Electric Wizard had been rumored to release a new album on Halloween 2016. Considering Halloween 2016 has come and gone, you'll have noticed by now that there is no new Electric Wizard album. So what happened? According to an interview with It's Psychedelic, Baby! Magazine, Electric Wizard has been working on a new studio and has been dealing with delays.
Yeah and we still are… I guess on the internet there was an announcement that the LP would be out for Halloween but that was only tentative. As usual we have had a load of delays and problems.
We basically built our own studio… which has been really cool and something we’ve always wanted but, yeah, there have been a few teething problems, haha. I mean when we started we hadn’t even finished the studio so we recorded the basic tracks (drums, bass, guitars) at a local studio with our tape machine. Then we moved all the gear back to our place… a farmhouse pretty much in the middle of nowhere and set-up a studio here.
We brought over Garrett Morris (Windhand) to help set up the recording as I couldn’t do both at the same time when we recorded the basic tracks. We worked together on the Cough LP last year and it was a great experience and he was totally up for coming over to help out. Also I should mention that Chris from Skyhammer Studio has been a massive help too as a technical advisor and helping set up the desk.
So yeah analog tape gear has become stupidly cheap recently… and after working with Garrett on the Cough LP (Still They Pray) I realised I could get a set-up going pretty easily.
It’s nothing special just a Tascam 16 track tape machine and a Mackie desk. I’ve kept it really simple with only a compressor and some vintage Reverbs/delays (Copicat, Space Echo and a Phillips 202W), and a Neve clone preamp. We’ve relied on getting a good sound straight to tape which is how I like recordings to be anyway.
Also we got some more amps and a Crumar Organ which is the closest to a Hammond as we couldn’t get one in time. I’m always buying overpriced vintage fuzz pedals, haha.
In the interview, Jus Oborn also says it'll be the band's first album on its new Spinefarm imprint label, Witchfinder. He also adds that the new album is "really very basic and heavy… but it’s not Doom or Heavy Metal or Psych. It’s really dark heavy music… it’s crushing and mind altering still. Some of it is kinda bluesy and there is some atmospheric creepy stuff too."
Right, so who's stoked for a new album? Electric Wizard always brings quality to the table, but I'm extremely keen on hearing a new direction from the group. It's also worth mentioning that Electric Wizard's new album will be the band's first with bassist Clayton Burgess and drummer Simon Poole.
