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SF003
Biblical Proof Of UFO's
s/t CD





1. 16 & 3
2. Sinkpisser
3. Jan Michael Vincent
4. Budapest Best
5. Dirty Dishes And Broken Bones
6. The Universalist
7. Axial Tilt Is The Reason For The Season
8. Providence
9. Liber Scivias
10. Arson Tells It Like It Is
11. Pamela Channeling
12. Cigar
13. Chris Smith Goes To The Vatican

Four nutjobs from Cleveland, Ohio deliver a fully instrumental brand of rock that is both heavy and tuneful, like Karma To Burn meets Don Caballero meets AC/DC meets your ears. Following the recording of this album (which lay dormant until we decided to put it out about 3 years later!) the band shed both guitarists, relocated to Hollywood, California, and got a dude in to do some singing, finally issuing another album called "Interstellar Messages" and planned to do a split 7" with The Eagles Of Death Metal. Both Johns Peel and Garcia dug them! Furthering the Kyuss connection, drummer Mike Peffer also plays for Brant Bjork.

Released 01/03/00.

CD SOLD OUT

CD ltd. to 1047 copies.





Biblical Proof Of UFO's | Mike Peffer, Scott Silverman, Ray Piller, Ron Kretsch | Bandcamp

Digitalmetal
A definite album of the year and a definitive metal-yet-not-metal album, this self-titled debut full-length is simply magnificent. Since 1995, this Hollywood-via-Cleveland outfit has played instrumental rawk supreme, like Karma To Burn gone prog. Their "Vishnu Were Here" EP on Ohio’s Cambodia Recordings (early home of Keelhaul) started the ball rolling, and it seemingly hasn’t stopped since. Though their newest material adds a vocalist and more rock-based chords, this album captures BPUFOs at the absolute top of their game. Drummer Mike Peffer, who played on Filter’s megahit "Hey Man, Nice Shot," pins down the impeccable rhythm section alongside bassist Ray Piller, and guitarists Ron Kretsch and Scott Silverman weave in and out of musical traffic like Rush’s Alex Lifeson jamming with Keelhaul. "Sixteen And Three," "The Universalist," and the wittily titled "Axial Tilt Is The Reason For The Season" contain heavy, metallic parts and whispering, fusion-jazz parts, almost like Keelhaul (circa their II album) with no vocals, while "Sinkpisser" and "Jan Michael Vincent" (yep, the star of TV’s Airwolf as well as many direct-to-video yarns) sport fluid bass lines that’re meandering yet circumspect. "Liber Scivias" is a more brooding number with lots of echoing chords and a Melvins-like resonance, while "Arson Tells It Like It Is" resembles a faster Karma To Burn. Mastered at a higher volume so it startles the listener, "Cigar" sounds the most like Karma To Burn with its interlocking chord repetition, yet "Chris Smith Goes To The Vatican" (reportedly about Keelhaul guitarist/vocalist Chris Smith visiting the Vatican where he was asked to remove his hat, revealing the still-raw pentagram tattoo that he had just had done the day before) distills the heaviest moments from Live’s Throwing Copper. All in all, Biblical Proof Of UFOs is the most logical progression of Keelhaul’s II without the aggression and with all technical aspects intact; play both albums side by side for instant conversion.

Carbon 14
The only words you get on this pulverizing all-instrumental debut CD are in the smart-ass titles, scrawled like graffiti ("Sinkpisser"), a mocking ransom note ("Arson Tells It Like It Is"), a departing ex-lover's lipstick imprecation on the mirror ("Dirty Dishes and Broken Bones") or an addled professor's chalkboard equation ("Axial Tilt Is The Reason For The Season"). When we say "instrumentals", we don't mean cute surf music or retro lounge comas. These are monstrously heavy passages, with alternately elegant riffs twisting like interlocking tree branches, climbing into stoner-rock cloudiness and intricately arpeggiated respites of out-and-out prettiness. Most often though, everything gives way to a rolling bass thunder, an avalanche of toms and a brainy bramble of barbed live-wire guitar. Since recording this impressive first album a while back in their Cleveland hometown, the fast-moving BPUFOs have switched guitarists, moved to Hollywood and written a batch of inescapably catchy tunes - with vocals! - that are the next logical progression in classic rock.

