Before finding an interview that confirmed my suspicions about the meaning of this band’s name, I engaged in some internet research. The results of much of my searching directed me to “the black maria“, despite the difference in spelling. “The black maria” was the colloquial name for horse-drawn police wagons, with the term’s origins dating back to the mid-1800s in New York City. It was pronounced in the same way as “the black moriah”. Other searches pointed me to Moriah, the Hebrew name for the mountain where, according to the Book of Genesis, God told Abraham to take his son Isaac and sacrifice him. But none of those references is correct.

Searching more thoroughly would lead you to tales of Tombstone, Arizona, a silver-mining boomtown that became emblematic of the lawlessness and violence of the Old West in the 1800s, most famously the site of The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral and of the Boothill Graveyard, so named because most of the men buried there had “died with their boots on”. “The Black Moriah” was the name of the horse-drawn hearse that took many of those men to their final resting place on Boothill. The actual hearse is now housed in Tombstone’s Bird Cage Theater Museum, which was itself the site of an infamous brothel in those old lawless days.

And that horse-drawn hearse from Tombstone is in fact the source of the moniker for this North Texas band, who have embraced what old Tombstone came to stand for. Portraying themselves as a “horde of highwaymen”, they create “blackened thrash for a desert funeral”. The title of their latest album, Road Agents of the Blast Furnace, could serve as an alternate name for the band, because they do indeed sound like outlaws riding the wild roads of a sun-blistered land on horses from hell. Continue reading »

It’s not often I get an e-mail from a band that just says “For Your Damned Ears” with the band’s name and a web link . . . and that’s it. Well, really now, how could I resist? Especially when the band refer to themselves as “Road Agents of the Blast Furnace” or “a horde of highwaymen, hell-bent on Vulture Culture” (I found that out later when I visited that web link). The answer is, I didn’t resist.

The band’s name is The Black Moriah. They’re from North Texas and they “drink the spirits of past greats Bathory, Kreator, Motorhead, Slayer, [and] Venom,” or so though say, though I’m inclined to believe them.

They include former members of bands such as Absu, Bleed the Son, Psychiatric Regurgitation, and Aversion To Life. They’ve recorded and recently self-released a three-song demo called Casket Prospects, with the following track titles: “Casket Prospects”, “Chained and Confined”, and “Watch My Town Burn”. They got some skills. Looks like they may have some knives, too.

They can also rev the thrash engines into the red zone. The title track proves that, with vicious riffs, rapid-fire bass, snare-heavy drums with crashing cymbals, hard-driving pistons, a rusted exhaust pipe belching putrid smoke, and infernally blackened vocals. Irresistible headbang material. Continue reading »