John McLaughlin
I was visiting my grandparents one weekend in 2003 when a friend of mine came over and started bragging about the new guitar he bought and how badass it was that he could play the guitar solo from “Like a Stone†by Audioslave. He then looked at me and said “Hey, you should get a bass and we can start a band.†A few months later, I owned a bass. And so I became a musician.
We never actually started that band, and he eventually stopped playing, but I kept with it and gradually music took over my life, as my tastes evolved from radio hard rock/nu-metal to commercial metalcore, to Gothenburg melodeath and Opeth, to old-school death metal and classic prog, to stoner doom and psychedelic rock. It’s been an incredible journey, and I have no plans to stop or slow down.
I got my start as a music writer in early 2013 with Iron Hops, a now-defunct craft beer/heavy metal blog (oh yeah, I’m a beer nerd too). Phil Johnston messaged me about joining the Ech(((o)))es and Dust team shortly before Iron Hops shut down, and I am very grateful for the opportunity to keep writing about the thing I love most.
You can follow me on Twitter, where I tweet about a variety of things relating to music, beer, the Red Sox, UMass Basketball, marching band, and some other stuff.
Articles by John McLaughlin
Despite the quality of the riffs, Maxilla Prolabitur just feels lifeless. It has the things a good sludge album should have, but manages to be less than the sum of its parts. – By John McLaughlin
Queensrÿche is a step in the right direction, and I expect long-time fans of the band will be satisfied with that. But this is far from a return to greatness for a band that has made numerous missteps. – By John McLaughlin
The staggeringly-prolific prog/ambient black metal duo Njiqahdda is a bit of an enigma with their two their members sought to be fiercely anonymous. John McLaughlin asked the clean vocalist/guitarist/keyboardist/field recorder of the duo E. a few questions to try and figure out some things about them.
The change in membership has certainly had an impact on Black Pyramid’s sound, but thankfully not the quality of their work, as Adversarial is a shorter-yet-still-sweet chunk of awesome riffs. – By John McLaughlin
Artists as prolific as this have no reason to be this creative or this adventurous, and yet Njiqahdda seem to have limitless reserves of great ideas. Changes in direction as drastic as this often fail, but when they are fueled with great ideas – like Serpents in the Sky is – they can go to great places. – By John McLaughlin
The passion this band shows for its craft is easily apparent, and there is energy on this album that doesn’t exist within a lot of their peers. By John McLaughlin
High Frontier sounds like being stranded on a strange planet. It doesn’t leave you wandering the outer reaches of the galaxy like other krautrock albums do, but while your surroundings appear familiar on the surface, they feel alien nonetheless. By John McLaughlin
Vow is at times warm and inviting, at others cold, haunting, and dark, and at all times beautifully arranged and composed, and missing this album would be a mistake. By John McLaughlin
Full of horrifying riffs and shrieking guitar leads, Below is a crawling black mass of impure, soul-sucking malevolence. It is cold, grotesque, and depraved, and I would have it no other way. – By John McLaughlin
Frozen Galaxies is a phenomenal follow-up to a fantastic debut album. It is a good sign when a band shows willingness to evolve and expand their sound and is able to get results out of doing so, and Pyramidal’s refusal to rest on their laurels should make them rising stars in the psychedelic rock scene. By John McLaughlin
Arckanum’s newest, Fenris Kindir, sees Shamaatae shift from the more melodic sound of the past few albums for a stripped-down, almost punkier sound. The change works, as Fenris Kindir feels fresher and more inspired as a result.- By John McLaughlin
The riffs are strong, the performances are tight, the production strikes a good balance between being raw and clear, but everything just feels the same. The base of the material is solid, and some very basic changes could make Deathcult a band to keep an eye on. – By John McLaughlin.
Live: Birch Hill Dam, The Scimitar, Titanis – Silk City Taproom, Florence, MA, USA. April 19th 2013.
Live review of the Birch Hill Dam, The Scimitar, Titanis gig at Silk City Taproom in Florence, Massachusetts, USA. – By John McLaughlin.
Welldweller sticks to a formula that works. The world could always use more gigantic, crushing hardcore punk-tinged doom guitars, and Lothorian’s contributions are certainly worthy. – By John McLaughlin.
Congratulations On Your Loss by Father Figure Recommended by John McLaughlin
Old Wounds aren’t here to coddle you or sing you lullabies, they’re here to shred your fucking face to pieces. Nothing about this album is nice or pretty, and it is better off because of that. – By John McLaughlin.
Morgengrau’s Extrinsic Pathway won’t be the best death metal album you hear this year, nor the most original. But death metal fans should find some nice riffs and an overall enjoyable experience from a solid debut album. – By John McLaughlin.
Despite their traditionalist roots, Tribulation have delivered something that is very much fresh and unique to the death metal world. The Formulas of Death is adventurous in ways many metal albums aren’t, and it demands equal adventurousness from the listener. – By John McLaughlin.
Föllakzoid have put together something brilliant, and if you enjoy modern psychedelic rock, II will be one of the best albums you hear in any genre. – By John McLaughlin.
If you’ve yet to listen to Spiritual Beggars, don’t make the mistake I did and ignore them. If ass-kicking, hard-rocking riffs are what you seek, Earth Blues delivers in spades and you should check it out as soon as it is available. – By John McLaughlin
If you want a fix of extreme prog metal, then False Consciousness will give you that. There is a lot of potential here if Man Made Origin can develop a unique musical identity
