NC "Thursday"- Viajando

   I know what you are thinking, "damn it Bluebird, you've made me wait weeks for your next feature on a North Carolina band. You lazy good-for-nothing slob, I want my NC Thursday feature and I want it now." A valid reason for such accusations of my character, but no one ever said music journalists are the most timely bunch, so who am I to rock the proverbial boat? Well wait no more you hippies and headbangers, feast your eyes (and ears) on Viajando.

    

    There is just something about growing up in the south. Life moves at a slow pace. The dicey historical baggage, the artery clogging food, and the thick humidity of the region can make one drag their feet through the thick sludge, and wipe their brow as they trudge to their grave. With that sort of immediate surroundings, it really is no surprise that this is where the blues and country music originated , incorporating a steady swinging rhythm that is a far cry from the hectic jazz music happening up North. Inevitably, the best heavy metal music to come out of my native region has historically incorporated similar plodding rhythms and smokey blues-oriented riffing, a far cry from the chill of Scandinavian Black Metal or the blitzing speed of Bay Area Thrash. While Black Sabbath melded blues with the industrial landscape of post-war England, the majority of such "groove" oriented heavy metal comes from the American South (and the contrasting landscapes of west coast "desert rock"), that has a clear regional identity. Over the last decade, Georgia has made a name for itself as the "place to be" for sludge metal, with modern heavyweights like Mastodon, Baroness, and Kylesa making huge waves in the international metal scene. But as these bands have expanded to broader sounds and have stepped out of the underground and onto a larger scale, there has been a vacuum of music that is slow, vast, and heavy (and sometimes catchy). North Carolina's Viajando has to the potential to pick up this torch(e) and carry it proudly.

   Formerly known as Stone City, Viajando (vee-uh-hon-doe) have recently released their Stone City demo, a culmination of several months of musical and personal progression. Their riffs reek of resin hits and bong water, fueling their crushing rhythms that inspire the sincerest of head banging. With surprisingly harmonious vocals reminiscent of both Kyuss and Floor, the vocal melodies seem to be made as more of an accompaniment to the music than the driving force of the songwriting.  Where they lack in innovation to the sludge/stoner metal genre, they make up in gusto and song-craft. I reached out to my old friend, and Viajando guitarist, Nick Brown to discuss the name change of the band, his record label, and why music can sometimes sound better slow. 

Bluebird: well to start, could you explain the name change from Stone City to Viajando, and the meaning of the new band moniker?

Nick Brown: Well simply Rick James' backing band is The Stone City Band and we just wanted to avoid any legal issues. Viajando is the Spanish word for "traveling" or "traveling a great distance." It seems to stand out and people like it so we've stuck with it.

BB: Do you feel like "traveling a great distance" has any relation to the band, or was it just an immediate sort of approval of the sound of it?

NB: Kind of funny you say that. I "commute" so to speak from Greensboro once a week to practice and travel whatever distance to play for the band. I feel that traveling also means exploring and we have been exploring all kinds of styles and combinations to make our distinct sound. I think "traveling" has a much larger meaning then just moving from point A to point B.

BB: Absolutely. I feel like the appeal of such a name comes from both a musical and physical sort of movement, but more importantly I feel like this could also apply on a larger scale to how one's personality and livelihood can travel from one transition to the next..

NB: Not only that but we have shifted from a four to a three piece which has dramatically changed our sound without letting our intensity die. It's very interesting

BB: Absolutely. To me, it seems to represent the constant flux of life.. Now, I've always thought of punk rock/hardcore as an incubator for vastly different art styles that many artists use as their initial musical foundation, and than use that as a springboard for a more vast web of content, but I feel that it somehow leaves it's thumbprint on any later content that is created. Now, that being said, you initially came from a punk/thrash background, so could you tell me about your initial immersion into "heavy music" and the transition from rabid punk rock to the more patient and groove oriented nature of stoner rock?

NB: It was a huge time, in my life at least. I was in college and was partying more and then the Magrudergrind self-titled came out and I heard SFN for the first time and those dudes had some slow fucking songs for being some of the fastest powerviolence I heard at the time. I think I finally accepted slow music. I also had a band black lung that wanted to do some kind of downtempo hardcore band thing and we kept getting out of tune and more stoned so we ended up with that stoner doom sound. Time went on and I kept discovering new styles, dynamics, theories, and especially bands that gave me new inspiration. I wouldn't even call my "style" as stoner. As long as it's groovy and fun and especially loud then I am definitely doing it right. I couldn't get more satisfaction than that from people telling me how much fun they had during our set.

BB: That sounds like it was a really natural evolution for you. You've mentioned to me before that when you were younger, you really enjoyed bands like Black Sabbath and Fu Manchu. Would you say it felt natural to maybe go back to music that had effected you years prior?

