Press for "DEFENDER, REDEEMIST":
"It's like Behold! The Monolith, an unassuming power trio of laid-back Californians, have listened to the latest albums by Mastodon or Baroness and figured out what it is that made them suck. While some just sit around bitching about it, Matt, Chase and Kevin picked up their instruments and showed everyone how it should be done. Long and colossally heavy songs like 'Redeemist' or 'Bull Colossi' have everything you should be looking for if you're a fan of heavy music - coarse, I-don't-ever-want-to-be-a-singer vocals, kickass riffs that owe as much to sludge as they do to the blackest doom and a dirty, catchy swagger. It's these people who should be headlining arenas."
Jose Carlos Santos - TERRORIZER MAGAZINE
"BLACKENED STONER METAL: Behold! The Monolith is a bunch of tricky dudes. Every time you think you have their musical stylings pegged, they throw another twist in the myth. The music dive bombs you like that celestial knight riding the spiny Gryphon on the cover. It's not that they stray too far from their core sound, but it's a pleasant surprise the way the music evolves organically over the course of Defender, Redeemist. The first track is a super slow sludge instrumental, so you think you're in for some doomed agony, but then "Halv King"kicks into a High On Fire and Mastodon gallop. "Redeemist" starts out with intergalactic space rock noises, turns into doom, and then brings in a black metal guitar sound. The middle passage of "Cast On The Black-Lamentor-Guided By The Southern Cross" veers into straight-up black metal, enough so that, if you aren't paying attention, you might think an entirely different band had started playing. And yet, if you go back and listen to the track again, the segue seems entirely natural. Even though it's only their second album, these Los Angeles natives have mastered the art of becoming genre chameleons. The individual segments may not be overly original, but the way everything fits together is. With that in mind, Defender, Redeemist is an impressive monolith to behold. 8/10"
Jeff Treppel - OUTBURN MAGAZINE
"B!TM rudely grasp Mastodon by the throat, snip their tiny prog balls off, and proceed to shit vociferously into the wounds. They then thumb a ride with High On Fire’s Matt Pike, break open a suitcase of cold ones, and proceed to break the empties over his thick skull. He smiles, gives them his last bag of weed, and sings their praises as they roar off to pillage his women and rape his village. You know the tag words – doom, stoner, sludge. It’s all here, but with a extra burst of creativity and energy lacking from many of today’s bands of this ilk. Moody, pissed-off, and reeking of flatulence and unshaven privates, this album should redefine exactly what Stoner Metal™ means in the year MMXII."
Corey Mitchell - MetalSucks.net
""BEHOLD! THE MONOLITH is an inducer of earthquakes. You will feel the earth shift beneath your feet on this sucker. Don't cast aspersions about the "self-released" tag either. New kids, unknowns, or otherwise, "Defender, Redeemist" does more than hold its own against the commercially established and the much hyped; it is a certifiable threat."
Scott Alisoglu - Blabbermouth.net
"Stoned and dethroned. First impressions don't lie: It sounds like a Billy Anderson record. More specifically, it sounds like High On Fire's earlier, more molten output, circa The Art of Self Defense, and, even more notably, Surrounded by Thieves. That's clearly what Behold! The Monolith were going for with their latest full-length, Defender, Redeemist, and sure enough, Anderson's behind the board on this one. The pounding drums are a dead giveaway! Anderson's core competency is as a structural engineer, building bridges between proto-doom, '80s stoner foundations à la Saint Vitus and modern exemplars like Sleep. That dramatic through-line reverberates in the sound, tone and shape of Defender, Redeemist, and Behold! The Monolith have crafted an album that's certainly evocative and authentic.
The Los Angeles power trio remains ambitious when it comes to stretching out their bottom-heavy jams to epic lengths. The group's 2009 self-titled record featured a 12+ minute triptych as a fitting coda; Defender,Redeemist follows suit with an even longer multipartite showpiece ("Cast on the Black/Lamentor/Guided by the Southern Cross") that shifts gears seamlessly between single-chord drone in its middle section and '70s guitar rock flamboyance as it fades to black. Guitarist Matt Price's solos are flashy and fast on the intro to "Witch Hunt Supreme" (which also features a quasi-interpolation of "Smoke On The Water" mid-song) and modest but memorable on longer tracks like "Redeemist". Innovation comes in the form of short patches of acoustic ambience, where ambition gives way to polite-ness on an otherwise lurching, bowel-shaking and thoroughly unnerving trip."
