Labels: Vendetta
Review by: Alex Deller
Another beautifully-packaged doom release from Vendetta here, this one pitting prolific Baton Rouge denizens Thou against relative newcomers Salome. While I’ve made my thoughts on Thou’s recorded output to date abundantly clear to anyone bored / incapacitated enough to sit around and listen, their side of this here platter represents a bit of a step up in the quality stakes. After some bland acoustic picking things lurch sullenly into a solid dose of nicely variegated doom metal gristle, all grimy riffs, pounding low-end THUNK and repugnant blocked-drain gargles. After a while things tail off into some so-so post-rock meanderings whose dreary presence isn’t exactly welcome, but the heavy duty damage has at least been done and you can always lift the needle early if FX-treated guitar plunk and anonymous strings aren’t quite your bag.
Salome, though, were the real draw for me here: been meaning to check ’em out for a while, particularly given vocalist Katherine Katz’ current involvement with the dayglo vulgarity known to the world as Agoraphobic Nosebleed. First impressions are pretty good indeed, the band forgoing any ‘artistic’ fannying about and going straight for the throat with a nice line in heavy-as-fuck sludge riffing and some ungodly vocals that veer wildly between vengeful harpy shrieks and enraged, fist-pounding bellows. Rather than flail wildly in the low/slow tarpit they’re not averse to throwing in the occasional NWOBHM gallop either, ensuring their two tracks linger long in the mind even after the bruises have healed.