In light of the major announcements for both Dax Riggs’ new solo album and the almighty Acid Bath’s reunion, we at THC Zine present a special retro spotlight on the last two albums he last appeared on.
[ by Rx Zenabi & LA SERPIENTE 666 (RIP) ]
LA SERPIENTE 666’s original column, reviews, and memorial page here.
ACID BATH
“Paegan Terrorism Tactics” CD
Rotten Records, 1996
The Deal: downer doom rock with brilliant lyrics
What’s it like: BLACK SABBATH doing Santeria rituals down the bayou!
How could anyone go wrong with songtitles like “Bleed Me An Ocean”, “Graveflower”, and “Locust Spawning”, I now ask you? Acid Bath delivers their downright home-cooked doom goodness, like a double hit of windowpane, like what your lysergic nightmares are made of, scary but beautiful at the same time.
This is the second and unfortunately, last release from these Southern voodoo doomsters. The Louisiana outfit sure brings forth thick heavy doom metal with a strong dose of 70’s psychedelia shot mainline, right through the veins because “You scream, I scream, Everybody scream for morphine!”
An image of a goat’s skull, or that of an ibex, graces the CD like there will be a bayou cult ritual. Welcome the adventure.
Life is halted, as white rabbits with angel wings enter the scene. White rabbits like those of Joe Preston, but holy mother they do possess wings like those of angels as they radiate total doom, so paint the hallways and porches with whiteout, “for he is raised”.
Who is he, we ask? It is Jesus, I tell ya. Never will you fool me. Raise, Jesus, raise out of easter eggs like larvae from larva-lamps! A trippy-ass painting done by none other than Doctor Death himself, Dr. Jack Kevorkian! Cult of death abound! Unholy drug suicide!
The riffage from the starting “Paegan Love Song” reminds you so much of DOWN as you hear the growlin’, but then the guy shifts to singin’ as he states, “dying felt so goddamned good today”, it leads their music down SABBATH/ CATHEDRAL territory. And I see nothing but the cemetery scene right off “Easy Rider” (1969), their sun-bursted heads beaming off in heavy psychedelic glory. Oh, the doom!
Like the cold-ness of that New Orleans graveyard, as doomriders trip on mescaline and bad acid, trippin’ with hoez like it’s nobody’s business! And boy, their singer’s, when he really sings, is one of the most beautiful voices I’ve had a chance hearing. All I could say is “Don’t you just love the singin’?” It’s got its Anselmo parts, but you just have to hear the singin’ for that guy could actually sing! You just don’t know how much atmosphere this song brings! And just how many times would you come across a song with lines like, “trippin’ on real blood in strange sunshine”?
“Bleed Me An Ocean” plain rocks out with the best of them. Total crushing doom! “Can you feel the cold death that rides along your spine?” You witness your hazy memories of THE OBSESSED! Take your hog to deathride, superheavy snakeriders! They do trip on the slow creeping sounds in full stereo. Oh no! Guest appearance blackmetal voice enters, and it’s all good and gnome-like!, just when the song progresses to a bayou-boogie you could make sweet lovin’ to.
Test your patience to “Graveflower” for it drags like FLIPPER on Nyquil with Lee Dorrian singin’. Some songs you just catch them doin’ their PANTERA trip in full-effect!, with some singin’ here and there, blues-based riffs abound so you know it’s still a-rockin’, keepin’ the songs from stagnation. I just could not dig at all, when they go on their deathmetal/thrash trip.They do it with greatness, but a total disappointment they have to put fast death/thrash in this here album. I frown. There’s even this total fast thrash song with this alternating thrash, blackmetal, and doom vocals! (songs 9 and 10) Nu-metal shit retards never stand a chance to Southern hell children of swamps! Total headfuck!
The very last song is all glorious. Earth organic like acoustic guitars made of cedar! Welcome gloom and grey clouds! Welcome soil and timbers! Transmissions taking you from muddy swamps to the backwoods somewhere in Oregon, or Olympia or Aberdeen, like bong children of the Pacific Northwest! They dubbed it grunge I tell ya, and it used to be special. Stoner youth cult special, the warm Jerry Cantrell guitar mellow-out! Watch out for that thulsa-like poetry after 16 minutes called “Agents of Oblivion”, also the name of the band formed out of Acid Bath’s ashes. Other members went on their endeavors in GOATWHORE and CROWBAR.
There is only so much grief, tragedy, and agony one can get to handle. This is for real! Drug abuse the Southern tradition! You shall bear witness to so much doom! Savour the cajun satanic!
“…’Cause the skyscrapers look like gravestones from out here…”
[by: LA SERPIENTE 666, originally published in scrawlshop zine 2002]
[originally published in Druid’s Den 0))) zine, issue #2, 2010]
Dax Riggs
Say Goodnight to the World
Fat Possum
Say Goodnight to the World is the highly-anticipated new record from our fave doom singer Dax Riggs. He takes time between records but always releases a killer album. The title was supposed to be a term by the late writer Carlos Castaneda about turning off the human perception on this plane.
As always, if you’re a fan of Dax, every new album or tour that comes along is a good time for a heavy toke. It’s always honest energetic dark rock and roll that sounds just like no other in this late hour.
Dax has already established himself in his own genre, and this record is another killer set of songs that seem to get smoky and mono black each time, like phantoms and ghosts in old and beautiful lavish New Orleans chapels and mansions (although Dax calls Austin, TX home now).
Dax explores all his strengths in songwriting and vocal approaches by offering soul rock, garage, barroom blues, 70s glampunk and even an Elvis cover. They all kill as usual.
“Heartbreak Hotel” is where Elvis disappears in Dax Riggs’ joint and joins him in the song as a ghost. Dax converts the hotel into his own graveyard smoke out spot in Texas, where he outdooms and outsmokes the King.
“Gravedirt on My Blue Suede Shoes” may be another reference to the King, but compared to the Elvis cover, it’s more upbeat and rocking. Dax goes on to state “Envoking me what I must be, Forget this skull, this cemetery. Envoking me what I must do, Gravedirt on my blue suede shoes”. It then goes into a haunting, soulful “wooh” section that stops in the middle, before drenching the song in heavy riffing and setting everything on fire for the finale.
“Let Me Be Your Cigarette”, the lead-off single, is prime rockin’ Dax in the tradition of his frenetic tunes from the last album, and some of his garagebluespunk style in Deadboy & The Elephanmen’s last one as well.
Elsewhere, “Like Moonlight” is a funeral dirge lullaby to lull you to sleep in the graveyard, with that trademark Dax soul blues style. It’s superchill but haunting. It can serve as the last track of this album, but it’s just the end of the first half. That distinction is reserved for the slower haunting final track, “See You in All Hell or New Orleans”, a perfect ending this awesome album.
While some would say that the songs on “We Sing of…” were too short but classics nonetheless, the songs here have a little more space to breathe, more time for introspection. It’s also more haunting than its predecessor.
And another common thing with each album is that each successive spin lulls you into its own world and you won’t even notice you’re hooked again. You’re always bound to find gold in Dax’s records, and this one is no exception. Full Support for the FAT POSSUM posse. If you haven’t listened to We Sing of Only Blood or Love then listen to it as well. (Rx Zenabi)
Towards Harmonious Civilization Zine 
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