First of the two epic sized tracks is "Slope Dealer", it begins with a sedate slightly off-kilter guitar and bass combination then, when the drums join in, morphs into the sort of "out there in the cosmos" jam that many bands might have chosen to finish a song rather than place near the start of one. As the piercing guitar solos, growling bass motifs and hell for leather drumming subside the song then settles into a low, slow and extremely weighty stoner doom groove decorated in drawn out and grizzled vocal tones that tell "weedian" flavoured tales of "giants and witches on melting ridges" before musically returning to the soaring psychedelic jamming that was part of the songs origins, it's spectacular stuff! Track two, "Black Knight Sattelite" is no less impressive either musically, vocally or lyrically, although Desert Psychlist does need to admit to having to google the meanings of the words "aeonic" and "enochian", and that we are still a little unclear as to what an "Antarctic command conduit" is or actually does. Musically this is a song with it roots buried deep in stoner-doom soil, a lurching lumbering beast of a tome built on thick dank reverberating guitar and bass refrains supported by some of the slowest yet busiest drumming you are likely to find in this genre ever. Vocals here are a mixture of grizzled lead and dual harmonies but to call them harmonies is probably pushing things too far as the sound those voices make together is more akin to two bears roaring for dominance over a carcass than anything approaching melodic, but that's ok because they are the perfect fit for lumbering gait of the dark and dank grooves surrounding them. Despite the songs lurching nature there are moments of relief to be found here one of which occurs when all the bluster falls away and the band lurch into a doomic blues groove, but its only a brief moment and overall this is doom at its most insidious and menacing, which is just the way most of us in this scene like our doom to be.
© 2025 Frazer Jones
