Dwellers – Pagan Fruit
Label: Small Stone
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By: Phil Kimm, RockRevolt Magazine Contributor
Salt Lake City-based rockers Dwellers are back with their sophomore effort Pagan Fruit after slapping the world awake with their accomplished debut Good Morning Harakiri. It is a stunning body of work that, while bearing influences from the past, charts its own course to the future. The aim is to snatch you from your mundane existence, teleport you into an idling spaceship, and rocket you into an alien musical experience. And I dare say the talented trio of vocalists and multi-instrumentalists achieved their lofty aim. Scheduled for release on Small Stone on May 6th, Pagan Fruit is a worthy addition to any rock-head’s collection. When you get the album, load these nine gems on your iPod, snap on your headphones, and see where you end up.
The album introduces itself at walking pace with a lethargic guitar riff signaling the start of “Creature Comfort”. Joey Toscano drags his verses out with the roar of an awakening lion and eventually allows his guitar do the singing for the last two and a half minutes of the song. Not that you’ll mind – Joey’s fingers tease and bend the notes out of the guitar with the mastery of an obsessed wizard. As your mind is still smarting from the blazing solo, the more energetic “Totem Crawler” jumps off the blocks.Although the tempo never gets anywhere near that of a Blink 182 banger, Dwellers maintain true to their self-concocted ‘gut-rock’ subgenre, a mélange of acid rock from yesteryears. There is gravity and energy in the instruments that form the canvas on which this ode to the “queen to whom I crawl” is painted; Toscano’s vocals managing to exude submission and fury at the same time.
Zach Hatsis’ drumming is reduced to labored thumping on sighing cymbals in “Return To The Sky” providing the platform for Toscano to drone on about the afterlife and how he can help you get there. Eventually tortured guitar riffs rise to shred your eardrums, leaving them alive just long enough to catch the flying chords of “Rare Eagle”. This eagle seems to soar forever on the whopping seven minutes it is allocated, but they are nothing if not seven minutes of pure bliss. To be honest, I love how Joey takes his time to let his guitar bleed after mercilessly slaughtering the instrument in ecstatic self-expression.
“Son of Raven”, a personal favorite, comes swaddled in trembling Rhodes and generally impresses with its instrumental diversity. Joey’s voice echoes like the voice of a desperate wanderer trapped among towering canyons. Out of his words, sometimes screamed, sometimes groaned, floats the image of a scavenger eyeing the weary traveler hungrily.
The tempo of the album is raised a few miles an hour on “Waiting on Winter” which presents itself as a tangled mesh of guitarwork guided by breathless drums. The cut gallops to a frantic conclusion, pursued by frenzied guitars and Joey’s nightmarish yells. Pagan Fruit closes with the trio returning to their comfort zone on the viscous closer “Call of the Hallowed Horn”. You feel suspended in time as the track speeds up and slows down before bringing the CD to a composed finish.
Most definitely 4.5 skulls out of 5!
DWELLERS IS:
Joey Toscano: vocals, guitars, harmonica
Dave Jones: bass, organ
Zach Hatsis: drums, vibraphone, Rhodes piano, synth, tambourine
Additional Musicians on Pagan Fruit:
Genevieve Smith: cello on “Spirit Of The Staircase”
Raven Quinn: vocals on “Call Of The Hallowed Horn”
Connect With DWELLERS:
FACEBOOK | BUY THE ALBUM
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