The Evil Smoke Possession

Ufosonic are a very ok band. The singer is fine, the instrumentation competent, the production nicely vintage but with a bit of modern clarity. They play stuff that sounds like Black Sabbath and Paul Chain, with a bit of rock 'n' roll-ish stuff that vaguely (vaguely) reminds me of Grand Magus in points. If this sounds good to you then go, get the album. Personally I think this is staler than Harambe memes or the fart my kid did in the car a week ago that still kinda lingers.

A friend of mine once mentioned that the reason why Hellhammer is good, but Hellhammer clones generally aren't, is that Hellhammer, despite a fairly primitive sound, limited riffset etc etc had real boundary pushing ideas in mind; and the problem with the clones is that they tend to copy the former but not the visionary mindset. I think with almost anything 70s influenced the problem is the same, but worse; what sounded fierce and crushing back in 1975 doesn't sound like that anymore, hell it probably didn't back in 1985. Hellhammer clones can still get by because fast parts and first wave sounding black metal is a lot of fun; I'm not really convinced that's the same with these fairly staid, thoroughly worn out tunes.

Having given Thin Lizzy's Jailbreak a few hundred listens of late (been in my car, the kids love it) you can really tell that everyone in that band is going pretty hard, the drummer beats the shit out of his kit, the guitars are loud as hell, Phil is fairly going for it. This (and most other throwback bands) sounds like a bunch of dudes just cheerfully jamming Sabbath riffs which is fine -and fun, when you're doing it, but not terribly interesting to listen to. No one is pushing themselves here; no one is really wailing on their instrument. Combined with the general lack of hooks or strong choruses and this album becomes a real chore.

I guess to sum up my little ramble- Evil Smoke Possession captures the 70's doom sound very well, but it does not capture the spirit, which is much more important; becoming a hopelessly stale throwback in the process. Musically it's maybe a straight 50, in terms of how I feel about it it would be much closer to a 10, so let's try not to be hyperbolic and throw a rating in the middle of it.