Review: Sloath - Deep Mountain

There’s a wonky little note-bend at the end of the main riff during “Persian Rug”, and it sounds a bit like someone prising their big toenail away from their foot and letting it snap back. Sloath do it over and over again. Deep Mountain is an album of instant and insular self-indulgence, regardless of how grotesque. It’s about doing what feels good right now; which, for the most part, happens to be swinging slow-motion rock ‘n’ roll riffs around like a fat briefcase full of money, exploiting repetition in a manner that feels partly transcendent and partly plain gluttonous. Case in point: the fuzzy wallow of the title track outro, squashing the riff down beneath wah solo and nasty guitar noise, hitting the point of pay-off for as long as it’ll pay out.

The best part? Sloath want me right there with them. The guitars are ragged and muscular, shoulder-charging the speaker grill in an attempt to knock it down, kicked up the arse by a drummer whose role is to bring plosive and punctuation to every guttural low-end swing. Vocals are drizzled on top like syrup, with reverb running between whatever gaps remain. The whole thing is a sweaty jostle for space (save for a couple of quiet minutes during 11-minute monolith “The Toucher”, during which the band stagger back against the walls to catch their breath), and could perhaps be likened to wearing a mudpack laced with gold and whiskey; cleansing and unclean all at once.