At a quarter of the way through 2015, there has been a
large amount of heavy classic rock influenced stoner passing through Heavy
Planet towers, and as sweet as a lot of it is, we’ve just been waiting for
something to shake things up, tear us a new one, bring us face to face with an
otherworldly brutality of sludgyness: thank fuck for VAILS!
It has only been six months since their blistering two
song demo was spread thick for us to hear, and now the ever growing superb label
When Planets Collide (seriously how good is this label at the moment? Along with
VAILS, there’s
GURT,
Mother Corona,
PIST,
Wort; seriously exciting stuff fromthe British label) have
helped the band release a heavy, sharp, skull smashing EP in the form of the
excellently named
Galactic Triceratops, and it’s a hell of a beast to behold!
The Welsh duo (bassist/vocals Owen Street, drummer
Matthew Ham) kick of the record with ‘Sally’s In Love’, showcasing a
combination of doom vocals set over slow burning sludge lines that explode with
the force of an army, and considering they’re a duo, that’s a hell of an
impressive feet, you couldn’t even guess it was bass guitar led if I hadn’t
just spoilt it for you before. Highlight of the record, and probably song title
of the year, is ‘Megatron’s Telethon’ (told you) with it’s crushing riffs and
suffocating vocals creating a euphoric moshing experience that just feels like adrenaline coarsing through your veins.
Much focus will be put on the fact that VAILS are a duo,
which compared to other acts in the same field is an unusual thing, but what
they lack in numbers, they make up for in every other aspect; the riffs are
heavier, the songs are more brutal than most, and their waves of doom encompass
your contorting soul. Galactic Triceratops is just what we needed to kick us
right in the face, it’s a record that will make other bands raise their game,
and the listeners smash something large.
