Goblinsmoker started as a one man band born in a Durham bedroom in 2016.  The idea that Adam Kennedy had was to combine the bleakness of Black metal and the colossal riffs and fuzz of Doom.  He had a story that he needed to inflict on the world, one of Goblins ruled over by the Toad King who uses his loyal subjects as packing for his pipe. A Goblin Smoker if you will.

Now if you think that sounds like an epic story and pretty strange and groovy it is. Soon the sounds got too big for one man and he drafted in Calum Young on drums and Mitch Walker on bass so Kennedy could concentrate on vocals, guitar and writing 9 minute epics to a warty toker of mythical creatures.

So, to the music, A Throne In Haze, a World Ablaze is the second part of a trilogy which began in 2018 with the Toad King E.P a live version of which was released last year.  What the trio specialise in is dirty, filthy, grimy, smoky, earthy , deliciously putrid sounds. Like Hang the Bastard and EyehateGod grooving with Darkthrone and Bongzilla.

“Smoked in Darkness” rumbles in and I know I am in for a treat. One of those scary life changing treats that make you wanna turn everything up to 10 and let the world disintegrate around you. So much heavy!  The riff almost sounds like an electric double bass – it is so low and so fuzzed out it can’t be coming from a guitar surely?

The opening riff in the second track “Let them Rot” is so huge you could hang a fucking battleship from it and then a crash of cymbals ushers in some rib shuddering Primitive Man level nastiness. Just relentless heaviosity that swamps your very soul and smothers you in primordial tar. I hope they can identify me by my dental records as my tattoos will slough off under the molten onslaught.

The final track is a spritely 7 minuter in comparison to the 9 and 10 minutes of its predecessor. The anguish and rage spat forth by Kennedy has me wincing at the thought of his poor larynx. The cymbals poke through like green shoots in scorched earth offering a little light in the overbearing shade.

Goblinsmoker are damn fine.  This is the kind of music that makes you stop in your tracks. It absorbs the listener and forces you to relent to its smoke filled spell . If you like your music to pick you up and take you a million miles from this mundane existence and take you to a terrible but invigorating plain then this is for you.

Hail to the Toad King baby!

(8.5/10 Matt Mason)

https://www.facebook.com/Goblinsmoker

https://goblinsmoker.bandcamp.com/album/a-throne-in-haze-a-world-ablaze