Seemingly at odds with the rest of the metal world, I have never really got on board the Anathema train, being a little bemused at the exalted status they seem to hold in the metal community. This, of course, may be down to the fact that I was out of the metal loop during their earlier days, so I have only ever viewed their metal phase from a retrospective viewpoint, thus being unaware of the contemporary impact of their music and being personally uninvested in their work, a phenomena whose effect is a big influence on what does and does not resonate with us.

The first thing that baffles me about Eternity is it's doom metal tag. I can't hear a whole lot of what I understand as doom metal here, but I do think it leans towards gothic metal. The bass sound in particular comes straight from The Sisters of Mercy, the jangling nature of a lot of the guitar work owes much to The Mission or the early sound of The Cult's Billy Duffy and "Cries on the Wind" even sees vocalist Vincent Cavanagh aping Aaron Stainthorpe's gothic delivery. So I would tag this as gothic rather than doom metal, although that in itself doesn't tell the whole story of Eternity as it also has a very progressive feel and enters into dalliances with alternative metal.

Most of the reviews I have read of the album refer to it as a transitionary album for the band and I get that, because it feels like an album by a band who have found the constraints of the metal sphere too restrictive to allow them to express the emotions and ideas that they wish to convey and who are testing the restraints that bind them. Initially I was underwhelmed by Eternity and felt it lacked bite, but having lived with it for three or four days now and having got underneath it's bodywork, allowing my preconceptions to fall away, it has revealed itself to be quite the tour de force, albeit with a major caveat that I will get to shortly. The songwriting is excellent and is filled with melodious hooks and pensive, reflectively atmospheric moments. The instrumentation is high calibre with a couple of impressive solos that sound restrained and yet still soar majestically over the on point rhythm work in a style not entirely dissimilar to that of Pink Floyd's Dave Gilmour. In fact The Wall-era Pink Floyd crept unbidden into my mind on more than one occasion as brief snippets seemed to be eerily similar to parts of Floyd's 1979 concept album meisterwork, Eternity Pt.2 bearing a particular point of reference.

And so to that caveat I mentioned which is a major stumbling block to me dishing out a top tier rating. The issue that ultimately left me feeling slightly disappointed is the vocal performance of Vincent Cavanagh, which I don't think is sufficiently proficient to express the emotional heft that the material required, robbing it of a lot of it's poignancy as a result. Vincent seems to be struggling at times and is helped out more than once by backing vocals that cover up for some of his shortcomings, but is still a little jarring in places which led to me being snapped out of the spell that the music had been weaving. With a top-drawer vocalist then I would have had no problem dishing out a 4.5 or 5 star rating, because songwriting and instrumental performance-wise this is an album that worms it's way into even my jaded and cynical psyche, providing a melancholic, yet uplifting, sensation that has been artfully crafted, but sadly left bereft by one important aspect falling short. Maybe a further passage of time will see me warming to the vocals, but for now to me this is a classic that got away.

I'd not heard much about Californian five-piece Toadliquor before now. They've kind of existed on their own underground plane for the last few decades, always steering well clear of the mass popularity contest that is the commercial metal scene in the United States. Hell, they've always flatly refused to release their most popular record (i.e. this one) on CD, instead choosing to offer it up on vinyl only which should tell you a little bit about the band themselves who have largely remained fairly anonymous with none of the five members being associated with other acts. But people seem to have picked up on Toadliquor fairly organically over the years & we now see their 1993 debut album "Feel My Hate - The Power Is the Weight - R.I.P. Cain" being held up as a minor classic in some parts of the more well-informed metal demographic. As you all well & truly know by now, I need to know why in these cases so this week I've decided to explore Toadliquor for the very first time to see what the hell all the buzz is about. I'm glad I did too because it's a very rewarding record indeed.

"Feel My Hate - The Power Is the Weight - R.I.P. Cain" is a 42-minute album that includes seven songs with all of them being well & truly worth your time. It's an unapologetically sludge metal record too it has to be said. Other websites like Metal Archives & RateYourMusic will always award releases like this one a dual tag with doom metal but, in reality, there's really no need to if you have any idea as to what the sludge genre is all about it because it inherently implies the inclusion of doom tempos & riffs. As with a lot of good doom metal though, there's no necessity for Toadliquor to reinvent any wheels as far as their sound goes because good doom riffs are timeless & Toadliquor are too in many respects because this album could just as easily have been released today as 31 years ago. There are loads of bands that sound like this but very few deliver their product with this level of conviction. It's interesting that some RYMers are tending to reach for drone metal secondaries for this release though. Just where they're finding those associations is beyond me as I simply don't see it. 

