Review by Sonny for Conan - Evidence of Immortality (2022)

I've not got much of a history with Conan to be honest. I checked out their debut Monnos a good few years back and didn't care much for it back then, so I went into their latest, Evidence of Immortality, with quite low expectations. Well, I don't know if it's the band who have changed much or me, but I really enjoyed this one and I suspect I will have to go back and re-evaluate my opinion of the Scouse doomsters.

Evidence of Immortality is ultra-heavy, slow-moving stoner doom with anguished vocals that sounds like the result of putting Ufomammut, Electric Wizard and Eyehategod in a blender. Any of the synonyms for crushing could be deployed to describe the album because, make no mistake, this is one heavy motherfuckin' slab of doom metal. There is precious little variety exhibited during the fifty minutes on offer here (at least until the closing track), but I'm pretty sure that if this is your bag then that is no problem for you whatsoever. The performance is pretty tight and Conan seem as capable musically as anyone in the stoner doom scene. The riffs are gargantuan and cavernous, the rhythm section move with the heartbeat of a dreaming Titan and the sludgy vocal bellowings are left to snarl their defiance into the face of an unstoppable force of nature.

Closing track, the fourteen-minute Grief Sequence does throw out a bit of a curveball with a monotonous riff overlaid with swirling, ambient-style keyboards which produce a funeral doom-like effect, at least intially. As the track progresses it gets weirder and more psychotic as effects are introduced that give it a hypnotic, illusory and tripped-out kind of atmosphere, like an acid trip that is just about to turn bad, but it may actually be my favourite track here because it is ridiculously effective at sucking you into it's insanity.

Overall, if you are a fan of Ufomammut or Electric Wizard (especially the earlier material) and dig music that makes you feel like you're being sucked into a black hole, then this should more than likely be right up your street.