When considering the music credentials of the members of the
\nAtomic Bitchwax, there’s little room left for debating that the
\nband carries the goods to be heralded as one of the forerunners of
\nthe “stoner rock” movement. With the band’s first two albums,
\ninconspicuously titled
\nAtomic Bitchwax<\/i> and
\nAtomic Bitchwax II<\/i>, being received with generally wide
\nacclaim, guitarist Ed Mundell of Monster Magnet fame, bassist Chris
\nKoznik (ex-Godspeed), and drummer Keith Ackerman found themselves
\nreleasing what normally would be considered an EP of sorts with
\ntheir seven-song effort
\nSpit Blood<\/i>.<\/p>\n
In fact, this effort is more of a hodge-podge of tracks that are
\nnow being given the light of day. One AC\/DC cover song, one jam
\nfrom a previous album that has an alternate close, three new
\ntracks, and two dusted-off songs from 1996 form the guts of this
\nrelease.<\/p>\n
The liner notes mention that the band only performs the AC\/DC
\ncover (“Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap”) live when they can summon a
\n“guest singer with balls” to perform the vocals. This should give
\nyou a good impression of how crappy the song sounds as the lead
\ntrack on this album. There’s absolutely nothing revolutionary to
\nsay about the Bitchwax’s version as all of the original
\narrangements of the song remain intact; the vocals are simply
\nhorrid.<\/p>\n
“Liquor Queen” is an alternate version of the track that
\nappeared on
\nAtomic Bitchwax II<\/i>. The
\nSpit Blood<\/i> take is a groovy little number, highly
\nsynthesized in the opening, that maintains the same overall pace
\nand sonic diversity of the previously released version. While
\ndevoid of lyrics, the song is a scorching jam session, suggesting
\nnothing more for the listener to do other than buckle up for the
\nride.<\/p>\n
When studying the new tracks, I’m moved to say the song “Cold
\nDay in Hell” is imminently forgettable with its repetitive loops
\nuntil the last minute or so when the song is fused with the
\nspaced-out warble of Mundell’s guitar riffing. It’s the cosmic
\nsound where the Atomic Bitchwax are at their distinctive best. The
\ntitle track is a spacy effort that has the band experimenting with
\nsounds culminating in a nod to a late 1960’s-era drone of
\npsychedelia. The common thread that can be associated with all
\nthree of the new songs on
\nSpit Blood<\/i> are that the jams are much slower and drawn out
\nthan nearly all of the tracks on the first two Atomic Bitchwax
\nalbums. You could call it stoner rock relying on the blues to guide
\none through the night, or you could just say the Atomic Bitchwax’s
\nperformance of these tunes is far less exciting than their previous
\nwork.<\/p>\n
The other two tracks, “Black Trans-Am” and the funk-style “U
\nWant I Should,” are songs recorded from the early Atomic Bitchwax
\nera that muscle their way through the album with the stoned-out
\n80’s vibe that essentially spawned the whole stoner rock movement.
\nWhile the two songs have undergone re-mixing since they were first
\nrecorded, they remain distinctive.<\/p>\n
This “vault” style release captures each period of time leading
\nup to the band’s previous studio releases, incorporating the
\nvarying styles in a mix-n’-match way. The end result is a bumpy
\nlistening experience. It’s worth noting that Ed Mundell quit the
\nband just weeks before the album’s official release; I can’t help
\nbut wonder if the events leading up to Mundell’s departure allowed
\nfor the album to be constructed in such a sloppy way. A possible
\nsaving grace to this whole mess is that Meteorcity kicks in a
\nsampler CD disc of other bands tracks from the stoner scene. The
\nsampler helps make up for the some of the deficiencies that
\neventually drown
\nSpit Blood<\/i>.<\/p>\n
\nSpit Blood<\/i> should be remembered for what it is and that is
\nnothing more than a “cleaning of the closet” of material most
\nsuited for die-hard Atomic Bitchwax fans. Given that the album’s
\nbest song can be found elsewhere in their library, that’s probably
\nwhere you should focus your attention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":26356,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6837],"rating":[11204],"class_list":["post-37586","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-atomic-bitchwax","rating-rating-c-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/37586\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=37586"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=37586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}