Dance Of Days
What a nice bandname! And even nicer songtitles: "Budapest Best", "Chris Smith goes to the Vatican" ... - BPUFOs sound like a project band of Snapcase and Kyuss members doing instrumental stuff. The lack of vocals isn't a problem for me and makes this quite unique. They had a song on Deep Elm's Emo Diaries 3 in case that matters to anyone. 13 songs in 47 minutes.

StonerRock
Biblical Proof of UFO's is a 4 piece instrumental outfit hinting on sounds as not quite as weird as The Fucking Champs, but more closer to the sounds of Don Caballero or Slint...but make no mistakes, these guys rock hard, venturing close to metal at times. Some of their stuff is almost Am-Rep noise sounding, once in a while it reminds me of great bands like Dazzling Killmen, Regraped or Bread Winner...Shiny Beast, Stinking Lizaveta or Jesus Lizard. Super precise at times and great changes. All these guys exorcize extreme chops constantly. It's definitely math rock, but not the super confusing style...these cats seem to generally write in a style that is easy to understand and bang your head/fist to. Very impressive slab of rock. Not my everyday listening, but many of you would beg to differ. These cats are a 'bands' band for sure, but don't let that steer you wrong...anyone and almost everyone could find something to enjoy and nice to say about Biblical Proof of...I do. It fits well with Am Rep- math prog collectors and those that just plain want something different. Ultimate bill would be these guys sandwiched between The Champs and Sons of Otis.

Smother
Most Americans have the dull sense that our music scene dominates all other scenes and that others whether in Europe, Asia, Australia, or even Africa take our music and influences and call it their own. Well that's just a sad mistake. Biblical Proof of UFOs is another example of how far advanced the UK music scene has been for so long. Never afraid to concentrate on doing something new and unique and yet still make it approachable by the critical masses. "Sixteen and Three" introduces us to an eclectic modern rock quartet that consummates a new breath in the right direction and prepares us for the Tool-esque bass rhythm of the following opus "Sinkpisser". The first time I had heard of these guys was way back on the compilation "Emo Diaries 3". Apparantly there's been some lineup changes since but nonetheless they're still just as exciting and non-linear. Some detractors may wonder what's missing but the vast majority of music aficionados will not notice the lack of vocals because the music is that powerful and inviting. Some may notice the similarities to other bands like the Duvalby Brothers and occasionally even Engage but these guys are certainly not a rehashing of other vocal-less rockers like Karma To Burn. An instant favorite is "Axial Tilt is the Reason for the Season" with its pulse pounding percussion and twisting melodies and nonchalant song structure and excellently accented offbeats. Truly a gem worth more than a mention and one that will hopefully influence other American bands as well as convince music labels that they can take this kind of chance too.

