Crowbar - Lifesblood for the Downtrodden (2005)^{Release ID: 3423}

My rare forays into The Fallen clan are well charted on Metal Academy.  I think I have a handful of reviews of doom, funeral doom, sludge or death/doom albums.  With us being in a new year I found myself drifting around the wastelands of metal, kicking over some rocks occasionally to see if there is anything of interest, wading into some waters to see what lurks beneath and climbing some vistas to see what the view shows me.  And so I found myself listening to Crowbar this past fortnight, or their eighth studio offering at least.

This is not my first listen to Crowbar.  Previous attempts have seen me baulk at the vocals of Kirk Windstein, whilst fully acknowledging the power of the riffs and rhythm machine that sit behind them.  Somehow, I always got the impression that the vocals were selling the rest of the band short.  On reflection they actually work really well against the musical powerhouse that chugs alongside them, allowing it to breathe and fill the ether of each track.  One thing that really leaps out at me on Lifesblood for the Downtrodden is how well the vocals and instrumentation track one another in terms of pace and tempo.  As the music winds down a notch or two, Windstein matches this perfectly (and indeed vice the versa).  As a cohesive unit, Crowbar sound taught and together.  I have also found a previously undiscovered (or indeed unthought of) range to Windstein's voice.  I mean, he is not Halford by any means but he can actually offer dreamy/gazey, Deftones-like ethereality to proceedings when required and in these moments his vocals are oddly comforting.  On the flipside of this he can rage his heart out but listening closely to the album this anger sounds reflective in nature, based on mistakes made and learned from.

Riff wise, LftD is monstrous.  To my mind, the groove and power of Pantera gets stripped back in terms of pace and accentuated to allow the coarse allure of the riffs to thrive.  With Rex Brown handling bass, acoustic guitars, keyboards and production duties here, the Pantera reference seems as relevant as ever.  As a whole, the album leaves me with the memory of riffs and vocals.  The drums and bass - whilst most certainly present - do not provide anything noteworthy by way of comparison and let us be honest, in a genre as riff-driven as sludge metal we would not expect much from them.  I find LftD to be a true 'grower' of a record and one that rewards with repeated listens; uncovering some real depth from an artist you have perhaps written off more than once is truly rewarding experience I must admit.