Swamplung- Cracked Teeth and Gospel Ashes

 What is a "scene"? That question has come up in my wanderings through the internet. It seems a lot of people now regard "metal" or "punk" as a scene itself. When I was young "scene" referred to a local area that had developed a certain characteristic. The New Orleans Sludge Metal,  Florida Death Metal or Norwegian Black Metal are examples.  These were local areas that developed a certain atmosphere, philosophy and style for a genre of music.  In the age of the internet, that has seemed to be lacking. 

So why do I bring this up? Well, the next few reviews will be highlighting bands from a local scene that have struck a chord with me. For those that have read this blog for a while, you know I use this blog to highlight bands I like that are either new or flying under the radar. This scene has produced some great music this year so I decided to highlight 3 new EP's from the area. 

Something is in the water in Gainsville, Ga. Swamplung arrives out of the mountains of Georgia swinging full tilt at your face. Sounding like a hybrid of Weedeater and Buzzo-ven, they rage through five tracks of rage filled sludge core consisting of raw, ragged riffs, heavy bass tones, pounding drums and ragged and vocal chord tearing vocals. The Southern Sludge is returning and it is glorious. 

Starting off with the corker, "Dialated" stomps you into the ground before moving to the double headed steamroller of "Ruined" and "Ashtray Baptism".  After that the groove laden and heavy "RRR" and the wildly slow and maniacal "I'm Done" finish pounding your corpse into oblivion.This is high quality sludge core that retains a rage filled tone but keeps a southern groove. This is a really great record. 

"Ashtray Baptism" is an interesting anomaly here in that it doesn't have traditional lyrics. It uses samples for the movie "The Shining" as its "lyrics". The scene is the bar scene before Jack Torrance snaps where he gets drunk and confesses to the violence his drunkenness causes. Its an effective way to use movie samples in a disturbing fashion in this kind of music. 

So as I stated this review is the first of 3 surrounding bands from Gainsville, GA. This EP is a fantastic showing for Southern Sludge. Its has all the necessary components but it has a sound all of its own. Highlights:  "Dialated" and "Ashtray Baptism" but another all around great EP from the South, especially for a newer band. So definitely go check them out.  I'm personally hoping to see these dudes live soon since they are pretty close to me. If I do, you'll get the live review here.

https://swamplung.com/