I wouldn't say that Toadliquor's sound is quite as dark, drug-fueled & desolate as an Eyehategod whose highly regarded sophomore album I reviewed only yesterday but I would suggest that it's slightly more consistent in its overall heaviness & I tend to favour it over "Take as Needed for Pain" for that reason, particularly given that it doesn't revert to groovier stoner metal riffs like Eyehategod have a tendency to do.  The most significant & divisive element of their sound though is quite clearly the vocals of front man Rex whose delivery comes in the form of a tortured howl more than a masculine hardcore grunt or psychotic scream. I have to say that I do struggle with him a little bit at times & I can't deny that his inclusion has limited just how high my rating has the potential to go because I can't deny that Toadliquor would have been much better served with a more traditional sludge metal vocalist. Perhaps they wouldn't have been able to separate themselves from the huge swarming mass of American sludge bands if they had of gone that way though as Rex is certainly the main talking point when discussing the album. I just wish he didn't sound as phoned-in as he does at times because the effort doesn't always seem to be there.

The tracklisting is brilliantly consistent with the instrumentalists all having a fantastic understanding of the sludge metal medium & of dynamics in general. It's really very hard to pick out highlights as every song has excellent instrumentation with Rex's contribution tending to hold me back from being able to claim many of them as genuine classics. I do think that the crushingly immense heaviness of "Fratricide: A Requiem" manages to overcome those limitations & I can see it going on to become a genre favourite for me in the future. Outside of that, I'd probably suggest that the two tracks that precede it in "Gnaw" & & "Charred" make for an excellent trio that represent somewhat of a sweet spot for the album overall. The rest of the record isn't much different though & if you like one Toadliquor song then you'll no doubt dig everything they bludgeon you with here. Be warned though, this record isn't for the faint-hearted or the casual sludge listener. It's a wall-to-wall sludge-a-thon.

"Feel My Hate - The Power Is the Weight - R.I.P. Cain" was a very easy one to come up with a rating for really. I clearly couldn't afford it an elite score as Rex's vocals simply don't leave that as an available option but, at the same time, the instrumentation is so well written & executed that it was never going to score less than four stars either. I feel that I can easily see a) why Toadliquor as so highly regarded in underground circles & b) why they've never managed to break out of those circles for more mainstream appeal. They're very much a sludge band for sludge fanatics only &, thankfully, I just happen to be one of those so this has been a very worthwhile experience that I'd recommend to others who fall into that category.

For fans of Meth Drinker, Nightstick & Grief.

It's been just over two years since I finally decided to take the plunge with New Orleans sludge metal phenomenon Eyehategod through their very solid 1996 third album "Dopesick". I found that I really enjoyed their drug-fueled, desolation-inducing brand of sludge at the time & wondered why it'd taken me so long to get them given their stature in the scene, even if some of the more groovy stoner inspired moments weren't particularly to my taste. I subsequently added Eyehategod's other supposed classic in 1993's "Take as Needed for Pain" to my to-do list but it's probably more of a reflection of just how greedy I am for quality metal to find that it's taken me this long for that investigation to actually come to fruition. I'm glad it has though as the effort was certainly paid off.

After reading my review of "Dopesick", I've almost decided that there's no need to review "Take as Needed for Pain" given just how similarly I feel about it. In fact, that review perfectly describes what I've been thinking of writing for this one so I'd suggest that "Dopesick" was very much "Take as Needed for Pain Part II". There's nothing particularly fresh or new about Eyehategod's second full-length either though. It's simply a highly effective sneak-peak into the mind of a down & out drug addict, living in redneck America with a level of pent-up anger that would seem ready to explode into violence at any moment. What we have here is some crushingly heavy sludge metal riffs of pure doom, taking the occasional groovy stoner metal direction to break up the misery, & with a super-pissed & vicious front man who does his very best to make sure that your attention doesn't deviate from the horrifying human car crash he's describing in great detail.

As expected, I'm nowhere near as big a fan of the stoner parts as I am the remainder of the album but I can accept that this element is a part of Eyehategod's identity & move on to the more attractive (yet equally repulsive) darker shit, even if my scoring has been capped a little as I don't think I could consider my more elite ratings for a record like this one where none of the twelve tracks reach classic status for me. There are a couple of moments across the fifty minute run time where the album temporarily loses my interest too with the more stoner-inspired "Sister Fucker (Part I)" not being to my taste & closing tape music interlude "Laugh It Off" being pretty much a waste of space. It's hard to pick out the highlight tracks from this lot as the stronger moments tend to have a lot in common with each other but, if pushed, I'd probably mention songs like opener "Blank" (my personal favourite), "Shop Lift" & the bravely-titled "White Nigger". There's a clear correlation between the increase in stoner & my scoring dropping off a touch though which I could have told you would be a problem.

It's really very hard to pick a winner between Eyehategod's two most widely celebrated album "Take as Needed for Pain" & "Dopesick" as there's nothing between them as far as I can see. Perhaps the fact that I've now spent a fair bit of time with "Dopesick" is seeing me just leaning towards it by the slightest of margins but if you enjoy one then you'll no doubt really dig the other too. Is this the pinnacle of the sludge movement? Nah... I don't think so personally but I'll be damned if it's not a worthwhile exercise in general discomfort & depravity though. As will all good sludge metal, the world that Eyehategod depict isn't a pleasant one but there's a twisted part of my brain that craves this sort of misery. Perhaps my wife is right & I've simply taken too many drugs in my life. Personally, I'd suggest that I haven't taken enough of the good ones but that's just me. Regardless, all druggy sludge metal devotees will likely want to ensure that they acquaint themselves with "Take as Needed for Pain" as it's a high-quality & undeniably important release for the genre.

