Spaceslug - Eye The Tide: Album Review

 

*sparks a doobie*

Spaceslug is a band I've been keeping my eye on for the past week or two. I was really interested in their prog/sludge approach to doom metal, and with a new release on the horizon I went back and listened the band's very short discography. I was pleased to see that while the band puts out a new record every year, they always attempt some new approach to their sound, giving their music a pleasant unpredictability that other bands pumping out records every year (King Gizzard I'm looking at you) tend to sometimes miss. Their new album “Eye The Tide” had some very promising singles, but does it have enough going on to truly show off the band's potential?

“Eye The Tide” takes the progressive sludge route that the band's last album “Time Travel Dilemma” pulled off quite well. If you've listened to similar prog/sludge acts then Spaceslug's approach won't surprise you all that much. Like a lot of bands that play close to their genres, the devil is in the details. Spaceslug's heavy sludgy riffs aren't all that surprising, but I dare you to find a band with a more refined and razor focused sound in the doom metal scene. The band's wonderful production leads the crunchy guitars and thick bass to create these ultra aggressive highs and subtle gloomy lows. The band's slow style and heavy emphasis on atmosphere paint an absolutely beautiful picture of constantly moving and shifting waves, working into the album art's imagery. The songs themselves also benefit from Spaceslug's previous experience with progressive rock, ironing out the occasional repetition and clunky flow from “Time Travel Dilemma”.

So while “Eye The Tide” is certainly an improvement, or rather, a refinement, of the band's previous work, I am slightly disappointed by it. Only because, with the band pushing themselves to release a new album every year and showing signs of challenging themselves on this new record, it becomes obvious that the band just weren't challenging themselves enough. While the songs are certainly refined and show signs of fixing the issues the sound had on the last record, not much has been done to really push Spaceslug to their absolute limits in terms of true experimentation. I suppose it's fine, not every band needs to be King Gizzard or Death Grips, radically changing and shifting genres with every release (or every track for that matter), but I look at Spaceslug and see the doom metal equivalent of Obscura: a group who, if they really pushed themselves artistically, could make one masterpiece after another, but instead simply approaches a new record with the intention of making a slight variation on what has already been done. Had the album been more adventurous, I feel like Spaceslug could have really made something special. Though it bears mentioning that the one time the band really got out of their comfort zone was on the track “Words Like Stones” which includes some harsher screaming vocals and some blast beats. Unfortunately, this is probably one of the weaker songs on the record because of these elements, as it's obvious the band was not totally prepared to tackle this particular style. The vocalist's screams are pretty plain as far as screams go, and the drummer sounds very clunky and unnatural, sounding like he only had a week to figure out how to pound out some blast beats. 

Though I sound a little hard on this record I don't want to take away from “Eye The Tide”'s strong points. The beautiful vocal harmonies throughout the record sound both lovely and haunting, the albums slower and subtle moments are absolutely therapeutic, and the ambient chimes on “Vialys” are very pretty. It also shouldn't be understated that the flow of these tracks have greatly improved from “Time Travel Dilemma”. With 6 tracks (don't let “Vialys Parts I and II” fool you) at about 8-9 minutes each, not a single moment is really wasted on the record. Each song has a pretty graceful structure while leading into one another pretty easily, resulting in a very meaty record that never really gets tiring or boring, even after a dozen or so listens.

I really enjoyed “Eye The Tide” and would even go as far to say it's the best sludge metal record I've heard all year, but I can see the cracks in Spaceslug's formula. Should the band keep pumping out records like they have been, and I can see myself getting bored pretty easily. On the other hand, the band's attempts to refine and focus their sound pays off in spades. For the time being, Spaceslug has a great future ahead of them. Let's hope they sail on some smooth waters.

8.5/10