Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Drone Cult Sabazius

Drone is something I've been trying to get more into/of, ever since the Angelic Process and Black Boned Angel blew my mind with their 'doomier than doom' albums.  In that spirit I sought out the Terrorizer-approved Sabazius, a two-man drone act from England.  Their Facebook page makes prominent use of the claim that "they make most funeral doom bands sound like Pig Destroyer" - amusing hyperbole aside, they're not quite as monotonous as that blurb makes them sound.  Though the majority of their material could provide the fanfare for giant tortoise racing, they vary their pace skillfully, even speeding up to a lumbering gait on occasion.  In fact, I'll go on the record as believing there's more thought put into a single Sabazius song than the last three Electric Wizard albums combined.

Sabazius have a knack for crafting songs that run a half hour or longer, taking the listener on a journey rather than just punishing them with the same riff over and over again (although they do plenty of that as well).  Appropriately, one of the members composes music for film and television; the other plays bass in the doom crust band Sea Bastard.



Sabazius have released a pair of EPs this year, Parousia and the Watchers - both of which average about an hour with neither one exceeding a couple songs.  The band have made their releases available for free download here, and their label Loathsome have done the same here.