Nick Green - Decibel Magazine
"The L.A. based riffers summon High on Fire's hesher fury on their second album. Partial credit for this is due to HoF/Neurosis producer Billy Anderson, who helped this power trio capture its pummeling rhythms and burning guitar work. The result is eight thrashing tracks of bullish, doomy Metal."
Guitar World Magazine
"Defender, Redeemist builds on the cement foundation of Sleep and Electric Wizard while using lumber coated with Mastodon and Baroness. The reinforced finished product, however, is pure B!TM"
Chad Kallauner - The New Review
"Where did these guys come from?"
Todd Lyons - About.com
"...the band is at its most heinous, laying down an ageless, soul-sucking black metal doom that ebbs, flows, and screams in myriad glorious ways....Defender, Redeemist is one hell of a monster on so many different levels."
BrokenBeard.com
"If a bong-ripping demon rose from the fiery underworld to impregnate Motörhead, their resulting hellish lovechild would undoubtedly be Behold! The Monoloth......like an auditory journey through the old wizard-covered highschool metalhead’s notebook you know you’ve got buried somewhere in your room, this album oozes pure ass-kicking aggression."
CVLT NATION
"Defender, Redeemist is one of those rare albums where saying “holy fuck” truly conveys the feeling behind the album..."
Dave Steed - PopDose
"Behold! The Monolith are one of Sludge Metal’s best kept secrets but its now time for that secret to be shared with the world....the first masterpiece of 2012 has truly arrived. This will definitely be on my best of 2012 list that is for sure."
TheSludgeLord.blogspot.com
"Behold! The Monolith crush your pathetic skeletal frame with their Doom power....this is one bad-ass, maniacal, beast of a record that should put this band on the fast track to subgenre dominance and larger stages to hold their chaos."
Brian Krasman - Meat Mead Metal
"Behold! The Monolith have really outdone themselves with this one. I always knew this band was good but I didn't expect this. 'Defender, Redeemist' is my first favorite album of 2012. It is a flawless album that should push the band to the next level of popularity. Killer stuff...........10/10."
Doommantia.com
"Even though there is a variety of musical elements throughout the album, the apocalyptic doom vibe is created right from the first note, and never leaves the album at any point. This vibe binds the eight tracks together brilliantly and makes “Defender, Redeemist” worthy of continuous long-play. Fans of the older material will find plenty here that they’ll identify with, but the music is stronger, darker, more diverse, and certainly more epic....a relentlessly amazing record from start to finish, this one comes as strongly recommended from me to all fans of heavy music. Rating: 10/10"
Andrew Bansal - metalassault.com
"It's like Behold! The Monolith, an unassuming power trio of laid-back Californians, have listened to the latest albums by Mastodon or Baroness and figured out what it is that made them suck. While some just sit around bitching about it, Matt, Chase and Kevin picked up their instruments and showed everyone how it should be done. Long and colossally heavy songs like 'Redeemist' or 'Bull Colossi' have everything you should be looking for if you're a fan of heavy music - coarse, I-don't-ever-want-to-be-a-singer vocals, kickass riffs that owe as much to sludge as they do to the blackest doom and a dirty, catchy swagger. It's these people who should be headlining arenas."
