Review: The Heads ‘yourprettyplaceisgoingtohell’
Throughout my years at The Sleeping Shaman, I have often waxed poetic about my late ‘90s and early ‘00s experience of discovering, then obsessing over, the early sounds of what is now commonly known as stoner or desert rock.
I was a massive fan of Frank Kozik’s (RIP) legendary Man’s Ruin label, while simultaneously blowing wads of cash on one of the era’s famed websites, All That’s Heavy.
Along the way, I stumbled upon Bristol, UK’s famed reality-warpers, The Heads. I was instantly captivated by their fuzz-drenched, distorted, psychedelic garage-rock attack. It was as if Mudhoney took their sound, amped up The Stooges worship, fuzz, distortion and psychedelia to eleven, added a generous dose of UK contemporaries like Loop, Spacemen 3, and The Telescopes, and then blasted the whole thing into space.
I consider their albums Relaxing With… and Everybody Knows We Got Nowhere to be stone-cold classics of the era, and of underground heavy music as a whole, with time doing nothing to diminish my opinion. However, they can be a challenging band to follow for the uninitiated. Similar to peers like the Melvins and Boris, The Heads have released a flood of music – including albums, singles, splits, compilations, demos, and live LPs – which can be overwhelming for the curious. Intentional or not, they are also a mysterious bunch. There simply isn’t a ton of interviews, photos, or videos of them scattered across the internet. In a world of 24/7 social media dumb-fuckery, that only adds to their intrigue. Fortunately for us all, and with minimal hype or fanfare, they return with what is (depending on how you stack up their vast discography) their fifth full-length album.
Produced by Monster Magnet legend and noted sound manipulator John McBain, yourprettyplaceisgoingtohell is also a title that is both a nod to the Iggy & The Stooges rager from Raw Powerand ostensibly an acknowledgement of the fucked state of the planet – an idea amplified by the stark, monochrome oil rig on the cover, which seems about to be overrun by vengeful seas. Kicking off with hits like a dove, it deftly serves as the perfect opener for the band in 2026. Packed with all the fuzz-drenched riffs, wah-noodling, spaced-out vocals, and rhythmic crash-and-bash any fan of garage psych could possibly want, they even throw an air-raid siren into the interstellar shred and cacophony simply because they can.
Up next is cardinal fuzz (an obvious nod to the impeccable underground record label of the same name), wherein the listener is instantly floored by a Blue Cheer-esque riff of Herculean proportions, accompanied by a deluge of spaced-out effects and wah-soaked shred. Flowing alongside the musicianship are some weirdly melodic, harmonized vocals that completely fit the vibe. Next up, can’t stop the rushing is a trippy yet driving affair that features ample interplay between guitarists/vocalists Simon Priceand Paul Allen. The duo combines with their equally formidable rhythm section of bassist H. O. Morgan and drummer Wayne Maskell to craft an earworm experience. Over the course of eight-plus minutes, it organically builds toward a mesmerizing, psychedelic rock and roll mindfuck of grand proportions.
a dimension-shifting, all-consuming, head-nodding, hypnotic heavy rock trip…
It turns that was just the appetizer. The interstellar, musical version of a desert road sign reading ‘last gas for miles’ arrives with it’s about time….and space. This almost twenty-minute, psychedelic, meditative experience, that while repetitive, offers enough layers, effects, and musicianship for the listener to easily get lost in its sounds. It is a dimension-shifting, all-consuming, head-nodding, hypnotic heavy rock trip that historians and space explorers alike can look to in the future as a prime example of how psychedelic, heavy rock and roll is done properly.
Coming back to our own galaxy, we get back-to-back garage-psych pummelings. First up is the face-melting psych-rock of on, which finds Price and Allen effortlessly alternating between distorted proto-metal and echoing garage-psych. That is followed by the unreal, jaw-dropping, fuzzed-out insanity of snake oil. I’m going to guess this burner is inspired by the orange slug occupying the White House and making life hell for people around the globe. The track itself is a ferocious, garage-punk annihilator teeming with aggressive riffage and vicious shred. I am also betting that if I could understand the heavily distorted vocals, this would be a diatribe against everything that man and his movement stand for.
Following that double sonic assault, we arrive at what has become my favorite offering on the record (as of this writing), sunquaker. It begins with some delicate acoustic noodling before unfolding into an awesome, clean, echoing guitar line that recalls early records from fellow British rock legends The Cult. The main riff, accentuated by some sick wah-pedal action, is a clinic in spaced-out garage-psych. Couple that with vocals stating throughout the chorus, ‘I just wanna, I just wanna, I just wanna soak in the sun,’ and you have one of the best tracks I have heard in a long time. They then proceed to go the fuck off during the house-burning, wah-soaked, unashamed Stooges worship of the outro, which is easily among the best two minutes of rock and roll mayhem I have encountered over the last few months.
socially awkward is a heavy, weird, mid-tempo affair that boasts some serious psychedelic shred, while entropic dissolution is a trance-inducing acoustic piece. The latter sets the stage for the auditory wormhole of bullet’s fly but no bees, a crushing barrage of garage-psych riffage and battering rhythms that can produce psychedelic effects when your eyes are closed. True story. The penultimate track, it’s all over now sunshine, is a nodding, kaleidoscopic brain melt. It takes its time building on a rolling beat before overflowing with all sorts of effects and insane, ripping bursts of shred. We exit with the musical equivalent of floating through space on the ethereal off, where you can practically hear the band climbing back aboard their spaceship and setting the controls for planets unknown.
I do not think it is hyperbole to say that The Heads practically invented the genre we know as heavy psych. It is indisputable. These guys are true originators, taking familiar sounds and sending them through their own reality-warping, fuzz-and-wah portals. Simply put, nobody does it better, and they prove it yet again with yourprettyplaceisgoingtohell. It has been on non-stop rotation since its release, and I am still hearing new sounds with each listen. This is easily in the mix for my top albums of the year. Even with so many great bands returning and releasing fantastic records, this mind-warping, reality-bending, Stooges-worshipping garage-psych madness just may have surpassed them all.
Label: Rooster Rock
Band Links: Facebook | Bandcamp | Spotify | Instagram
Scribed by: Martin Williams
