Having only formed in November of last year, Northern Ireland’s Astralnaut are band still very much in their formative days. However, they were quick to release their first effort, the digital EP “Back to the Bog”; showing a palpable enthusiasm and fervour in their stoner doom efforts and the EP stands as evidence of that.
While still peppered with some difficult to digest moments, “Back to the Bog” is a healthy effort from the Armagh band, displaying a cluster of potential. Their stoner doom is heavily infected with an affection for classic rock, an even self-described as “hard rocking stoner blues”. It’s an influence that makes itself heavily felt throughout but for the most part, Astralnaut wear their love of Saint Vitus, Trouble and Pentagram on their sleeves with immense pride.
The guitar tone is mostly buoyant and in your face with big, utterly fervent riffs straight from the off with short title track to open. After that, the EP quickly moves into the slow seething intro of “Behold”. The lack of a segue between the two songs is somewhat off-putting, but only marginally so. Perhaps the order of the songs here could have been re-worked to give “Back to the Bog” a more naturally feeling flow. However, more importantly, each song stands totally on its own anyway.
Astralnaut’s only real weak link is the vocals; while not bad by any means, they aren’t as powerful as the towering riffs demand them to be. The notable exception though is G.U.P.I., with vocalist Thomas Mallon delivering an imposing performance, boisterously bellowing over the EP’s deadliest riffing. Somewhat sounding like an eerie mutation of Danzig at first, he eventually moves into more cerebral and mellowed verses – more of this in the future could serve Astralnaut very well.
“Back to the Bog” is solid. It’s very rough around the edges, but that’s the nature of the music, but what is certain is that there are buckets of potential here.
The EP is available for download from Astralnaut’s Bandcamp.
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