Jose Carlos Santos - TERRORIZER MAGAZINE
"BLACKENED STONER METAL: Behold! The Monolith is a bunch of tricky dudes. Every time you think you have their musical stylings pegged, they throw another twist in the myth. The music dive bombs you like that celestial knight riding the spiny Gryphon on the cover. It's not that they stray too far from their core sound, but it's a pleasant surprise the way the music evolves organically over the course of Defender, Redeemist. The first track is a super slow sludge instrumental, so you think you're in for some doomed agony, but then "Halv King"kicks into a High On Fire and Mastodon gallop. "Redeemist" starts out with intergalactic space rock noises, turns into doom, and then brings in a black metal guitar sound. The middle passage of "Cast On The Black-Lamentor-Guided By The Southern Cross" veers into straight-up black metal, enough so that, if you aren't paying attention, you might think an entirely different band had started playing. And yet, if you go back and listen to the track again, the segue seems entirely natural. Even though it's only their second album, these Los Angeles natives have mastered the art of becoming genre chameleons. The individual segments may not be overly original, but the way everything fits together is. With that in mind, Defender, Redeemist is an impressive monolith to behold. 8/10"
Jeff Treppel - OUTBURN MAGAZINE
"B!TM rudely grasp Mastodon by the throat, snip their tiny prog balls off, and proceed to shit vociferously into the wounds. They then thumb a ride with High On Fire’s Matt Pike, break open a suitcase of cold ones, and proceed to break the empties over his thick skull. He smiles, gives them his last bag of weed, and sings their praises as they roar off to pillage his women and rape his village. You know the tag words – doom, stoner, sludge. It’s all here, but with a extra burst of creativity and energy lacking from many of today’s bands of this ilk. Moody, pissed-off, and reeking of flatulence and unshaven privates, this album should redefine exactly what Stoner Metal™ means in the year MMXII."
Corey Mitchell - MetalSucks.net
""BEHOLD! THE MONOLITH is an inducer of earthquakes. You will feel the earth shift beneath your feet on this sucker. Don't cast aspersions about the "self-released" tag either. New kids, unknowns, or otherwise, "Defender, Redeemist" does more than hold its own against the commercially established and the much hyped; it is a certifiable threat."
Scott Alisoglu - Blabbermouth.net
"Stoned and dethroned. First impressions don't lie: It sounds like a Billy Anderson record. More specifically, it sounds like High On Fire's earlier, more molten output, circa The Art of Self Defense, and, even more notably, Surrounded by Thieves. That's clearly what Behold! The Monolith were going for with their latest full-length, Defender, Redeemist, and sure enough, Anderson's behind the board on this one. The pounding drums are a dead giveaway! Anderson's core competency is as a structural engineer, building bridges between proto-doom, '80s stoner foundations à la Saint Vitus and modern exemplars like Sleep. That dramatic through-line reverberates in the sound, tone and shape of Defender, Redeemist, and Behold! The Monolith have crafted an album that's certainly evocative and authentic.
The Los Angeles power trio remains ambitious when it comes to stretching out their bottom-heavy jams to epic lengths. The group's 2009 self-titled record featured a 12+ minute triptych as a fitting coda; Defender,Redeemist follows suit with an even longer multipartite showpiece ("Cast on the Black/Lamentor/Guided by the Southern Cross") that shifts gears seamlessly between single-chord drone in its middle section and '70s guitar rock flamboyance as it fades to black. Guitarist Matt Price's solos are flashy and fast on the intro to "Witch Hunt Supreme" (which also features a quasi-interpolation of "Smoke On The Water" mid-song) and modest but memorable on longer tracks like "Redeemist". Innovation comes in the form of short patches of acoustic ambience, where ambition gives way to polite-ness on an otherwise lurching, bowel-shaking and thoroughly unnerving trip."
Nick Green - Decibel Magazine
"The L.A. based riffers summon High on Fire's hesher fury on their second album. Partial credit for this is due to HoF/Neurosis producer Billy Anderson, who helped this power trio capture its pummeling rhythms and burning guitar work. The result is eight thrashing tracks of bullish, doomy Metal."
Guitar World Magazine
"Defender, Redeemist builds on the cement foundation of Sleep and Electric Wizard while using lumber coated with Mastodon and Baroness. The reinforced finished product, however, is pure B!TM"
Chad Kallauner - The New Review
"Where did these guys come from?"
Todd Lyons - About.com
"...the band is at its most heinous, laying down an ageless, soul-sucking black metal doom that ebbs, flows, and screams in myriad glorious ways....Defender, Redeemist is one hell of a monster on so many different levels."
BrokenBeard.com
"If a bong-ripping demon rose from the fiery underworld to impregnate Motörhead, their resulting hellish lovechild would undoubtedly be Behold! The Monoloth......like an auditory journey through the old wizard-covered highschool metalhead’s notebook you know you’ve got buried somewhere in your room, this album oozes pure ass-kicking aggression."
