The English branch of the stoner-rock movement tends to be darker than the American; not for nothing do they call the music “doom” on the other side of the Atlantic. Sitting somewhere in the middle—geographically and sonically—is sHeavy (pronounced “Chevy,” like the car), a band that first came together in St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada in 1993.



“We were called Green Machine in the beginning because we couldn’t think of a name and because we played ‘Green Machine’ by Kyuss,” drummer Ren Squires says. Not surprisingly, Bjork’s playing was a major influence on sHeavy’s drummer, along with punk-rock groups like the Misfits and classic stoner-rock influences like Black Sabbath. In fact, singer Steve Hennessey’s vocal resemblance to Ozzy Osbourne has garnered countless Sabbath comparisons, even though the pummeling but melodic sound of songs like “Quincy the Pig Boy” and “Alcofuel” embraces other influences as diverse as the Melvins, Deep Purple, and mid-’70s Pink Floyd.



Another self-taught musician, Ren Squires graduated from playing along with records on a rubber practice-pad kit in his bedroom to drumming for punk-rock garage bands. “I was in four or five punk-rock bands before I started to realize what I wanted to play,” he says. “I started off fast and realized that playing slow was a lot more fun. Then I started getting into music that was slowed down, the kind of psychedelic stuff from the ’70s.



“When I’m playing in sHeavy, I like to picture myself as the guy in Deep Purple, Ian Paice. He’s just so smooth, and he’s doing really complicated stuff which I can’t even touch. It’s amazing—the smoothness, and when he’s solid, he’s so solid; especially with the last record, that’s what I really tried to do. Other than that, I don’t really think about playing drums, I just kind of do it. I don’t have any real training, and I don’t know any technical terms. I can’t read music or anything like that. I just sit there and go bangity-bang. I should be embarrassed to tell you this, but between Electric Sleep and Celestial Hi-Fi, I literally didn’t pick up my drum sticks. Playing drums for me just kind of happens. I’ve got no interest to play drums unless there’s other music going on.”



In addition to drumming for sHEAVY, Squires manages the band and runs an Internet-only stoner-rock record store, Dallas Tarr, which can be found through the band’s web site, www.sheavy.com. Because of the distance and the expense, sHEAVY has yet to do a major tour of the U.S., and things are further complicated for the group by the fact that Hennessy has relocated to Texas for his day job. Still, the band continues to come together for recordings like the recent Celestial Hi-Fi (The Music Cartel), and its albums are favorites with stoner-rock aficionados.



Ren Squires has fewer problems being linked to the genre than some of his fellow musicians, though he is dismayed by some bands’ lack of creativity. “I always think, ‘Man, if they’re lumping us into a category with like 20 other bands that I like equally as much as my own band, that’s just dandy,” he says. “On the other hand, I hate to thing of things in terms of ‘scenes,’ and it is kind of getting redundant. There are a lot of good bands that are still doing what they always did—which is changing over time—and then there are all these other young bands that are popping up doing what was already done five or six years ago: big fuzz and a little psychedelic breakdown middle part and then back into something heavy with a scream. And that’s just terrible.”



When sHeavy drummer Ren Squires left the band, Kevin Dominic took over the sticks.



Proudest recorded moments:

“I think it’s ‘Strange Gods, Strange Altars’ or ‘Solarsphere’ from Celestial Hi-Fi; I forget which. It starts off with a drum roll. Those two songs, when we recorded them, they appeared on the album the same way we recorded them, like back to back immediately one after the other in the studio, so I get them confused. My next one would probably be ‘Tales from the Afterburner,’ just because it’s slow and I actually kept in time. I can’t see how Dale Crover does it—that guy, he hits weird chimes and stuff instead of keeping a beat, and it sounds like he’s playing with two-by-fours!”



His gear:

“The drums themselves are a Canadian kit called Canwood made in British Columbia. I got them used; all my kit is low-budget stuff that I stumbled across. The cymbals are mishmash of everything; I’ve got a big Paiste ride that I’ve been using for years and years, and some Sabian Fusion hi-hats, and whatever crash I can find at the time. They’re small; the kick drum is 20-inch, but it’s long, so it’s like a little cannon. But otherwise, no fancy stuff here; I’m a low-budget drummer! In fact, when my friend heard that I was going to be in Modern Drummer, he was like, ‘But you don’t even have good drums! I’m the one with all the fancy gear!’”



(© jimdero.com)