Dove – s/t – CD (2004)

This is fucking great. If High On Fire is the big daddy of the
stoner-hardcore rock family, Dove is that weird cousin with Attention Deficit Disorder that you only ever see at funerals. If you’re after a quotable descriptive soundbite, then imagine the ideal cross between Kyuss and (early) Fugazi, because this album has a really dense heavy sound, with thundering… well, everything, but with an unwillingness to stand still in any one place for too long. This rules.

On the first listen, you might think that Dove have gone and shot themselves in the foot in an attempt to appeal to the entire cross-section of hesher fandom. With all the sudden chops and changes wrong-footing each time you begin to get into the groove of things, it’s almost too much to digest initially. However, by straddling so many musical stools at once – sludge, stoner, hardcore and punk – Dove have created a real grower, that once you get used to it is immensely satisfying.

I think first and foremost, Dove is a hardcore band. When “Goes Without Saying” springs into action (after a nice opening folksy acoustic ditty), it’s brutal and heavy like all good music should be, but also surprisingly fast, with a number of twists and turns. Instead of being annoying and
disrupting the flow, the welcome changes make everything interesting and fresh. The melodies are carried by the totally badass riffs, with the vocaldelivery again being reminiscent of a hardcore band. Henry Wilson (moonlighting from being Floor’s drummer) shouts away, a little lower in the mix than usual, overpowered slightly by the unholy guitar shitstorm going on around him.

The dove used to be a symbol of peace. Not any more.

The band themselves put this CD out, and it’s distributed (in the States) by Relapse.