Let us introduce you to Fat Grass, Fabrizio Ferreira (bass): Marcos Sosa (drums) and Hernán Alco Torres (guitar/vocals), a stoner doom/sludge trio, from Cordoba, Argentina, who some may remember from their 2010 release "Deep Trip" or its excellent follow up "Shadows" (2022). This month sees Fat Grass release their third album the self-titled "Fat Grass" a release we predict will be embraced by all those who still love their grooves slow pondering and heavy.
Opening track "Scum" starts nice and nasty and remains in that mode throughout its eight minute plus tenure. Dark reverberating riffage and steady pounding rhythms are the bands weapons of choice and they wield those weapons here with aplomb. The songs tempo is for the most part achingly ponderous and heavy and its vocals have monotonic Gregorian quality, the songs only moments of relief being the appearance of what sounds like keyboards, but could well be a guitar effect, around the songs three quarter mark, we did promise you grooves of a slow lurching quality and that is exactly what Fat Grass deliver. If you thought "Scum" was like listening to Black Sabbath played at the wrong speed well then next track "Lost Faith" finds Fat Grass making Sunn O)) sound like a thrash outfit, this is a song where the intervals between each power chord seems to take about an hour and the drummer sounds like he's hitting his skins with war hammers, factor in its monastic flavoured vocals and what you have here is a sound that even the words dirge-like would struggle to cover, and we mean that as a compliment. Third song "Rayo Blanco" begins moody and sinister with just a bass line and drums then is joined by guitar n groove that ramps up the atmosphere but not the tempo, the monastic flavoured vocals, that have decorated the two previous songs, are here jettisoned for somewhat grittier tones and it is something that works to the songs advantage especially in the songs last quarter when the band throw caution to the wind and shift into something approaching proto-metallic speeds. Next we get the appropriately titled "Interlude" a brief but fairly interesting instrumental piece that doesn't really say much about the band other than that even they need a break from all the brooding the intensity every now and then. "El Brujo y el Tiempo" is a stomping, throbbing slice of sludgy doom buoyed by a surprisingly swinging vocal , the contrasting attack of those monstrous grooves against that bouncy swaying vocal melody really works here and is something Desert Psychlist hopes the band will be explore further on the future endeavours. Finally we arrive at "Sickness" a song that, like its title suggests, lays you low from its first reverberating note to its last, a song that like a disease or a virus attacks you at your very core, there is not much variation to be found on this thrumming insidious instrumental but that is also its beauty, a mercilessly onslaught of dank groove that keeps coming at you wave upon glorious wave until there is nothing left to do but run up the white flag and surrender to its relentless dark majesty..
There seems to be a lack of doom lately that has that lumbering, crawling quality, a quality that was once omni-present in our scene, why that is who can say but it does seem that a lot of those bands who built their reputations churning out grooves of a sedate and lumbering nature have either fallen by the wayside or have altered their musical attack to incorporate more varied tempo's. textures, colours and dynamics in their music. Now there is nothing at all wrong with bands doing that, artists evolve and are always looking to improve on what they do, however there are those among us who miss hearing music with a meandering and menacing gait and its music of that nature that Fat Grass deliver with their self-titled third album "Fat Grass", music that brings to the minds eye visions of slow moving decrepit creatures inching their way across rain sodden ground with arms outstretched and a blood lust in their eyes.
Check 'em out ..... .
© 2025 Frazer Jones
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