[batreleaser]

Anyone else into this band? I thought I've seen them mentioned here. I have had thier record "UnonoU" for a while now, but just recently I've realized that it and thier "S/T" record are some of the most original and pure rocking things I've heard these days. The band is pretty young but has already fully realized thier sound. And what a sound it is. Almost reminds me of Sparks "Hello Young Lover", as that album combines operatic like glam-prog instrumental and vocal passages with straight up pre-thrash hard rock riff ragers. This album is like that only the whole thing is riff ragers. I'm hearing Thin Lizzy as well. Also the occasional nice synth sound to liven the mood. Seriously, there really is no other band doing anything remotely like this, a totally unique thing going on here.

I might as well mention Endless Boogie here as well. Thier recent full length album is fucking phenomenal and essential for any lover of psychedelic rock. It sounds like the absolute best parts of a ZZ top song stretched out to about 15 minutes. Think the ZZ dudes heading out to the desert and dropping peyote, and managing to use batteries and plug in and put all the volume up to ten, past that even, the bass and guitar then start a virtuosic rhythm that then just locks in and doesn't break throughout the duration of the song, this gives room for ol Billy Gibbons to shred and rip his guitar around like a drugged wildman all while slowing his early 70s talk style of singing to a slow gargle of random slurs. Except the band is Endless Boogie and there are two guitars going to fucking war. The vocals are really how I said though; just nonsensical talking and mumbling and screeching; they sound awesome. The real mindblower though is the rhythm section; like I said, they just stay locked into this amazing power-tribal pattern that crushes as much as it hypnotizes, they leave so much room for the guitars to just freak out but never lose rhythm. Fucked up band. Droning COCK Rock I'll call it.

Kind of a rant but these bands both have been blowing my mind.

[Dead-Air]

My friend Monte drums for them. That said, I'm not as into them as I feel like I should be. I wish they'd stay away from the more pop side of the hard/prog rock and focus on the doom and metal influences. No denying the talent and dedication in that group though. Even though it's not totally my type of music, I'm impressed with how serious they take their trip.

[batreleaser]

No way man, think of how many fucking bands there are that play in a slow doom style? That type of music is totally played out, it basically started and peaked with Sabbath and there's been interesting variations of it here and there. Danava's sound is just so original. More than anything, I think I appreciate thier originality, there isn't a band doing anything remotely like them right now. Tell your friend Adam Lehrer of tucson gives his band props.

[SpectralJulianIsNotDead]

I heard them once on the radio
I liked the song enough to call the DJ up and ask what he was playing
I kind of forgot about them

[Kuwa_Slayne]

I kind of dig Danava. I only have their S/T, though. For some reason I get a Spinal Tap vibe from them.

[DJ Rick]

Danava are pretty unique for sounding at times like every different flavor of heavy metal from the entire decade of the 70's....plus elements of "glam" and "space" in there.

I first saw them in November of 2004 when they were touring with Glass Candy, and they practically made my jaw hit the floor. I picked up their four-song demo CDR and everything else on their merch table, including the LP by the pre-Danava band called Princess Sweepstakes, which became my #1 favorite thing of 2004. Everyone in Danava was in Princess Sweepstakes, but there was this other dude named Zac (as opposed to Zack who is a different guy in both bands) who split from Portland after Princess Sweepstakes and moved down here to Sacto and later formed Who's Your Favorite Son, God? and records solo as Hexlove and/or Faulouah...all of which have provided some excellent moments. Princess Sweepstakes was a very different beast from Danava....sounds like they coulda come out on Ralph Records 30 years ago! If you were to plot the Residents, Chrome, and Pere Ubu on a graph, Princess Sweepstakes would be in the middle of that triangle somewhere shading a bit toward the Residents' point. Apparently, they've played a reunion show very recently.....wish I'd known...I woulda certainly driven the 600 miles to Portland to see that. (Call me crazy!)

There's another band in this family tree called Willow Bay which is pretty much the same membership as Princess Sweepstakes doing some even weirder shit. A little more electronics creeps in, and you can hear Zac making his mark unmistakable.

There's actually about a dozen bands in this family tree leading back to all of these bands' Midwestern roots. All of the bands have CDR releases on a label called Scenery Audio Archive which is like some crazy deep wellspring of weird flavors of psychedelia. Sounds mostly like stuff on Paw Tracks, but heavier at times and a lot more intensely personal.

Another splendid side band of Danava is Dogbite 65. I heard a CDR-EP of them called Motorbike Poop a few years back which sounds like someone jammed Hampton Grease Band and Caroliner all day, took some really good drugs, but stayed firmly enough on the ground just to be able to nail a good chunky riff in time.

Zac released a Scenery sampler CDR comp of sorts not quite two years ago called Flat Gettin' It, and it had even more solo stuff by various members of the Princess Sweepstakes/Danava family tree, including Buck Rothy, who was (still is?) on the same radio station as Dead-Air.

[batreleaser]

ear princess sweepstakes.

funny you mention hampton grease band, i just downloaded like 5 of thier records last night.