Voidlurker - Industrial Nightmare

Heavy metal and the city of Birmingham have been interlocked in a deadly embrace since a certain Mr. Iommi accidentally played a part of Gustav Holst’s Planet Suite incorrectly. The rest, they say, is history. Almost 50 years to the day since Black Sabbath released their seminal debut album, a new band from Birmingham have taken up the Doom mantle. Incredibly, they’ve made it one hell of a lot nastier, too. Riding high on the wave of their spectacular Metal to the Masses victory and a slew of gigs supporting the who’s who of modern Doom near the end of 2019, Voidlurker have started the new decade with just under half an hour of grim tidings that leaves you no choice but to sit up and take note with their debut EP, Industrial Nightmare.

While there is more than a passing resemblance to Black Sabbath: filthy, fuzzed-out guitars; lumbering, elephantine riffs and crushing drums aplenty; this EP neatly manages to avoid the pastiche that so many bands get accused of these days. There is no fat whatsoever on this thing. Voidlurker do not deal in anything as cumbersome or self-indulgent as a guitar solo or bass noodling. No, sir, what they provide is a homorhythmic dirge that feels like an anvil has been dropped onto your ears from a great height. From the grim stomp of the title track, which showcases singer Brad Thomas’ inhuman screams and gives a nod to Iron Monkey as it plods by before desceding into a hardcore-laden finale, to the jarring shifts from the slow to the even slower on Rotten Seed, boasting a controlled drum attack from Jack Bourne that even the Melvins’ Dale Crover would drool over, it is in this EP’s simplicity and single-mindedness that its grim beauty lies. The vehement lack of frill or pomp creates an oppressive, claustrophobic atmosphere that sucks you into the centre of its black hole-darkness and refuses to spit you out again until it’s done with you. Nowhere is this more evident than on the standout track: Jeffery Doomer. Once you’ve endured the bone-shaking opening and swirling acid rain of the verses, the band mercilessly unleash a droning monstrosity of a riff that really should come packaged with some kind of public health warning. So fearsome is this track that even its namesake, the Milwaukee Cannibal, Jeffery Dahmer, would be left with no option but to run and hide. 

Weirdly, though, through all of the sludge and filth, there is actually an intensely cathartic and uplifting listen awaiting you. The ferocity and rage with which Voidlurker hammer out these songs creates an EP that weighs on you so hard that you feel lighter and decompressed when you finally do manage to stop listening to it over and over. In the polarised, divided, technological and, erm… Industrial Nightmare in which we find ourselves in the current year, what could be a better antidote to the nagging feelings of doom and gloom than a record that demands those feelings be brought to the forefront of your mind so that it can exorcise them with a more than liberal dose of fervent headbanging. Most refreshingly of all, Voidlurker prove that Doom is still alive, kicking and screaming. Shockingly, less can, indeed, be more. My only complaint is that there isn’t more of it... #VDC

BP