British doom metal band Moss live up to their name. The group's 2005 release Chthonic Rites and 2008's
Sub Templum were both produced by
Electric Wizard main man Jus Osborn, and sounded like it; drug-fogged riffs oozed forward like cooling lava from hell as the drummer pounded the skins like he was keeping count for oarsmen on a slave ship, and the vocals were formless howls of torment, buried in the mix. Not much has changed on
Tombs of the Blind Drugged. The riffs are still so slow the members of
Sunn 0))) might well encourage them to pick up the pace a little; the drummer still seems like he's using a coma patient's EKG as a click track; and the vocals are still incomprehensible and disturbing, seemingly torn from the singer's throat with heated pliers. And so it goes for three tracks, each over ten minutes long and each holding to the Moss career path. But then, out of nowhere, there's a curve ball that makes you wonder whether these guys have more going on than might be immediately apparent, as they close the album with...a
Discharge cover? "Maimed and Slaughtered" has been stretched from its original 65-second running time to nearly six minutes, the riff distended almost beyond recognition, somewhat akin to the way
Sunn 0))) mangled
Immortal's "Cursed Realms (Of the Winterdemons)" on 2005's
Black One. It's an interesting trick, and it succeeds in making Moss seem more creative than some of their doom peers. ~ Phil Freeman