NB: Fu Manchu was a huge blast from the past once I seriously got into stoner metal. Everyone remembers "evil eye" from THPS 2x and that song wasn't punk or metal or rock and I was interested in their music video but the rest of their music was quite different. I think I was like 11 when I first heard them and I wasn't ready to seriously listen to them yet. Black sabbath was always in the picture. Always. Classic rock was, is, and always will be in the picture. That's what made me put my hands on a guitar.

BB: Would you say that living in the south has at all informed your or your bands sound?

NB: I'd say the south is a very interesting place for music. Not only is it on the east coast but it's also in a hard part of America for artsy music to find success. The south is desperate for change all the time and I think more so than anything it wants better music all the time. If you think about it, all the people that go to shows are in bands. Bands want to work with other bands to make the whole scene better. This has allowed for a really positive attitude with these southern bands but the audience has not gotten bigger. So all though I have pursued music and have been surrounded by people that care, it's hard for people that aren't active in music to stay interested, discover new bands, and go to local shows which makes it hard on the others that want to see success with their creative pursuits which require a huge amount of time and unfortunately money. I think that the south has definitely motivated us to get out of the south haha but without our friends, family, supporters, and southern, drunken, rock n rollers, we wouldn't be able to do anything

BB: Could you give me a rundown on your guitar rig and how it contributes to the bands sound?

NB: I'll give you the quickest run down since I could literally write the most boring book about it: I have a Verellen Loucks going into a mojotone 4x12 and I have a laney aor pro-tube 50 through an avatar 2x12. I have an agile with a bridge p90 going into a xotix sp compressor into a boss ps3 into an OCD into a mojo hand nebula 4 into a Ernie ball vp passive into a carbon copy into a lehle little dual. There is tuner somewhere in there. I use two amps for three reasons: 1) volume 2) tone boost - the laney exemplifies the tone of the Verellen and makes it oh so pretty. 3) it fills the tone space that another guitarist would fill. We had such a huge drop in tone when the other guitarist left and another amp was the only solution. I play both amps at the same time ALWAYS

BB: You recently started a label/distro called Crimson Eye Records. Could you tell me about your goals/ vision with this endeavor?

NB: Totally separate from the band but the label has always been a goal of mine for a long time. Not much to say about it. I plan on making a family and my kids will be the bands I work with and the albums they make. I mainly put out vinyl records but I have some other cool projects in mind. Not limited to any kind of music except that music that I like this baby is brand new so lots of time to grow. Keep an eye on it at www.crimsoneyerecords.com! Following my interview with Nick, they shortly after released the crushing new track Rogue, that can be checked out at viajando.bandcamp.com. There really is something about growing up in the south, and Viajando are simply a reflection of such an enviroment.

BB: Alright Nick, lastly, are there any plans in the not too distant future for Viajando?

NB: We just finished our first song "Rogue" that is on our split with The Seduction. It will also be on our first EP which is being recorded currently. The van is getting worked on so more out of town shows soon! New album, more shows, more of everything. We aren't slowing down and everyone should watch out because the fun has only just begun!

  Following my interview with Nick, they shortly after released the crushing new track Rogue, that can be checked out at viajando.bandcamp.com. There really is something about growing up in the south, and Viajando are simply a reflection of such an enviroment. Do not fuck up by not listening to this crucial new metal band.

NC Thursday: Future Primitive- FP14

The first in an ongoing series highlighting the best in DIY NC music.

"Punk rock is a youth movement." These words sum up what makes Future Primitive an important band to me. When I was in high school and lived in Greensboro, I boiled with frustration that my band at the time, a scrappy thrashcore band, was not only one of the handful of fast/angry bands in our city, but we were possibly the only one with a band primarily made up of teenagers. While we had a handful of friends who liked and supported our music, I could never shake the feeling that our age was a gimmick to the older kids, who verbally would pat us on the head for refusing to sing catchy hooks or play at a mid-tempo. I wish so badly that a band like Future Primitive was around at that time, to stand in solidarity as a group of kids refusing to be placed into a quaint "cute kid" role, and have fun and let go, fulfilling what punk rock needs to be (at least to a degree). These guys are in their late teens (I believe around 18-19), and are already light years ahead of what the jaded has-beens are achieving. These guys have only been a band for a few months now, but they are already "top 10 NC bands" material for me. This is a band that needs to be heard.

   Residing somewhere between hardcore punk, melodic hardcore, skate punk, and the smallest hint of emo, FP has a remarkably fresh sound. While you can certainly tell these guys have heard their fair share of pop punk, they synthesize it with raging Kid Dynamite-esque hardcore that is simultaneously angry, emotional, and even fun. 

