South Africa's Acid Magus, Keenan Kinnear (guitars); Roelof Van Tonder (bass); Jethro Vlag (drums); Anrico Jeske (vocals) and Brendon Bezuidenhout (guitars/backing vocals), have to date only released a handful of single releases and three full albums (this one included) but already they are being spoken of in the same breaths as some of our scenes biggest hitters. On paper it would seem like Acid Magus' ascendancy has been somewhat meteoric but a lot of hard work has gone into getting them to the point where an Acid Magus release has become something to pre-order long before its release date, the band are of course consummate musicians, writers and arrangers but they also have a great team behind them which has allowed them the freedom to concentrate on what is important to both them and us as consumers...their music. The bands latest album, their third, "Scatterling Empire" (Mongrel Records) is now out in the world, it is a conceptual piece, "detailing the conquest of culture and the resilience of nature", and finds the band adding a blackened edginess to their already quite edgy mix of doom, prog and psych, it is a sound that fits them like a velvet glove and makes "Scatterling Empire" not just a good listen but a totally essential one.
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Opener "War" enters with an off kilter droning effect then explodes into an onslaught of thundering riffs and rhythms, this is everything that you could possibly want from an opening number, its heavy furious, intense and features a well balanced mixture of soaring clean and gutturally harsh vocals, even the songs slightly off-piste and vaguely psychedelic middle section feels crushing! Next song "Incantations" begins with, yes you guessed it, an incantation which is then followed by Jeske reverting to a clean powerful croon to tell us of "rituals" and "rites" against musical backdrops that are constantly shifting between luscious and lilting, its a well balanced tome that although slightly anthemic in places does not ever feel overblown. "Wytch" opens with Jeske soulfully wailing of " sirens" and "vultures" over what sounds like an organ or synth accompaniment, things feel pretty civilised up to this point but then as Jeske reaches the last line of the first verse he is joined by the rest of the band in an explosive and intense prog-metal groove that although not quite carrying the forceful impact of opening number "War" nonetheless still packs a wallop, a wallop that is driven by Van Tonder's growling bass and Vlag's busy industrious drumming, these two really are becoming a force to be reckoned with. "Ascendancy" follows and is a one minute plus wave like interlude consisting of richly ringing guitar textures and is quickly followed by "Emperor" a song that sees Acid Magus doing what they do best and that is layering killer vocal melodies over swathes of of lysergic laced doom'n'roll, big shout out here has to go to Kinnear and Bezuidenhout they really nail that two guitar attack thing with crunching chord work, circular guitar motifs and spiralling lead work adding colour and texture to all that they touch. The word "citadel" translates to a castle or fortress that overlooks/guards a city and so it seems fitting that a song called "Citadel" should possess a a similarly imposing feel and this one does, here we find Acid Magus at probably their most progressive utilizing numerous shifts in tempo, dynamics and volume to create a feeling of largess and vastness that at times feels too big to be contained in something as small as a set of speakers or a pair of headphones, and the vocals, oh man the vocals are some of the most emotive and passionate Desert Psychlist has heard gracing a rock album in an absolute age. Penultimate track "Absolution" is another lilting guitar drenched interlude and leads us into "Haven", now if you thought Acid Magus had taken things to a peak with "Citadel" then this song with its moments of undulating languidity, occasional blackened bluster, unbelievably powerful lead vocals and choir like harmonies will change your mind, this is the sound of other level musicians playing other level music.
Acid Magus describe their music as "garage doom on shrooms", which of course is their prerogative, however we at Desert Psychlist have always tended to think of any music carrying the tag "garage" as being somewhat a little raw around the edges, maybe a touch unkempt and intentionally messy and to our ears that is something Acid Magus' music is a million light years away from being. Ok the adding of "on shrooms" to their description does allow for those occasional moments of looseness that find their way into the bands music but to describe the intricacies and complexities, which are an integral component of new album "Scatterling Empire", as anything even approaching "garage" is doing their music a disservice, "garage doom", no way, this is doom of the stately home variety.
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