Lord of Bukkake / Warchetype / Sons of Bronson - Split CD (2009)

Three totally different bands all hailing from Spain jam together to release of the finest doom albums of the year. Its great to see how all the three bands play an altogether different style of doom from one another.

While Warchetype have a style similar to none except may be DESIRE (does that ring a bell?), They are more of your traditional styled doom mixed with vocals that are often slow and rumbling with occassional growls on occasion. There is a single 20 minute track on the album.

Lord Of Bukkake have achieved a cult status among the newer breed of sludge bands. If you like your sludge to be slow, dirty, muddy with hateful vocals, LOB are your best bet. Again this band will gratify you with an extraordinary masterpiece of sludge track that is almost 19 minutes long.

Sons of Bronson is the most unique of them all. You wont find them listed on metal archives (hey guys, may be they aren't METAL ENOUGH, lol)! Its really difficult to classify the kind of doom they play. How about labelling them as experimental doom. The one band that they remind me of are Infidel?/Castro! considering how they have used similar strong walls of noise among all the chaotic riffs! Absolutely the best of the lot in this split.
Holy Shit!

Bloody Panda - Bloody Panda

A sludge band that doesn't intend to spread hate with its aggression or crush the listener with it's riffs but instead intends to create an atmosphere that reeks of insanity, desolation and melancholy may not interest the hardcore sludge listener.

Bloody Panda don't seem to be a band that chooses to walk on different paths of their musical career but gather whatever they can along their straight path, for the music on this EP, their first release and the latest LP, Summon doesn't seem to have changed much excepting a few tweaks here and there.

Slow music with the use of female vocals that are rather operatic and darkwave influenced seem to be the order for the day with a tinge of spoken vocals here and tad of screamed vocals there,

This type of music, for me at least deserves to be listened only once or maybe more depending on your mood. Nothing much to be said about the song writing except the fact that the music goes through on year, leaves the other leaving no impression on what lies between them.


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Bloody Panda - Summon

Nothing much has changed for the band since the first release. The vocals shine amongst the backdrop of music which leaves near no impact on the listener. The band , has gotten a bit more experimental with use of droney key boards and the inclusion of post rock moments.

Often quite slow, as we’d probably expect, the American band portrays the emotive side of the songs through a combined effort between the vocals and guitars, surging forward with some mighty riffs along the way, though nothing truly memorable, The drums aren’t that affective. They seem to only be present to layer and thicken the bass sound. Varying speeds distract the listeners attention from the positives and Bloody Panda do not seem to be able to interject small doses of experimentation like bands such as Disembowelment without too much fuss. From slow to double bass fast beats, it's hard to keep up with what Bloody Panda are attempting to achieve with this odd style of music. It's melancholic atmosphere is present throughout and is one of the better aspects of this release.


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Bloody Panda - Pheromone

On hearing this one would feel that this is more doom than sludge, but give it some concentration and you'll find the sludge variations buried deep into the fuzzed out distortion. In terms of being a hybrid band, Bloody Panda are interesting, certainly, though not the best. Alongside bands like Salome, Bloody Panda have opted to include the female vocals to make matters slightly more interesting against a backdrop of simplistic instrumentation, though the atmospheres are complex in mood structures.

The vocals are pretty much the highlight of this band, Yoshiko Ohara being the temptress. Her vocals soar above the rather dull portrayal of desolation and despair and are the spark in this rather level headed release.

Hit It

Paul Chain - Park Of Reason

Imagine how Tony Iommi might play his heart out if his mother had just died slowly of a horrible disease and you might come close to this. Dave Chandler is certainly a master of psychedelic guitar freakouts, but Paul Chain really captures the Iommi tone and wah-wah character almost perfectly, while playing with a distinct style that is all melancholy and anguish.
For anyone who ever though PAUL CHAIN lost his heavy touch in later years, get ready to be pulverized by this monster from just a few years ago. As with "Life & Death," "Park..." sees PAUL alternating bizarre spacey landscapes like "8 String Sweep" with mammoth metallic crushers "Solitude Man" & the mauling "Sanctuary Heve." Especially interesting is the concluding 15-minute psych explosion of "Logical Slow Evolution / ....In Time." In this one, 2 completely different tracks are recorded in the left & right channels. They can be listened to either isolated in mono or blended together with the balance in the middle for a truly
other-worldly experience. Wildly, the insert booklet actually explains this, including a drawing of a balance control for the listener's convenience!
This is certainly not something you listen to casually, slap on at a party or play a song or two from before going out to the bar. You listen to this in a state of seclusion, without distractions, and possibly with the aide of your favourite psychotropic substance. Keep your mental pathways open and perhaps you will feel a connection forming between you and a man who's art is certainly one of the most challenging and individualistic in all of metal, as well as one of its best-kept secrets.

Part 1

Part 2