Order and Listen to the new Mammoth Volume here!
As you know, we love the "new" here at Blues Funeral: new musical discoveries, and new bands fusing youthful enthusiasm with their own interpretations of classic sounds.
On the other hand, we also believe strongly that what came before shouldn't be forgotten. Yeah, some bands fade away, and eventually exist in our minds as flashes from the shimmering past, ever connected to a time or memory by that one unforgettable song.
But some bands and musicians who first made their mark 10, 20, 30 years ago still have more to say and more to play. And as fans as well as professional purveyors of records, nothing gives us more pleasure than to shepherd these bands back into the riff-heavy consciousness so we can all hear it.
Within the last couple years, we've been lucky enough to do this with Lowrider and Josiah, working with them on phoenix-like returns with staggeringly brilliant new albums after long absences. Now, we enthusiastically get to do so once again with the utterly singular Mammoth Volume.
Today, we officially present Mammoth Volume's new album, The Cursed Who Perform the Larvagod Rites. And boy, do we have some things to say about it.
The Cursed Who Perform the Larvagod Rites is the glorious comeback album of genre-bending heavy rock fusion from the godfathers of stoner prog.
Here are just a few of the gushing words on this record we've read from some of the luminaries of rock and metal media:
"Like Boss Keloid and King Crimson got into a fight with the modern sludge scene. It's fantastic and you need it in your life." — Metal Injection
“The Cursed Who Perform The Larvagod Rites puts this Swedish quartet right back to the top of the eccentric pyramid of progressive stoner.” — Distorted Sound
“It’s heavy, it’s interesting, it’s inventive, it’s performed with verve and gusto and it’s fucking good fun trying to work out where it’s going next.” — Ever Metal
"The twenty years between this album and the band's last seem to have made no dent at all on the group's chops or their hypnotic command of stoner rock." — Invisible Oranges
You might know a bit of the background about this band, who were founded in the small Swedish town of Lysekil in 1996. At the time, stoner rock was new, cool, and catching fire in Sweden, and Mammoth Volume immediately sought to differentiate themselves.
Proggy sections, unexpected phrasings, jazzy breaks, shady tempo changes and wistful ballads became hallmarks of their sound, alongside some of the biggest riffs to emerge from the Swedish "desert" scene.
Soon, Mammoth Volume went on a three-album run which saw them heavily praised and (frankly) dominating attention at StonerRock.com, the original online place to be for many of us. Their third record, 2001's A Single Book of Songs, hit like a bomb and even won best album on Stonerrock.com's yearly poll, no small feat by a band who was clearly as influenced by Yes and Mike Oldfield as by Kyuss.
Inexplicably, the band went dark within a couple years of that phenomenal album, but The Cursed Who Perform the Larvagod Rites feels as fresh, infectious and unrestrained as anything Mammoth Volume did in their heyday. It's obvious that the members' years spent in other bands have only expanded and refined their inimitable ear for putting together head-bobbing grooves and almost comically outlandish progressive twists, but it all makes for one smooth, infectious listen.
Here's a little nugget of embarrassing truth: our founder's original label, MeteorCity, passed on working with Mammoth Volume when they were getting started. Why? Because one of their coolest sounding songs seemed to be missing a drum beat right at one of the turnarounds.
The band weren't sure they agreed, but even so, their DIY recording method didn't really allow them to go back in and make adjustments or add missing beats like you can today. The record was so damn catchy and he thought the missing beat would always bug him, so he grudgingly wished them well in their label search.
Decades later, the song in question, "Seagull," currently stands as far and away their most-listened to track on Spotify, a perfect microcosm of what this band does better than almost anyone, why the early days of heavy, desert-influenced rock were so much fun, and how even our founder sometimes gets it wrong. But this little tale just makes it feel even more fitting and satisfying that this band and label have finally come together.
And so, Mammoth Volume is back, stronger and weirder than ever. It wasn't too late for us to jump on this bandwagon, and it's not too late for you either.
To order your copy of The Cursed Who Perform the Larvagod Rites on limited edition vinyl and CD or stream it on your favorite digital service, click the button below, and get ready to take one of the craziest rides that modern heavy rock has offered you in a hell of a long time.
Comments