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Review: Stöner, Thekla
It’s an agreeably mild evening in Bristol rather than a sun-baked one, but the desiccated desert riffs being delivered down at the Thekla certainly live up to that description, as billed. Like Phil Collins and Dave Grohl, Brant Bjork started out behind the kit. As a guitarist, he’s developed an enviable tone that hits the sweet spot between fuzz and crunch.
Some stoner bands, particularly those towards the doomy end of the spectrum, put their heads down and hit a self-medicated groove that persists for hours on end. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but Stöner ain’t those kind of, er, stoners. Reuniting Bjork once again with Nick Oliveri, fellow co-founder of cult ’90s act Kyuss, which in turn spawned Queens of the Stone Age, this power trio prefer to spice things up with a variety of influences.
Opener Rad Stays Rad kicks things off in traditional stoner style with a big fat riff overlaying the bedrock of a pounding rhythm supplied by Oliveri and drummer Ryan Gut, which gets heads nodding. But the greasy The Older Kids sounds as though it could have been lifted from the first Motörhead album. Indeed the Motörhead influence becomes even clearer later on when they play a cover of R.A.M.O.N.E.S. (Memo to all other bands: if you’re going to do a Motörhead cover, choose something different like this rather than going for the obvious choices.) Stand Down, meanwhile, gets downright funky in places, while Own Yer Blues is a basic blues stomp that sounds as old as time itself.
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The two frontmen, who swap and occasionally share vocals, make a pleasing visual contrast too. Resembling the missing Furry Freak Brother, Bjork rocks the Randy California headband look and sports a vintage Ozzy T-shirt, while Oliveri essays the scary neighbourhood meth-dealing punk image, but actually seems much mellower than his reputation might suggest. And it’s Oliveri who takes the vocals on Stöner’s occasional detours into US hardcore punk territory, such as Evel Never Dies.
But it’s never long before they’re drifting back on a patchouli-scented cloud to the late sixties and early seventies, before any of these guys were born. Curiously, there’s little sign of the claimed Blue Oyster Cult/Kiss influence on their music, though Blue Cheer are an obvious reference point (wonder if they know that a later incarnation of the band played the Thekla in its early days), as are Sabbath (obviously), while anyone who’s familiar with the oeuvre of Foghat or Grand Funk would feel right at home here.
Encore time inevitably brings a couple of Kyuss classics, Gardenia and Green Machine (y’know- the one that sounds as though it’s about to turn into Master of the Universe), both of which, lest we forget, were written by Mr. Bjork, who was the primary creative powerhouse in that band. Crowd-surfing delirium ensues.
Read more: Metal & Prog Picks: May 2022
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