CVLT NATION
"Defender, Redeemist is one of those rare albums where saying “holy fuck” truly conveys the feeling behind the album..."
Dave Steed - PopDose
"Behold! The Monolith are one of Sludge Metal’s best kept secrets but its now time for that secret to be shared with the world....the first masterpiece of 2012 has truly arrived. This will definitely be on my best of 2012 list that is for sure."
TheSludgeLord.blogspot.com
"Behold! The Monolith crush your pathetic skeletal frame with their Doom power....this is one bad-ass, maniacal, beast of a record that should put this band on the fast track to subgenre dominance and larger stages to hold their chaos."
Brian Krasman - Meat Mead Metal
"Behold! The Monolith have really outdone themselves with this one. I always knew this band was good but I didn't expect this. 'Defender, Redeemist' is my first favorite album of 2012. It is a flawless album that should push the band to the next level of popularity. Killer stuff...........10/10."
Doommantia.com
"Even though there is a variety of musical elements throughout the album, the apocalyptic doom vibe is created right from the first note, and never leaves the album at any point. This vibe binds the eight tracks together brilliantly and makes “Defender, Redeemist” worthy of continuous long-play. Fans of the older material will find plenty here that they’ll identify with, but the music is stronger, darker, more diverse, and certainly more epic....a relentlessly amazing record from start to finish, this one comes as strongly recommended from me to all fans of heavy music. Rating: 10/10"
Andrew Bansal - metalassault.com
Press for 2009 "S/T"
"In a day and age when even bands as abrasive and drug-imploded as ZOROASTER are inking relatively big record deals, it seems the time is right for West Coast golems BEHOLD! THE MONOLITH to shamble into view. Worshiping at the altar of the riff, possessed of an earth-rumbling tone, and crafting lengthy sludge epics worthy of their hessian ancestors, these guys are a worthy next step in the evolution of the heavy....If the doomed, creaking soul of proto-metal stoner riffs, agonal vocal scratchings, and the lurching throb of big, booming low end appeal to you — basically, if you like any of the above-mentioned bands — BEHOLD! THE MONOLITH are worth seeking out. Their earth-cracking crunge is the perfect soundtrack for these troubled times, bleary-eyed doom sludge as soundtrack to the end of the empire. Recommended."
- Keith Bergman, BLABBERMOUTH.NET (Feb 25, 2010)
"It may come as no surprise to discover that Behold! The Monolith are a Sleep-inspired stoner/doom band with a penchant for virile, manly pursuits such as mercilessly waging battle and gazing into Chthulu-esque abysses in search of tentacled, multi-dimensional demigods, but this California-based three-piece also have a sensitive side. Amongst the loping, dandruff-loosening grooves and burrowing, fuzzed-up leads there's a wistful airiness brewing that expands into the languid psyched-out space rock. Behold! The Monolith will have you seeing all kinds of stars."
- Jonathan Selzer, METAL HAMMER MAGAZINE (Nov 16, 2009)
"Ass-heavy like Mastodon or High On Fire, y'know, that sort of weightiness that you won't even headbang to because your neck feels too heavy, Behold! The Monolith promise great things on this three-track debut EP. Uglier and grittier than the aforementioned heavyweights, they can also rock out like the '70s were just yesterday. Bodes well, this does. 8/10"
- Jose Carlos Santos, TERRORIZER MAGAZINE (Apr 06, 2009)
"A friend turned me onto these guys by sending me a link to their myspace page. They are a three piece doom metal band out of the Los Angeles area and I really dig this album. One of the great things about working at and with indie record stores is the chance to find bands that aren't signed to a label or anything and get them some exposer. We worked out a direct deal with em to get their content on the digital site cause i feel they are just a good as any of the bigger "doom" bands out there. They have a little bit of a psych feel to them at parts so it's not all "slow and low" as you would think. Besides, you got to love an album with a song like "Battle For Balls Deep" on it. "
- ThinkIndie.com, ThinkIndie's Top Releases for 2009 (Dec 21, 2009)