Teeth of the Hydra

Teeth of the Hydra frontman and guitarist Matt Miner describes his group as "'70s death metal." Take "The Garden of Rotten Teeth" for example, off the Hydra's ominous new disc Greenland. Clocking in at 11 minutes, it's a slab of epic classic-rock that's tuned so low, it scrapes the upper strata of Hades. The rest of the disc follows suit: bubbling hypno-sludge that a mammoth could drown in.

The underground-metal trio hails from Columbus, but it features one of the most versatile musicians from the Akron-Kent indie scene: Jamie Stillman hit the skins for Harriet the Spy and slung an axe in Party of Helicopters.

"When Jamie joined in 2003, the music got much more aggro," says Miner. "I was totally under the influence of mid-tempo black metal, so the record has lots of galloping drumming and not as riffy guitar -- more of a wall of noise. I was inspired by looking at pictures of glaciers and Greenland. All the songs are set in the Arctic. There are songs about drowning on a fishing trip, being shipwrecked at the edge of the world, and freezing to death on a livestock train in Siberia. Fun stuff."