UPCOMING SHOWS

Saturday, December 29, 2012

Year's End Pt. 2: Tim's 2012

As we reach the end of the calendar year, it's good to look back and see what has affected you in the past 12 months. For me, as I go back through a year in the life of myself, most of the significant events tie to a certain album, song, or band that I had been listening to. Not always as a direct result, sometimes as coincidence, and others just by pure chance. This list will catalogue 6 albums that were events in themselves to me. Works that left me with no choice but to continue listening on repeat until every last bit had fully sunken in. Bare in mind, not all of these are from 2012, however I did try to keep it to bands that had released something or been active in 2012 in some form, for the sake of the year end list's purpose I suppose.


Krallice - Years Past Matter :
"Years Past Matter" is quite possibly my favorite release of this year. I have yet to be able to turn it on and not finish it completely. I've literally sat in my car outside my garage or work for the last 20 minutes of the record on more than a few occasions when it hadn't finished by the time I was where I was going. This band traps you in the voids of space and pummels you until you don't know how you got there. The only down side is that  I can't find a way to stay there beyond the end of the music.

Drudkh - Handful of Stars :
From the second I first heard this band I had to try to find everything they had ever released. Drudkh is raw, bleak, and hypnotic in all the best ways. "Handful of Stars" is on this list because I listened to this album more than any of their other releases so far, and I still queue is up when I'm not sure what I'm in the mood for.

Converge - All We Love We Leave Behind :
I've said it before, listening to Converge is like being set on fire and loving every second of it. The way this band is able to capture such harshness, such blatant disregard for comfort is unmatched. This record album is flawless from beginning to end.

Between The Buried and Me - Parallax 1&2 : 
The piece of music that spans these 2 cds is incredible. A deliriously well crafted concept record that swoons with sweet comfort, slams into pummeling momentum, and then careens off a cliff into melodic cacophony over and over. No matter how many times I listen to this record, I still get totally lost within it and have a hard time placing where I am in the album.

Wolvhammer - The Obsidian Plains :
This album has a sore kind of sound to it. The whole thing sounds raw and even a bit messy, in the best possible way. Black metal that is truly rooted in the traditions of the genre without being even a little boring. Obsidian plains helped me beat the living hell out of my first 10K run and a few 5Ks over the year as well. When I want something drenched in hate and seething with murderous intent, I turn to these guys. If you can listen to this without imagining yourself trapped in the woods alone with some sort of corpse to feed on, you're doing it wrong.

Old Crow Medicine Show - Carry Me Back :
OCMS does a pretty damn good job of playing new music that rings true with all of the things that make true bluegrass great. Knee slapping jams and lonesome ballads, this one has it all. Most of all, like all of their previous records, this one is an absolute blast to listen to. I suggest it with coffee and the open highway early in the morning to get your day started in the right direction. 

ALSO:

Gilead Media - False, AshBorer, Fell Voices, Northless, Aseethe : 
I hate to lump all of these bands together like this, but let me explain. I attended the first Gilead Media Festival this past summer and had the chance to catch these, and a ton more awesome bands over the course of 2 days. Each of these bands presents an incredibly unique side of genres already well traveled. Fell Voices single handedly renewed my interest in black metal. They were directly followed by Ash Borer and False. Northless is heavier than anything has ever been, and Aseethe makes drone interesting in many different ways. So, in summation, no, these bands don't all sound alike. They all sound so different and unique, I offer them to you as a sampling of the awesome you'll find by visiting the Gilead Bandcamp page. 