   Maintaining a heavy skateboarding aesthetic, particularly that of the Bones Brigade (which I consider to be the golden age of skating). FP harkens on a visual level to classic bands such as JFA, Aggression, and early 90s Fat Wreck/epitaph bands, but FP pays both homage to this classic merger, but also has a sense of vitality and immediacy that feels neither contrived or nostalgic.. Much as can be true with punk rock, there seems to be multiple skateboarding scenes, some of which are polished, pretty, and corporate, and then there is the edgy, underground, and gnarly underground scene. It's pretty clear which one FP takes inspiration from.

  Future Primitive has the potential to make serious waves, as they stand in an interesting place in the punk spectrum. So many audiences can find something to love in this EP. Whether its the octave heavy guitars typically found in pop punk, the raging 2-4 beats of melodic hardcore, the harsh screams of west coast hardcore, or even occasional 90s emo interludes, this could be a band that could create a bridge between the factions. This EP has a sense of completeness and an amazing flow between tracks, which don't necessarily have a stand out track, but instead feel like a single piece of music holds together tightly. I only hope that these guys don't lose the aggression in favor of a more palatable sound, and push their style to an even more sharpened sword, to become one of the voices of Greensboro Hardcore (along with Holders Scar and Born Hollow) that they deserve to be.

I believe in Future Primitive.

Check them out at http://futurexprimitive.bandcamp.com/releases

  

  

10 Records That I Deem Worthy: Pt 2 (5-1)

    While my bottom five records were ones that I thought were great, these next five albums were truly fantastic. While I certainly could have made my favorite punk or metal or hip hop records of the year, I tried to consolidate it all together to pick the records that I will have in rotation for years to come. With that said, lets keep this train-a-rollin.

5. Ghost- Infestissumam

     Perhaps one of the most buzzed about bands of the heavy music scene of the last five years, Ghost initially became more known for their on stage gimmicks and mysteriousness than for their actual music. While looking at them, you may expect drone metal such as Sunn, or perhaps bone crushing Black Metal, but instead what you get is a throwback to mid 70's heavy metal, bringing to mind the guitar harmonies of Thin Lizzy, the dark melodies of Black Sabbath and Pentagram, and the theatricality of Alice Cooper, all blended in with a grimacing Satanic message. The record introduces new elements to the Ghost formula, with frequent keyboards/organs, and occasionally a less metallic tone, that sometime even could be described as beautiful. While there is more diversity present here than on their debut, the record is unmistakably Ghost. "Secular Haze" was the first song I heard off this record, and it can truthfully be one of the first songs that I've heard in years that actually gives me the creeps. It brought me back to when I first heard Sabbath's title track, and all the eerie feelings that accompanied it. While many bands try to be so satanic that it becomes silliness, Ghost embraces the gimmicks of 70's hard rock, which creates a vibe that is both light and incredibly heavy; leaving you to decide if Ghost is an auditory version of a goofy 80s B-movie or a darkly disturbingly morbid and disturbed skin flick. If you dig pop songs about Satan with duel guitar leads, look no farther.


4. Earl Sweatshirt- Doris

     Odd Future have always been a very strange act for me. I could never decide if I enjoyed them or was totally disgusted by their content and often moronic music. For every "Yonkers" or "Assmilk", we'd have an abundance of "Bitch Suck Dick" or "epaR". Earl Sweatshirt has always been a disappointing story for me, as his shock lyrics and personal life really downplay the fact that he is one of the most talented hip hop lyricists this generation has seen. With Doris, Earl has finally allowed himself to ignore the silly trap rap parodies and goofy music videos that have watered down the recent OF releases, and given himself the chance to speak on his own level. For years we have been wondering what Earl would sound like when he "grows up", especially after his heavily publicized time out of the public eye. Lead single "Chum" is jawdroppingly sincere, with a beat that may be reminiscent of early 90s albums from Nas or BIG, but does not bog itself down in phony nostalgia for a generation he was not even a part of. Everything isn't completely bleak though, with "Whoah" being something of a banger, and could be the soundtrack to doing ignorant shit with your friends. It also must be said that Earl has finally dropped the heavy handed shackles of rape stories, constant f-word dropping (I am not referring to the word "fuck"), and misogyny that was more disturbing than thought provoking. By dropping the childish shock format, we get to see a young man really come into his own as a thoughtful and clever rapper with a maturity that is far older than his Wikipedia page may indicate. Without being either overly emotional, dark, or light, Earl created a record that, to this writer, is the cure to the generic and rehashed ideas ruling the hip hop scene. Along with Kendrick, A$AP, and their ilk, for the first time in quite a while, the future may be looking bright for the next generation of MCs.


