MEN OF MUNGA ~ THE NANTUCKET SLEIGHRIDE ..... review

Suffolk, UK combo Men of Munga, Eddie (guitars/vocals); Gish (guitars); Stevie (bass) and Cooper (drums) make the music they want to make, they are not a band interested in jumping on bandwagon's or pandering to new trends, "fusing the punk scratch, the stoner groove and the doom rumble into a fuzzed-out, post-everything fuck you to the easy choices" is the mission statement gracing their Bandcamp page, it is an attitude reflected in their music which at times has a raw and uncompromising edge, something you will find out for yourselves when giving their latest release "The Nantucket Sleighride" a spin.

  "Coil" is the first stop on "The Nantucket Sleighride" its lone guitar intro soon joined by the rest of the instrumentation in a throbbing groove rooted at the proto end of doomic over which a gravelled voice tells its tales of woe backed by sympathetically gritty backing vocals. By this point you will probably thinking this is pretty damn good stuff but nothing really that out of the ordinary but then out of nowhere comes some otherworldly guitar noodling, backed by low key rolling drum patterns, followed by an equally low key passage of lysergic doom supporting throaty narration, and all of a sudden it starts to dawn on you that these guys have something different going on. Following track "Reaper" begins fairly doomic and heavy but with that heaviness offset by some lithe and lysergic guitar work, that guitar work becoming the songs main focus during the songs first verse when it is used, along with some nicely  underplayed drumming, to support a breathy and quite hazy vocal before the song returns to its initial heavy beginnings. The band use the same trick for the songs second verse but then things start to get a little gnarly with the band hitting into a pulsating sludge like groove over which angsty vocals are delivered in tones that are a mix of growly harshness and snarly cleanliness, things are not over yet though because the band then fade out with some psychedelic laced low'n'slow stoner doom. Third track "Ballads of Munga and Men" on first impressions seems to be straight down the line doom laced stoner metal but Men of Munga don't work in straight lines and its not long before what was a riff fuelled romp has become a walk on the psych side with fractured chord voicings reverberating over subtle rhythms and basement level low bass. When the song does finally return to its initial heaviness it is with the gritty vocals, employed in the songs post psychedelic passage, replaced with some highly impressive searing lead guitar. And so it goes on, through the fractious and constantly shifting "War of the Factions", the psychotic and slightly blackened "Blood Eagle", the punk meets stoner "Control" all the way to the doom/psych/sludge/post-metallic hybrid that is final number "The Walk", Men of Munga constantly fooling you into thinking a song is going in a given direction only to then suddenly change course, its an unpredictable ride granted but damn if its not an exciting one! 

Recording an album over one weekend in one room with instruments bleeding all over each other is not an ideal way to record an album but Men of Munga have made it work for them. The songs gracing "The Nantucket Sleighride" may come across as uncompromising and may not always follow the paths you expect them to but that's part of their appeal, if you want music that is polished, goes down straight lines and follows rules then look elsewhere, if on the other hand you want something that will challenge your expectations then "The Nantucket Sleighride" is a ride you'll want to take.    . 

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