Lowered

Lowered is a new blackened doom band from Portland, Oregon, though its three members turn out to have good CVs playing in other bands including one with the terrifying name of Black Hole Of Calcutta, the infamous dungeon where 123 of 146 British POWs died from suffocation, heat exhaustion and being trampled on 20 June 1756. With a pedigree like that, the new band has a lot to live up to and this self-titled debut recording strives mightily to do that. The band has a very meaty, grinding sound that with the right riffs and melodies can sound absolutely massive. Vocalist Anna Vo has an angry crabby rasp that suits the band's style well - I only wish her voice was a bit more upfront and then it would be a perfect nightmare beast to haunt your blackest dreams.

There are only four songs on the debut and to be honest they're not that distinctive from one another so with a playing time of just over 30 minutes, why not hear this album right the way through as a soundtrack to the most monstrous horror film imaginable? Come on, if you've seen enough horror films, you have plenty of visual material to play with. Lowered have already done the dog work of supplying the most delirious, the most intense and the bleakest, blackest music to inspire you. It boasts the zingiest, sharpest scimitar riffs of all zingy and sharp riffs and the darkest, witchiest jewel-like guitar sounds this side of Deathspell Omega. Bursts of blastbeat percussion that fair clean out the gunk between your ears and scrapey vocals that sweep the ear canals clean of any residue are additional attractions. For sludge-inspired music, this album moves at an impressive pace with plenty of muscular thunder drumming and sweeping bass-driven riffs - check out the monster riff thunder near the beginning of track 4 "Call of the Moon"! - that blast all life before them, leaving naught but wasted heath-lands behind.

I must admit with such powerhouse juggernaut music the black metal element is hard to find apart from Vo's vocals but with a debut like this, I feel like a curmudgeon to utter anything to suggest this debut is anything less than perfect. I would just say that (as mentioned previously) Vo's singing could be more forward in the mix as the music does tend to drown her out with its sheer power. Other listeners might wish the album were twice as long as it is and I would have no objection to that, except that you might end up resembling a schnitzel from over-exposure to all those monster riffs and crazed lead guitar solos. On future albums, the band could experiment more with its sound and include longer instrumental and more improvised music.