For fans of Acid Bath, Iron Monkey & Crowbar.

It took a while for us to get here, but we finally have the debut full length record from US Power Metal's Savage Oath. 

Now I might have said sometime ago that the American strain of Power Metal does not provide the same kind of positive reaction as the European counterpart. Something about it being super derivative and not doing much in the way of standing out from its influences. Power metal in the United States became much better when it dropped the cheesy pretense and became speed/thrash metal. But Savage Oath are trying to be a fading spark in a genre that is now almost exclusively carried by legacy acts.

In a way, Divine Battles reminds me of the newest releases by Cirith Ungol. The mixing is very underappreciated with how it sounds modern while also feeling deeply nostalgic. Guitars are not the focal point of this mix and that allows for the tasteful bass lines to give the album some dynamic weight. The percussion is pretty solid, if a little overbearing. But that only seems to be the case early on in the album on "Knight of the Night" and "Wings of Vengeance."

With such a solid foundation, it really pushes the vocals to the front and they sound excellent. Brendan Radigan has a varied vocal timbre and fits the landscape of this project quite well. There is quite a bit of influence from the power metal great vocalists, but also provides his own style and personality to the performance. That said, I feel like the variety in the vocals is a double edged sword; for example, while "Wings of Vengeance" has a wild timbre and can even be reminiscent of classic Rob Halford, songs like "Madness of the Crowd" have passages that sound deeply out of tune. It just sounds bad and gives me the feeling of sky high aspirations by the group that were just not met.

But beyond that, I don't see much else in the way of obvious criticisms. The album can run a little bit too long at times, but that feels like an issue for a handful of songs instead of a critique of the entire album. If you like power metal in the 21st century, but would like to hear something that isn't directly related to the past (i.e. Blind Guardian, Helloween, Metal Church), then Savage Oath might just be your next favourite band. Just hoping that the next album does something new and different.

Best Songs: Wings of Vengeance, Blood for the King, Savage Oath

I have no idea who Juie Christmas is, or what her work outside of this collaboration may sound like, but one thing is for sure, she has certainly brought an additional dimension to CoL's sound, without nudging it too far from what we have come to expect from the swedish atmo-sludge crew. I went into Mariner expecting it to be Cult of Luna with ethereal female vocals, presuming Julie Christmas to have come from a darkwave or gothic background similar to Chelsea Wolfe, but that isn't what she brings to the table at all. In fact, there is a quite a variation in her vocal styles, ranging from a quite twee-sounding, young girl-like voice to a snarling, sharp-edged sludgy shriek. I must admit that it is the more aggressive latter style which I found most appealing, such as she uses on "The Wreck of S.S. Needle" alongside a clean style that reminded me of SubRosa's Rebecca Vernon. I can see that Julie's vocals may be divisive among CoL fans and I feel that it may take me a few more listens to be completely at home with them myself, but she does help to revitalise a band that was getting maybe a little too comfortable in it's own skin.

Of course, this being Cult of Luna, the instrumentation is impeccable and the songs are multi-textured affairs, but they feel less reliant on the build-and-release trope that has become the main feature of atmospheric sludge in general and CoL in particular over the years. I think this may be down to the flexibility of Julie Christmas's vocals which bring wider textural variety to the vocal aspect of Mariner's sound and makes it less reliant on the building of instrumental tension and the subsequent payoff of it's release that the genre has stereotypically come to rely on. This fundamental aspect of Cult of Luna's sound isn't completely absent of course and is very much still in evidence in a song like "Approaching Transition" which, tellingly, Julie is less involved in and as such sounds more like the CoL we are all used to.

Whilst the album as a whole is a very solid and interesting affair, for me it is at it's best when JC is given free rein and utilises all the vocal tricks in her toolbox, with the closer "Cygnus" and the afrementioned, "The Wreck of S.S. Needle", being the two standouts as her vocals weave in and around the band's searing and soaring instrumentation in a quite sublime dance of musical dexterity and creativity. The songwriting on these two tracks is quite exceptional and feels extremely natural, as if the sounds these two entities have ended up producing are the only feasible outcome of their inevitable collaboration.

I must admit, before listening to Mariner, I thought that Cult of Luna no longer really had the ability to surprise me. Entertain and delight me, for sure, but to make me do a double-take and really sit up and take notice of a newly-heard release, no those days were gone. I was wrong for sure and I can't really explain why it has taken me so long to get around to checking this collaboration out, other than I already thought I knew what to expect. Well bigger fool me, because this is not at all that thing, but rather an invigorating and special slab of atmospheric sludge that stands up to scrutiny against all but the absolute best that the genre has to offer. Maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks after all.