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Psychedelic fuzz rock outfit FREE RIDE will release their Acido Y Puto full-length on August 9th via Small Stone Recordings.

Born from the smoky depths of underground jam sessions in generator parties, FREE RIDEemerged from the haze with a thunderous blend of stoner rock, psychedelic grooves, and cosmic vibes. Formed in Madrid, Spain by childhood friends Borja Fresno (vocals/guitar), Victor Bedmar (bass), and Carlos Bedmar (drums), the band came together in 2016 with a shared passion for heavy riffs and mind-expanding melodies.

FREE RIDE channels the spirit of the ’70s with their raw, unapologetic approach to rock music. Influenced by the likes of Hendrix, The Stooges, and Black Sabbath, the band’s sound is a sonic tapestry of fuzzed-out riffs, pulsating rhythms, and lysergic solos that transport listeners to the outer reaches of the cosmos.

For their second album, Acido Y Puto, the band sought to capture the raw energy that flourished within the confines of their humble rehearsal room. Armed with nothing but their instruments, a few microphones, and an insatiable desire to create, they set out to capture the essence of their sound in its purest form. Produced by Fresno himself and mixed and mastered by Matt Dougherty in Chicago, the band’s DIY ethos permeates every aspect of the recording process, from engineering their own sessions to experimenting with different mic placements and recording techniques.

Acido Y Puto is a sonic exploration of the human psyche and the depths of the unknown. This album delves into the mysterious and often unsettling aspects of existence, inviting listeners to confront their fears and embrace the darkness within. Musically, it’s a journey that defies categorization, blending elements of psychedelia, punk rock, and even surf-rock into a fascinating soundscape. The result is an album that shimmers with crude intensity and cosmic energy, where each track is a testament to the band’s unyielding dedication to their craft.

In advance of the record’s release, today the band unveils a video for first single and album opener, “Space Nomad,” a tale of a nomadic voyager traversing the universe in search of cosmic truth and connection.

Watch FREE RIDE’s “Space Nomad” video at THIS LOCATION. 

FREE RIDE’s Acido Y Puto, which features artwork by Borja Fresno Benítez and Carlos Bedmar, will be released on CD and digital formats via Small Stone Recordings and opaque blue vinyl (limited to 250) via Kozmik Artifactz. 

Find preorders at the Small Stone Recordings Bandcamp page at THIS LOCATION. 

Acido Y Puto Track Listing:

1. Space Nomad

2. Outsider

3. Kosmik Swell

4. Vice

5. Nazaré

6. Steamroller

7. Joy

8. Blackout

9. Living For Today 

FREE RIDE:

Borja Fresno Benítez – vocals, guitars, synthesizer, percussion, sitar

Víctor Bedmar Lam – bass

Carlos Bedmar Lam – drums

Photo by Audrey Wilson

North/South Carolina heavy rock outfit SHUN will release their long-awaited new full-length, Dismantle, July 19th via Small Stone Recordings! 

SHUN released their self-titled debut through Small Stone in 2021. Outlaws Of The Sun called the record, “a big adventure [that] takes the listener on an exciting journey within the vastness of progressive rock and stoner metal,” while Sentinel Daily likened the record to Foo Fighters, “had they avoided a life of Hollywood openings and celebrity girlfriends, concentrating instead on year after year on the road with COC, Clutch, and Cave In… that’s a mighty fine something to sound like.”

Dismantle continues several crucial threads from the debut in terms of songwriting and the returning production of J. Robbins (who also contributes percussion, guitar, and synth), while expanding their scope with a more refined crunch and drifting, ethereal outreach. It is heavier and paints a broader landscape in Matt Whitehead’s vocal and guitar melodies, able to take a prog-metal chug in “Horses” and reshape it as the backdrop for weighted post-rock while refusing to sap its own vitality in service to shoegazey posturing.

Punk and noise rock such as Cave In and Hum feel like touchstones as much as Sabbath and whom- or whatever might’ve inspired the crush tucked at the end of “You’re The Sea,” and while Dismantle may hint as a title at notions of things coming apart, there’s as much being built in its ten tracks as is being destroyed. What results from the trio of Whitehead, bassist Jeff Baucom, and drummer Rob Elzey (Bo Leslie has since joined on guitar, re-completing the lineup) is material varied in its purpose but drawn together in traditional fashion by the electricity of its performances. The band-in-the-room feel in the methodical rollout of opener “Blind Eye” is all the more resonant with the debut having been remotely assembled during plague lockdowns.

Does that make Dismantle something like a second first album? Not really, but if it helps you get on board, you probably won’t get a ton of arguments. While Whitehead’s past in Small Stone denizens Throttlerod is still relevant to SHUN in some essential and riffy ways, SHUN steps forward with Dismantle and declares their meld of styles in tracks like “The Getaway” and “Interstellar” which are able to push, pull, crash down loud, or recede into float as they will. That they’d wield such command in their craft likely won’t be a surprise to those who took on the self-titled, but among the things Dismantle undoes, it strips the listener of expectations and replaces them with its unflinching creativity and refreshingly forward-looking take.

