Metal’s poster boy for body positivity,
Matt Pike – have you ever seen the guy perform in a shirt? – and his crew
HIGH ON FIRE don’t need much introduction. Suffice it to say that they deliver beefy Sludge with some melodic leanings but also infused with a healthy dose of Thrash Metal aggression since 1998, the year that
Pike’s band
SLEEP called it quits. Earlier this year
Pike released a comeback album with
SLEEP, which got accolades from the Metal press and got a fair amount of attention and praise from the general music press as well. Now late in the year
HoF is back with another full-length album titled “
Electric Messiah”, that is coming out three years after their last release “
Luminiferous”.
HoF don’t mess around and deliver an almost one hour monster with most songs clocking close to the five minute mark but also two lengthy quasi-Progressive numbers that are over nine or ten minutes long.
The album opens with a pretty standard number “S
pewn from the Earth”. It is dirty and high energy, but it feels to bit like a middle-of-the-road Metal – Punk with no standout riffs or hooks. There are a couple of these “
MOTORHEAD on steroids” songs on the album, like the title song for example, none of which are bad, but none of which I get too crazy about. I like the Sludgy cuts on the album better with their heavy, sticky riffs and memorable vocal melodies. The second song “
Steps of the Ziggurat / House of Enlil” is one of the two songs on the album that surpass the nine minute mark and has some semi-Progressive compositional shifts. It has some really catchy riffs and passionate vocals that we expect to hear in a
HoF song, but there are also passages that unfortunately can feel a bit long-winded and compositionally, the song could be more dynamic. The same goes to the other lengthy song “
Sanctioned Annihilation” – I love some moments here, but on the whole I’m not completely sold. There are standout songs on the album for sure: “
God of the Godless” is an A+
HoF rager with some great riffs and driving rhythms. The closing song, “
Drowning Dog,” with its towering chorus and catchy groove, is a barn burner.
This doesn’t blow previous
HoF releases out of the water. It has some great moments, some not so great, but it it’s by no means underwhelming. It has a production that gives depth to the songs and
Pike is a one of a kind guitar player that always brings something special to a project. Give this a shot, especially if you’re a
HoF fan.
Songwriting: 6
Memorability: 7
Originality: 7
Production: 8