Digital Resistance

It’s been near four years since we last heard from America’s wayward metal philosophers in Slough Feg, and it’s great to have them back with Digital Resistance. Apparently, despite the switch to a major label, there was nothing really going on – the guys were just not feeling the rush to put out an album, so they waited until they had enough inspired material. I think it was worth the wait, as this is an amazing piece of work.

This sounds a bit typical for the band on first listen, but further listens open up an incredibly layered, complex work. I really don’t think I’ve ever heard them sound this professional and intricate, as all these songs are rife with killer riffs interwoven with Thin Lizzyesque leads and even some very deft, clever time changes and acoustic breaks. Mike Scalzi’s blaring holler sounds great; he doesn’t seem to falter at all with age. The rhythm section even kills, with some kick ass drumming that lends a lot of agility and gusto to the proceedings. The production is easily the best they ever had; heavy, clear as a whistle and with beautiful clarity on the guitar leads especially.

There's also a lot of old-school Sabbath referencing here. Far from the legions of retro-doom bands trying to ape the aesthetc of that old sound; fuzzy guitars and Ozzyesque vocals, Slough Feg dig deep into the roots of what was so fascinating about old Sabbath. On this album they bust out complex rhythms and guitar lines, wild drum patterns and dizzying time changes that recall the proggier side of Sabbath's early days, and it's all done without ever really overtly saying so. Moreso than usual you can hear this influence on the sound, and the band has really worked to incorporate the roots of the sound into their own unique style. Instead of coming off like a cheap retro trick, it sounds very genuine, and the variations between songs make the Sabbathine influence all the more delicious to behold - I always thought bands who just aped the "Children of the Grave" riff and spread it out over 40 minutes were missing the point, as old Sabbath did a lot more than just that. But Slough Feg gets it.

The songs are breezy and hooky, ending when they’re supposed to and not wearing out their welcome. Kinetic opener “Analogue Avengers/Bertrand Russell’s Sex Den” (which has the best song title ever) is one of the best songs the band has ever done – with a great vocal line, killer riffs, some great organ playing (!) in the background and a fluid structure breaking into some mellow, reflective bits near the end. It’s a wild ride of a song that comes off a bit jarring at first, but I’ve come to find it wholly addictive. Another oddball for the band is the dirty Western ditty “Habeas Corpsus,” with its dusty acoustics and rambling lyrics about a serial killer providing one of the most atmospheric tracks in the band’s discography.

Elsewhere we get the band going back to what they do best, as on the boisterous, slamming riffs of the title track, the hypercharged blast of “Magic Hooligan” and the galloping riff-bonanza “Laser Enforcer,” which has some of the band’s most enjoyable lyrics. The callback to the band’s classic “Walls of Shame” on “The Price is Nice” is good, but what really sells the track is the horror movie/Vincent Price inspired lyrics – it puts a smile on my face to see this convention has not gone out of style. “Ghastly Appendage” is a killer old school 70s style groove-monster and “The Luddite” is a slice of pure riff-driven brilliance.

All of the lyrics are just really damned good, and even when they talk about subjects that have been done before (the anti-cell phone, kids today are obsessed with technology ranting), they’re still written with class and delivered with a sense for the poetic that sets the band apart from their contemporaries. I find all of these guys' lyrics a joy to read, and after not getting them on The Animal Spirits I really think it adds to the experience to be able to read them in full on this album. This is one of the few metal bands where I could honestly recommend reading the lyrics apart from listening to the music, as they are just that good.

The greater sense of complexity and care in these songs really comes off strong, and the album reveals new things with each listen – new guitar licks, new melodic cues and even some wry references to past material both lyrically and musically. At first the songs just sound too much like their old work, but careful listening reveals that the band fully intended these songs to sound as they do. It’s an album about past and future – about yearning for the past and yet realizing things can never be the same again, either. The lyrics to closer “Warriors Dusk” express it pretty well:

But then warriors don't age well as it seems
When they shower you with mortgages and dreams
Was it something that you found?
That made you turn around?

So they can’t really go back to their early days as young men, throwing ridiculous live shows and touring all the time. Times change. And, as expressed in interviews, a lot of the album deals with Scalzi’s irritation with cell phone culture and the way kids act now. Overall it’s an album expressing a sort of longing for the way things were, while also acknowledging there isn’t much anyone can do to change things either. The mood of the music, while headstrong, also has an undercurrent of cynicism to it that pervades most of the songs, with a side of lament for what once was. It’s powerful stuff, even if there’s no track quite as emotional as “Second Coming” off of The Animal Spirits.

So Digital Resistance is the band acknowledging they’ve grown up along with the world and providing a sort of statement of purpose with the music – they’ve embraced the past in its fading lights and are also putting a new spin on the classic music they released. I think this is a great album. It's addictive, endlessly replayable and full of nuance and subtlety that I have not often heard out of the band. I don’t really want to compare it to their classics, so despite the high rating I am giving it, I won’t say it’s better or worse than x or y album in their past – it’s just another notch in Slough Feg’s belt as one of the best acts in the business. Highly recommended, this is the heavy metal album to beat in 2014.