Comments Whitehead on the band’s first single, “‘Drawing Names’ was written in its entirety in under 30 minutes while jamming at our drummer’s house. I’ve found those quick-to-come-together songs that aren’t over-thought and overworked often turn out the best… go figure. The recording of the track was super fun and collaborative as well. I’ll never forget J. Robbins crouched down by my delay pedals turning knobs while I played one section. And then he later added a double tambourine part in the chorus which we absolutely loved.”

Stream SHUN’s “Drawing Names” at THIS LOCATION. 

Dismantle, which features artwork by Alexander Von Wieding, will be released on CD, limited LP, and digital formats. Find preorders at THIS LOCATION. 

Fans of Torche, Cave In, Alice In Chains, Failure, ASG, and huge riffs, pay heed. 

Dismantle Track Listing:

1. Blind Eye

2. Aviator

3. Horses

4. Drawing Names

5. Storms

6. NRNS

7. You’re The Sea

8. The Getaway

9. Through The Looking Glass

10. Interstellar

SHUN – Dismantle Record Release Shows:

7/19/2024 The Odditorium – Asheville, NC

7/20/2024 Swanson’s Warehouse – Greenville, SC

7/26/2024 New Brookland Tavern – Columbia, SC

8/02/2024 185 King – Brevard, NC

SHUN:

Matt Whitehead – guitar, vocals

Rob Elzey – drums

Jeff Baucom – bass

Additional musicians:

J. Robbins – percussion, synths, guitar

Bo Leslie – guitar

Photo by Rachel W. Rawle

Cult heavy rock trio IOTA will release their long-awaited Pentasomnia full-length on March 22nd via Small Stone Recordings.

It’s been nearly sixteen years since Salt Lake City’s IOTA carved a place for themselves in the heavy underground with their debut album, Tales. Released by Small Stone Recordings, it was recorded by drummer Andy Patterson (The Otolith, ex-SubRosa), with founding guitarist/vocalist Joey Toscano (who’d form Dwellers later), and bassist Oz Inglorious (ex-Bird Eater, Suffocater) and drew heavy rock impulses across space in a way that was innovative and engrossing. Marked by the twenty-minute “Dimensional Orbiter” that was the first song the band ever wrote, it showed huge potential for IOTA, who moved onto other outfits while the cult of those in the know steadily grew.

Pentasomnia, an album of five dreams, marks a return for a project begun by Toscano circa 2001, a band that has been intermittently lived with, shelved, pushed, pulled, stretched, and twisted, but whose sound shimmers with atmosphere and the resonant, bluesy emotionalism of Toscano’s vocals. Rather than some slapdash decade-and-a-half-later follow-up to a record on its way to being a niche-classic, Pentasomnia is cohesive, and as much an unexpected step forward as an unexpected return. IOTA — Toscano, Inglorious, Patterson — revel in the groove and sway of these five songs, from the boozy head-hang of opener “The Intruder” into the ambient push of “The Returner,” which feels like a manifestation of the meld between cosmic and desert rocks that was so much the heart of the band during their first run; the very essence of what they do, given new life and perspective.

“Pentasomnia is an amalgamation,” says Toscano, “roughly translating to ‘five dreams’. Each song is told from the perspective of a different mental state. Challenging the ideas of traditional norms about identity and our place within the world; questioning the very idea of a self. A cathartic acknowledgement of our infinitesimally small place in a vast musical landscape. Live shows will unveil the album’s essence, offering glimpses into our musical journey’s dark comedy and complexity. Enjoy these songs as snapshots of a fever dream.”

IOTA‘s sophomore full-length was written and recorded live over a series of sessions between 2018 and 2019 and completed in the tumultuous years after with family health emergencies, other projects and recordings, the pandemic, work, and all the stuff of life happening all at once. And yet somehow, in and perhaps from all of that, the three-piece have managed to come back together, find each other and renew their sound, and to let the intervening time underscore how crucial their collaboration genuinely is. There are going to be a lot of heavy rock records released in 2024. You sleep on IOTA at your own risk.

In advance of the release, today the band debuts first single, “The Returner.” Toscano further notes, “Pentasomnia, is centered around dreams. With each song narrating a first-person account of an acute mind state, ‘The Returner’ — the album’s third track — attempts to describe the character’s experience of waking from the dream of life, encountering their now unrestrained hallucinations in the in-between, and then returning to yet another dream. Interpretation, divine.”

Stream IOTA’s “The Returner” at THIS LOCATION.

Pentasomnia will be released on CD, LP, and limited-edition vinyl. Find preorders at the Small Stone Bandamp page HERE.

Pentasomnia Track Listing:

1. The Intruder
2. The Witness
3. The Returner
4. The Timekeeper
5. The Great Dissolver

IOTA:
Joey Toscano – guitars, synths, vocals
Oz Inglorious – bass
Andy Patterson – drums

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Photo by Matt Darcy

Boston-based desert rock trio SUNDRIFTER will release their long-awaited new full-length, An Earlier Time, on February 16th via Small Stone Recordings, today unveiling the album’s cover art, track listing, and first single.

