High on Fire – Cometh the Storm
April 19th, 2024
Sludge Metal / Stoner Metal
MNRK Heavy
Oakland, California, USA
Oakland, California sludge and stoner metal trio High on Fire are back this year with their ninth full length record, Cometh the Storm. Coming six years after the release of their 2018, Grammy Award-winning album Electric Messiah, the band has arrived not only with another heap of new riffs from guitarist, vocalist, and founding member Matt Pike as well as long time bassist Jeff Matz, but also a new drummer. Following the release of Electric Messiah long time drummer Des Kensel departed the band, thus leaving Pike and Matz to recruit Coady Willis of Big Business into the fold. As many would likely agree, this came with a certain degree of nervousness. I would argue that Kensel’s rhythmic attention to detail and low end onslaught behind the kit was a huge part of what made High on Fire’s sound so intense and sonically devastating. Thus the question as to whether or not Willis could fill those shoes came to the forefront.
Well, luckily for us listeners as well as the band, that is indeed the case. As evidenced by the first few cuts on this record, Coady Willis was an excellent choice to fill the new shoes (or socks) behind the throne. “Lambsbread” is an absolutely crushing opener while the followup, “Burning Down”, features exactly the kind of tom-centric drumming that makes High on Fire’s sound so pulverizing. Combined with the riffology from Pike and Matz as well as Pike’s bellowing growl, the album wastes no time in setting about its apocalyptic objectives.
Pike’s vocals on this record are just as good as they’ve ever been. Sounding like they’re being emitted from a person who has smoked an ungodly amount of weed, Pike’s rough n’ tumble, tough n’ gruff yelling is part and parcel of High on Fire’s sound, and its here in full force on this record. From beginning to end Pike delivers his lyrics about ancient deities and civilizations and the coming quickness of Armageddon through snarling teeth, an undulating throat, and the power of a monstrous beast.
The riffs across this whole thing are, unsurprisingly, fantastic as always. Pike has always been a certified riff lord, as evidenced by the droves of fans that his multiple bands have accrued, and the pure quality presented on most of his works. Taking elements of old school heavy metal, sludge metal, thrash metal, and doom metal, and mixing them all together in a hideous amalgamation that feels like Motorhead getting squeezed through a bong, Pike shreds all up and down this thing, as does bassist Jeff Matz. The two together create an unstoppable sonic wall that sounds like the equivalent of a colossal wrecking ball tearing its way through a glacial wall with little to no resistance. Its just so goddamn heavy, man. There’s a lot of variety too. While much of the first half of this record is relatively slow and brooding, the mid-point bashes you over the head with the speed metal one-two punch of “The Beating” and “Tough Guy”, both of which threaten to split your cranium asunder.
As previously postulated, drummer Coady Willis is able to easily hold his own on this album. If you’ve listened to Big Business over the years (which you absolutely should if you haven’t) you’ve already got an idea of what this guy is capable. Big Business being another band for whom the drumming plays a crucially important role, Willis was the natural choice to join High on Fire on this new outing. Just listen to the tom build-up on the title track or even to the verses in “Burning Down” and you’ll hear Willis slot right in to the typical High on Fire style. What sounds at first to be simplistic rhythms eventually unfolds into rather complex passages of drum beats that give the whole song and the rest of the record an off-kilter vibe that plays perfectly into High on Fire’s end-of-days lyricism.
Kurt Ballou once again handled the production on this record, and he couldn’t have done a better job. This album just sounds so friggin’ huge and yet manages to sound incredibly organic and human all the same. While effects are obviously placed on each of the instruments, from the reverb-laden vocals and drums to the beefed up guitars and bass, and the fuzz pedals, none of it sounds forced. Each of these performances feels so sincere in thanks to how they’re handled by Ballou. It’s no surprise that High on Fire would return to him after the masterful production job he conducted on Electric Messiah. Cometh the Storm sounds even more down to earth than anything High on Fire have done before.
It perhaps doesn’t come as a shock that I’ve loved this album as much as I have, especially considering the Discography Deep Dive I conducted on High on Fire earlier this year in which I delved through their first five albums and noted how much they’ve grown as a band over the years. With this much experience under their belts, it’s almost a given that the band would come out with another banger after stepping away from the recording world for a few years. Cometh the Storm is certainly another worthy entry into the discography of this destined-to-be-legendary band.
Final Verdict: 9/10
Awesome
Favourite Tracks:
“Burning Down”
“Cometh the Storm”
“Karanlık Yol”
“The Beating”
“Tough Guy”
“Lightning Beard”
~ Akhenaten
Where Strides The Behemoth? 