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SATAN’S SATYRS
Die Screaming

Bad Omen (2014)
Rating: 8/10

Well, I’ll be damned. I never thought I’d hear a band that sound like a peculiar yet astonishing mix between Dead Kennedys and doom metal! Virginia’s Satan’s Satyrs are indeed a strange bunch – a weird trio that formed in 2009, and which are a perfect fit for the current occult rock bandwagon that’s rumbling across the land.

But hey, Satan’s Satyrs are way too cool to merely hop on board a wagon that’ll soon perish over a cliff. These guys are taking Uncle Acid on and wiping the floor with them, merging doomier atmospherics with energetic shots of punk, sizzling lumps of psychedelia and with all the attitude of a late 50s biker movie. Indeed, it’s a case of all going on at the go-go for Die Screaming, the Virginia band’s second full-length platter which follows on from the impressive 2012 debut Wild Beyond Belief!

For those interested – and you all should be – Satan’s Satyrs is fronted by vocalist / bassist Claythanas, who may be familiar to those of you who worship the stoned occultism of Electric Wizard. In other words, Claythanas is none other than Clayton Burgess. He is accompanied by two other Devil’s rejects, namely drumming warlord Stephen Fairchild and guitarist Jarrett Nettnin, who worked with Burgess in Terraset – a band known for their brand of filthy punk sludge.

There may be countless acts opting for the occult oddness, but Satan’s Satyrs have the edge over most of them because they just sound so damn natural at marrying biker rock, be-bop punk and go-go rhythms which ooze from a ghoulish organ. One could imagine these guys on stage performing within the hot and sweaty confines of a Russ Meyer film, such is their sleazy, reckless way.

There’s a swingin’ edge to this wild and frenzied party, the sort of orgy that brings together Devil Doll, The Stooges, Dead Kennedys, Blue Cheer and the more recent Young Heart Attack. Rarely overweight, Die Screaming offers a hellish hip and happening glimpse into B-movie abandonment via dirty, greasy guitars and the unusual vocal rants of Claythanas, who has an almost unnatural, sleazy wine about him as if Ozzy Osbourne-via Black Sabbath had been introduced to a tablet of punk!

Eight tracks on offer here, the only negative being that the cuts would have benefited from being shorter and maybe a handful more tunes inserted. The joy of anarchic punk and those obscure, lo-fi Hammond-drenched cult 60s grooves is that they were all so fleeting. But I can’t complain when the music here is so darn groovy, and so with the likes of ‘Lucifer Lives!’, ‘Instruments Of Hellfire’, ‘Show Me Your Skull’ and ‘Black Souls’, Satan’s Satyrs strap you to the pillion of their big, bad motorcycle and take you on a one-way trip to hell.

Full of ghoulish lyrics and trippy structures, Die Screaming is the sweltering underground night club you so desperately want to discover, and yet when you get there just a quick glance at some of the entrants may well be enough to put you off. I’m sure I can see Charles Manson at the back, or could that be James Dean? Either way, Satan’s Satyrs – who might just want to be confused with the 1969 exploitation biker movie Satan’s Sadists – have created a doom ’n’ roll punk-fest that’ll leave you either dead or high!

Neil Arnold

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