Essentially the solo project of Arkansas multi-instrumentalist Nate Garrett, Spirit Adrift released a broadly innovative two-song EP last year and now return with five tracks stacked with ginormous downtuned riffs, sludgy tempos and bluesy, pentatonic voyaging.
Behind a fist-pumping dual-fretboard attack, bruisers like Psychic Tide and Chained To Oblivion sound like Amon Amarth and Down hooked up for a late night, Jack Daniel’s-and-weed-fuelled jam session.
Closer Hum Of Our Existence suggests that it might break into a windswept gallop but instead plunges into a crumbling doom onslaught. Where other swamp metallers serve up similar Sabbath riffs baked in ragged hardcore aggression, SA hew closer to the mindbending trippiness of Edgar Winter, particularly in the bludgeoning psychedelia of Form And Force. Tempos remain glacial and with the average track tipping north of nine minutes, some of the jamming feels unfocused, but there are so many lighter-hoising hooks and cosmically-oriented solos that Garrett can be forgiven for. Like bourbon, this LP will age exceedingly well.
