Invite a bunch of metal-loving buddies into a rehearsal room for a jam and the usual result is that you end up with a bunch of songs that sound just like the bands which influenced you. And why not? Have some fun with this Gothenburg band’s debut album by playing ‘Influences Bingo’ while you’re making a bacon sandwich.
Maximum points if you identified Mastodon in Enter The Night, Metallica’s The Call Of Ktulu in the title track and so on. Thankfully, however, there’s more to Bombus than mere idol-worship, as they cover a wealth of territory from Apparatus’s greasy hardcore via the ponderous biker-rock of Master The Reality and Into The Fire’s fully fledged doom metal.
The atmospheric textures, plus the band’s willingness and ability to avoid any particular pigeonhole, give The Poet And The Parrot a touch of depth and range. In fact, Bombus album number two could be pretty spectacular if they can buff off a few rough edges – such as the vocals, which rarely deviate from two blokes shouting in what sounds like a cupboard under the stairs.
