Like nature itself, Earth’s glacial sludge rock awes even when it’s bleak and uncomfortable. Takes discipline to grind and drone at such a tectonic pace, giving painstakingly sustained notes open space to disintegrate. The veteran Olympia, Wash., unit’s 10th studio LP renders guitarist Dylan Carlson’s riffage as a singular, all-encompassing force. “There Is a Serpent Coming” boasts a blues-derived vocal from Screaming Tree Mark Lanegan. Ex-Rose Windows vocalist Rabia Shaheen Qazi belts out similar visions of doom on “From the Zodiacal Light.” Star power aside, vocals and lyrics get in the way of the slow-mo sonic onslaught. As the wordlessly volcanic “Even Hell Has Its Heroes” demonstrates, Primitive and Deadly fares best when Carlson’s emotive solos are afforded due perimeter. (Sat., 11pm, Elevation Amphitheater)
This article appears in May 8 • 2015.
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Greg Beets was born in Lubbock on the day Richard Nixon was elected president. He has covered music for the Chronicle since 1992, writing about everyone from Roky Erickson to Yanni. Beets has also written for Billboard,Uncut, Blurt, Elmore, and Pop Culture Press. Before his digestive tract cried uncle, he co-published Hey! Hey! Buffet!, an award-winning fanzine about all-you-can-eat buffets.
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