Other stuff that was in constant rotation for me this year:
God Is An Astronaut, Pelican, Neurosis - Honor Found in Decay, Abraham - The Serpent, the Prophet, the Whore, The Mire - split w/ Cronos, Battlefields - Agasiz, The Avett Brothers, Nachtmystium, 

Peace and best wishes to everyone in the new year. Do yourself a favor and make a resolution to explore music the way you explore facebook from now on. Who knows what you might find.
-Tim






Year's End Pt. 1: Will's top 7

So this year again, we've taken time to bring you our own personal "Top" listing for the year of 2012. I've decided against a "top 10" as most people do, for the bands that I've caught live this year, in the moment that I saw them it was perfect! No video feed or recording could possibly capture the true emotion and depth of atmosphere and the underlying "feeling" of what these bands accomplished! And so I'm reflecting on the year with the number Seven which to me represents a perfect numeral which breaks order (10).
I do not list these bands in any order, because to do so would build an unjust bias. With that I give you my "Perfect 7 List of 2012:" (7 bands that really kicked ass live in the Twin Cities!)
 1.) Morality Crisis
 2.) O'death
 3.) Russian Circles
 4.) The World / Inferno Friendship Society
 5.) Guzzlemug
 6.) Speaker Eater
 7.) Lungs
 A couple of these bands have a few things in common, but there are a vast number of differences separating them entirely onto 7 different planes. A challenge to anyone who wants to check any of them out is to prepare your mind and let it marinade in every note and pitch, close your eyes and let it take you on a journey. Concentrate and reflect. Open your 3rd eye and let it speak directly to you! Imagine! Hope everyone has a happy New Years celebration, see you on the other side! (2013)
-WSOrwell

Monday, August 6, 2012

Erik's Live Rig

Hey all, Erik here. Seeing as Tim threw up his rig, thought I'd let you guys see what's happening on the other side of the stage. Hope you gear hounds are still paying attention...
Warrior "Fully Armed Knight" Guitars These guitars are unbelievable. Excellent build quality and superb tone from these guys. The guitars have a unique neck shape that make them almost effortless to play. The quilt top is loaded with Seymour Duncan Alternative 8 in the bridge position and Jazz bridge in the neck, while the natural mahogany has a Suhr SSH+ bridge and SSV+ neck set. Both sets have tons of output and are coil tapped to allow single coil tones. I like to get silly with my pickups to get different sounds throughout the set. These guys run through my board into...
Splawn Quickrod (early 3 pre version) I've had a lot of great amps, but this guy beats them all (for now). A 'roid raging Marshall. This thing can do Plexi to hot-rodded JCM800 with ease. Get the right pickup combo and the clean is pretty decent too. What's this pumping into?
Port City WaveOS 2x12 "The best sounding 4x12 that just happens to have 2 speakers." I found this beauty in my local guitar super store Dave's Guitar Shop (where I found most of my rig really) and I don't think it'll be going anywhere. This cab blows me away every time I plug into it. The front port design adds the low end and thickness of a 4x12 without the extra speakers or weight. This beat out a Mesa OS 4x12 in my book. And then there's.....
THE BOARD! This guy is ever changing for me, but it's loaded with some awesome effects to bring out the layers Tim talked about earlier in Avoh. Starting in the upper left, a TC Electronic Hall of Fame Reverb. Awesome reverbs from old school spring 'verbs to haunting cavernous echos. Modtone Analog Delay, cool little short analog delay for some leads. ISP Decimator G String pedal to keep things quiet. Eventide Pitchfactor, TONS of cool sounds in this guy, great harmonies and synths in this. When I get bored I start going thru this thing to see what other sounds I can find in it. Korg Pitchblack Plus tuner, great reliable tuner with two inputs programmable for different tunings. From bottom left, Line6 DL4 Delay Modeler, fantastic delays in this thing with an easy to use looper, MXR EVH Phase 90, the coolest phaser I think, the EVH model has the old school "script" version and the newer "block" phase. T.C. Jeaurnig Gristle KING pedal. Great tube screamer on the left, gain boost on the right. Many cool tones from this guy. You can even switch the gain boost to be pre or post tube screamer to act as a volume boost or gain boost. Everything is connected from board to amp with a cool cable called the Pedalsnake. It has four different cables in one, each with Midi connectors on the ends that accept different adaptors to run audio or power signals, so I can keep my power supplies back behind my amp and run audio to the front of the amp and to/from the effects loop. Cool thing is that as my rig changes, I can change the ends of the cables as needed without buying different cables altogether, plus it's just one calbe running to the board instead of 4 or 5. So there it is! You can see all this and us on tour in just a few days!

