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Stöner, featuring ex-Kyuss members Brant Bjork and Nick Oliveri, have announced a new live album, Hittin’ the Bitchin’ Switch.

Ahead of the October 11th release date, Bjork and Oliveri served up a cover of their former band’s staple song “Green Machine,” which closes the tracklist on the forthcoming LP.

“Green Machine” was a highlight track on Kyuss’ vaunted 1992 LP Blues for the Red Sun, the album that helped launch the careers of Bjork, Oliveri, and guitarist and eventual Queens of the Stone Age mastermind Josh Homme. Here, Bjork and Oliveri revisit the classic song alongside Stöner drummer Ryan Güt, beefing up the low end on this live take.

Hittin’ the Bitchin’ Switch was recorded live at Altroquando in Treviso, Italy, by Matteo Pillon and engineered, mixed, and mastered by Tommaso Mantelli and Max Ear at Lesder Studio. The LP is 15 tracks in length and also features an additional Kyuss...

The Brant Bjork Trio, featuring the former Kyuss frontman, has announced a new album, Once Upon a Time in the Desert, arriving September 20th on the re-launched Duna Records imprint.

Bjork and company also offered up the single “Backin’ the Daze,” a relentless groover that showcases tight combo of Bjork (vocals/guitar), bassist Mario Lallo, and drummer Ryan Güt. A nostalgic number, the song’s video takes a trip back through Bjork’s rocker past with archival photos, while the lyrics are quite open about the youthful lusts and desires of those bygone days.

Those themes of nostalgia also tie in to the revival of Bjork’s imprint Duna Records, which has been on hiatus since 2006. Once Upon a Time in the Desert will mark the relaunch of the label — the future home of Bjork’s musical prolific output.

“Things come and go and sometimes they come back again,” remarked Bjork in the press release.

Former Kyuss singer John Garcia has announced a Spring 2024 tour with support from Jared James Nichols, Telekinetic Yeti, and Left Lane Cruiser.

The outing launches from Madison, Wisconsin, on May 15th and runs through May 29th in Brooklyn, New York.

Tickets for select dates are available via Ticketmaster. Fans can also look for deals or get tickets to sold-out dates via StubHub, where your purchase is 100% guaranteed through StubHub’s Fan Protect program.

The jaunt will see Garcia performing music from throughout his career, including songs by Kyuss. His backing band features guitarist John Bennet, bassist Billy Cordell, and drummer Greg Saenz.

Garcia fronted the pioneering stoner rock band — which featured a young Josh Homme on guitar — for the duration of the band’s run through 1995. The singer then formed Slo Burn and Hermano, carrying on the desert psych spirit of Kyuss.

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Garcia also formed...

Baroness have announced their sixth studio album, Stone, arriving September 15th. Simultaneously, the band has also mapped out a Fall 2023 North American tour and has shared the video for lead single “Last Word.”

The seven-week “Sweet Oblivion Tour” kicks off October 13th in Baltimore and runs through December 1st in Philadelphia. Notably, the band has tapped a who’s-who of rising heavy underground acts to provide support on a regional basis: Jesus Piece, Portrayal of Guilt, Primitive Man, Ken Mode, Wayfarer, Chat Pile, Vile Creature, Soul Glo, Sheer Mag, Escuela Grind, Midwife, Hoaxed, Empire State Bastard, Cloud Rat, Imperial Triumphant, Uniform, and Agriculture (with more to be announced).

A Live Nation pre-sale for select dates goes live on Thursday (June 22nd) at 10 a.m. local time via Ticketmaster using the code Disco. General tickets sales begin Friday (June 23rd) at 10 a.m. local time. You can also look for deals...

Gozu have announced a new album, Remedy, their first LP in five years. In advance of its May 19th release, the Boston band has unveiled the cleverly named single “Tom Cruise Control.”

The track gives off heavy Alice in Chains vibes with its thick riffs, compelling guitar arrangement, and the husky-yet-melodic vocals of singer-guitarist Marc Gaffney. Rather than letting their riffs repeat ad nauseam, Gozu steer the song into atmospheric asides that add an emotional weight not always found in heavy psych or stoner rock. Appropriately, the band is letting the music do the talking.

“‘Tom Cruise Control’ will take you riding into the danger zone,” the band stated in a press release. “Turn ‘n burn.”

Remedy was engineered, mixed, and mastered by Dean Baltulonis at Wild Arctic studios in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It follows 2018’s Equilibrium and marks the end of an extended break for the band.

“There is...

Nearly 20 years ago, Dave Grohl enlisted members of Motörhead, Celtic Frost, Venom, and other heavy-metal pioneers for Probot, his side project that he once referred to as a “death-metal Supernatural.” With the upcoming release of the Foo Fighters’ horror-comedy film Studio 666, Grohl returns to his most aggro side, telling Rolling Stone that he’s recorded an entire metal album as the film’s fictional band Dream Widow.

Studio 666 follows the Foos as they set up to record their 10th album in a dilapidated mansion. “I wind up finding this creepy basement.

Before Nevermind, Ten, Badmotorfinger, or Dirt, there was Gish. And while it may be a stretch to say that Smashing Pumpkins’ 1991 debut LP was the first album of the alternative rock revolution (Jane’s Addiction, Pixies, Nirvana, and Mudhoney might have something to say about that), it was an enormous landmark nonetheless. At a time when most indie albums failed to reach many fans outside of an act’s small cult, Gish entered the Billboard 200, topped the Cmj chart, and connected in territories as far away as New Zealand and Australia.

On July 3rd, 2019, Stonechild Chiefstick, a Chippewa Cree man who was part of the Suquamish tribal community in Poulsbo, Washington, was shot and killed by police during a confrontation at a park. Accounts surrounding the circumstances of the confrontation vary, but he wasn’t carrying a gun, and the officer who shot him was eventually cleared of any charges.

Chiefstick’s death is a tragedy that — like so many others of the last few years — has left a lot of questions and anger in the space where a living person should be.

When Joshua Ray Walker was a kid in Dallas, Texas, his mom took a job doing marketing at motorsports events. Every weekend, he’d tag along with her to monster truck competitions, motorcycle rallies, car and boat shows — anything that had a loud engine really. “Basically any redneck sport you can think of,” he says.

Walker liked being around the cars and trucks, but he was most fascinated by the rough-around-the-edges women who were recruited — often by his mother — to promote a certain product. Which is to say they were paid to wear a bikini,...

Queens of the Stone Age frontman Josh Homme led his first “Desert Session” in 1997, a year after he left stoner-metal firebrands Kyuss, when he invited members of Monster Magnet and Soundgarden, among others, together for an improvisational jam in Joshua Tree, California. After that, he regularly organized different groups of musicians to record whatever came to them and put out 10 volumes of their recordings through 2003.

Now, after a 16-year break that saw him playing with the Queens and Them Crooked Vultures and producing Iggy Pop, he gathered together a new...

California’s High Desert is heavy with rock history. It’s where country-rock icon Gram Parsons had his corpse cremated by friends; where an Irish band found a name and cover image for a great LP; where Jim Morrison dropped acid and made a movie; where Josh Homme and Kyuss cooked up stoner rock. Now The Mekons — those zany, erudite and beloved British punk-country-reggae-rock survivors — join the processional with Deserted. Recorded near Joshua Tree, the LP loses itself in the desert and finds timely survival metaphors everywhere. And it burrows...