Labels: Back On Black – Candlelight
Review by: Alex Deller
Here’s one of those bands that I’ve been trying so hard to like for so long. Like I feel I should support a slice of homegrown doom talent and appreciate that all the constituent parts are put together with skill and art. That I should appreciate how the big, deep sorrowful riffs are doused in heavy swathes of Hammond and how Sharie Neyland’s ethereal voice sounds like Grace Slick trying to wrest the soul from a secret compartment in Ozzy Osbourne’s brittle chest. But I am not. I am not crushed. I weep not. I am not swept away or enthralled by its Epic Majesty. Instead I am letting out a long, exasperated sigh and tapping my watch to reassure myself that time itself has not stopped and that I am indeed still breathing. I am quite bored. I doodle on the back of an envelope. I leave the room to make a cup of strong tea. I should really just accept my simple dislike for The Wounded Kings and move on, switching to Warning or Pallbearer or Candlemass instead.