Artist: Talbot
Title: EOS
Type: Album
Label: Slow Burn

There’s always something intriguing about a bass-led setup - Beehover, Primus, Lightning Bolt, Palehorse – that’s endless fascinating. Of course, given that Talbot operate in the cosmic doom sphere, which values tunings low enough for the strings to drag along the floor, having a bass and drum set up is an instant universe. But to fill a universe with noise, you need more than a rumbling stack and a target spot on the loudest part of the cymbal. Talbot have all this, and succeed in cracking open the boundaries of your mind, all without leaving your iPod.

Coming on like a metronomic Buzzov*en mixed with a spilling of YOB (a band so heavy they’re always capitalised), ‘Threshold’ gets off to a steady unfussy start, with delicately double-tracked feedback helping you bed in before the churning locomotive riff jerks into life, which is neatly broken up by something more lithe to keep everyone on their toes. And that in essence, is the Talbot formula. And happily enough, they have enough tricks in the bag to keep the momentum. ‘Observer X’ has more of an Earth feel to it, with desolate winds heralding the stampede on the horizon; it does lack Earth’s delicate touch, but then the delicate passage is a means to an end, rather than an end in itself. And to Talbot’s credit, when the overdrive kicks in, they retain the same momentous regal pace and motif. The title track is sparse, mischievous, and leads perfectly into the centrepiece of ‘Combat Zen Speech’. Swamped in space age feedback and reverb heavy vocals, it once again proves that slow and steady wins the riffing race, especially if it is twelve minutes long.

After this dizzying high, the last two tracks meander somewhat. ‘Coach’ closes out the album, but sounds rather claustrophobic and heavy-handed, and the switch between shimmering reverberating clean vocals and depth-of-sludge growls isn’t quite as seamless as it should and had been previously; so is the sudden switch halfway through – a middle passage that could well be Motörhead – slots in about as unobtrusively as a fat trucker with his dick hanging out on loose women. At this point, you can deduce that Talbot’s bag of tricks has run out by this point, but one dodgy moment aside, this a tight display of celestial heaviness.

http://www.myspace.com/talbotmusic