Swamp Coffin - Flatcap Bastard Features (2019)
Coming to us from the Rotherham region
of England, this is the debut EP from the three-piece of Swamp
Coffin, set for release on August 23rd. Featuring four
songs of increasing length, the band leads with “Blood in the
Water”, a pull from their debut single Hey Ho, Stolen Logo,
released at the start of last year. The six-minute song opens with a
yowl of sustained feedback, bass gradually asserting itself until the
guitar lands and sets the main groove. The drumming is generally
spacy, but impactful, and the low-pitched growls of the vocals do a
lot to build the sludge feel in the presence of the mostly
clean-toned guitar. A chuggy breakdown pulls things into swampier
territory, and SC maintain that trajectory through to the song's
stripped-down end.
With follow-up “Annihulus”, some
death metal flavor bleeds in, and the activity of the drumming gets a
shot in the arm, throwing in some tasty fills wherever they can fit.
The guitar and vocals feel more closely aligned here as well, and the
instrumental stretches build some great moodiness out of the stark
arrangements. The central riff gets some nice treatment, building in
intensity until the last crash, whereupon “Black Shirt, Blacker
Sabbath” takes over with a suitably stony groove. The dirty vocals
and clean guitar push further apart here, but not enough to really
throw things askew, and towards the end of the song's nine-minute
run, there's some quite fun soloing action to savor, along with some
cool crunch punctuation.
The eleven-minute-plus “Last of the
Summer Slime” rounds out the EP, with its slow-burning sludge slog
pulling in features from the preceding tracks. The chuggy breaks are
there, along with lengthy instrumental measures, the death metal
latherings, and craggily catchy bass-lines. There's some
particularly effective resonance effects on the vocals at times,
which lends things a subterranean feel, as does the gradual sinking
of tempo and pitch towards the song's end. All together, it makes
for a strong opening salvo from the band, and one which should turn
some ears their way. Look for it to drop next month, and be sure to
give it a listen once it does.
~ Gabriel
For Fans Of; Attalla,
Black Box Warning, NIXA, Quallus, Tombtoker
~
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