What can we tell you about Ultra Death Cult? Well the truth is not really a lot as their social media presence is at best sketchy, the bands Bandcamp page is not much better with their page header photo showing three members but their liner notes only mentioning two, Chris Taylor (vocals/guitar/bass) and Chad Huntington (drums). What we can tell you though is that whether consisting of two or three members Ultra Death Cult make a seriously impressive noise, as you will no doubt find out for yourselves when giving their debut EP "End Times Are Good Times " a spin The bad news is that ..read more

Eye of Aquila, Matt Snyder (vocals); Nicole Ridge (guitars); Joe Neves (drums) and Bruce Fowler (bass), are the third Californian band in the last two months to have earned themselves a Desert Psychlist review and are the third in that period to blend into their core sound of doom, heavy psych and stonerized metal elements of grunge and alt-metal. Desert Psychlist does not know if, due to some undiscovered underground tributaries, water from Seattle has been finding its way into California's drinking fountains but something must be causing these bands to take their music into these grungier ..read more

Doom and goth rock (especially the British variant) have a lot in common musically, both genres rely heavily on their atmospherics and both possess a mournful, almost melancholic, quality which is why it seems strange to Desert Psychlist that there are not more bands out there in the world exploring some sort of middle ground between the two. Well one band who are exploring that ground, as well as some others, are Canada's Hexenbane, Starla Nostraius (vocals); Cody Bobier (guitar), Alex Beaudoin (bass) and Tanner Hartmann (drums), a combo hailing from Nanaimo, British Columbi ..read more

Blending stoner/desert rock with blues, psych and alt-metal is not something new, there are a million and one bands out there doing much the same thing, many who have graced Desert Psychlist's pages, but to blend those elements without one gaining total dominance over the other is somewhat of a feat. California's Desert Suns, Ben McDowell (drums); A.J.Belluto (guitar); Lucas Fisher (guitar); Gabe Fonseca (bass) and Jason Busiek (vocals), are a band who have that balance almost down to a fine art. Of course it has not always been that way, it takes time to polish coal into a diamond, but with ..read more

For those not familiar with Gudger, Aaron Eddleblute (bass/vocals); Derek Eddleblute (guitar) and Justin Kaplan (drums), the band jam a groove that is an amalgamation of old school heavy metal and stoner/hard rock, a sound that unapologetically draws its influences from the 70's right up to the present day. Do not feel bad however if up until reading this review you have been unaware of the bands existence because frankly Ohio's Gudger have not been exactly the most prolific of bands when it comes to album releases, since their formation the band have only previously re ..read more

  It is funny how we have come to associate a certain kind of sound to underground rock bands and artistes from different countries, for example we tend to expect a level of  crushing intensity from bands hailing from Poland, Swedish bands we often associate with distortion drenched hard rock mixed with a large dose of fuzzy bluesiness while Chile seems to have cornered the market, in our minds, when it comes to swirling heavy psych. Now we do not know if it is just us but when we think of bands from Mexico we tend to think of bands with an abrasive and gritty edge to the ..read more

  Another year goes flying by and here we are again with another best of list. Once again we are publishing a list of  the 30 albums/EP's that kept us at Desert Psychlist relatively sane and grounded. As we say every year these are our picks and may differ greatly from your own but then you probably realise that already, we also need to tell you that the text accompanying our choices are a mix of snippets of reviews posted on Desert Psychlist's pages and blurbs we have posted on the various artists Bandcamp pages. Right fasten those seatbelts here we go again...... 30.  HUAN ..read more

Regular readers of Desert Psychlist will know that most of our reviews are split between music that is gnarly and crushing and that which is lilting and psychedelic as well as music that falls somewhere between the two. Today though we are reviewing a band whose music could just as easily be seen gracing the Doom Charts as it could heard gracing the airwaves of mainstream rock radio, a band with an undeniably American sound but one edged with world-crossing metallic growl and bite. The band we speak of are a Ohio three piece, consisting of Derrick Walter (guitar); Ryan Sharkey (drums) and Jo ..read more

As much as we at Desert Psychlist love the Electric Wizard inspired psychedelic fuzz drenched mayhem delivered by the likes of Sonic Demon, Witchsnake and Demonio we do sometimes hanker for that more expansive desert sound that first turned our head in the direction of Italy's underground scene many moons ago. Thankfully our hankering was assuaged somewhat by an email from Cesena based four piece Desert Collider, Federico C (guitars/synths/backing vocals/FX); Federico G (vocals/Synths; Andrea (drums/percussion) and Manuel (bass/FX),  informing us of the release of th ..read more

Aside from Mott The Hoople and three of the original Pretenders Hereford, UK is probably better known for its cattle than it is its rock music but that does not mean that there is a dearth of aspiring rockers to be found in the city. One such Hereford based band hoping to make their mark on the world are Mudlarker, Tom Berrow (vocals); Marc Jones (bass); Elliott Crosby (drums) and Dave Knott (guitar), a band who pitch their grooves somewhere between current era stoner rock and metal and 70's classic rock. Some out there may remember the band from their moderately well received  ..read more