#but Vinny was just like well it makes sense i love nirvana. like yes my beautiful generic looking man its as deep as that

[the-acid-pear]

I love when I hear people worry about "accidentally plagiarizing" something like brother that's inspiration. That's just what taking inspiration from someone is. You see something it sticks to your brain and you want to make something like that too because you liked it.

[doomedandstoned]

Season In Hell:

King Zog

Debut LP Stokes Ungodly Flames

By Billy Goate

Everything's too fucking LOUD!

Australia has always felt like a second home for me, even though I've not gotten over there too often in recent years. My grandparents, after homesteading with a family of seven in Anchorage, decided to uproot and hammer down fresh tent pegs in Western Australia. Well, more like a houseboat, to be precise. One of my earliest memories is watching Tom Baker's Dr. Who (I'll forever identify him with the role) on a black and white television below deck, docked in the harbors of Perth. The whole experience was like being on Earth 2 for me. When I came back as a young adult, I remarked that Australia is what the U.S. would look like if the British had won the War of 1776.

As you can imagine, then, I'm quite fascinated with the heavy music scene Down Under and follow it keenly. People, it is absolutely exploding there. Just pick your city: Melbourne, Tasmania, Brisbane, and the aforementioned Perth on any given night you can get your ear drums blown by some incredibly talented axe wielders and amp worshippers. One band that recently caught my interest was KING ZOG:

Daniel Durack (lead vocals, rhythm guitar)

Vince Radice (lead guitar, vocals)

Rory Keys (drums)

Martin Gonzalez (bass)

"Guitarist Vinnie Radice started this band with me in 2013 after I'd moved back from London, having lived and worked there for eight years," front man Dan Durack tells me. "We'd both been in rock 'n' roll, garage, and punk bands over the years and it was Vinnie's idea to put together a band to play heavy music, with both of us being obsessive fans since we were kids growing up in rural Western Australia."

You're curious about their name, I'm sure. I was. The first hit you get for your armchair sleuthing is Zog I, King of the Albanians. This enterprising fellow went from Prime Minister to President to King (yes, all three). "Bizarre King Zog" he was called. Despite all of his tyrannical proclivities, perhaps his one redeeming quality is he was one crazy chain-smoker, said go through 200 cigs a day. Could there be a connection to the band? It didn't hurt to ask. "A friend of mine's family is of Albanian descent and told me about Zog," Dan recalls. "A pretty interesting character. I thought the name sounded great, perfect for a metal band."

Even though King Zog is pushing five, they've only been gigging for the last two years. "It took us ages to find the right rhythm section. It was pretty comical, really. One bassist we believe took all the ecstasy in the '90s. After being in the band for a few months, he went away for a fortnight then came back and forgot everything. Another guy brought a practice amp to rehearsal and starting slapping the bass to Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground" while we were setting up."

The bad luck didn't end there. "Unfortunately, we had to fire our drummer, Merrick, after we finished recording. Lovely man, but sadly just not the right guy for us anymore. He likes playing fast, with double kick, whereas we just want to get slower and dirgier, if that's a word. We found a killer young drummer, Rory, who's fit in really well, so already looking forward to recording with him. Since it took fucking ages to settle on a recording line-up, Vinnie and I already have a bunch of songs that the band is currently learning. Feels great to be finally progressing after years of being bogged down with people who weren't quite up to it."

King Zog by King Zog

This summer, King Zog's eponymous debut stole my attention. Enticed by Dominic Sohor's arresting album art, I stopped what I was doing and gave it a spin. It's a slow burner with a steady doom groove from end to end. Sometimes a band just does the basics really, really well. So well, in fact, you feel like you're hearing the sound fresh, almost for the first time. That's King Zog for you.

"We finally began recording last year with a rock 'n' roll producer named Ken Watt," the band says, "an amazing guitarist/front man and was in a couple of great Perth rock bands, Valvolux and The M-16s. He's not really a metal guy, but he's obsessed with guitar sounds and tone and knew exactly what we wanted. He set up a studio in his house right in front of Scarborough Beach, one of Perth's most popular beaches. It was winter when we began laying down tracks and it was pretty inspiring seeing the wild coastal weather while recording."

