Hermano: Out of Key but in the Mood

A brilliant song by Hermano. An earth moving Led Zeppelin-esque groove meets the vocal style of Cream and desert/stoner rock. Leave it to John Garcia. Click here.

Orange Goblin: Jesus Beater

Orange Goblin with John Garcia on guest vocals. Cool! Incredible song. From COUP DE GRACE.

Orange Goblin: Made of Rats

Here's a little Orange Goblin with former Kyuss fromtman John Garcia on guest vocals. Can't go wrong with this track.

HERMANO: THE BOTTLE

An excellent, grainy, black & white, gargantuan club performance here by Hermano of "The Bottle". Even though the sound quality isn't too great, this song can still knock you down. John Garcia in top form once again...ex-Kyuss, ex-Slo Burn, ex-Unida, but early Hermano...killer desert rock. Pick up "Only a Suggestion", Hermano's first and overall best. Three studio albums so far. Hope they stick together for a few more.

HERMANO: AT THE BAR

We go from the worst song ever made to one of the best (and little known). This song comes from Hermano's 2007 album "Into the Exam Room". "At the Bar" is such a perfect song....so quiet, a beautiful downer....thick, glossy, desert haze. John Garcia, please keep making music.

Some More Unida...

Here's a few tracks from Unida's only full length album, "Coping With the Urban Coyote". It's been long out of print, and is nigh impossible to find, except at a very high price. I would kill to have this album (not literally)....I wish it would come back in print. Heavy stuff, just as heavy as Kyuss. As I said earlier, Unida is John Garcia's most intense, full throttle, sun baked work since Kyuss split. The production is not as strong as you would expect from Kyuss, but after all it's hard to top the production work of Chris Goss. Garcia is also coming more and more into his own sound here, drifting somewhat from the trademark Kyuss sound. After Undia split, he really came into his own with Hermano. Unida is still impressive indeed...brain damaging molten metal. Give these two tracks a listen..."Nervous" and "Human Tornado".

UNIDA: FLOWER GIRL

Here's a track from Unida, one of vocalist John Garcia's bands he formed after the legendary Kyuss split part. This is very heavy stuff, Garcia's most intense work since Kyuss. Pure molten, ferocious desert/biker/hippie metal at it's finest. This is the first track from their 1999 split EP with Dozer. Unida has four songs on the EP, and all are great. It is worth the price for these four tracks alone. Without any further ado, here's "Flower Girl", the first rack from the EP. Enjoy.

SLO BURN: AMUSING THE AMAZING

Slo Burn was a band formed by Kyuss vocalist John Garcia after Kyuss' demise. The only album Slo Burn released was the four song EP "Amusing the Amazing" in 1997. Like Kyuss, Slo Burn is extremely heavy, desert stoner metal. Slo Burn's music is surprisingly good. John Garcia's vocals and range were growing stronger, and his sense of melody can be devastating. You can feel the desert sun blazing in all four of these songs. They are trippy, heavy, and soulful all at once. The production is not as strong as what you would hear on a Kyuss album, but that is ok. The music is strong and furious enough to overcome this problem. My two favorite tracks are "July" and "Pilot the Dune". Highly recommended. Here's "Pilot the Dune". Enjoy.

After Slo Burn, John Garcia would go on to form Unida and Hermano, both excellent bands and well worth seeking out as well.

HERMANO: "...INTO THE EXAM ROOM"

"Into the Exam Room" (2007) is Hermano's third and strongest studio release. Hermano are an excellent band led by ex-Kyuss singer John Garcia. Their music strays away from the stoner metal of Kyuss, exploring the many aspects of 1960's and 1970's psychedelic rock & metal instead. They are equal parts Led Zeppelin, Cream, Blue Cheer, and Black Sabbath. John Garcia's vocals are in top form, smooth and plaintive when they need to be, and dead on heavy whenever the music calls for it. "Into the Exam Room" has a high gloss 1970's production, and the feel of this album reminds me at times of the starry eyed retro rock of The Cult. All the tracks are great, as the song writing maintains a strong balance between melody and heaviness. Highly recommended, and here's a few of my favorite tracks.

LOWRIDER: "ODE TO IO"

Lowrider is a Swedish stoner metal band that only released one album, "Ode To Io", in the year 2000. Their sound is an impressive yet somewhat derivative mixture of the sun-drenched desert metal of Kyuss and a hint of the world-eating psychedelia of Monster Magnet. Their music is very heavy and low-tuned, with the vocals being somewhat reminiscent of John Garcia of Kyuss. They are not your most original sounding stoner metal band out there, but their material is heavy, convincing and well executed. I recommend tracking this one down if you're into this genre of music. It will not disappoint. Here's "Convoy" and "Dust Settlin". Enjoy.

