Yellowtooth, an Indiana sludge/doom trio, had their 2012 debut with Disgust. It was a decent platter of lo-fi filth, with down-tuned riffage and rough hewn production that brought Winter’s Into Darkness to mind. With that said, I’m intent to see how they’ve progressed in the three years since.
I was somewhat surprised to hear a Crowbaresque mid-paced sludge attack off the bat in “Meet Mr. Mossberg.” The album has a cleaner, brighter sound, much more akin to the last couple Crowbar records, where the deep-throated bellows echo above some meatier grooves. “Climbing the Mountain” meshes stoner-rock riffs with gritty grooves, coming off kinda like Pantera fronted by Chris Barnes. This dude’s definitely got the Cookie Monster vocals down pat.
That said, seven-and-a-half-minute “Season’s End” sounds more like Down, complete with Anselmo-style yarling. And the nearly-nine-minute title track is much more similar to the dropped-down death-doom of the debut—so they haven’t completely progressed past that point. (That isn’t a bad thing, BTW.)
(Orchestrated Misery Recordings)
