Let’s be honest: Weed Is Weed as band’s moniker… You might have a clue what this stuff would sound like / would be dealing about, don’t you. Besides, the band consists of members currently or formerly involved with the likes of Earthride, Spirit Caravan, Bobby Liebling’s Ram Family, Pentagram and Land Of Doom, so you cannot deny it anymore: this must be hazy and psychedelic Doom. And indeed, it is!
This stuff originally was released in January 2013 by the band itself (also digitally), but now it’s available on vinyl with assistance (thankfully appreciated) by Ripple Music.
And what can the listener expect? Well, actually it is some kind of canalisation of what this band’s members’ experience brought them to, i.e. Stoner-injected Doom Metal in the vein of, indeed, Pentagram, Earthride, Spirit Caravan and the likes. There are some bluesy elements, then again it sounds heavier à la Saint Vitus or Solitude Aeternus, or rocking à la some Sabbath-meet-Trouble adventure, even mingling grungy details as well as Seventies Rock-oriented elements.
Is it renewing? No, not at all. Does it bother? No, not that much, but there are more comparable acts around, and to my modest opinion some are just more attractive / impressive. Blunt Force Trauma lacks of balls; there are three guitarists, you know, and still I can point some projects with one guitar player only that sound so much more intensifying, you know… Maybe it is because I am totally sober right now (except for some glasses of red wine, i.e. a 2010-Cabarnet Sauvignon the Chilean wine-house Miguel Torres, but that’s it right now), but I did listen to this album twice before (a couple of days ago, and in early November), and I did not get aroused then either…