That would explain the churning feeling I'm picking up on here. Songs like the opening "Lost At Sea" present a slow, doom jam with strong, clean vocals that remind me a lot of Plush-era Scott Weiland, emotive guitar solos, and a stormy undercurrent that's pays homage to Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, and Nirvana, presumably the music. In other instances, the influence of Black Sabbath is both undeniable and welcome (check out "Fuck Island," a real headbanger). While 'King Zog' (2017) is a metal album through-and-through, it is appropriately tempered by these influences, which makes the record, well, interesting to listen to.

"Recording it felt easy since we'd been playing those songs for about three fucking years," Dan remarks. King Zog lucked out in having their debut mastered by famed English sound engineer Noel Summerville, whose resume includes decades of greats, including records by Bolt Thrower, Napalm Death, and Electric Wizard's Witchcult Today, "a record I've been pretty fanatical about since it came out."

The songs on the new record go back to when King Zog was still in is awkward growth phase, just Dan and Vinnie. "We write well together. We're good at completing the other's songs," Dan says. "I'll put in a bridge here; Vinnie will add a chorus there. Once I get a theme for a song in my head the lyrics come quickly, which might sound obvious to anyone who reads them! I try to keep it simple. I like a good vocal melody having grown up listening to Ozzy, Dio, Gillan, Paul Di'anno, Rob Halford, and Blackie Lawless."

These vocal anchors make sense for this record. While much of doom today adopts death-style vox, Dan prefers singing over the growling. "Cookie Monster style," he calls it. "Just a personal preference. I do like eating cookies -- we call them 'biscuits' in Australia." I almost forgot that. Please pass the biscuits.

And that grungy sound I described earlier? Turns out I was on to something. Dan and I grew up in the same era. "I was a teenager until 1994 and dug some of the grunge bands," he tells me, "particularly Nirvana, L7 and Mudhoney. Some of Soundgarden's stuff. I'd been pretty metal-obsessed as a teenager, but as I got into my twenties I did what a lot of people do and started looking backwards and getting into the pre-history of the stuff I loved, which led to a lot of '60s psychedelia, garage rock, and proto-punk."

This included bands from the groundbreaking Nuggets compilation, The Stooges, MC5, and Aussie acts Radio Birdman and The Saints. "All rites of passage bands for young Australian men," he explains “Australia had a band called The Missing Links in the '60s which I loved -- trashy and loud. While I never stopped listening to metal, I did embrace '70s and '80s punk and a lot of '60s music."

From there, Dan spend time in London soaking in the scene. "Living in England and its close proximity to Europe was perfect for metal shows and festivals, and I saw a lot of bands. I'd go out of my way to see Electric Wizard. I took a bus to Bristol and a plane to Berlin to see 'em. That band makes me feel like what it must have been like for a Sabbath-loving teenager in the '70s. They are easily the band I most look up to in terms of sheer mind-numbing, crushing, hypnotic riffs." At this point, I was curious what else was on rotation in the King Zog playlist. "Lately been listening to Windhand, Monolord, Yuri Gagarin and we listen to Sleep a lot."

Before I let front man Dan get back to riff-slinging, I had to ask about Perth. It had been years since I'd been there and I was curious what it was like living and gigging in the City of Light. "Perth's an isolated city. Whether that's reflected in the music, I don't know. There's a small but vibrant metal scene here that's also quite supportive. We've played with grind bands, punk bands, thrash bands, southern metal bands. We supported Acid King last year which was cool. We play loud and there's a lot of young sound engineers in Perth who are okay with that, thankfully.

There was that one time, however. "We played one venue down the road from where I live, an RSL hall (Returned and Services League, a support organization for men and women of the Defence Force) which we played at a couple of months ago. They'd been hosting bands for about a year but shut it down after we played. We'd only played a few songs when the guy who ran the bar yelled at me, saying 'You might be the best fucking guitarist and singer in the world but we'll never know because everything's too fucking LOUD! You've even alienated your own fucking fans, they're sitting outside!' We think the venue is probably better suited to bingo nights."

I don't anticipate King Zog turning the volume down anytime soon. 'King Zog' (2017) is an enjoyable ripper from end-to-end. "We're getting vinyl pressed in the next couple of months so looking forward to getting hold of it. We're focused on the next album already. Only the most lumbering, killingest riffs will make the cut."

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