Witch Mountain

These days, doom metal groups recruiting soulful female singers has become a major trend, including the likes of Windhand, Blood Ceremony, Serpentcult (currently not active), Mount Salem, Haunted, and so on. Witch Mountain have been at it for a decade already, so accusations of populism would be ill-founded, as would the criticism that Kayla Dixon’s vocals are shoehorned into the traditional doom style. Rob Wrong (currently also with neo-Trouble crew The Skull) and his henchmen know a thing or two about slow-burn riff witchery, while Dixon - who, at 13, fronted a jazz group - brings overwhelming possibilities to the tried and true Northwestern doom sound.

35 minute albums with only five songs, including closers clocking in at 14 minutes, tend to have balls. Such is Witch Mountain. Naming the fifth full-length after the band was a ballsy move too. Getting Dixon to contribute harsh growls to several songs and keeping ‘Hellfire’ as an atmospheric/acoustic ballad with very little percussion was nothing if not fucking ballsy. That neither feels unfitting is a sign that the Portland, Oregon quartet know exactly what they are doing. The main element that inspires these songs to succeed is the contrast between the sonic darkness of the band and the emotional expression of the vocals. Not to take away from the crawling riffs that Wrong and new bassist Justin Brown wring out during ‘Burn You Down’, but Dixon’s multiple styles of wailing, crooning, and growling prove the electric focus of every song, multi-tracked as some of them are. The transitions in the rhythmic cover of Spirit’s ‘Mechanical World’ are commanding: the sparse, unchanged refrain of “Once in my younger days, I had a girl to love” is spellbinding.

Few bands these days can put together an album as risky, dynamic, and intoxicating as Witch Mountain. Selecting totally disparate songs that mesh wonderfully into an endlessly repeatable experience makes it almost a certainty that the music coalesced naturally around the chemistry of the bandmembers, giving a genuine feeling of freshness. Trend sceptics and riff junkies might have their doubts, but everyone else who loves heavy music needs to get themselves to this mountainous album pronto.


Originally written for Metalegion #4 - www.metalegion.com