Dudes of the Year, 2006

2007 is already well on it's way, with lots of Columbus-related awesomeness on the horizon, but I wanted to take a few posts over the next week or so to look back on some things of which I'm very happy that '06 brought us. Over at Donewaiting.com, Rob Duffy has recently tallied voting on his first annual Friendship Farm Awards, including the ever-important band of the year category. It was between The Lindsay, Brainbow and Teeth of the Hydra - all great choices, indeed - and though it looks like the very worthy Lindsay are going to take home the crown tonight, there's no doubt in my mind that Teeth of the Hydra are Columbus' band of the year for 2006.
If you asked me what my favorite record out of Columbus from last year was a few weeks ago I'd have told you Dragged Out, by The Lindsay, without hesistation. But I finally got ahold of Teeth's massive Greenland LP (Tee Pee Records, TPE-071) and things have changed. It hasn't left my turntable since. And it sounds heavier with each listen, a heaviness I never thought TOTH - quite simply the loudest band ever from Ohio - could duplicate in a studio.
Greenland manages to do what very few Metal records these days do: to remain balanced, well-written, and consistently bring the heaviness over the entirety of the album. It's stoner without the excruciating intros, it's doom without the heavy-handed spirituality....hell, it could fall into many of the hundreds of sub-genres that have sprouted up in Metal over the past 35 years (a history that these dudes know about extremely well) but Teeth of the Hydra on Greenland are just fucking Metal. That's it. Sure, they channel many of the greats, from proto-legends like Pentagram, to the avant-blackness of Celtic Frost, up through the sludge of the Melvins and the green-worshipping Sleep and even, on side 2's "Narsaq", the legendary Krautrock bands of the 70's. All amounting to the finest Metal record this city has ever heard. It's a monster.
Yup. Miner, Bailey and Stillman had a pretty great 2006. And they deserve it. Seems like this record's been in the making for three years now. But seeing how it came out pretty late in the year (late September), Greenland has a lot of life left for 2007. Teeth didn't get to do as much touring as they wanted and plan on going out West (where I believe they'll do very well) in the spring. Hopefully word-of-mouth continues to spread nationally and some more reviews begin to pop-up because this album and these guys are worthy of all kinds of worship. For now, raise your fists in praise of Teeth of the Hydra - dudes of year, 2006.