We haven’t done one of these since OCTOBER?!  For shame, Nine Circles, but what better time to rectify this indiscretion than with the back half of a little Steve Blanco double feature?  Drink from the cup of heresy.  This week’s offerings: Sarmat’s Upgrade and Solemn Oath Brewery’s Kidnapped by Vikings.

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The Tunes: Sarmat’s Upgrade

Sarmat, for those not in the know, is the side project inhabited by Steve Blanco, perhaps better known as the bassist and keyboardist of Imperial Triumphant, whose newest release I am still spinning like it’s going out of style.  Sarmat has always had a nebulous relationship to lineups and genre, and on Upgrade, the band sees another shift in personnel hinted at by the title.  Joining Blanco and crew is new guitarist and composer Zachary Blakeslee Reid.  A student of jazz and avant garde music under the tutelage of the renowned Elliot Sharp, Reid slots into the band perfectly and leads the cohort on the kind of free jazz odyssey Spinal Tap would shit themselves over.  The two songs on Upgrade were recorded totally live in the studio (much the same as their previous EP and prequel to this release Dubious Disc), and mixed and mastered by, you guessed it, Colin Marston, so you know all the chaos and nuance of the performance is captured in loving detail.  And what details they are: the opening title track is a crunchy, heavy look at progressive metal with a lot of not so subtle jazz breakouts and nods, from the trumpet to the synth and effects break in the middle to the atonal guitar work from Reid to close the song out behind Ilya Belko’s bellowing guttural vocals.  This is exactly what Weather Report would sound like if they listened to a buttload of Gorguts.  It’s the kind of avant-jazz that sounds like noise to the untrained ear, but you know every single second of the 13.5 minutes of jamming is meticulously arranged. 

The real surprise, though, is the second track and back half of the EP, “Serum Visions”.  Here we see Blanco, gasp, drop his bass guitar and pick up a keytar (because why the fuck not at this point?), Ryan Hale steps into the role of guitarist and composer in place of Reid, and Niko Hasapopoulos grabs an upright bass to fill out the low end.  If you think that sounds weird, you’re right, but it’s also so incredibly cool.  It’s by far the jazziest that Sarmat have gotten thus far, with an “everybody gets a solo” section right at the front that wouldn’t be too out of place in a smoke-filled night club, assuming the patrons can tolerate Blanco’s screaming keytar and the droning rumble of the upright bass behind the cacophonous wall of sound dominating most of the sections of the track.  Point is, if you’re looking for something off the beaten path and you’re not already on the Sarmat tip, you need to fix that, right now.

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The Booze: Solemn Oath Brewery’s Kidnapped by Vikings

You’re probably sick of me writing about IPAs in this column, but I’m not sick of drinking them yet, so you’re just going to have to cope somehow.  Kidnapped by Vikings is not a groundbreaking IPA by any stretch of the imagination, but it is still a very good IPA from a brewery that makes some of my favorite IPAs (Snaggletooth Bandana is for sure up there, if you can find it anywhere near you).  Of course, we have the bitter, piney opening that tastes like licking a Christmas tree farm, which carefully fades away into tangy citrus notes of grapefruit, lemon and lime, before finishing with subtle grain sweetness.  Again, this is a flavor profile you’ve seen time and time again, but it bears repeating that when it’s done well, it doesn’t have to break the mold to be something I seek out time and time again.

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We will be doing this again before too long.  I swear it, upon my honor.

-Ian