Watcher's Guard

Doom metal has never been the most fashionable of genres within our wider heavy metal family. Scotland however has proved to be an exception to this general rule, with the emergence of several doom bands of some quality emerging over the last 5 years or so including Pyre of the Earth and Atragon. The newest incarnation of all things doom and gloom is Watcher’s Guard, a 4 piece ostensibly from Glasgow but with half of its members hailing from the Northern city of Elgin and so giving a nice bit of geographical diversity to the Scottish metal scene.

And so in 2017, Watcher’s Guard released their debut release proper, eponymously titled and serving up 3 relatively lengthy songs of sonic melancholy. The EP kicks off with “Watcher’s Guard” (so that’s the band name, the EP name AND also the song name for those eagle-eye readers keeping score at home), which begins with a slow and crushing riff, so associated with the genre. Notable is a short spoken word section by vocalist Gordy Jebus soon follows before the guitars kick in again and the EP gets going proper.

Musically, I believe it to be worthy of comment just how varied this EP is. The length of the tracks allows the band to introduce a few different ideas within the same song. Sometimes this is an approach which feels unnatural but I’m happy to report that this isn’t the case here. Generally speaking, Watcher’s Guard take the Pentagram or Candlemass approach to doom metal (indeed these 2 bands are by far the greatest influence I detect within the music) but there are moments where they slow things right down to a crawl which is reminiscent of early My Dying Bride. The clearest example of this comes in the final track, “The Ruiner”, as the music creates a crushing, almost oppressive atmosphere as Mr Jebus wails repeatedly that “there is no hope”. It’s a simple approach but one that works magnificently well. Doom metal is at its base about despair and The Ruiner certainly manages to create that bleak sentiment of being sucked into a black hole without any certainty of escape.

Watcher’s Guard aren’t content to always take the glacial approach to songwriting though. There are some moments which feel almost thrashy, a rare thing to find in a doom metal record but again it doesn’t feel out of place. Of course they never quite go all Necrophagist on us but their faster moments are done so both competently and sparingly. Moon Torn is the most obvious example of this, with its catchy chorus again being an example where Watcher’s Guard break the typical doom metal mould. As a debut EP, there really isn’t much to criticise about this release. The vocals are perhaps buried a little too much in the mix for my liking and perhaps the spoken word section of the opening track will be off-putting for purists but overall Watcher’s Guard is a very worthy and welcome addition to Scotland’s (comparatively speaking) burgeoning doom metal scene. As the band might say, True Scottish Dour Metal indeed! Dour or be Doured!