The Sword - Gods Of The Earth

by Nadeem Ali

Molten metal madness

"The demented ’To Take The Black’ has gonzo hard rock appeal while the ‘Maiden, Mother And Crone‘ and its retro doom grooves is just plain appealing."

The Sword are almost too good to be true. Despite their cross over appeal, the near parodic song titles, and subject matter The Sword’s heavy metal musings seems to be sincere. This isn’t a bunch of Vice magazine reading hipsters who heard Mastadon a couple of years ago and decided they wanted to form a metal band. ‘The Gods Of The Earth’ sounds like a bunch of guys who have grown up listening to metal and were destined to become The Sword. ‘Gods Of The Earth’ has innocence to it, an innocence that makes it timeless. Timeless in the sense that it could have recorded anytime in the last thirty-five years. The Sword have refined their heads down good time stoner metal onslaught on this their second record. They don’t do anything original but they no how to rehash clichés with renewed vigour and style.

After the short instrumental opener ‘How Heavy This Axe’ kicks things off in truly splendid fashion. It is a lean, mean and nasty punch to the gut. Blistering guitars duel each other to the death while the bass and drums stampede like Godzilla on the rampage. The demented ’To Take The Black’ has gonzo hard rock appeal while the ‘Maiden, Mother And Crone‘ and its retro doom grooves is just plain appealing. ‘Fire Lances Of The Ancient Hyperzephrians’ features high flying melodies and escalating riffs that will make your senses tingle. ‘The Black River’ is a storming tempest of devastating low-end and insistent riffage.

Aside from the bombastic psyche-metal epic ‘The White Sea’, that closes the album The Sword boys keeps things tight and concise. On occasion J.D. Cronise’s inexpressive monotone vocals lets things down bringing the band clumsily down to earth. ‘The Gods Of The Earth’ is a shallow but fun ride that doesn’t try to engage the brain. It’s as thrilling and as disposable as the Weird Tales the band plunder their Lovecraftian and pseudo-Lovecraftian imagery from.

Niggy Tardust said on March 21st 2008 [report abuse]

Actually, the first song after the instrumental opener is "The Frost-Giant's Daughter."

Nadeem Ali said on March 22nd 2008 [report abuse]

not on my copy

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