White Hills

Space-rock doesn’t get any more space-rockist than White Hills, the outer-limits exploration unit centered around guitarist/singer Dave W. and the bassist Ego Sensation. Any and all music in rock history whose intent has been to entrance minds and dilate eyes seems to course through their pulsing veins, from Deep Purple to Pink Floyd to Hawkwind to Krautrock juggernauts such as Can and Amon Düül II. The New York band’s repeti-riff sound has lots of company lately, standing strong beside grinding workouts by Wooden Shjips, Oneida, Cave, and Disappears.

What sets White Hills apart from their peers—well, excepting perhaps fellow long-form travellers Oneida—is an undaunted desire to hammer at their star-struck strings well past the normal breaking point. On their latest album, Frying on This Rock, a one-chord pound called “Robot Stomp” stretches its welcome into a dizzying 12-minute mantra, while a soaring, arena-sized blast called “I Write a Thousand Letters (Pulp on Bone)” occupies 14 minutes of hypnotized headspace.

It’s all pretty indulgent, to be sure, but Dave and Ego are formidable momentum-sustainers; they have some innate compass for how much more intoxicating a song can be when you stretch it to baffling proportions. For elongated space-jammers, White Hills can still sound pretty sharp and pointed, too. Take “Pads of Light,” whose slapping beat and churning riffery mean it feels like a punk thrash that just decided to hang out past closing time. Think of this as the musical equivalent of staying up all night, letting yourself down that extra beer or pop that extra tab just this one time. —Marc Masters