That’s where you’ll find your heart
In between those twin moons

Those lines are the chorus of ”Twin Moons”, opening track of Swedish alternative heavy rock duo Molosser Crude’s first album, ”I Am Distortion”. And indeed it could also serve as a description of Molosser Crude: In the middle of a tight orbit formed by drummer/singer Tess and guitarist Jahn, the music is a living, throbbing heart that’s moved in tidal rhythms by the two circling satellites in shifting patterns of darkness and light.

The tracks

More darkness than light, perhaps. ”Twin Moons” is a kind of brooding, sludgy stoner blues that gives way to ”War Horse”, taking one step further into a monotonous landscape of broken marching drum beats and dark guitar drones – but even here, a powerful chorus lends if not light then at least plenty of energy to the track, as always with Tess’ powerful vocals on center stage.
Midway through this five track album, the tempo perks up a notch with ”In the Details”, the only song of the lot that clocks in at under six minutes. After this relatively straightforward presentation we move on to another celestial number, ”Swallow the Sun”, where stoner psychedelia meets tight noise rock riff choruses and the jazz flavoured grooves of sixties hard rock. We stay in this mood, more or less, with the closing track, ”Slave to the Voices”, which during its close to eight minutes waxes and wanes through several phases of calm and chaos.

Stoner blues noise rock?

As you might imagine from this description, Molosser Crude have always had a hard time defining themselves genre-wise. Like bands like All Them Witches, Queens of the Stone Age or Melvins, they live in an in-between territory, making their very own brew from influences in stoner rock, noise rock and gnarly blues, but also soul and free jazz, something that becomes evident not least in Tess’ vivid vocals and Jahn’s excursions onto the thin ice of improvisation. The duo’s extensive use of the voice as an instrument and the instrument as a voice is another element that sets Molosser Crude apart from many other hard-riffing combos. As is of course the unusual combo of vocals and drums, but it fits Tess perfectly as she’s bursting with multi-focused energy. ”Actually”, she says, ”it’s easier for me to sing while drumming than not. I have a busy brain, and when it’s occupied like this it’s not tempted to wander off in other directions.”


The darkness prevails in Tess’ lyrics as well, and while these, just like the lyrics of many other heavy acts, deal with demons and monsters, these demons live within and the monsters wear a suit and tie or the false smile of an intolerant neighbour.

I Am Distortion – long story short

”I Am Distortion” represents the first time the duo use standard studio procedures, giving the tracks a more produced feel than the earlier tracks, which were all recorded live in the studio, one take, no overdubs. It’s still just the guitar, drums, vocals, though – delivering riffs, rhythms and melodies with organic honesty, and still not a click track or pitch correction device in sight.
Originally, this five track album was meant to contain more songs, but as the duo made a series of live gigs in Sweden during spring 2025 – parallell to releasing four of the album tracks as singles – many of the songs grew leaner and meaner, rougher and rawer. The duo realized that these would benefit more from a simpler, more straightforward presentation, closer to the live versions than they were on the studio recordings, and decided to start recording a second album right away.