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Blue Record
Barnes and Noble
Blue Record
Current price: $12.99
Barnes and Noble
Blue Record
Current price: $12.99
Size: CD
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Georgia-based psychedelic rock band (calling them a metal act seems very reductive, though there's some seriously headbangable material on this disc)
has made a subtle but unmistakable evolutionary leap on this, their second full-length and a clear companion piece to 2007's
. It's hard to say exactly what new guitarist
has brought to the band after replacing drummer
's brother
, but the band's established blend of Southern sludge riffs, druggy instrumental journeys, and melodic interstitial interludes, all propelled by a particularly thudding drum sound and held together by
's hoarse but clean vocals and gorgeous cover art, are even stronger now than before. The transition from the almost
-like
into the crunching hard rock epic
is just one example of
' seamless melding of moods through technique and compositional acumen. There are numerous interludes on the disc -- basically, any track shorter than four minutes is an exploration of a riff followed by a dissolve into sound effects or keyboard swooshes, slowly dissolving into the next actual song.
for example, offers one of the album's heaviest riffs, but it's a mere appetizer before
a suitably galloping prog-metal epic that effectively conquers
's territory, and includes some astonishing guitar leads. This is a ferocious album that's not afraid to be genuinely beautiful. ~ Phil Freeman