Official press release:
Swamp Witch is the culmination of psychedelic substances, occult practices, and a collective interest in dark, strange, and ultimately hallucinogenic music originally devised with the sole intent to commit and record ritualistic extremities through heavy music only for the night of 9/9/09. In the aftermath, members found themselves pressed to continue the slow-burning drudgery sparked on that September ninth into the months that followed, leading to shows, recordings, band members towing themselves out of the smog from Central Valley, California and into Oakland (and Arcata, respectively) and finally, the vinyl release that recollects the original material of that evening: Gnosis.
The punishing, murky layers protruding from 2011’s Gnosis recordings drip with the trance-laden, drug-induced efforts of ’70s psychedelia compressed into the claustrophobic toil and painful repetition of ’90s sludge. This concept of Gnosis actually seems more akin to H.P. Lovecraft’s ideas of psychosis and derealization as the only thing the feeble human mind can experience when confronting truth (cosmicism), as opposed to Gnosis in the classic, transcendental sense of the term. In other words, it’s fucked up.
While Gnosis was being released on cassette, and finally, vinyl, Swamp Witch had already begun preparing material for what was to become the six claustrophobic tracks that make up The Slithering Bog. To help achieve this, former drummer Dirk V took up second guitar duties and helped further emphasize the psychedelic undertones heard in Gnosis, while collaborator Adam T. took on drums. The end result of almost two years of writing proved worthy, as warped landscapes and fungal textures resting somewhere between dream-like and sleep paralysis culminated into The Slithering Bog recording of late 2014.
The decaying sounds of The Slithering Bog were captured during July 2014 at Earhammer Studios in Oakland, California by Greg Wilkinson (Brainoil, Annihilation Time, Noothgrush, et al) and mastered at Trakworx in San Francisco by Justin Weiss (Ludicra, Slough Feg, Cormorant, et al). Initially released on cassette last year via Transylvanian Tapes, the collection of nightmare rituals that made this release so necessary and bizarre has finally oozed its way onto vinyl on three color variants (black, purple haze and swamp green) thanks to Tribunal Of The Axe Records who will unleash the offering later this month.
For preorders visit THIS LOCATION.
The Slithering Bog track listing:
Side A:
1. “Strange Cults”
2. “Marsh Of Delusion”
Side B:
1. “Slither Into The Circle”
2. “Bayou Tomb”
3. “Dead Root”
4. “Lost Symbols”
