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IN REVIEW: The Sword - "High Country"

 

As one of the leaders of a new wave of Sabbath-inspired "stoner metal" bands about ten years ago, The Sword quickly positioned themselves as one of the most intriguing bands of the bunch. As their career progressed, they started playing around with their sound, going so far as to make their third record a sci-fi concept album. With their previous record, 2012's Apocryphon, they regressed a bit, resulting in an uneven record that felt by times like a last ditch effort to find proper inspiration within the genre they were pigeonholed into.

With the benefit of distance (three years to be exact), The Sword approaches fifth album High Country from the vantage point of a band separated from their past, making the record they want to rather than the one they feel they need to. As a result, while similarities to their previous work do exist, High Country ends up taking their sound toward lighter territory. Think less Black Sabbath and more Thin Lizzy and you're getting the idea.

The title track (and lead single) strikes a perfect balance, feeling like a song they may have laid down early in the recording sessions and gotten an epiphany from. Guitars on the record are, by and large, twangier and less muscular. That's not to say there isn't anything heavy (Buzzards is as close as you're getting to the old familiar Sword), it's just that the group's heaviness is tempered with melody rather than brute force. Early Snow is a good example, relying more on groove than tone (I'm not sure if the song needs the horn section that shows up toward the end, but it doesn't ruin the song).

What hurts High Country is in its overall execution, in that there seems to be more emphasis on the aesthetic than the songs. Granted, there isn't much of anything on here that's outright bad, but it does seem that, by trying to pull away from their core sound, they end up spending too much time in a state of transition, with their hands gripping the safety rail of their core sound and only a toe or two actually in the water.

With so much invested into the idea of the record and its effect on their career arc, I feel like a little more time spent on the songs would have resulted in a much better record. Out of the fifteen tracks, only five stuck with me after the first listen, with the rest just kind of floating by. That's not to insinuate that High Country is bad; like I said, there aren't any major missteps. It's an interesting record, just not interesting enough to warrant closer inspection or repeat listening outside of its handful of stellar songs.

August 21, 2015 • Razor & Tie
Highlights High Country • Buzzards • Early Snow

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