Now, the name of this Houston outfit had me hoping for some sort of cross between Toronto post-sludge squad Pyres and Mothership, one of my favourite heavy-rock bands going. And actually, that’s not too far from the case here… well okay, they’re probably much closer to the former. Pyreship‘s self-described “blend [of] post metal and doom with a raft of 90’s slowcore and noise rock influences” really comes through on this release.
The five-song, 36-minute effort (I guess it’s more album than EP?) kicks off with “Gravity,” a seven-and-a-half-minute number that builds up slowly into a rolling, mid-paced riff barrage with some soaring clean vocals. There are some solid grooves on the chorus that kinda remind me of Kylesa. After a spoken-word intro, “Machine Men” launches into some solid post-sludge riffage, sorta sounding like the heavy-but-beautiful construct of ISIS’ Oceanic album. Daaaamn, dude!
“When Leaves turn to Blood” takes a mellower approach, with more space between guitar notes and a thumping, pulsing percussion a la Jason Roeder, before gliding into a slightly slower-than-mid-tempo head-nodding crawl between verses. “Die-Sect” is even slower and sparser to start, wallowing in the mire for a while, but not really hitting you with that first heavy riff until a little more than halfway through its eight-minute runtime.
“…Are We Dead Yet” ends the album with a more punishing attack, a mid-paced gutpunch with a few groovy breakdowns for good measure… albeit not without veering off into mellower territory around the midway mark, throwing in an almost jazzy guitar solo. It’s sorta like Spinal Tap playing “Jazz Odyssey” … but better!
