Goatsnake

Goatsnake
Goatsnake's current lineup as of 2015.
Background information
Origin	Los Angeles, California, USA
Genres	Doom Metal, Stoner Metal
Years active	1996 - 2001, 2004 - 2005, 2010 - Present
Labels	Southern Lord Records, Man's Ruin Records
Associated acts	Burning Witch, Asva, The Obsessed, Sunn O))), Thorr's Hammer, Acid King, Fireball Ministry, Kyuss, Across The River, Doomriders, Scream, Wool, Sun & Sail Club, Sonic Medusa
Website	Bandcamp
Current members	Greg Anderson Pete Stahl Greg Rogers Scott Renner

Goatsnake are a doom metal band from Los Angeles, California who have been sporadically active in some capacity since 1996. In a contrast to guitarist Greg Anderson's drone-based musical endeavors they are more of a doom metal/stoner metal band known for their molasses tone, catchy grooves and vocalist Pete Stahl's soulful musical delivery.

History

Initial Formation (1996 - 2001)

Goatsnake formed in 1996 when Greg Anderson expressed an interest with jamming with Guy Pinhas and Greg Rogers, both of whom were in The Obsessed, a band that at the time recently disbanded. Anderson would travel to Los Angeles to jam with them and not long after recruited Pete Stahl (Earthlings?, Scream!) as their vocalist.

“	“I hooked up with the rhythm section : Greg Rogers, and Guy after they split from the Obsessed. At the time I was living in Seattle and my band Engine Kid had broken up. Through the suggestion of a mutual friend, Guy contacted me asking if I wanted to jam. Being a huge Obsessed fan I jumped at the opportunity! I went down to Los Angeles, we jammed and it all clicked. After a couple months we decided to try and find a singer... We all loved Petes voice and his previous bands Wool, and Scream... So we asked him to come down and it all worked out super well.”	”
	— Greg Anderson, Psychedelic Zine

Around 6 - 8 months after forming, Goatsnake would start recording material in 1997. In 1998, the band would release a 7" single entitled IV via Prosthetic Records, limited to 1000 copies. Not long after a second 7" would see release as Man of Light via Warpburner. The band also performed live in the West Coast, sharing the stage with the likes of Queens of the Stone Age, Fatso Jetson and Fugazi. The next year the band would release their debut album I on Man's Ruin Records and tour Europe for the first time, notably an appearance at Dynamo Festival and a handful of shows with Electric Wizard. By the end of 1999, Guy Pinhas left the band due to personal differences and was replaced by G. Stuart Dahlquist (Sunn O))), Burning Witch). Throughout 2000, the band would put out three releases: An EP entitled Dog Days on Southern Lord Records, a split with Burning Witch on Hydra Head Records and the bands second album Flower of Disease on Man's Ruin. The band toured the US and Europe in support of the record alongside Witch Mountain, Orange Goblin and Sunn O))).

By 2001, Dahlquist and Rogers had both left. Taking place on bass and drums leading up to a European tour with Queens of the Stone Age were Joey Castillo on drums and Ron Holzner on bass. Sometime after the band would go on a hiatus.

First Reunion (2004 - 2005)

In 2002, Greg Anderson and JR Conners would record a trio of songs with Scott Reeder (Kyuss, The Obsessed) adding bass to the recordings. Later, Stahl would provide vocals to the recordings and along with two previously recorded songs, would be released as an EP in 2004 entitled Trampled Under Hoof. A reissue of the band's first album & EP entitled I + Dog Days seen release. Goatsnake would perform at least two shows that year in California before going on hiatus once again.

Second Reunion (2010 - Present)

Goatsnake were announced to reunite in 2010 at Roadburn Festival as one of the headlining acts. It would be the first time the original lineup had performed together in over ten years. Also leading up to the reunion show Flower of Disease was finally reissued on CD and vinyl (Along with a I + Dog Days 2LP set) on Southern Lord Records. In an interview with The Obelisk, Greg Anderson would speak about how the reunion came about, how he feels the band took a hiatus rather than broke up and how he felt of the performance:

