Electric Wizard

Black Masses (Metal Blade/Rise Above)

Catalog monolith Dopethrone (2000), epic UK sludge equal to all of stonerdom’s unwashed bongs, overshadows most Electric Wizard dialogue, but Black Masses‘ analog distortion and druid doom flourishes in the massive psych drone of “Venus in Furs” and succeeding “The Night Child,” 14 minutes combined. Ten-minute tar pit “Satyr IX” and others lack only the radioactive guitar pulse of “Turn Off Your Mind.”

***.5

This article appears in August 26 • 2011.

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San Francisco native Raoul Hernandez crossed the border into Texas on July 2, 1992, and began writing about music for the Chronicle that fall, debuting with an album review of Keith Richards’ Main Offender. By virtue of local show previews – first “Recommendeds,” now calendar picks – his writing’s appeared in almost every issue since 1993.