Feedback mounts, drums pound, and out of the wall of noise emerges a doom riff as heavy as a feather isn't. Draped in cymbal crashes, the harsh vocals – a venomous mix of hardcore and torment – spit rage and rancour. Opening track "Monasteries" is upon us, dragging us down into the putrid mire. The opening riff to "Passed Out Standing" is pure Southern-vibe filth and the songs drives on nice and steady. The bass line that opens "Tise Is Rising" is thick, dense, and distorted dirt. Both this track and "Christmas Morning" – not the kind you want to have, believe me! – follow a similar structure, moving into the high gears before slowing part way through for a doom mid-section to rise again for some killer double kick work and climaxing in enormous chords and tormented screams. After a minute or so of uptempo riffage, "CCEC" moves into the low gears and some huge chug territory. Out of the filth of feedback, the charging riff of "Follow The Serpent" pushes through the murk. More feedback and "Swamp" is punishing in its deep grooves. And, what's this? Yep, more feedback to open "Beirut", a track that for some reason has the volume greatly reduced. Is it a live track? Is it a demo? Who knows, but it's as colossal as the rest of 'em.
The lyrical themes include politics, imposed conformity, and menacing priests, and with no room for figurative language, cutting razor-like straight to the point. Though each instrument plays an equal and vital role in the stoner/sludge barrage that lurches on, it's the drum work that is exceptional. As if beaten with sledgehammers, the big grooves and killer fills colour the album front to back. Eight intense slabs of stoner sludge, each track is compressed seething bile. Like Elitist's debut, Fear in a Handful of Dust, this is without sympathy, direct and destructive, like a gas-guzzling monster of a machine remorselessly pumping its leaden smoke straight into the cancerous lungs of the world. Seven Sisters of Sleep's debut is sludge/stoner/doom metal at its most noxious, the thick, black fumes of this album, properly inhaled, are toxic.
Track Listing
- Monasteries
- Passed Out Standing
- Tide Is Rising
- Christmas Morning
- CCEC
- Follow The Serpent
- Swamp
- Beirut
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