Well, 2021 is well and truly under way, with glimmers of hope in the form the removal Trump, assorted vaccines and a vague possibility of a return to normality and social interaction. However, the world ensures that there can be no complacency, and a glimpse outside offers plenty to be gloomy about, with mutant disease strains, military coups, sabre rattling from the East, fuckwittery from the West, and the 24/7 stream of news that is barely one step away from being delivered directly into your brain full of buffoons and blowhards touting their own deluded agendas. As such, it’s essential to accentuate the positive, grasp hold of pleasures that can be had without putting others down, and indulge in the likes of music to lift the spirits, right? Not if you are Indica Blues of course, as they say ‘We Are Doomed’ in no uncertain terms.
‘Inhale’ opens mellowly enough, gently strummed chords wandering from the speakers promising a soothing idyll, all before the riff fires in composed of equal parts fuzz, sustain, and pure filthy sludge. I can only assume whatever these four lads from Oxford chose to inhale was not the good stuff, as blimey, whilst they sure can play, happy they are not! Title track and lead single ‘We Are Doomed’ follows with sound clips that come straight from my youth when schools gave out ‘Protect and Survive’ leaflets in class and watching the public information film was mandatory in light of the anticipation of the Cold War going hot. Whilst I’m fairly certain the band are too young to have lived through that era, I’d like to nonetheless thank them for recreating the atmosphere of fatalism I lived with back in the day care of this sonic bludgeoning.
Surely there is some light relief coming, and ‘Demagogue’ with its distorted opening bars promises the possibility of some space rock in a Monster Magnet vein. Indeed, it does tread that same road, but only from the darkest eras of those veterans, journeying as it does through winding paths of despair. ‘Soul Embers’ keeps the gloom coming, ebbing and flowing between starkly plucked chords and down tuned walls of sound, whilst ‘The End is Calling’ starts with the dirtiest of bass lines that develops into an almost Bluesy swagger. Hell, if you don’t like the Blues, but love Doom, you should look at where the music you love developed from; Blues had themes of depression, drugs, loss and the Devil long before Les Paul electrified his first guitar. The whole album is rounded out by the slowly building instrumental ‘Cosmic Nihilism’, and finally finished with a number to get necks wrecked and hair flying, ‘Scarred for Life’.
This all sounds like a right old downer, doesn’t it? However, before you run away as if chased by the minions of Cthulhu, let me tell you, it’s a bloody good album and I bloody well enjoyed it! Indica Blues has a rhythm section that brings the beats to have fists pumping whilst the six stringers deliver riffs of Iommian stature and wailing solos to have air guitarists working up a sweat. Yes, the themes of the cleanly delivered lyrics are dark, but that’s a reflection of the world they were written in, and for me, facing unpleasant realities is the best way of overcoming them, rather than ignoring them or sugar coating them. This is not disposable pop music to download once, consume, and then dispose of like some kind of sonic chewing gum. ‘We Are Doomed’ is an album with stories grounded in the harsh reality of the twenty first century, and played with skilful passion. Help keep the underground scene going, and get this album purchased.
(8.5/10 Spenny)
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