Zach Hill: "Stoic Logic"

Zach Hill, drummer for notoriously advanced speed rock duo Hella, recently released his first solo effort, Astrological Straights. It’s a playful, personal expansion his more fundamental tenants of operation, veering out of speed-metal/punk territory into an area of composed psychedelia that actually kinda sounds like an interpretation of Zappa’s best work with the Mothers of Invention.

The most interesting track of the lot is mid-album stomp “Stoic Logic,” featuring Dean Spunt and Randy Randall from No Age on vocals and guitars. The song epitomizes the theme of escapist pop blare with which Hill has saturated his album. Spunt and Randall’s layered lines of screaming guitar follow Hill’s ultra-tight drums down a musical autobahn, switching time signatures and throwing down big hooks all the while. The centerpiece of the song is the lyrics brought to the party by the No Age boys. Ever the self-reliant optimists, Spunt and Randall spit forth some concentrated DIY ethics (“Cuts on your eyes and your palms with the night like you own it don’t quit”) that could have come off as stuffy at a lower BPM but soar at this tempo. The duo follow Hill into the blaring abyss he’s created; they croon assertively “burn what you learn in the black hole and wait for the winter to split.” It all crashes perfectly into mess of whirling beats and chords, vocals boasting, “I don’t want to go m-i-s-s-i-n-g.”

Spunt and Randall balance out some of the more wayward and challenging moments on Astrological Straits with an impressive shot of necessary, inventive garage pop cohesion. Here, with Hill behind them, the duo is free to work the inherent harmony between their words and chords, building a meticulous whitewall of sound to hurl at the masses. Truth be told, “Stoic Logic” is probably one of the most high-yield collaborations you’ll hear creeping through the zeitgeist all year.