Aversionline
This instrumental Cleveland act plays a heavy math rock sort of style comparable to a blend between their local contemporaries in Craw and Keelhaul, to name but a few, with lots of quirky rhythms and note-based riffing. This is of course different in its own right, though. It's definitely a little more streamlined and melodic, with tracks like the epic "Budapest Best" bringing in some excellent droning lead lines and clean guitars, falling back on heavier chord progressions and chunky time signatures more in keeping with some of the other material herein (and this style as a whole). None of the work is what I would call technical per se, either. They're clearly talented, and the performances are really tight, but the writing is pretty straightforward in some ways. The time signatures never get too wacky, the basslines tend to follow the guitars, the drumming is on point but nothing flashy, etc. But I certainly find some of the guitar riffs to be creative and interesting, and I love that they write songs based around feel rather than showy instrumentation (a common problem with instrumental acts), so I do like this stuff. There's a great balance of dynamics throughout, literally and atmospherically, with a good number of tracks reaching a darker and heavier vibe, while others mix it up with some lush harmonics and flowing clean breaks, and a scarce few get pretty damn rocked out (see "Sinkpisser" and "Arson Tells it Like it Is", for example). "The Universalist" has lots of winding changes and some killer arpeggiated riffs that are right up my alley (not to mention some random post-hardcore stylings), "Providence" has some sludgy chords that are a little different than most of the other chord progressions, "Liber Scivias" is softer and more repetitive – using some dissonant feedback that works to separate it from the other songs significantly, etc. The recording is a little thick and could be mastered slightly louder ("Cigar" is way louder than the other songs for some reason), but it sounds really good, so those minor issues mean little in the end. A little added brightness would help bring things out a little more, as the guitars are pretty dense since the bass tone is well defined to let the notes sit out front more than average, but it sounds very warm and natural, which is just what I want to hear for this kind of approach. The layout is honestly not that attractive. The color scheme is a little ugly, the typeface isn't that hot, the imagery… ehhh. It's alright. It's pretty skimpy, it works, but the visuals do sort of rub me the wrong way from the start. It's consistent, if nothing else. My only minor issue with the record as a whole is that it feels a little long. 46 minutes ain't so bad, but 13 tracks feels a little heavy-handed to me. No big deal, though. I had never heard of this band prior to this, and I have no idea what they're up to these days (if anything), but this is good stuff. Likely underappreciated, but that's all too often the case with bands of this nature. One would hope the traditions of their city of residence would score them a decent local following, but you never can be sure. Fans of the aforementioned Clevelanders and this brand of instrumental rock in general should definitely give this a shot. 7/10.

Fracture
From the clean-cut college guys that comprise Biblical Proof Of UFO's you wouldn't have them pegged as heavy fucking rockers. But the Fu Manchu shirt lurking under one of their leather jackets gives them away. Oh, and the opening riffs of "16 & 3" pretty much give the game away too, seeing as how they swipe you upside the jaw with thick guitars, a pounding bass and a hard-hitter wielding two drumsticks. Something tells you right about then that these guys genuinely are made from flesh, bone and rock music. You may by now have noticed the proliferate use of the word "rock" in this review and that's exactly what Biblical Proof are...a rock band without any iffy vocals to taint the boiled-down-to-its-essence rock they play. As they even state on their thanks list: "A double-shot of love to the drunken jackasses in attendance at our performances who apparently felt it helpful, clever or somehow even germaine to shout "Where's your singer?". Your wit, each of you was priceless." Spot on. The astute among you may also have thought, "Hang on, he's describing Karma To Burn here surely?". Aye maybe, and to that I can only say, "So fucking what? You want something more?

Play Dead
I'm not sure what the deal is with these guys, whether they're still together or what as it's copyrighted to 1998, but I don't really care, this album rocks. Hard. If you could think Mogwai, if they were brought up on big fucking riffs. That's about it. Occasionally, well more than occasionally, pretty much every song, they whack out a big fat riff and generally just piss around with it. It's kind of post-rock, but heavy post-rock. And what makes it even better is when they've finished pulling out a killer riff, they'll just chill out for a bit and play some Appleseed Cast style noodlings, which can hold their own up with the best. No wonder then that track 12 appeared on the Deep Elm series, as this band are every bit as good as their more well known contemporaries and every track of the 13 on show here prove it.

