― Urnst Kouch (Urnst Kouch), Friday, 30 June 2006 14:43 (seventeen years ago) link
― Urnst Kouch (Urnst Kouch), Friday, 30 June 2006 14:44 (seventeen years ago) link
― mcd (mcd), Friday, 30 June 2006 14:48 (seventeen years ago) link
― CDDB (Dan Deluca), Friday, 30 June 2006 15:41 (seventeen years ago) link
― JayBabcock (jabbercocky), Friday, 30 June 2006 16:24 (seventeen years ago) link
magnificent fiend is really starting to sit right with me. took some time to warm up to the organs and how dude bellows his lungs out every line, but the riffs were there right from the start. i'm not hearing faces/blue cheer et al so much on this one as allman bros/uriah heep. and i'm a sucker for michael moorcock song titles. nice follow up to the first one
― kamerad, Thursday, 14 August 2008 18:13 (fifteen years ago) link
i like it too!
Howlin Rain - Magnificent Fiend (Finally, Some Of Those Nu Dope Weirdos Make An Album I Can Get Behind!)
and i hate everything!
― scott seward, Thursday, 14 August 2008 19:02 (fifteen years ago) link
still terrible.
― GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ, Friday, 15 August 2008 00:44 (fifteen years ago) link
Pretty much sucks. Wrote about it here:
http://blog.rhapsody.com/2008/04/catching-up-wit.html
― xhuxk, Friday, 15 August 2008 00:46 (fifteen years ago) link
oh you people with your IMPOSSIBLY high standards. sheesh. it's a fun record. it's not terrible like most things are terrible. um, not that i didn't trade my copy into the record store, like, two weeks after i started that thread, but still...
it was the first major label rock record i could get behind since...i can't remember.
― scott seward, Friday, 15 August 2008 02:10 (fifteen years ago) link
I really liked the first album a lot, but didn't enjoy Magnificent Friend at all. I'm willing to give it another shot, as I only listened to it once or twice at the time, but I remember it sounding very lifeless to me.
― krakow, Friday, 15 August 2008 07:29 (fifteen years ago) link
another listen or two might be worth it. xhuxk, i could swear there are hooks
― kamerad, Friday, 15 August 2008 15:59 (fifteen years ago) link
not that i didn't trade my copy into the record store, like, two weeks after i started that
Surprisingly, I still have mine. Mostly, because it's not worth anything. Used CD prices crashed this summer when everyone started bringing in their trash in hopes of getting a little scatch to help pay for gas.
― Gorge, Friday, 15 August 2008 16:04 (fifteen years ago) link
Finally heard the new one. What. The. Fuck. This thing is so crazy. Its like probably one of the best approximations of a bloated 70s blooze-rock record I've heard. I mean, yeah you've got your long guitar jams, but you also get all the negative connotations of such a thing - slick vocals, the three-part female backing vocal harmonies, codas that double the song's length, a steady stream of blues tropes. Often times this sounds like a supergroup that Clapton would have been a part of in his prime, and I pretty much mean that in both the positive and negative ways you wanna take it. At its best, it gets a good groove going and you can hear the Comets On Fire influence, at its worst, like on "Can't Satisfy Me", it sounds EXACTLY like the kind of song that one Stevie Ray and Jonny Lang loving motherfucker would pump. Its just, I don't know. My initial reactionw as revulsion, but they just absolutely nail the bloated blues-schlock thing so well that its an always fascinating listen. Its oddly compelling.
Really, really curious to hear what skot and xhukx think about this thing.
― Gonjasufjanstephen O'Malley (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 27 February 2012 14:01 (twelve years ago) link
bloated 70s blooze-rock
phrases like that keep me from listening
― curmudgeon, Monday, 27 February 2012 14:13 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, I mean, thats what this sounds like though! Theres always been that element, but they just sort of decided to go for broke with it.
― Gonjasufjanstephen O'Malley (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 27 February 2012 14:15 (twelve years ago) link
"bloated 70s blooze-rock" is being used here in a realheadsknowthedeal.gif way I think
not listened to this enough to ascertain whether they take it to a properly good place but I think the IDEA with this band is that they dig the gold out of the mud, sorta thing
― Sylv_ebanks (DJ Mencap), Monday, 27 February 2012 14:40 (twelve years ago) link
Interviewed Ethan Miller the other week -- pretty engaging guy and he definitely has a strong sense of both what he can do as well as his bandmates. I'd say you always want to give him the benefit of the doubt.
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 27 February 2012 14:46 (twelve years ago) link
Oh I don't doubt the talent involved here and I definitely think everything on here is intentional, its just a question of how far they went in service of this sound.
― Gonjasufjanstephen O'Malley (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 27 February 2012 14:48 (twelve years ago) link
I still kinda actually dig this. SPIN gave it a "Worst New Music" tag.
― stan this sick bunt (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 14 March 2012 16:29 (twelve years ago) link
Haha I still haven't come around on The Russian Wilds as much as others and I wasn't a huge fan of Mansion Songs either. That said, I really, really dug 2018's The Alligator Bride and I still like the first two records.
Reason for the bump is a spin of the new rarities comp (Lost at Sea) they released digitally on July 3rd. Leftovers from most of their records and an abandoned Ethan Miller solo record, plus some live stuff. It's really great, their take on "Here Comes Sunshine" is among the better Dead covers I've heard lately.
― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 14 July 2020 20:20 (three years ago) link
Alligator Bride was my favourite album of 2018
― Pinche Cumbion Bien Loco (stevie), Tuesday, 14 July 2020 22:45 (three years ago) link
Love Alligator Bride but the Live album is still my favourite of theirs. Lost At Sea is not on spotify though :(
― incapacitant hairdresser society (rizzx), Wednesday, 15 July 2020 07:37 (three years ago) link
Hopefully it'll be back later this year. Lost at Sea isn't actually due out until December with a full roll-out (LP/CD/Digital) but they released it for pay what you want on bandcamp for just the first week of July as a "full album preview". It's great. I need to track down more of their live stuff.
― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 15 July 2020 13:54 (three years ago) link
New album falls a little flat? It rushes by without much significance, hopefully it'll all come together with a few more listens
― black dice live ft. jerry garcia (rizzx), Monday, 11 October 2021 13:50 (two years ago) link
Still waiting for my copy to ship, holding off until I have a physical copy. Wonder whatever happened with the physical release of Lost at Sea, must have gotten pushed back to focus on the new album.
― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, 11 October 2021 14:14 (two years ago) link
Every few years I think I’m gonna like this band and it always turns out that I don’t. The vocals are a big no for me.
― zacata, Monday, 11 October 2021 15:32 (two years ago) link
Vinyl delayed by a week, I heard. I've been living with it for months and I really love it. I wrote this last week, didn't realise things got so heavy with Comets (or that they almost finished a fifth album). https://thequietus.com/articles/30629-ethan-miller-comets-on-fire-howlin-rain
― thing that i used to think was cool but now i just don't have time for (stevie), Tuesday, 12 October 2021 08:33 (two years ago) link