Vancouver quartet Bison B.C.’s third album Dark Ages has a brightness to it, from the cover’s flaming serpents and the band’s orange logo to the instrumentation across these seven songs and 46 minutes — great double guitar leads, the unexpected gently twanging interlude, cathartic and anthemic vocal chops, etc. It’s celebratory even when it’s dirty or seemingly apocalyptic. A side-effect of the band’s relative youth? Or maybe it’s mixing up their sludge storm with vibrant shout-along punk and torn-denim thrash. See, for example, the up-swinging riffs and group chants in “Two-Day Booze,” a song that approximates a climb toward a good buzz, a few drinks before the inevitable crash. TGIF.

Bison B.C. – “Two-Day Booze”

Dark Ages is out 4/13 via Metal Blade. You can pre-order it now. It follows 2008’s Quiet Earth, in case you’re keeping track. You can hear the 8-minute opener “Stressed Elephant at ExploreMusic. The guys are on that aforementioned tour with High On Fire, Priestess, and Black Cobra. (You might’ve caught the warm-up at SXSW.) Check out that last date, when Mastodon, Baroness, and some others get involved.

04/01 – Madison, WI @ High Noon Saloon
04/02 – Chicago, IL @ Lincoln Hall
04/03 – Columbus, OH @ Skully’s Music Diner
04/05 – Morgantown, WV @ 123 Pleasant Street
04/06 – Philadelphia, PA @ First Unitarian Church
04/07 – Cambridge, MA @ The Middle East
04/08 – Milford, CT @ Daniel Street
04/09 – New York City, NY @ Gramercy Theater
04/10 – Baltimore, MD @ Sonar
04/11 – Washington DC @ Black Cat
04/13 – Charlotte, NC @ Tremont Music Hall
04/14 – Atlanta, GA @ Masquerade
04/15 – New Orleans, LA @ One Eyed Jacks
04/16 – Houston, TX @ Walters On Washington
04/17 – Austin TX @ Emo’s
04/18 – Dallas, TX @ The Loft
04/20 – Boulder, CO @ Fox Theater
04/22 – Tempe AZ @ The Clubhouse
04/23 – Los Angeles, CA @ El Rey Theater
04/24 – Costa Mesa, CA @ Detroit Bar
04/25 – San Diego, CA @ The Casbah
04/27 – Fresno, CA @ Audies Olympic/Club Fred
04/28 – Santa Cruz, CA @ Blue Lagoon
04/30 – Boise, ID @ Neurolux Inc
05/01 – Spokane, WA @ The Boulevard
05/02 – Bellingham, WA @ The Nightclub
05/04 – Seattle, WA @ Chop Suey
05/05 – Portland, OR @ Dante’s
05/07 – Eureka, CA @ Nocturnum
05/08 – Oakland, CA @ The Fox Theater #

# w/High On Fire, Mastodon, Priestess, Baroness, Between The Buried And Me, Valient Thorr, Black Cobra