Zoroaster
Matador
E1 Music

Like an ancient call from deep within the foggy halls of some floating, forgotten, and fervent cosmic temple of metallurgy, the songs on Zoroaster’s third full-length, Matador, swim between sludge-drenched doom, nerve-rattling drone, and psych-metal mayhem, creating one bastard of a heavy, hypnotic ride. This isn’t just music you hear, buddy, this is music you see. It pulses and surges like a snake swallowing a beehive, it moves in nocturnal, amphibious rhythms, it explodes and flows like an active volcano. On previous efforts, Dog Magic and Voice of Saturn, Zoroaster stayed the low-end course of doom, rarely varying from the path of heaviest resistance, but Matador sees the Atlanta trio free-forming their way through meditative expanses of earth-swallowing sound and noise. Dig the title track, “D.N.R.,” “Odyssey” and “Old World” for the freakiest, Om meets Kyuss examples, while the songs “Ancient Ones,” “Trident,” and “Black Hole” spit out those classic Zoroaster riffs, which sound like High on Fire wallowing in a tub of fuzz. This is a potent, mesmerizing, and audacious heavy metal album, my friends, and tailor-made for anyone with a beard.

Check out the video for “Odyssey” from Matador!

High on Fire
Snakes for the Divine
E1

High on Fire unleash the most dynamic, blood curdling power RIFF right off the top of Snakes for the Divine (the album and the song) and it’s absolutely ELECTRIC. I swear it’s unlike anything they’ve ever spewed forth before and just as your nerves are about to jump right out of your skin, they drop it all straight down into the black quagmire of unholy smoke and acrid metal they’re known for. It’s a familiar, hollow, fuzzy reprieve, but notice the precision that follows. Notice, if you will, the DEATH. High on Fire have fine-tuned their cavernous stoner doom metal sound into a knifing, slithering, death n’ roll sound, and sure, the differences between these two kinds of METAL are hardly discernible, but Snakes for the Divine is a progression, no doubt about it.

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