3. Night Birds- Born To Die in Suburbia

    2013 has been a great year for Punk Rock EPs and demos, there haven't been as many great records as I would have liked. This record though. Oh boy this record. This is one of the handful of exceptions. Coming up as a young punk rock kid in high school, I constantly had 80's west coast Hardcore on rotation. All the good stuff: Circle Jerks, RKL, Adolescents, Minutemen, Black Flag, Agent Orange, Dead Kennedys, Crucifix, etc. While there have been a ton of bands over the years that have had a classic Hardcore influenced sound, Night Birds are perhaps the only band that sound like they were ACTUALLY there. Its almost as if in my mind I can see a flyer for a VFW show with Youth Brigade, DI, Husker Du, and Night Birds. Perhaps the thing that really makes this band feel like an authentic 80's record is the fact that the songs are so damn catchy. Rather than screaming their lungs out in thirty seconds in a power-violent bravado, these are songs that you'll have stuck in your head for days. But that is not to say that I see them as a nostalgia act, because the music feels so damn genuine. The music truly flows from this group of guys, and the sincerity is apparent, the same way that Disma felt like a genuine continuation of 90's Death Metal. These guys flew onto my radar with their last record, and I thought it was fantastic. But this one pushes it much farther, creating a perfect record to slam dance in a grimy shit hole of a club, with a PBR in one hand, and the other one to block stage divers. Songs like "Golden Opportunity" and the title track are the perfect mix of youthful angst and rage, and track "Less The Merrier" are a fine continuation of the tradition of anti-Christmas punk songs. If you grew up on classic Punk records, but have become jaded with scene politics or pseudo jock Hardcore, this may be the record that'll make you want to put back on that leather jacket and pick up that Stratocaster and do it yourself.


King Krule- Six Feet Beneath the Moon

      This is probably the only record on my list this year that came completely out of left field. A good friend of mine had been talking about this guy for a few weeks, but given his name, I assumed he was a rapper in the vein of A$AP Ferg or something of that ilk. This is not what I found to be the case with this young man's masterpiece of a record. Perhaps this type of music is just not under my radar, and there is an entire scene of music in this vein, but I can truly say I had never heard anything quite like Krule. With jazzy and reverby guitars, this is THE record to drive around town to on a lonely winter night. Krule has the voice of a raspy man who has smoked far too many cigarettes. The kid oozes soul and passion, that is both sexy and introverted. The backing music can only be described as eerie and emotive, with dark synthesizers that don't allow themselves to go into post-punk territory, and percussion that alternates between crashing big band kits, and computerized hip hop beats. With the emotional pain released byJoy Division and the sincerity of Morrissey, and something that can only be attributed to mr. Krule, I can only say that you must listen to this record.


RVIVR- The Beauty Between

    Another band that had flown under my radar for quite some time, I have now become completely enamored with RVIVR's brand of poppy punk rock. In a genre that has historically been predominantly male driven apoliticism, RVIVR is a shining light in the dark. While lesser bands would wax poetic endlessly on relationship problems or youthful angst (not that there is anything wrong with that), RVIVR have used their platform to speak about sexual and gender identity, scene politics, personal crisis, and the injustices that even some of the post avid punk rock fans may not be aware are happening around them on a daily basis. A song such as "LMD" has singer/guitarist Erica Freas encouraging the listener that they have more strength than they realize, and to let them be unafraid to use that that to live a happy life. Initial single "Wrong Way/One Way" has to be one of the most empowering songs I've heard in years. Both Erica and other singer/guitarist Matt Canino battle with the expectations that society throws on us unwillingly, whether its the fact that perhaps you may not fit in with your peers, or that maybe, as a genetic male/female, you may not feel like you are a member of gender thrown upon you unwillingly at birth. After several more songs that are both fun and emotionally intense, we reach the epic "Hunger Suite" trilogy, a vibrant series of songs that ranges from slow bass-driven vocal interplay that is both dark and emotional with intense brass backing instrumentation, to blazing punk rock that keeps you on the edge of your seat till it brings it back down, just to build up to one last mid-tempo crescendo. The album closes out with "Party Queen", a song that is also epic on composition, with intensely beautiful harmonies that bring both awe and jubilation, closing one of the best punk records of the last few years. While RVIVR's music may not be as musically adventurous as bands such as Fucked Up, Iceage, or Titus Andronicus, they hold their own with superfluous amounts of energy and sincerity, with a message that is so direly needed in 2013 and beyond.
 

Thats it for the records of 2013. Stay tuned for my runner ups, top eps/demos, and best live music experiences of the year.