So, live music is but a distant memory to most of us thanks to the current Pandemic. Who ever thought I’d be subconsciously missing the whiff of sweaty metal fans, the taste of tepid, over priced beer and the racket of a local band on the warm up bill? Well, it’s true that absence makes the heart fonder, and so then we turn to what is the next best thing. I don’t know about you, but the whole live-streamed live experience is ok for what it is, but truth be told I’d rather settle down with a nice live album. That’s where this opus comes in.

So, I don’t know too much about The Bottle Doom Lazy Band (BDLB from here on in!), save to say that they hail from France, that they don’t have any discography listed on Metal Archives or Band Camp, and that the accompanying blurb says that they don’t really care if you listen (or not), buy their products (or not) and that they aren’t promoting anything. You have to admire that exercise in nominative determinism, I guess. This album is a collection of ten tracks culled from live performances over the years. Other than that kids, all I can tell you is that this record purports to tell the tale of the band over the last 15 years.

So, what do we have? After all, Doom is a broad church. What we have here is a pretty raw, energetic doom band that has a traditional Obsessed / Saint Vitus take on the genre, being a hybrid of some theatrical Pentagram-esque flourishes alongside the blues-inflected soulful slow heavy metal of the aforementioned acts. In fairness, there’s a lot to like here. The second track, for instance, “The Dead Can’t Lose Again” has a rigor-mortis inflected stomp, alongside some really truly entertaining vocal flourishes from singer “Bottle Ben”, the sub-Ozzy “Alriiiight Now” included! Elsewhere, “Night of the Living Dead” ploughs a similar furrow to Cathedral’s “Night of the Seagulls”, except for having a much more pronounced Wino influence thrown in.

In terms of song-writing, BDLB have it going on. I enjoyed pretty much every cut on here, and would actually really like to hear a more traditional compilation of these tracks. I sat listening to the astounding vorpal bass work on “Too Old” and found myself wondering just how the studio version of this might sound. In the main, I think that the production here works pretty well – it’s an honest and authentic (I assume) slice of primal live performances, though there are a couple of differences in sounds between the tracks on here which can be a little distracting on repeated listens. I can’t really tell you if the live album represents a good account of the Gallic crew on record having never heard them, but I can tell you that I’d very much like to see them play live if we can overcome the twin obstacles of: a) Post-pandemic restrictions and b) Post-Brexit nonsense. I’ve grown to really enjoy their blue-collar blues version of doom, and – lazy or not – I hope they pull their collective fingers out of their arses and start to do a little more in the way of promotion and studio releases, because this music is pretty good.

More please, monsieurs?

(7.5/10 Chris Davison)

https://www.facebook.com/bottledoom

https://sleepingchurchrecords.bandcamp.com/album/2005-2020-doom-over-the-years