Hermano was never a full-time concern for its band members: tt was assembled around the same time as Unida in the wreckage of Kyuss, with singer John Garcia channeling the end of that era into something looser and more informal, basically an excuse to get into a rehearsal room with some buddies and jam. Still, their debut ...Only a Suggestion remains one of the crown jewels of stoner rock, a record spoken about with the kind of reverence usually reserved for foundational texts. The problem with bands built this way, around multiple projects, jobs, families and the practical realities of adult life, is that getting everyone in the same room is a logistical nightmare, never mind planning an international tour. Consequently, Hermano had not played Paris in eighteen years but it's precisely that absence that turned this show into something far more valuable than a routine stop on a tour itinerary. Well, that and the kick-ass music.
La Maroquinerie is packed wall to wall with longhairs, old scene veterans, younger disciples and curious onlookers, all gathered for the same sacrament: riffs. Hermano’s music is steeped in the usual heavy canon: Black Sabbath’s menacing groove, Jimi Hendrix’s bluesy psychedelia, traces of hardcore punk abrasion... It also eschews all of the usual clichés: no dungeons and dragons or no empty hedonism in the lyrics. This is blue-collar heavy metal, written by lifers and played for people who understand exactly what it does to the nervous system.
In the suffocating heat of the room, that effect is immediate. The pit erupts with the first riff and rarely stops moving. Axemen David Angstrom and Mike Callahan come down like a hammer, hurling riffs and solos at the crowd’s skull, while Chris Leathers on drums and Dandy Brown on bass provide the anvil beneath them, a rhythm section heavy enough to absorb the blow and send it right back into the room. The audience is caught somewhere in the middle, and judging by the state of that pit, nobody seems interested in escaping.
And then there is Garcia. That voice, weathered but still enormous, still capable of that haunted wail that once made him the defining voice of desert rock. Somewhere between Layne Staley and Ozzy Osbourne, but unmistakable his own. Yet what the evening confirms is that Hermano’s appeal cannot be reduced to pedigree or nostalgia. These songs have built their own legend. and eighteen years later, Hermano is claiming its rightful legacy.
