Review: Oceanlord ‘Kingdom Cold’
Oceanlord hail from my favourite Australian city, Melbourne. They take the form of the tried and tested trio, and according to their website, play ‘stoner gloom rock’, and who am I to argue? Following on from a demo which was released way back in 2020, Kingdom Cold is their debut album and was released in May via Magnetic Eye Records.
The album opens with Kingdom, and a rumbling fuzzed-up bass riff, which is soon accompanied by a whale-song guitar intro. This sets the scene nicely for our trip into the darkest corners of the seven seas.
As with the majority of heavy rock that leans towards doom, we don’t have a huge variety of tempos here (and Oceanlord don’t really do the gallop sections that some of the classic ‘80s bands did), but the riffs are so good that this doesn’t bother me one jot. Kingdom Cold categorically does not sound like a debut album – straight out of the gate Oceanlord have the songs, the musical chops, and the all-important swagger needed to pull this sort of stuff off.
The second track, 2340, is my favourite on the album. It’s vaguely reminiscent of the sort of sounds that Trouble were making on their last couple of records with Eric Wagner. It undoubtedly grooves in a similar way to the best of the Chicago doomsters later work. The guitar work also reminds me of Wino at his most melodic, and any such comparison is high praise indeed.
It’s worth noting that a few of the tracks come with an accompanying video – they are all posted on YouTube and are well worth a moment of your time. The vid for 2340 is particularly good, being an animated telling of the story within the song. The music video is becoming a bit of a lost art these days, but Oceanlord clearly hark back to the good old days of MTV2 when we could sit for hours on end watching videos from Tad, Testament and Tool (other letters of the alphabet are available), happy in our ignorance of the very existence of the Kardashians.
Peter Willmott’s vocals aren’t your typical metal fare. There’s no barking or gargling going on here. His delivery is more of a croon, and a faltering one at that. But this isn’t intended as a criticism – the nature of his voice is inherently interesting, and the performances usher the listener in on the stories within each of the six tracks. His vocals are sometimes clean, and at other times have subtle effects applied, but either way, the mixing is excellent, and everything flows together very nicely (and of course, all nautically themed bands should flow).
straight out of the gate Oceanlord have the songs, the musical chops, and the all-important swagger needed to pull this sort of stuff off…
It’s perhaps unavoidable that I’m going to have to provide a direct comparison with the other (increasingly) high-profile nautical doom band, the mighty Ahab. I guess the best way to draw a distinction is to talk about intensity because there is a gulf. I have never in my life put an Ahab album on in the background whilst I was doing something else – cos it simply wouldn’t work. Where Ahab’s music is claustrophobic at times, and demanding of your absolute attention, Oceanlord are an altogether more approachable proposition. Despite their songs being Lovecraftian in nature, Oceanlord are more likely to make you want to head out onto the water, as opposed to Ahab, who render the prospect of a pleasure cruise down the local canal positively terrifying.
Having said all of the above, Isle Of The Dead lives up to its title and is the heaviest and most unsettling track on offer here. The riffs are more discordant, the pace is slower, and overall, the sense of dread is really well sold. So Cold then follows and ups the Trouble ante a bit further – this really wouldn’t be out of place on the Simple Mind Condition album. It contrasts with Isle Of The Dead really well, being far more bluesy in feel than anything else on the record. It’s also the shortest track to be found, clocking in at a little over four minutes. It packs a lot into its modest running time though.
Come Home brings the album to a close, and my only problem with this is that I actually prefer the version that was issued on their two-track demo (the other demo track was an early version of Isle Of The Dead). Here the song is stretched out to nearly nine minutes, and if I’m being brutally honest, it’s the track that I take the least from; I don’t find the riffs to be as interesting as those offered up by the preceding five tracks. However, I am clearly in the minority, as Come Home and its video on YouTube appear to have had more plays than any other, so clearly my wife was speaking more broadly the other day when she told me that I don’t know what I’m talking about!
So, does Oceanlord’s Kingdom Cold get the McLaren thumbs-up? Well, it’s been in pretty heavy rotation since I first received it, and my order for a copy of the CD is in, so that’s a resounding ‘yes’. I’m hoping we see them over on British shores sometime soon, but let’s hope they come via plane as there are far too many ship-eating giant squid-demons in the ocean these days by all accounts…
Label: Magnetic Eye Records
Band Links: Facebook | Bandcamp | Instagram
Scribed by: David J McLaren
