By: Theron Moore
Album Type: Full Length
Date Released: 22/07/2016
Label: Ripple Music
This one is crazy good, and crazy Sabbath
inspired too. Give this band a listen, you’ll dig it.
“The Judge” CD//DD//LP track
listing:
1). The Witcher
2). Heepster
3). Evil Woman
4). Tartarus
5). Mivub’ and Groovin’
6). Planet Doom
7). Suite of Jam
8). Desire
9). Rock Kickin’ Blues
The Review:
You walk a fine line when you play the retro rock
game. Kadavar
is a band that’s pulled it off seemlessly.
Radio Moscow too. Wolfmother not so. Kadavar’s music is
truly music out of time, you wanna talk being born too late? Kadavar is. Radio Moscow is. But if you cross that line you wind up in
imitation land. Just another sludge rock
wannabe. The previously mentioned Wolfmother occupy this no man’s land. The Judge, I’m happy to
say, has pulled off a real gem here with their self-titled record.
This one is crazy good, and crazy Sabbath
inspired too. Dylan Jarrett’s guitar
playing on “The Judge” is so close
to Tony Iommi it’ll mess with your head on this record. He’s got the technique and sound down to near
perfection. There’s gonna be a ton of
comparisons to Sab but the question at the end of the day,
is, did The Judge pull it off? Hell yeah.
And then some.
“The Witcher”
opens the record with a spot on take of early era Sabbath. It’s crazy how close to Sabbath
this is, really makes you do a double take.
But the song works as a whole.
The guitar is so close to Tony Iommi’s sound it’s insane, the vocals
sound so much like Ozzy, its nuts, but, you can’t stop listening to it. It has an ebb and flow to it that works,
though.
“Heepster”
keeps the fab Sab vibe moving forward but the vocals are
starting to take shape. I can hear less
Ozzy and more Tyler Swope, that band’s singer, but the Oz man inspiration still
flows through.
Two things stand out about third song “Evil Woman.” Tyler Swope’s vocals are sheer velvet,
nothing but heavy cream that in turn allows Jarrett’s guitar playing to get
showcased here. Swope has a nice, bluesy
aspect to his voice that carries this song.
“Tartarus”
finds me getting into the groove of the band as a whole. Only because Swope and Jarrett are as good as
they are, you tend to focus on those two and not the whole band but “Tartarus” brings The Judge
into full perspective.
I won’t go through every song but you get the
idea. “The Judge” as a whole works for me.
It’s not Sabbath rehash, it’s four guys who know how to handle
this type of sound and groove, they craft it, they shape it, in the end, they
made this sound entirely their own. Give
this band a listen, you’ll dig it.
“The Judge”
is available here
