Ominous clouds set in as The Cloth hits the stage this evening at Johnny Brenda’s. The band shreds through obstacles as a combination of fury and torment fuse, revealing themselves in the determined, emotive immediacy of the primordial vocals. Loaded with a batch of freshly recorded songs as they prepare for a tour in late spring, the band steadily moves forward, wielding an unrelenting heaviness that storms the gates as plunging bass and pummeling drums are joined by serrated guitar. The clashing of tranquil subdued melody meeting swift blasts of fuzzed-out grunge creates an intriguing juxtaposing dynamic to Blue Smiley. Pop-punk quartet Left and Right celebrate their new EP, Pivot Foot, released today. With their own new record Life is Alright, Everybody Dies, Boston’s Kal Marks explores the dreary avenues of the mind with a pronounced heavy yet captivating personal touch. Johnny Brenda’s, 1201 N. Frankford Ave., 9pm, $10, 21+ - Michael Colavita

Oakland's quintet post-rock outfit, Unconditional Arms, have unveiled their brand new track, Feud. The single comes off of the group's latest release, a split, with Los Angeles' Minnow. The split between Unconditional Arms and Minnow is available now, via Anchor Eighty Four Records.

Make sure that you head on over to the website and snag one of two packages of the Unconditional Arms x Minnow Split today. With any of the packages, you will receive a download of the album and a bag of Stumptown's 'Hairbender' blend of coffee.

It's nice to hear this new release from Unconditional Arms. They're new single borders on epic and the band has certainly honed in on their signature sound, become more confident and ambitious with their compositions. Good stuff.

We're excited to share that the upcoming community based music festival Freak Nest will be taking place on March 26th at The Cave in the Dogpatch District of San Francisco!

Freak Nest is an independent Bay Area music festival showcasing the local artistic community. The festival will be held on March 26th, 2016, at a warehouse in the Dogpatch district of San Francisco.

Freak Nest was founded as a way to unite the local community of artists, musicians, performers, entertainers, writers, photographers, poets, and people. The festival is an attempt to revitalize of our inherent responsibility to stand together in this time of spiritual and financial adversity.

All of the bands are local and independent. The lineup consists of Down Dirty Shake, Night Shapes, fpod bpod, Little Sister, Trans Van Santos, LOCO TRANQUILO, Michael Musika, Mayya and the Revolutionary Hell Yeah as well as a handful of other special guests, including Adam Vida (FKA A-1).

Local artists being featured include but are not limited to Kyle DeMartini, Taylor Lissandrello, Charlie Prather, and Will Durkee.

Something Other Than the Earth is a to-the-point package of what you really want when you're in a doom metal mood—to hell with subtlety; just give me the heavy. It's all here: thunderous guitars bellowing over a tundra of broken amps, intricate, twisting solos giving way to gut-churning chords, and Lovecraftian horrors explored in no particular hurry through track lengths in the double digits. Compound that with some in-your-face drums that would make Steve Albini cry (or whatever the max setting on his emotion dial looks like) and you've got an album with the heft and velocity to smash a whole city block. -Austin Phy

Sweet Cobra has released a video for their song "Repo" which appeared on their 2015 release Earth.

You can catch Sweet Cobra at Empty Bottle with like minded local band's Bloodiest, Electric Hawk, and Allen Epley on March 12th.