Spelljammer - Abyssal Trip (Album Review)

Release Date: 26th February 2021. Record Label: RidingEasy Records. Format: DD/CD/Vinyl

Abyssal Trip - Tracklisting

Bellwether

Lake

Among The Holy

Abyssal Trip

Peregrine

Silent Rift

Members

Robert - Guitars

Jonatan - Drums

Niklas - Bass/Vocals

Review

Swedish Doom/Stoner Metal Overlords Spelljammer are back from a 5 year slumber to wreak more Cosmic and Doomed Out Havoc with their new album Abyssal Trip. The album is quite a solitary and cold experience with the band focusing upon more of the darkness currently going in the world but set in the realms of outer space for the majority of the album.

Spelljammer focus on that Cosmic Doomed Out Sound from their past few releases and not the Desert/Stoner Rock grooves they first made their names with almost a decade ago. This album is full of heavy progressive and world-building riffs that build up to a melodic rhythm but Spelljammer have spent their time in the wilderness wisely by playing a more demented style of almost Occult Rock on this album.

I do get shades of Monolord and Slomatics on this record but those guys and Spelljammer are perhaps the best bands in the scene playing this style of Spaced Out Doom. Though Cities Of Mars aren’t too far behind.

Anyway back to Abyssal Trip. Spelljammer treats you 6 tracks of heavy progressive Doom/Stoner Riffs where the band blend Swirling Psychedelic Noises and Progressive passages with distorted vocals keeping the listener informed of what's happening around them.

The first opening 2 songs - Bellwether and Lake - is classic Spelljammer through and through. Progressive Doom/Stoner Rock merging into elements of dramatic Post-Rock ideas and letting the hypnotic and almost dreamlike music build at it’s own pace. Both of these songs are bone-crushingly heavy with distorted grooves being some of the best music that Spelljammer have released to date.

Third song - Among The Holy - sees Spelljammer operate with a more determined and direct sound with the song bringing a heavy thunderous Doom Metal atmosphere but with a classic Psych Rock attitude to keep everything grounded. This is one of the most aggressive songs on the album but one that also offers some of the most addictive riffs as well.

Fourth song - Abyssal Trip - is the first of 2 tracks that run past the 10 minute mark and this sees Spelljammer venture into the realm of Occult Doom Metal with a soundclip opening the song and setting the scene for a more gloomier offering from the band. The song soon moves into the normal Spaced Out Rock atmosphere but it’s been corrupted by a heavier gloom and doom element and Spelljammer just run away with this idea and offer the best track on the album. The song moves into many different areas of Doom and Stoner Metal that multiple listens of this song is an absolute must with the brilliant instrumental being on display.

The final two songs (Peregrine and Silent Rift) close the album brilliantly with Peregrine being a slow-paced gloomy and psychedelic instrumental track. Silent Rift is the other epic song the band have included on this release and it has a similar vibe as the title track. 

Silent Rift is more riff-driven and Spelljammer don’t waste any time in getting down in playing the good stuff and the fantastic drumming keeps everything moving along with heavy guitars adding layers of sublime riffs which allows the overall flow and mood of the album to be slightly more upbeat but still retaining that gloomy rock atmosphere that Spelljammer excel at.

Abyssal Trip is another wonderful and thrilling chapter from Spelljammer. This album has potential to be considered as one of the Doom/Stoner Metal albums of the year. I know it’s a bit early to say things like that but I heard Lowrider’s classic comeback album Refractions the same time last year. Look how things turned out for that record. Well I’m going to say that Abyssal Trip has the same type of appeal. 

This is a must have album to own. End Of.

Words by Steve Howe

Thanks to Dave at US/THEM PR for the promo. Abyssal Trip will be available to buy on CD/DD/Vinyl via RidingEasy Records from February 26th 2021.

Links

Facebook | BandCamp

Spelljammer - Ancient Of Days (Our 2nd Review Of The Album)

Release date: October 2nd 2015. Label: Riding Easy Records. Formats: CD/DD/Vinyl

Ancient Of Days - Tracklisting

Meadow 11:51

Laelia 1:47

From Slumber 5:46

The Pahtfinder 8:27

Borlung 11:05

Band Members:

Robert Sörling - Guitars
Niklas Olsson – Bass/vocals
Jonatan Rimsbo - Drums

Review:

This album is the smouldering top of the doom heap and stoner metal coagulation.

