HERE!