When it comes to stoner rock, doom metal, and sludge, there’s no denying that you know what you are going to get from any album described as such. There will only ever be one Black Sabbath, and very few will ever match up to Electric Wizard. That’s not to say that there isn’t room for more bands. While some sub-genres of music become stale and diluted – and above all, safe – there always seems to be ways to keep metal interesting. Enter Slabdragger, who play slow burning doom metal as their name suggests, and needless to say, it is utterly monolithic.
It’s been a long five years since the band released their debut album ‘Regress’. It was an album of punishing ferocity and psychedelic mysticism, raising the bar for UK metal. After hitting numerous obstacles – everything from drummer difficulties to collapsed lungs – it seemed like a follow up may never happen. However, once the band started moving forward, they set about recording with the bands very own vocalist/guitarist Sam Thredder at his Cro’s Nest Studio, creating the beast that is ‘Rise Of The Dawncrusher’.
From the outset, you must be prepared to be in for the long haul with ‘Rise Of The Dawncrusher’. These are tracks with an average length of twelve minutes of more, each making sharp turns and going off in different tangents. Slabdragger are able to make you feel uneasy, nervous, and scared with their music, but ultimately, there is something quite euphoric about the whole experience. The Sabbath worship at the core of ‘Mercenary Blues’, descends and decays into a bottom-end rumble halfway through before kicking back into a riff that even Lord Iommi himself would be jealous of.
They get the shortest song out of the way early with ‘Evacuate’, which was the first they aired from the album some weeks back. It is a blistering attack of frantic riffs, with powerhouse drums wailing over the cacophony of Thredder’s growl and guitar. This was clearly released to lure people into a false sense of security. For the rest of the duration ‘Rise Of The Dawncrusher’ is slow, dark and down tuned.
There are obvious shades of their peers through ‘Shrine of Debauchery’, which is equal parts Electric Wizard and Weedeater, but they drop into dissonant, space-rock passages at times. This somewhat matches the Hawkwind-esque artwork that accompanies the release. The closing opus of ‘Implosion Rites’ sees Slabdragger at their mind-bending best. Thredder’s vocals soar over low-end riffs, and for a near twenty minutes, the song twists through a classic stoner sound and psych freak outs.
For an album as bold, and daring as ‘Rise Of The Dawcrusher’, Slabdragger have made this look easy. Even at its most difficult, it is still engaging and cohesive throughout. They have expanded on the foundation laid down by the genres forbearers, creating a record that should be looked upon as a triumph, and is 60-minutes of cosmic bliss.
GLEN BUSHELL