I wonder if there was anything left of this band's instruments after recording this album? This band pushes their instruments to the limit. Another question you may ponder and repeat: “This record was made with only 3 dudes?” Unreal. This band is a true trio of doom, thus proving that less can be more.

I think this album is more complete and more polished than previous releases. The overall sound experience is one that you will return to quite often. The distorted passages are like prehistoric amber, dripping into the memory banks of your caveman mind. The slow, undistorted, passages sound like a heavy rock album from the 70's. This recording pushed the limits on my “Cerwin Vega” speaker system with its slow and heavy bottom end. Strap down your breakables. Beware.

It is now time to calcify your eardrums, fossilize your stereo and thicken your hide.

“Meadow”- The first track starts off with feedback that turns to forlorn distortion. It resembles what sounds like an amplified foghorn being pushed to its limits of propelled noise. It is not unlike the call to muster for the goblin armies to protect their birth-rite. The beginning slowly starts to build into the structure of the song. The vocals sound extended and, although there is no blood curdled screaming, the vocals are meant to convey meaning in the words.

At about the half way mark, we are treated to a soft intermission to ponder what we have just heard and to catch our breath before the song picks back up. This is a long song with peaks and valleys, which provides everything needed for a perfect journey into sound.

“Laelia”- This track is a short, sombre acoustic instrumental. It is an earnest expression, which paints the thought of a beautiful orchid that cannot survive on a lunar landscape.

“From Slumber”-This track is a groggy, gloomy, shadowy song displaying melancholy alongside stretched out, fluid like vocals. The start of this song reminds of a live act performing at the Fillmore back in the past. This track turns into a pounding song, tenderizing your brain through your eardrums. Again, there is no all out screeching on this album, yet the aquatic vocals have a certain quality that still command you listen.

This song is a perfect mix of distorted bass, memorable guitar and cacophonous drums. The song lulls you back to sleepy contemplation, like a whispering nursery rhyme at bedtime. You won’t even realize that the tentacles have wrapped around you, slowly causing just enough asphyxiation to drift you into dormancy.

“The Pathfinder”- This is a great sounding and well-constructed song, which is broadcast over time from the abyss. This song consists of heavy rock sections, reminiscent of 70's bands whom had those cool album covers, mixed together with distortion and blazing guitar parts. The instruments don't crowd each other, because each one is an essential ingredient of the greater sonic assault. I hope you like the taste of your own blood, because this song will leave you punch drunk.

“Borlung”-This track is a sonic serpent arising from the echoes of the deep. The sounds are primitive and aboriginal. The vocals are elastic. The bass is mangy. The guitar has gills. The drums are gargantuan. The album’s climatic and most extreme form of denouement.

The cover of “Ancient Of Days” is a thought provoking one, depicting an astronaut, standing alone, on a tableland plateau, finally facing the frontier of space. The lyrics are among the best I have recently read. I want more. I am now going take some petrified pterodactyl dung into the local cave and draw on the walls by candlelight. Come and join me.

Words by  Nick Palmisano

Thanks to Dave at US/THEM PR Group for the promo. Ancient Of Days is now available to buy on CD/DD/Vinyl from RidingEasy Records now.

Links

Facebook | BandCamp

Spelljammer - Ancient Of Days (Album Review)

Release date: October 2nd 2015. Label: Riding Easy Records. Formats: CD/DD/Vinyl

Ancient Of Days - Tracklisting

Meadow 11:51

Laelia 1:47

From Slumber 5:46

The Pahtfinder 8:27

Borlung 11:05

Band Members:

Robert Sörling - Guitars
Niklas Olsson – Bass/vocals
Jonatan Rimsbo - Drums

Review:

If there was ever to be an inventor of the stoner doom genre it could easily be Spelljammer that upon the launch of their first EP laid the ground pillars for this “stoomer” subgenre. Cardinal characteristic such as heavy as lead riffs, monolithic drumming, Richter-scale sized bass-rumbles and distant half-chanting half-screaming vocals.

First time I experienced the intergalactic extent of travelling the outer space with Spelljammer was in 2010 when their first EP took me for an audible trip in sky just a few Inches From The Sun. I nearly got burned back then and was scared for life by the heat so close to the brightest star in our solar system. And like all life’s existence on Earth depends on the vital solar rays, I too nourish from the soundscapes conjured by these Swedish overlords in über heavy space stoner doom.

