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Music

Stream Horsehunter’s Sticky and Smoky Album ‘Caged In Flesh’

There is only one thing you should be doing while listening to the Melbourne doom band's debut.

Horsehunter are heavy like a rain soaked blanket or flannel shirt. Like a dank backseat bong pull. Heavy with the weight of greasy hair, Sabbath riffs and suburban tedium. Slow and heavy. Music journalists call their songs atmospheric sludge. Their friends just call them fucking epic, long and rad.

Their self-released debut Caged In Flesh has become much talked about in their hometown of Melbourne and an intense live shows and supports for Sleep and High on Fire have led to a reputation as being on of the best in the doom scene.

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Magnetic Eye Records will be releasing this album on vinyl and CD along with a digital re-release on April 21. Listen to the album that we are streaming below and make up your own fuzzy mind.

We had a chat to the band’s Mike Harutyunyan about their breakout 2014 and the future.

Noisey: 2014 was a big year for the band. What was the stand out?
Mike Harutyunyan: Releasing our album and getting signed to Magnetic Eye Records was a great thing, we have our music on vinyl now and that’s always been a dream for us and the album took around two years to make so it’s great that that’s finally all wrapped up. The Cherry Bar residency was sick, a bunch of our local favorites jumped on to support us there and every night was a party. But the big one was probably playing with High On Fire and then Sleep. Where does playing with Sleep fit in?
I have no idea. That was a total trip. We really weren’t expecting to be offered that spot as we heard they specifically didn’t want to play with doom bands, so when we got the message we flipped the fuck out and smoked a lotta weed.

When it came time to play the show, we were all really buzzed up - it was by far the biggest show we’ve done, and it was amazing to see so many people cheering for us as the curtains opened. Playing with people you idolize is just fucked, we feel really undeserving, but if the opportunity is there we definitely aren’t going to say no. We went with it, had a blast, then it was over in an instant and we were just back to being four cooked teenyboppers prancing around stoned as fuck minding our gear in the loading dock outside of the venue as Sleep played a fat set (we took turns minding the gear and watching Sleep). Is Dopesmoker your favourite album?
Obviously. Haven’t you heard “Stoned To Death”? It’s about weed. Dopesmoker is about weed. I read this in a review “With an opening track "Stoned to Death" which clocks in around 16.28 this record is hardly a party pumper. It features no tracks which one would ‘chuck’ on in the background” Thoughts?
Well, of course don’t put our shit on in the background. It’s loud and angry so it’s like trying to have a good time at a party while there’s a big fight going on in the backyard. You have to be super wasted to enjoy that. I agree, don’t party with Horsehunter’s music. Party with Horsehunter though. Do you have a favorite review of the album so far?
One guy said it was really fucking terrible and that we’re a bunch of stupid dropkicks that should quit and learn to play faster. That was from an embarrassingly drunk/high guy (more drunk than high for sure) at Cherry Bar circa October 2014. It was a pretty good, well-summarized review that covered all grounds of what the album is about and gave us heaps of exposure and hype. Caged In Flesh was two years in the making. Are you tired of the songs yet?
I don’t think we’ll ever really be tired of the songs. Caged In Flesh was written while we were still pretty immature and angsty, and although we’ve matured and started writing heavier and less stoned music, we aren’t tired of those songs. We’ve barely even toured them, and we’re really eager to belt them out properly everywhere we can.

‘Caged in Flesh’ is available on Magnetic Eye Records April 21.