Infinite Monkey
Never heard of them before. I'm surprised because this album was recorded back in 1998. Considering the quality rocking on here I would have thought that word would have spread about them. As far as I can make out, they've split up as well. Shame, another band lives their life unheard while at the same time everyone's creaming themselves over the lastest Jimmy Eat World rip-off band. I'm sure time will be kind to Biblical Proof Of UFO's. All the lame CDs of 10th-rate 'emo' bands will all end up in charity shops or just be binned while the small pressing of this album will end up in the hands of people who care. People will tell their friends about them, put them on comp tapes, play them to people. Slowly people will hear them. Maybe one of Biblical Proof Of UFO's will start a band that gets the lucky breaks and the big record label and people will want to check his old band out. Be sure that in years to come, when all the trendy emo CDs have been sold to second-hand shops or hidden out of embarrassment, people will flick through their old copies of Fracture and kick themselves for being taken in by the full-page Vagrant and Drive Thru ads and wish they'd taken notice of the little SuperFi ads telling them of how good the Biblical Proof Of UFO's CD is. Please don't let hindsight get the better of you. Send some money off to SuperFi and get this CD. It is a CD of an unheard of band who've already split up but it rocks. They thank Cows, Keelhaul and Unsane on their thanks list. That should give you an idea what they sound like. You like the Kabinboy / Redneck Manifesto split 7" (which you fucking should!)? Then you'll like this. Heavy, pounding, intricate, instrumental rock. Just riffs and beats and rock.

UKBase
Instrumental rock is pretty much an aquired taste I guess. I have to admit that apart from the likes of Man, Or Astroman? and Huevos Rancheros I haven’t really paid much attention to the whole thing - then I get this CD. Having heard the name before from one of the Emo Diaries compilations I was pretty curious to check out what they sounded like. The nearest comparison I can think of is probably The Metroschifter, they use the same grooving rock riffs and stop/start melodies as the aforementioned band and I guess a lot of Metroschifter stuff is instrumentally driven as well so they are not as far apart as you might imagine. The press release mentions Fu Manchu and the like and I suppose I can see where it’s coming from - the lack of vocals means that this band could probably sit comfortably in both the post hardcore and all out rock camps. I really enjoyed listening to this CD and unlike most instrumental music it doesn’t have you wishing some vocals would drop in every now and again to give it a kick up the arse. This is cool stuff and deserves a wider audience than it will ultimately get due to the lack of vocals - maybe one of the reasons that since this recording they’ve drafted in a singer.

Organ
This is good, hard rocking instrumental nailed-on heavy guitar music. Metal music of a Soundgarden / Zeppelin nature, flavours of things like Rock Of Travolta, NoMeansNo, Rush - actually it's rather refreshing to not have a vocalist, it just makes a change to have some quality instrumental hard rock that's played rather well. It's nothing that complicated - these aren't boring muso types. They can play well, excellent drums, excellent groove. Damn fine album.

Smartz Zine
Terza ed ultima uscita della giovane label è invece un cd tutto strumentale, la descrizione per cui l'ho preso diceva "Don Caballero meets AC/DC", ed è tutto vero! Loro sono i Biblical Proof Of UFO's, 45 minuti di sano e potente post-rock ben riffato e decisamente vario, sarà che non c'è il cantato ma riesco a sentirmelo per varie volte di fila a volume semiallucinante mentre cazzeggio al computer, sinceramente di AC/DC alla fin fine ci trovo ben poco, ma pezzi fighissimi come "Sinkpisser", e molti altri, non mi sono ancora stufato di sentirlo, e questo è un ottimo segno. Bel lavoro.

Kerrang
If there is a bandwagon for big riffing and very little talking then those nice Virginian boys in Karma To Burn are in the driving seat (providing rumours that they've split aren't true, of course). What's more, Cleveland's Biblical Proof Of UFO's are possibly the only passengers. However, having taken the time to give their songs proper and also rather good titles ('Sinkpisser', 'Arson Tells It Like It Is' and 'Dirty Dishes And Broken Bones' being three) it would be unfair to dismiss Biblical Proof's more downbeat, but equally glorious, slacker-heaviness as the mere plundering of a peer's style. In lieu of a lyric sheet there's a sleevenote proclaiming the band's recorded form to have been disbanded and re-invented. They may now have a singer, they may not. Chances are they still rock.

The CD also sat on John Peel's list of recommended releases for the months of April and May of 2002!