KYUSS: WELCOME TO SKY VALLEY

Kyuss. If there is ever such thing as a quintessential, all encompassing stoner metal band, this would be it. They are driven by their influences from the past: Black Sabbath, Pentagram, Trouble, And Saint Vitus. What makes them unique is the ever present desert sun that permeates their sound and a strong penchant for biker metal a la Motorhead. They combine all of these influences into a sound that is all theirs and has fueled tons of imitators throughout the years. If there is such a thing as no holds barred, balls to the wall, acid burned, hippie biker metal, Kyuss is it. Kyuss came out with their first album in 1991. They released four albums throughout their career, and split apart in 1995.

Their hands down best effort of the four is "Welcome to Sky Valley"(1994). All of their releases are formidable, but this one is their best in my opinion. The teamwork, musicianship, and songwriting here are at their peak. John Garcia's gravelly yet melodic vocals are in top, ferocious form here, and guitarist Josh Homme's guitar work is outstanding, with his exotic tunings and mind-blowingly heavy guitar playing driving every track. Add to it one of a kind, trippy yet heavy drumming of Brant Bjork, the solid, melodic, fuzzed out bass-playing of Nick Oliveri, and the high gloss yet so heavy and bottom ended that your ears bleed production of Chris Goss(of The Masters of Reality) and you have the best stoner metal album ever made.

The album is actually only three tracks, with three songs making up the first two tracks and four making up the last one. The songs bleed seamlessly into each other. The only break you get is after one entire song cycle has completed. "Welcome to Sky Valley" is relentless and beautiful at the same time. There is a strong balance between melody and heaviness here, with nice spacey improv sections rising from the dust that remind me of the trippy sun and acid drenched jazz fusion of the 1970's classic Miles Davis album "Agharta". The lyrics, or what you can make of them, are incredible. They don't make too much sense, nor are they supposed to. "Welcome to Sky Valley" is best appreciated listened to all the way through with no interruptions, and on some really good speakers or headphones. You must kick back and soak the whole thing in...then you will be hooked. I cannot recommend this album enough.

I saw Kyuss live at a little club called The Midnight Sun in downtown Jackson, MS in 1994 when this album came out. Five dollars to get in. They put on a killer show. They had a gigantic incense burner and smoke machine going with Egyptian music playing in the background before they came on...the tiny, cramped place was filled with smoke and trippy lighting then Kyuss came forth and melted my brain and damaged my hearing for days...what a show! These guys were rigged for larger venues but they played the smaller clubs like The Midnight Sun as well with equal intensity. The heaviest live performance I've seen in a small club ever.

After Kyuss' breakup, gutiarist Josh Homme went on to form Queens of the Stone Age, drummer Brant Bjork joined retro stoner rockers Fu Manchu, and vocalist John Garcia formed Slo Burn, Unida, and Hermano. All of which you should check into as well.

Here's "Demon Cleaner" from "Welcome to Sky Valley". I know I've posted this one before, but not in the context of a review. Beside, it's the only video they made from this CD.


And here's the synapse-melting "Gardenia", the opening song from the album.

Gardenia - Kyuss

ORANGE GOBLIN

Orange Goblin are a heavy stoner metal band that came out around 1997. They have released six albums so far, my favorites being "The Big Black"(2000), "Coup de Grace"(2002), and "Thieving From the House of God"(2004). Their sound can best be described as seamless fusion of Kyuss, Motorhead, and Black Sabbath. In other words, no holds barred balls to the wall acid burned hippie biker metal with a tinge of horror thrown in for good measure. The vocals are always solid...they sound like a cross between John Garcia of Kyuss and Lemmy of Motorhead.

All three of these albums differ greatly from each other, but the same attitude runs through each. "The Big Black" is a heavy, trippy, sprawling, stoner space rock epic. "Coup de Grace" keeps the stoner rock but adds a hefty dose of biker metal and punk to the mix. John Garcia of Kyuss even does guest vocals on two tracks: "Jesus Beater" and "Made of Rats". They also do a very faithful cover of The Misfits' "We Bite"! On "Thieving from the House of God", they still keep on the stoner side, but have mellowed out a bit. They draw on more traditional '70's rock for this album, creating a more melodic, yet still potent sound.

I highly recommend all three of these albums. They are not perfect, because Orange Goblin tends to wonder off and lose focus on longer tracks, which is nothing to complain about because there's only a few. I would start out with "Coup de Grace" because it is the strongest of the three.

'Til next time,
As John Garcia sings in "Made of Rats"...

"If it seems like I'm sinkin',
and I'm talking to the back of my hand,
it's because I've been drinkin',
cuz I don't understand..."

Here's "Scorpianica" from "The Big Black", "Monkey Panic" from "Coup de Grace", and "Some You Win, Some You Lose", from "Thieving from the House of God". Enjoy!