SUNDRIFTER’s sound is bigger and broader on An Earlier Time. From the appropriate beginning of “Limitless” onward, the New England three-piece answers the potential of their 2019 sophomore album, Visitations, and their 2016 debut, Not Coming Back, with a collection that is likewise huge and intimate, bringing together expansive atmospheres a la Hum’s heavy post-rock vision with Soundgarden’s unmitigated heavy revelry and melodic command and the contemplative expressivism of Radiohead. The offering features eight songs, each one of them a world to get lost in.

With the returning trio of guitarist/vocalist Craig Peura, bassist Paul Gaughran, and drummer Patrick Queenan, SUNDRIFTER calls to mind the expansive atmospheric heavy rock of outfits like Forming The Void or Small Stone veterans Abrahma, but Peura’s vocals cull influence from ’90s alt rock in a way that emphasizes the individual now more than ever. The band’s third album realizations come complemented by the return of producer/mixer Dan Schwartz, mastering by Chris Goosman, and cover art by Branca Studio, furthering the “complete package” sensibility fostered in no small part by the weighted complexity and breadth of the tracks themselves. It’s not so much heavy rock as is, but as it could be.

In advance of the official release of An Earlier Time, today the band reveals the record’s first single, “Begin Again.” With Peura elaborating, “‘Begin Again’ is a constant battle to overcome negative self-talk and the pain that it can bring telling you of your failures, and the excitement that comes when you decide to acknowledge them and begin again.”

“I’d say the name says everything,” Gaughran continues. “It’s a statement of intention from the band. It’s taken far longer than we’d have liked to make this record, but time has its upsides. I’d like to think we’ve used it to hone in on a sound that better reflects our collective influences as a band, both musical and non-musical. ‘Begin Again’ tonally evokes all those influences, whether it be space and the desert or any of the spiritual concepts expressed lyrically, all while retaining the signature characteristics of our brand of heavy psychedelic rock.”

Queenan adds, “As the ancients had to rebuild humanity and societies after cataclysmic events so are we emerging from the ash and beginning yet again.”

Stream SUNDRIFTER’s “Begin Again” at THIS LOCATION.

An Earlier Time will be released on CD, limited edition LP, and digitally. Find preorders at the official Small Stone Recordings Bandcamp page HERE.

An Earlier Time Track Listing:

1. Limitless
2. Space Exploration
3. Nuclear Sacrifice
4. Prehistoric Liftoff
5. Begin Again
6. Want You Home
7. Final Chance
8. Last Transmission

SUNDRIFTER:
Craig Peura – vocals, guitar
Paul Gaughran – bass
Patrick Queenan – drums

Portland psychedelic stoner doom outfit ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD will release their 3737 full-length via Small Stone Recordings on November 17th, today unveiling the record’s cover art, first single, and preorders!

ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD released their Mystic Goddess full-length in 2021. The high-octane recording offered up a hallucinatory sound excursion through a wide range of styles that kept listeners engaged while never losing focus or sacrificing flow. The Sleeping Shaman noted, “This record touches on all aspects of stoner/doom/riff rock, blending them all together, in eyebrow-raising fashion. Desert rock, cosmic swirling psyche, Swedish-style stoner rock, as well as some grungy riffage…” Modern Free press hailed, “a fun ride through a smokey haze,” while Brooklyn Vegan wrote, “It’s heavy, riffy, and catchy, and if your taste veers towards this corner of guitar-based music, you should definitely check this band out.”

Two years later, the band is back and more potent than ever. With the assistance of renowned engineer, Billy Anderson, ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD delivers a relentless rock ‘n’ roll album spanning thirty-seven minutes and thirty-seven seconds. But the title is more than just the duration of the recording, and the band took notice of the number’s significance. There exists a theory in numerology that guardian angels attempt to communicate through divine numbers – specifically the repetition in numbers, and this one specifically is to remind us that, “magic and manifestation are knocking at your door,” and that, “you are about to attract your inner most desires.” Emerging from the pandemic and coping with the loss of loved ones, heartache, and mental anguish, the band decided to harness this energy and pour it into 3737.

As a result, we are left with an album rich with additively heavy riffing complimented by pummeling drums, groovy bass lines, and Caleb Weidenbach’s raw and commanding vocals. ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD intended to deliver something meaningful, not only to the band but to the world. 3737 is the answer.

In advance of the record’s official release, today the band unveils first single, “Hindu Kush” noting bluntly, “We got high and wrote a song about getting high. Turn this one way up, spark a joint and enjoy.”

Stream “Hindu Kush” at THIS LOCATION.

3737 was written and recorded by the band, mastered Justin Weis, and comes wrapped in the cover art of Zaiusart. The record will be released on CD and digital formats via Small Stone Recordings and on limited edition vinyl by Kozmik Artifactz. For preorders, visit THIS LOCATION.

3737 Track Listing:
1. Hindu Kush
2. Creature
3. Holy Ghost
4. Moustache
5. Apollo
6. Silver Cloud

ROBOTS OF THE ANCIENT WORLD:
Caleb Weidenbach – vocals
Nico Schmutz – guitar
Justin Laubscher – guitar
Trevor Berecek – bass
Harry Silvers – drums