“	“Another band that I’m involved with, called Thorr’s Hammer — which was actually Stephen O’Malley from SunnO))) and my first band together — we got asked to play a festival in Birmingham, England, last summer called Supersonic. The bass player for that group is out of the picture, we haven’t talked to him for (laughs) 10 years or whatever, so it was like, “Okay, if we’re gonna do a Thorr’s Hammer set, we need to find a bass player,” and the first person who came to mind was this guy Guy, who was a founding member of Goatsnake as well, and he was always a huge fan of Thorr’s Hammer, and actually helped fund Southern Lord to release the Thorr’s Hammer recordings. We asked him to take part in it, and he was living in Europe, and that made it a bit easier for travel and expenses and stuff like that – plus he’s a killer player. We enlisted him to play in Thorr’s Hammer, and at that festival, the two guys that organize the Roadburn festival were in attendance, and they saw Guy and I hanging out and they said, “Hey, what are the chances of Goatsnake playing in the future?” Guy and I were like, “Yeah, why not?” We were having a great time playing music together again, and Goatsnake never officially broke up and there was never any real bad blood between any of the members, it was just kind of one of those things where members got busy doing other things, and it was just put on a lengthy hiatus. Guy and I kicked around the idea, talked to the other founding members of the band, Pete and Greg, and everyone was real excited to try getting back together and playing music again. So that’s what we did. I really like the Roadburn festival, so it was an honor to be asked to play, and they asked us to headline, so it was a really great opportunity we couldn’t pass up, so we basically put a lot of work and effort into getting it together for that thing and played the fest. (In regards to the performance at Roadburn) It was awesome. It was really, really great. It exceeded my expectations. We worked really hard and rehearsed and spent a lot of time trying to get the tone right, making sure everything sounded as good as possible, but a lot of that shit just goes out the window when you play live (laughs), because there’s different forces at work. There’s adrenaline, there’s nerves, and my experience, honestly, Goatsnake, to me, was never a great live band. I didn’t really feel like we rehearsed enough, and I didn’t feel like we pulled off what we had recorded in a live setting, so I had that lingering in my mind. And Goatsnake never played a lot of shows. We never played east of the Rockies, and we did some stuff overseas, but we never did anything extensive, and I always felt like Goatsnake always sounded better on record. I had that nagging at me in the back of my mind. This is for me personally, I think the other guys would say something different. This is my own personal scrutiny and analysis of what worked. I was pretty nervous for this show, because I wanted to be good. Everyone put a lot of time and effort into it, and I know there was a lot of expectations and a lot of people were really excited to see it, people had traveled to see it and stuff. It was one of those nights where it was pretty magical. Everything really worked out well. The crowd was amazing. I thought everyone played really well and there wasn’t too many mistakes (laughs). It was just a really good vibe. The other thing that was really daunting about the whole thing was the stage we played on was fucking humongous, and Goatsnake had never played on a stage that size. The other thing was the most people we had ever played to was probably about a thousand people, and that was one time. But we never played on a stage that big and we never headlined for sure. It was never these kind of expectations on us. I had some anxiety about it, but I thought it went off really, really well, and I was very pleased with it and the audience was amazing.”	”
	— Greg Anderson, The Obelisk

The band would keep performing after this special show throughout the next few years. The first string of shows were in 2010 on the West Coast along with an event Anderson curated entitled Power of The Riff, featuring bands from the Southern Lord label at the time such as Corrosion of Conformity, Black Breath, Pelican and Nails to name a few. The band would tour Europe the next year including an appearance at Hellfest.

In 2014, Scott Renner was recruited as the bassist for the band as they performed a string of shows including Southwest Terror Fest. The band announced they were starting work on a third album. In 2015 the band would release Black Age Blues on Southern Lord, their first album in fifteen years. The band would tour extensively in support of the record throughout Europe and the United States including appearances at SXSW, Psycho Festival, Maryland Deathfest, Temples Festival, Freak Valley Festival and Desertfest Belgium to name a few.

The band only performed once in 2016 at their second appearance at Hellfest.

Discography

Studio Albums

• I (1999, Man's Ruin Records)
• Flower of Disease (2000, Man's Ruin Records)
• Black Age Blues (2015, Southern Lord Records)

Misc. Releases

• IV (1998, Prosthetic)
• Man of Light (1998, Warpburner)
• Goatsnake/Burning Witch (2000, Hydra Head Recordings)
• Dog Days (2000, Southern Lord Records)
• Trampled Under Hoof (2004, Southern Lord Records)
• Breakfast With The King b/w Deathwish (2020, Southern Lord Records)

Members

Current Lineup

• Greg Anderson - Guitar (1996 - 2001, 2004 - 2006, 2010 - Present)
• Pete Stahl - Vocals, Harmonica (1996 - 2001, 2004 - 2006, 2010 - Present)
• Greg Rogers - Drums (1996 - 2001, 2010 - Present)
• Scott Renner - Bass (2014 - Present)

Past Lineup

• Guy Pinhas - Bass (1996 - 2000, 2010 - 2011)
• G. Stuart Dahlquist - Bass (2000 - 2001)
• Ron Holzner - Bass (Live) (2001)
• Joey Castillo - Drums (Live) (2001)
• Scott Reeder - Bass (2004 - 2006)
• John-Robert Conners - Drums (2004 - 2006)

Tours

• QotSA Mini Tour 1998 (With Fatso Jetson, Acid King, Queens of the Stone Age) (1998)
• I European Tour (With Electric Wizard) (1999)
• Flower of Disease North American Tour (With Witch Mountain) (2000)
• Flower of Disease European Tour (With Orange Goblin, Sunn O)))) (2000)
• 2001 European Tour (With Queens of the Stone Age, King Adora) (2001)
• 2004 Shows (With Khanate, Thrones, Graves at Sea, Lair of the Minotaur) (2004)
• The Power of The Riff 2010 (With Corrosion of Conformity, Black Breath, Eagle Twin, Righteous Fool) (2010)
• 2011 European Tour (2011)
• Black Ages Blues European Tour (2015)
• Black Age Blues North American Tour (With Black Breath, Battalion Of Saints, Obliterations, YDI, BIG|BRAVE, Pelican depending on dates) (2015)

External Links

• Old Official Page
• Facebook
• Bandcamp
• Archived writeup on Trampled Under Hoof
• Interview with Guy on Goatsnake's Page
• Tour Dates 1998 - 2001