Release Date: October 06th 2023. Record Label: Self Released. Formats: DD
Wherever It Goes - Tracklisting
Fee Fi
Facedown
Crimson
Look At Your Hand
The Start
Fade
Wherever It Goes
It’s Getting High
Members
Ben Cornel - Guitars/Vocals/Bass
Julian Lac - Bass/Vocals/Guitar
Alex Segreti - Drums/Vocals/Percussions
Review:
Canadian Hard Rock/Stoner Rock unit MOOCH return with their second full length album Wherever It Goes and if you dig classic rocking tunes that take creative aims from bands such as KYUSS, 1000Mods, Truckfighters and Borracho though MOOCH take a more outlandish approach with influences such as The Doors, The Who and QOTSA. The album strikes the right balance of Classic Rock riff-worship and modern day Psychedelic/Atmospheric sounds.
With a thirty three minute run time it’s majorly impressive how many different styles of music that MOOCH contain within such a tight time frame. Echoes of buoyant KYUSS/QOTSA runs supreme on the excellent two opening tracks of Fee Fi and Facedown. There is a wicked melodic sound that airs on the more rebellious style of Stoner Rock but MOOCH show some impressive waves of Post-Rock or Post-Stoner grooves that builds upto a sound that even QOTSA would be proud to call their own.
Third track Crimson ventures into the world of Art-Rock with Prog Rock flourishes and trippy Stoner jams with an essence of the Scorched Californian Desert Rock landscape being given a distorted FUZZ and JAM-BASED makeover. The song is quite slow-paced but is perhaps the standout track on the album with MOOCH adding a level of creative maturity that some established long-time acts never achieve. The vocals are quite surreal and quite DOOM based with shouts of “UNLOCK THE DOOR” making you feel you’ve come down from a bad trip. Crimson successfully explores the hopefully 1960’s Psych Rock scene with the hedonistic style of 1990’s Stoner Rock/Metal.
Fourth song Look At Your Hand is another track where MOOCH embraces a different musical persona by playing Middle Eastern inspired Psych Rock/Folk/Tantric Pop hooks. There’s still a sense of world-weary Stoner Rock mysticism but it sees MOOCH in their most inventive when thinking outside of the box. Surreal and trippy spaced out sounds allows this song to have an easy-going attitude which is very hard to resist.
Fifth song The Start is a Punk Rock driven Stoner Rock number with free-flowing 1960’s poppy inspired vocals which are marred with that classic sounding Stoner reckless and seedy lifestyle which allows MOOCH to return to their WEEDIAN ways. The added bonus of sublime extended instrumental jams with layers of ridiculous FUZZ allows this to be one of the other standout tracks on the album.
The final three songs of Fade, Wherever It Goes and It’s Getting High is where MOOCH combine elements of The Doors with traces of King Buffalo inspired Psychedelic/Spaced Out jams which perhaps come through strongly mostly on Fade and Wherever It Goes. There’s a little bit of everything within the Desert/Stoner Rock universe that’s being played on this album and don’t MOOCH just run amok with a sense of dangerous bravado that brings some of the heaviest and most dangerous grooves on the album.
Remember, MOOCH’s debut album was recorded and produced by Brant Bjork, Bubba Dupree and Joe Segreti. This time round, the album was produced by MOOCH themselves. They did a stellar job here with production values matching their debut album and even in some cases surpassing them especially on the more heavier psychedelic moments.
This is the type of album that famed underground labels such as Ripple Music or Heavy Psych Sounds should have released. That’s how great the album is.
Wherever It Goes is a mysterious and mind-expanding album that will take you on quite a surreal journey within the Stoner Rock vortex where the grooves are soulful, beautifully heavy and outlandish from start to finish.
Words by Steve Howe
Links
Facebook | BandCamp | Instagram
Thanks to MOOCH for the promo.
Wherever It Goes will be available to buy on Digital from all digital suppliers from October 06th 2023.a