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Creating Layers Live: Tim's Rig

So, for the gear nerds out there I thought I'd give you a run-down of what I use live to recreate all the righteous sounds we have on AVOHFASIH. I'll go through it in list form to make it nice and easy!

- AMP -
• ENGL PowerBall - Best head I've ever owned. Reliable, tough, and loud as fuck. Plus the focused mid option gives my tone some extra fat.

• Marshall 4x12 - To be honest, I'm not sure exactly what this cab is, but it's loaded with 4 25 watt BlackBack speakers. Insanely gnarly.

*Dahlia to fat-awnry cat not included*

- PedalBoard -
• Homemade board

• Line 6 MM4 - I basically picked this up because I couldn't fine a Phase 90 locally. Dave's guitar in La Crosse had this thing laying around. It has phase, flange, tremolo, chorus, etc etc. Fun to mess with, and I use it for some auto-wah and flange type stuff live here and there.

• ISP Decimater - Noise gate, I try not to use this unless we have a part in a song that requires real silence, otherwise, I just like to let the amp hum and hiss all she wants.

• T. Juernig Gristle King - The king of versatile overdrives, hand-built right here in Wausau by a rad dude named Tim Juernig. We used this for most of the overdrive/distorted tones on AVOH in some way, and I have it on live for various parts to add thickness. Also, I use the second channel of it for a solo boost. It's not the cleanest of boosts, but who the hell cares, it sounds fucking awesome.

• Korg Blackout Tuner - nice and simple, registers low tunings well. Can't beat it.

• Channel switch - lets me access all 4 channels of my amp with just 2 little buttons.

• Line 6 DL4 - I use this pedal for tons of stuff. It has a bunch of great delay, and a 16 second loop, which we use live for "From Depths, I Rise" to get multiple guitar lines layered for the intro.

• Eventide SPACE - You can't find a cooler pedal than this. Honestly the only thing I've found that rivals it is the Eventide Pitchfactor, which Erik has on his board! haha. In all honesty though, If you need reverb, delay, or just some crazy sounding stuff, this pedal can do it. You could ask my wife how many times we've been listening to music only for me to turn it down and say "I bet I could make that sound with the SPACE" and you'll probably get and angry look and a answer something like "too god damned much" lol. If you ever have a chance to play


   

And that's it! Other than a couple LTD guitars and some monster cables!
Thanks for looking and feel free to ask questions if you have any!


mind-numbing detail.

Monday, July 9, 2012

2012 August Tour Announcement!






We're Hitting the road with our brothers in SPEAKER EATER. Check it out. RSVP right here on our site to put it on your facebook calendar. We can't wait to bring AVOH to you guys on the west coast, and we are truley excited to be taking a trip through some of the most beautiful areas of the country that most of us have never been. Please help us spread the word! Thanks, see you all soon!
- ORWELL 

- Speaker Eater is offering a of the third track from their new album, Lords entitled "Inalienable Tongues," availably exclusively on Metalinsider.net.  

LINK: http://www.metalinsider.net/new-music/orwell-announce-western-tour-exclusive-stream-from-opener-speaker-eater
Aug 09 - Minneapolis, MN @ The Tree House
Aug 10 - Fargo, ND @ The New Direction
Aug 11 - Missoula, MT @ Zoo City Apparel
Aug 12 - Seattle, WA @ TBA
Aug 13 - Portland, OR @ The Know
Aug 14 - Oakland, CA @ Vitus
Aug 15 - Los Angeles, CA @ TBA
Aug 16 - Las Vegas, NV @ Yayo Taco
Aug 17 - Salt Lake City, UT @ TBA
Aug 18 - Denver, CO @ The Lion’s Lair