Review: The Machine ‘Another Sun’
What draws me to Dordrecht, Netherlands’ heavy psych rock power trio The Machine is their understanding of something many heavy bands seem to forget: a riff doesn’t have to end when you’ve heard it. Sometimes, that’s precisely when the interesting part begins. For them, repetition isn’t a limitation but a gateway to something deeper.
A guitar, bass and drums lock into a groove, and slowly, almost imperceptibly, the music starts changing shape. The bass shifts beneath the guitar, the drums alter the pulse, and the riff opens into something heavier, stranger, more psychedelic. What began as a simple figure becomes a journey. This is where The Machine have always had me.
Their albums have different personalities, but the essential ingredients remain – enormous guitar riffs, a deep, restless bass, powerful drumming and that beautiful willingness to let a piece of music breathe.
Their 2012 fourth album, Calmer Than You Are, captures their rawer side. Tracks like Moonward, D.O.G. and Sphere (… or Kneiter) have that primitive physical force that brings the spirit of ‘70s heavy rock to mind, sometimes even the unpolished aggression of Raw Power. Not that The Machine sound like The Stooges, but they share that refusal to polish away the danger. The guitar has to hit hard, and the rhythm section has to make it count.
The bass is never merely following the guitar. It gives the riff its weight and movement, while the drums push against it, occasionally pulling the whole thing somewhere unexpected. When these three elements lock together, the music becomes almost physical. I can feel it as much as hear it.
Then there is Offblast! and, above everything else, Chrysalis (J.A.M.). This is The Machine at their most absorbing: heavy, bluesy, psychedelic and completely surrendered to the groove. The guitar establishes its enormous presence, but the real magic lies in the conversation between the musicians.
The bass makes everything roll and breathe – the drums provide the muscle while allowing the music to wander into more spacious, almost jazzy passages. When the heavy riff finally returns, it feels twice as powerful. That moment of return is one of my favourite things in music. You leave the riff behind, drift somewhere else, and then suddenly discover that it has been waiting for you all along.
the relationship between guitar, bass and drums remains the beating heart of everything…
Their new album, Another Sun, their eighth studio effort, builds on that fascination while remaining true to the sound they’ve spent years refining. The explosive opener, Drop/See delivers the guitar power I expect, supported by a rhythm section that keeps everything moving rather than letting the heaviness become static. Evolver feels particularly appropriate in a catalogue built on constant exploration without losing its central character, while In Search Of Yellow brings more psychedelic colour to the heavy foundations.
However, it is Swallow The Sun that draws me in most. Over eleven minutes, there is room for the music to develop instead of rushing towards an ending. The guitar stretches out, the bass changes the ground beneath it, and the drums gradually reshape the direction. Yet the music never loses its centre. Even when the musicians wander into more abstract territory, the original groove remains somewhere underneath, holding everything together.
That is the difference between a long track that simply goes on and a track that genuinely takes you somewhere. I don’t need ten minutes for the sake of ten minutes. I need to hear what those ten minutes do to the music, how a riff can become something I would never have imagined when it first appeared.
When I listen to the Dutch trio, I hear echoes of Blue Cheer in the sheer violence of the guitar, the 13th Floor Elevators in the hypnotic repetition, and Black Sabbath in the foundations. There are also connections to Kyuss and Queens of the Stone Age, bands that understood how a simple riff could become an entire world through groove and persistence.
Yet The Machine have developed their own language. Calling them stoner rock doesn’t quite cover it. There is too much blues, too much psychedelic space and too much freedom in the way their music unfolds. They belong to that wonderful territory where heaviness becomes a form of exploration.
Looking back at Solar Corona, Drie, Calmer Than You Are, Offblast!, Faceshift, Wave Cannon and now Another Sun, I hear a band that has continued to explore its possibilities without abandoning what made it special. Some records are rawer, others more spacious or exploratory, but the relationship between guitar, bass and drums remains the beating heart of everything. And perhaps that is why I keep coming back. The Machine don’t need to become Metallica, QOTSA, Tool or Elder. They have their own territory, somewhere between the physical force of ‘70s heavy rock, the hypnotic pull of heavy psychedelia and the freedom of the extended jam.
The guitar gives me the riff. The bass gives it weight and movement. The drums give it life. Then the musicians begin pushing against one another, and something unexpected happens. The riff becomes a journey, and I never want it to end simply because four minutes have passed. I want to know where it can take me after ten minutes, what it can reveal when the obvious has already been said. With Another Sun, The Machine are still finding those places. And after all these years, that matters more than reinvention ever could. The machine is still moving.
Label: Stickman Records | Blues Funeral Recordings | Awe Records
Band Links: Official | Facebook | Bandcamp | Spotify | Instagram
Scribed by: Domenico ‘Mimmo’ Caccamo