I returned in 2012 for more of Spelljammer’s replenishing acidic rain of melodies and grooves just to find myself left cold and battered to pieces on a dark place atop of Aun’s Mountain. Vol II was a different tale boasting a darker and more doomy version of Spelljammer than was evident from their first outing, which was more on the stonier side. The imprint left with these two excellent pearls of amazing stoner doom called for a full length and the vinyl release of Vol II on the high-praised STB Records the following year did little to calm down the expectations of an imminent LP release. And then silence… Rumours of the guys have called it quits started circulating.

More than 3 years should pass before the Intergalactic unity of sonic destruction would resurface, now comprising a new drummer, Jonatan Rimsbo, and this time under the Riding Easy Records banner with the promise of new works under way. Anticipation started to build, expectations were sky-high. I think it’s safe to say that you need not to worry. The Spelljammer that I have come to love once again deliver the goods in a convincingly style.

Ancient Of Days is all that of an album one would expect and pray for them to deliver, forget about Monolord, forget about Acid King, forget about “insert band here”.

Meadow starts thing of with drawn-out guitars, pulsating, vibrating, waving from side to side, and pushing everything into motion. Tension builds and it becomes evident that something is on the way in the dark horizon as higher and higher waves of sound washes around you. The build-up lasts almost to the 3 minute mark where all energy is unleashed with a huge crash; enter dump-truck sized drums and bass lines with a magnitude designed to tear down houses.

Suddenly you find yourself floating in a syrupy sea of stoner grooves transporting you far into stoner doom heaven. This is a musical mind-fuck of the highest calibre. The track has a strong ebb-tide composition where the rock-solid stoner groove alternates with more quite psychedelic parts that give the song some great counterparts to the ever so massive grooving riffs. Once the spell is cast there is no turning back from their vibrating vacuum. It’s all about succumbing to the power of the massive soundwaves emanating from this super-massive black hole radiating high in a star lid sky without getting torn to pieces by the swirling razor-sharp riff. And before noticing the song is brought to a halt.

Only one track in, and already it feels like a long journey, meant in the most positive way, as at no point Ancient Of Days feel monotonous, perhaps due to the aforementioned ebb-tide effect or simply by the fact that this album is damn well executed. The second track Laelia, a short acoustic instrumental intermezzo, comes with perfect timing leaving enough time to pack your astronaut bag and check for supplies for the next astral journeys that lies ahead.

3rd track, From Slumber, starts of quiet and kind of ambient, with a much laid back approach oozing with an almost “Sleepy” atmosphere and an ever present Dopesmoker kind of vibe. In fact the first half of this track could easily have been found as a slight-return on said album. Second half takes off into space with swirling guitar flares bursting into the pitch black night sky while thick waves of bass-lines meander like hot molten lava underneath it all. At times Niklas Olsson’s voice almost menacing on top.

Comparisons aside, Spelljammer is doing stellar work on this track and slip-sliding the obvious traps of merely mimicking the genre’s greats. They instead create their own niche within the super-heavy space stoner doom and evolve from the notes stroked on their previous works.

The Pathfinder starts with feedback and after a quick scream it ready-on launches directly into another of Spelljammer’s monstrous signature stoomer grooves. This track embodies a lot of the best things from the Vol II EP’s and also includes some super-sweet bass leads scattered around the track that brings back the epic work of Geezer Butler to mind. Pathfinder is the stand-out track for me on the already impressive collection of songs that constitute Ancient Of Days. It has this sort of “driving” feel where everything works as a well-oiled engine pushing all elements forwards towards the inevitable end - although you never want it to end.

Album closer Borlung sets the scene for a space lord duel on a barren wind-swept planetary desert, where the two villains slowly are approaching each other as spacey samplings and ambient noises forewarn of a near clash between the duellists. Slowly circulating and attacking at once at the onset of the stoner machinery, the battle of Borlung has begun. And it’s a fight of epic proportions, through the next 11 and some minutes the serpentine bodied lord fights for his life.

The track turns and twists as the battle unfolds, spikes and blades fly high in the air above the surface of this futile planet. As Borlung finally manages to subdue his opponent the hymn slows down and the whole thing ends in a huge flash of light with the final beat of the drums. Verdict: A sonic tale of universal dimensions and clearly a contender for Top 10 of 2015.

Words by Niels Fuzz Bartholdy

Thanks to Dave at US/THEM PR Group for the promo. Ancient Of Days is now available to buy on CD/DD/Vinyl from RidingEasy Records now.

Links

Facebook | BandCamp