Artiste: (The Lord Weird) Slough Feg
Nationality: American
Album: Ape uprising!
Year: 2009
Label: Cruz del Sur Music
Genre: Heavy Metal
Tracks:
The Hunchback of Notre Doom
Overborne
Ape uprising
Simian manifesto
Shakedown at the Six
White cousin
Ape outro
Nasty hero
Chronological position:Seventh album
Familiarity: Zero
Interesting factoid: The band's name comes from a character in one of the stories in
2000AD. Ah, ya can't get away from it in
my journals!
Initial impression: Dark, doomy, morbid but with a certain flair
Best track(s): White cousin
Worst track(s):Shakedown at the Six, Nasty hero
Comments: Those of you who know me will knwo why I got this album. In the
2000AD strip “Slaine”, there is a character called The Lord Weird Slough Feg, a kind of dark druid. He's bloody hilarious, saying things such as “Stupid boy! This meat is fresh! I only eat
rancid flesh! Go get me something stale and rotting from the bins!” and giving advice like “If you can't afford to feed her, may I suggest you
eat Granny?” So this band were going to be on my radar, whether they suck or become my new favourite. Plus they're metal. Slough Feg (sometimes they use the full name but often drop the first three words) have been in existence since 1990 apparently, and this is their seventh album, of which they now have, at the time of writing, nine. I'm not sure whether this is a) a concept album (though you would think so with a title like that and the songs mirroring same) or b) anything to do with the movie franchise for
Planet of the Apes but at any rate it kicks off with a biting guitar as “The Hunchback of Notre Doom” takes us in, with indeed a Doom Metal feel.
It's slow and grindy, crunching along and when the vocal comes in it's dark and growly, though very understandable. The song itself is like a lament, and does seem to be based on the famous Alexander Dumas character. So perhaps not a concept album after all. “Overborne” speeds everything up, kicking along nicely with some fine guitar work, while the title track keeps things flying along well, though it is perhaps a little stretched at just over ten minutes. Some sort of eastern influences in the melody, bit of a celtic swing too.
“Simian manifesto” has a lot of energy and aggression about it. Excellent drumming with a sort of seventies hard rock idea in the guitar and a kind of boogie near the end. Nice. Departing from what has been, up to now, something of a continuing narrative, “Shakedown at the Six” is one of those hard-driving road warrior songs. And for what it is it's good but it's nothing terribly special. A very Lizzy style to the guitars that open “White cousin”, then it goes acoustic for a bit and it's probably one of the better tracks on this, which is just as well, as I was so unimpressed up to now that I was having real problems selecting tracks that were better than mediocre.
“Ape outro” has a lot of eighties Iron Maiden in it, some very good shredding, and returns to the slow grind of the opening right at the end. I guess that's closing out the ape storyline as such then. This leaves us with just one more track, and “Nasty hero” is a decent fret workout and a good song, but again there's nothing terribly distinctive or special about it.
Overall impression: Other than the name, and one track, the final sentence of the review above says it all. Fairly pedestrian, generic metal and nothing really that I haven't heard a hundred times before. Something of a disappointment.
Hum Factor: 3
Surprise Factor: - 8
Intention: Unlikely I will bother checking out their eight other albums now.