Battalions "Nothing to Lose"

    Heavy might be an understatement at times when describing the sound that Battalions has to offer listeners on their eight song debut full-length release, “Nothing to Lose.” The band’s music is like a juggernaut of terrorizing distortion destroying a helpless village of disco and rap fans.

    Based out of the United Kingdom, Battalions is yet another sludge/doom metal band throwing their axe into the arena and trying to get their music heard amongst the global metal community. I swear there are a lot of sludge and doom bands coming out these days trying to be like the next Eyehategod, or the next Crowbar. To me it really depends on how the band is able to standout from the usual suspects with their songwriting skills, musicianship and overall musical delivery.

    So, does Battalions give us a release that breaks away from the other simplistic and mundane sludge acts? Well, I would say yes for the most part and the reason being that the band writes some catchy doom riffs that convey a killer classic seventies hard rock groove sound. You get a balance of extreme sounding sludge with a mix of more classic doom metal style. The singer’s vocals are a strong part of the album and I like the way that they were recorded. Some bands go for that overly tortured raw sound to where the singer is literally just screaming his lungs out without making any impact. Again, some bands need to stop trying to be Eyehategod and focus on doing their own thing like what Battalions singer is doing.

    Songwriting is an important factor for me when reviewing and Battalions does know how to write some angry sounding tunes. The drummer, two guitar players and bassist come up with some solid tracks full of riffs that can be intense while at the same time very catchy. The opening track, “A Coward’s Manifesto,” contains these monstrous guitar parts and the vocals set the stage for some unforgiving sounding lyrics. I think this was the best song to start off the album, because it happend to be my favorite track off of the album.

    Other songs to mention are “You Have Nothing to Lose but Your Sons and Your Souls,” “Whiskey and Wine,” and “Shitstorm Troopers.” I thought the other songs were decent, but these were some that just stuck with me after listening to the album. “Whiskey and Wine,” has some wicked sounding riffs that you can bang your head along to while taking shots of whiskey...just watch out as you might fall over once the song is finished and end up on the roof of your house.

    Closing up this review, I think it is safe to say that Battalions did alright for their first album. Of course, I hope to hear the band continue to push themselves as songwriters and keep hammering out more extreme sludge riffs that hit the listener right in the chest. Sometimes people want something not too technical and progressive, so if you desire a mean sounding riff with some pissed off sounding vocals...I recommend Battalions.

Battalions "A Coward's Manifesto" :

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https://www.facebook.com/BattalionsSludge