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Artist |
Earthbound Smoke Ghost |
| Title |
Karma's Grave |
| Label |
Independent Release |
| Reviewer |
Vinnie Apicella |
| Rating |
 |
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Earthbound Smoke Ghost... you'll remember this one for the name alone.
Or ESG for short, though pronouncing the whole is more fun, is uneasy
listening to the extreme. In a very methodical, grind-it-out sort of
way, these New York natives lay the pestle to the mortar like few others
I've heard in recent spates of consciousness. Stoner excess? Somewhat,
as they combine the fuzz-tone friendly and vast reverb effects to a very
discordant style that sends cold chills up your spine as quickly as the
voltage shoots through the amp meters. On the one hand, they're
riff-heavy, foreboding of an evil presence or something that surrounds
you -- a black aura perhaps, and here we get the rhythmically evil twin to
the original dark clouds of doom, Trouble, and conversely, when the
cosmic doom subsides... nah, that's about where it lies.
Nothing pretty
on this five song debut, but what they lack in optimism they make up for
in musical skill and lyrically inept word journeys that take ya to the
ends of the earth and beyond -- "Asphalt Green," the opener speaks of
"Purity in a bottle of smoke, the souls of the oceans choke, as the arms
of the planet broke, bone by bone." I could've probably ended it with
the first line but to coin the verse of this first tune, we're all of
sudden dealing with a being with a conscious... and an intriguing way of
presenting their views -- a world view under a cloak of mold, mildew and an
altered state of mind.
Vocalist Pheroze, known for his work with fellow
NYC ditch-diggers Skrape, brings a level of out-front audibility seldom
heard in typical Stoner Rock / Doom circles, often moving from a night
piercing shriek to Hetfield-like groans -- so we'll forsake the whisper to
a scream ideology so prevalent in so-called "Nu-Metal" but worth
pointing out here, sometimes you're not sure if you're listening to the
earth cave in or the bounty hunter high on his horse proclaiming victory
with a monumental moan of gratification.
Set mainly to mid-tempo meter,
often low pitch-bordering on barely above ground, picture the likes of
Clutch meets Alice in Chains, Danzig meets the Swamp Devil... and can you
imagine? The smoke's becoming awfully stale lately, but this is one band
that appears to have the foresight to cut through the fog and break the
grip of Stoner Rock stagnation that by its very principles has little
room to maneuver.
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© 2001 AMZ/music-reviewer.com
Robert R. Lewis
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