Blind Monarch

Blind Monarch

What Is Imposed Must Be Endured

Black Bow Records

Release: 5 April 2019

1.Suffering Breathes My Name 13:15

2.My Mother, My Cradle, My Tomb 10:24

3.Blind Monarch 13:33

4.Living Altar 17:12

total time 54:24

Oh, boy, what an experience this album is turning out to be. I recommend that you approach it in a relaxed way, this ain’t gonna be no quick listen, friend. The album is the pure happy joy of diving deep into the oceans of super duper heavy duty massiveness in which time slows down to a crawl. The guitar is essentially as heavy as it is technologically possible in 2019 in the general style of sludge death doom. I am discovering for myself that if you really listen to the whole album, you can find the twisted motivations of this band: to bring you some cheer and an escape from the fast routine of everyday life through ear-splitting super slow extreme doom.

Quiet desperation is the English way no more. Slow but very loud sludge desperation is the new English way. The band pushes the power of distortion to the maximum sludge quotient. Be careful with the volume, these Englishmen have the sinister of intention of possibly damaging your hearing. It might seem like the previous sentence is making a joke, but this band knows very well that it is not a joke, especially if you hear this album at high volume in the car or on any real speakers.

Besides the big heaviness and the overwhelming extreme doom experience, are there any particular traits to mention? Well, the guitar tone is rather clear and you hear the actual guitar playing, which is a nice change of pace in doom. It is not a totally and completely fuzzed out big blur of grime and fog. The song “Blind Monarch,” is sort of divided in two: the first half is the band rocking out and sounding like a heavy metal band doing headbanging music (believe it or not!), and the second half works the heaviness big time and the pace slows down, and then a space rock vibe takes over until it is topped off with a mini-solo. Both the rocking and the melody were unexpected, but very nice.

On the other hand, don’t get it all twisted, this is, in fact, doom and gloom. Personally, I especially enjoyed the song “Blind Monarch” for the band’s willingness to break the rules and rock out, but the whole big drums, big cymbals, big fat simple riffs and the growling, especially the lower growling, is fun for the times when the house is a rocking slowly.

blindmonarch.bandcamp.com/releases