With a name like Druglord, I expected doom and I got doom.  I’ve heard their handle circling online conversations but until getting busy with their second LP, New Day Dying, I hadn’t heard too much of the music.  They are on the sludgy tip for sure as I get a few whiffs of early Electric Wizard, Eyehategod, Buzzove*n, Cough circa Ritual Abuse and Cavity but I’m also feeling some of the heavy grooving, thick tones, vintage metal touches and offbeat melodic swing of Blood Farmers, Purple Hill Witch, Black Pyramid and Serpent Venom as well.  They are the prime illustration of a power trio and I am absolutely in love with that guitar tone, the ultra-dense drumming and the fact the bass is propped equally prominent in the mix as well with the haggard, larynx ripped vocals falling in picture perfect line.  This is the way this stuff should sound for sure.

“Blood and Body” couldn’t be a better start to this record.  A fucked-up, minor key riff raises the hair on the epidermis before pulling it out with a pair of pliers as acidic melody turns into ER bound, curdled milk doom pungency.  They whip into a bluesy pummel tremoring beneath gargantuan kick drum surgery, planet chewing bass tones and riffage that goes for broke with its head down as the band charges straight at a concrete wall to brain traumatized oblivion.  Vocally, strangled melody and gutterball screams are the order of the day and they are delivered with conviction and power to spare.  There’s even a blustering yet deliciously succinct solo guitar burst that gets the job done by saying a lot with a little.  Again, that guitar tone is fuckin’ out of this world with some cool phase/wah style FX really fattening that son of a boar up with a trough full of human blood.

“Walk with God” utilizes diseased discordance/dissonance in its opening riff figures as the rhythm section plays it Earthy n’ slow as the vocals scrawl a vicious southern drawl into the flesh.  Slight blues-lathered bends are employed on the riffing but this thing steamrolls its way down the pike like a southern-inflected Grief or Noothgrush.  There’s plenty happening to keep it catchy and the almost Am-Rep noise-rockin’ guitar scrambles and even a small touch of organ make for some dementia that’s on its way to the asylum.

Busting out a screaming, boogie guitar hoedown “Rot of this Earth” gives guitarist/vocalist Tommy some room to really indulge in 70s ripped psychosis.  This jam definitely stole Bongzilla’s weed and smoked every last damn nugget.  It charges instead of nods and has some of the most metal/punk leaned pacing on the album as the drumming wallops a fervent 4/4 meditation into the mindset and the bass jettisons the whole thing into maximum broken leg overdrive.  The wicked soloing is also much more thrash-based than anything else on the record while still maintaining the putrid sludge/doom vibes like a hydroponic greenhouse maintains its incoming crop.

“Buried Demons” slinks into action like a drug-butchered burglar on the wings of amps feeding back before letting loose on a house cleaning, downward salvo of meaty power chords and ringing melody squeals.  Feeling a lot of Buzzove*n influence on this smasher with hopelessly drawled, semi-shouted/screamed whiskey vocal howls, mutant sludge blasts and winding lead licks.  The rhythm section packs this baby tighter than a nun’s butthole, churning out brickshithouse bass lines and stumbling drunk beats.  Along with the previous slug-eyed cut, this is one of my favorites on the record.  A sick late game solo rips your eyeballs out and extracts the tears with its soulful progression towards the track’s dire end.  “The Flesh is Weak” walks a similar downtrodden path along a road that’s been closed and forgotten probably over 50 years ago; fuckin’ excellent guitar shred bringing this one to its resting place like Slayer on ‘ludes.  The title track caps off the album with a derelict benediction of mucous splattered slow riffs and the most violent vocals on the entire disc.

Druglord won me over instantly on New Day Dying.  The riffs, rhythms, playing and production squashes your temples till your gray matter is oozing out your ears.  I feel like the writing, though traditional as it may be, also works in enough interesting elements to make the band’s entire sound ring of the maximum desperation needed to really sell a kick ass sludge record.  It’s the real deal and anyone into the genre should at least give it a chance.  I’m hooked on these guys and already started working my way back on hearing the previous releases.  Plenty of good stuff on each one…

[Visit the band's website]

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