SAVANAH ~ THE HEALER .... review

Austria's Savanah blew everyone's minds when in 2015 they released their debut album "Deep Shades" a stunning collection of grooves that garnered plaudits from bloggers, journalists and music fans from across the globe. Well two years after that iconic album Savanah are back ready to re-blow those minds and a few more besides with their second album "The Healer" (StoneFree Records).

"Intro" a short  51 second piece consisting of howling feedback and droning effects is used as a gateway into the next track
"Mind"  is a stunning mixture of riff heavy stoner bluster and laid back psych all coated in warm clean vocal melodies, the band switching back and forth between the two dynamics and along the way visiting a plethora of differing grooves, tempos and time signatures.
"The Healer" follows, it's initial stoner doom groove of heavy crunching riffage and monotonic vocal tones is broken up by sudden bursts of feral energy with banshee-like guitar wailing,  growling bass tones and ferocious drums all creating a raucous heavily psyched groove before the band dive headlong back into the murky doom to start the whole process all over again.
"Pillars of Creation" an instrumental, sees Savanah jamming a hazy desert/psych groove that builds layer by glorious layer until exploding into a heavy psychedelic freak out replete with soaring guitar solo's and dusty desert rhythmic splendour, it goes to prove those nights sharing stages with the likes of Colour Haze and Seven That Spells didn't go to waste.
"Black Widow" initially follows a similar sandy path to the previous track but then takes a sudden left into harder, darker territory with the refrains and rhythms getting a little menacing and  the vocals taking on a darker more mournful edge. Leaning close to doom in places the song is pulled back from the edge of the pit by the band going off on delicious tangents into desert, psych and even a little lysergic funkiness.
"Panoramic View Of Stormy Weather" closes the album and finds Savanah fully embracing those Colour Haze influences touched on earlier with twisty liquid bass lines and intricate percussion laying a foundation for the guitarist to paint lysergic portraits with his six-string palette. This is not Colour Haze though, this is Savanah and its not long before they wrench the warmly fuzzed groove back and move it into darker, doomier regions, the band hitting into a crunching, stuttering  doom riff overlaid with powerful gritty vocals  enhanced by soaring guitar solo's over a foundation of grizzled bass and powerhouse drumming. Just as your getting down and dirty, nodding your head and throwing horns to the dark, dank doom Savanah once again pull the rug from under you and the listener is transported from the dank doomy darkness back into a multi-coloured world of  lysergic splendour, the band taking the song to its conclusion on wave of intense psychedelic groove that sits somewhere between Earthless and Elder but still retains a sound that is wholly Savanah.

I could finish this review with a whole paragraph of reasons why you should  buy/hear "The Healer" and none of them would do justice to the molten grooves of doom, desert and psych the band deliver on these six gloriously schizophrenic songs, so your just gonna have to hit the link below and check it out ....

© 2017 Frazer Jones