Sons Of Otis - Discography

Sons Of Otis/Queen Elephantine– Split (Concrete Lo-Fi Records)
By Kevin McHugh
May 11 2007
The Sons of Otis/Queen Elephantine split is a trance-inducing slab of psychedelia, steeped in illicit substances and left to dry under an alien sun. It matches veteran Canadian heavy space voyagers Sons of Otis with Hong Kong newcomers Queen Elephantine in a most satisfying trip to the center of the mind.

Sons of Otis! Where have they been hiding lately? Despite their Spinal Tap-like problems with keeping drummers, they’ve been a towering presence in heavy space music for a decade or so, from the sludgy ‘Paid to Suffer’ through the classic titanic space voyage of ‘Spacejumbofudge’ to the more focused ‘X’ from 2004. So although Otis is best known for their space trips, they’ve experimented with other genres here and there throughout their history. The initial track on this split, a slug-slow minimalist mix of thunderous bass chords, bass drum, and feedback reminiscent of Khanate or Earth may throw many fans for a loop, it’s not like they’ve never experimented before, as a thorough investigation of their past will demonstrate. The second tune, ‘Oxazejam,’ will be more familiar, a somewhat lo-fi space rock jam that will have you seeing colors in no time, with Ken Baluke’s guitar sounding like Robin Trower or Hendrix played under the heavy gravitational weight of Jupiter. It’s good to have Sons of Otis back!

Queen Elephantine is the new dude on the block, a group of Hong Kong teenagers (!) who love the classic psych journeys of yore, and aren’t afraid to rekindle the past, adapted to the 21st century. For players so young, they’ve really done their homework! Their single song on this split, the epic ‘The Battle of Massacoit (The Weapon of the King of Gods)’ is a droning psychedelic trip that, despite its 25-minute length, is over too soon. The music has a meditative space sound, like a solarized wind calmly blowing on an alien planet, or a brace of Tibetan monks on PCP, glued to their prayer mats and ommm-ing themselves to oblivion. It is reminiscent of the more organic, calmer moments of early Hawkwind or the cosmic Krautrock explorations of Walter Wegmuller or Sergius Golowin on the elusive ‘Lord Krishna von Goloka’ album. Oms blend with guitar strumming and sitar until the vocals come in around 19 minutes, sounding not unlike Sleep on the must-have ‘Dopesmoker.’

Цитата:
Doom heavyweights Sons of Otis, notoriously famous for producing some of the heaviest space rock humans have ever experienced, have teamed up with young psychonauts Queen Elephantine to release a split. The album is deathly slow, with meditative psychedelic vibes driving through the entire breadth of this collection. By the end of it, the listener can expect to have lost all grasp on real time and space. The Sons of Otis tracks are terrifyingly bare, with piercing other-wordly sounds attacking from the glow of a distant planet.

Queen Elephantine's contributes a single epic track. The paralysis-inducing song slowly leads through several phases of droning mantra, opening portals and doorways down to the core of the Earth.
www.stonerrock.com

Current Line-up

* Ken Baluke - Guitars, Vocals
* Frank Sargeant - Bass
* Ryan Aubin - Drums

Past members

* Tony Jacome - guest drummer on the Songs For Worship album (2001).
* John Moran- Drummer (1993-1995)
* Emilio Mammone- drummer (1997-2001).

Biography

If the Bermuda Triangle or Twilight Zone existed in the Canadian music
scene, then Toronto's Sons of Otis would be their prime resident. The band
creates a genre unto its own, unique enough to become a patented
prescription medication. Known for their trance-like neuron-firing live
performances which include spinning lights and smoke machines, Sons of Otisprove to audiences everywhere that they can summon spaceships and create supernovas. Sons of Otis have shared the stage with bands like Kyuss, Queens of the Stone Age, Clutch, Fu Manchu, New Kingdom, Voivod, Electric Wizard and Shallow North Dakota.

The seed was planted in late 1992 by the trio's founder/guitarist/vocalist
Ken Baluke, an export from Detroit, Michigan. The band was originally dubbed Otis, in homage to the character of the same name in the cult film Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. Enter bassist Frank Sargeant in 1994 when the band released a 6 track EP entitled Paid To Suffer. The instant success of the EP as well as a presitigious reputation in the underground Toronto music scene led them to a recording contract that same year with Canadian label Hypnotic Records.

Just before their first full-length disc SpaceJumboFudge was released in
1996, the band had to affix 'Sons Of' in front of their name due to a legal
conflict with a US band with the same name. SpaceJumboFudge was to be the only album to come out of the record deal. It trickled over to Europe where it garnered legendary status among fans of the 'heavy music' genre. Soon after its release, a plethora of problems arose with their label whch led to a nullfication of their contract.

For the following three years, Ken and veteran bassist Frank reclusively
retreated to their basement rehearsal space and re-evaluated what needed to be done. They decided to write the heavies, mind altering t tunes known to mankind. The prerequisite for Ken's writing style was simple - "If it sounded heavy when my guitar was unplugged, then it could only be even more crushing when it was plugged in".

However, an unusually long germination ensued due to the fact that they went through 10 drummers, who for various reasons could not adjust to the
regimental work ethic of the band, which involved rehearsing at least 3
times a week. They temporarily had to revert to the unheard of use of a drum machine (gasp!) to fill the void and create vibrations.

In the summer of 1998, these same vibrations were felt in San Francisco, a
place that is no stranger to seismic activity. One character awoken up by
this bowel-rumbling heaviness was infamous poster artist Frank Kozik, head
guru of Man's Ruin records. The resulting product is Templeball, the band's
second full-length release. After a European tour with Electric Wizard, and
finally settling on a temporary studio and live drummer, Tony Jacome
(Shallow North Dakota), the band entered the studio for their debut release
for The Music Cartel. The result is Songs For Worship. Songs contains some of the most organically dense and psychedelic riffage known to man.

Each track billows forth from uncharted regions of the cosmos--especially the riffed-out version of the Hendrix classic, "In From The Storm". Ken's
vocals echo from underneath, seemingly processed by a series of relayed
satellites from ultra-deep space. Utilizing only the finest vintage
customized instruments, amplification and recording equipment, the band has already gained notoriety as being 'the heaviest' around. Songs For Worship solidified this reputation both here and in distant solar systems...

The year 2004 saw the band releasing the album "X", which stands for ten years of OTIS. The album was engineered by and co-mixed by Billy Anderson, a veteran and crazy/eccentric producer/engineer who is renown for his relentless and vast amounts of work with tons of bands from the genre (and then some) such as The Melvins, Noxagt, Sleep, High On Fire and even Red House Painters/Mark Kozalek. The album was highly critically acclaimed and restablished the band as a 'must hear' group. Sons of OTIS are a love them or hate them kind of band. If you 'get it', you are in for one hell of a cosmic & immersive voyage where the grooves of this unique mix of doom, blues, psychedelia and as of late, repetitive slow space rock will lock in with the listener's central nervous system and "blow you away.". However, currently, the band is again without a drummer and are looking for another. Time will tell. Rest assured, the band will be back with another album and drummer soon enough!