Saturday, April 04, 2015

Hanging Low And Heavy...

Desert Suns - Desert Suns (2014)


This debut album from the Desert Suns of San Diego, CA, runs to half an hour of noisy attitude and throwback riffs, fitting with their cover art and track titles to provide a solid chunk of expansive & sometimes-fuzzy rock.  With bass, drums, guitar, and vocals melting together in effective harmony and good-natured dirtiness, the album hits its groove right from the start in "Burning Temples", and rides that vibe through melodic twists and break-down dips all the way to a satisfying final slide in "Run Through My Roots".
The band shines with the way they can put together those stoner rock riffs that sound instantly familiar, then jazzing them up and making them the band's own by way of extra filter effects, getting loose with the tune, and throwing everything into high gear when they need it.  Their meat and potatoes on this album is the drawn-out and desert-dry bluesiness of their slow jamming, which really gets shown off in the full-on blues of "Ten Feet Down", and on the advance single, "Space Pussy".  That track popped up on a Classic Rock Magazine compilation last year, presumably leading to the band's new link with HeviSike Records, who are putting the full album out on a very limited 300-copy run of vinyl; 100 of those are clear, sold direct from the label, the rest are white and will be the distro/band-sold copies.
Working the friendlier shades of modern stoner rock alongside the weight of traditional heavy metal, there's a lot for fans of early Black Sabbath to dig into here, while a heatwave shimmer from southwest desert rock gives it an extra psychedelic unpredictability.  Earthy and unearthly, Desert Suns have put together an extremely solid debut, and are rumored to already be working on a follow-up.  The album's up for streaming in full on their BandCamp, so you can give yourself a fair shot at figuring out whether you want a physical copy before they're all gone.
~ Gabriel

For Fans Of;    Powered Wig Machine, Chubby Thunderous Bad Kush Masters, Brimstone Coven, La Chinga, Mother Mars




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