March Metal: Great Black Swamp
Here at Doom and Dead we shine a spotlight on small-time doom, drone, and psych acts that deserve more attention. One of our favorite releases this month comes from Phoenix desert-doom outfit Great Black Swamp.
Featuring just two songs, the Mother Earth EP is brief but mighty. The band is inspired by the inhospitable landscapes in their home state of Arizona, but that’s not what makes this band unique. Their signature sound is an amalgamation of clean singing and imposing riffs assembled at odd angles and welded together with a bead of horror movie sound effects.
At first glance, GBS might look like a classic doom metal 4-piece with vocals, bass, guitar, and drums. But during the pandemic, the band assembled their own portable performance machine — a 5th member of sorts stitched together from a Mackie mixer, a guitar processor, a bunch of mics, beer bottles, scrap metal, and variety of found objects. Dubbed the “Swamp Tank,” this handmade leviathan helps the band create spooky sounds sure to unsettle audiences at home or on the road.
The title track, Mother Earth, starts simply. A melancholy guitar and haunting vocals forge visions of destruction. Other instruments join the fray. Humanity’s end looks desolate and saturnine. Amid the haze of smoke and ash, the only thing certain is how undeniably heavy this composition is. Dynamic vocal work and sludgy sections are guaranteed to give your stank face a workout. The latter half of the song highlights some of the Swamp Tank’s more unconventional sound-making capabilities with foley effects worthy of a spine-tingling fright flick. A granite bass line holds things steady while the guitar whines and wanders. This song showcases everything I love about doom metal — boundless misery set to a meaty groove.
The second track on the EP is Sentient Machines. This one features a bold grungy riff that would make Tom Morello proud. Once again, the band strikes a careful balance between weightiness and euphony that makes for some damned melodious doom metal. A raga structure gives shape to off-color effects and unexpected motifs. These arid grooves will leave you picking bones from your teeth and grit from your boots (or vice versa.)
Great Black Swamp serves up melodic desert doom tinged with grunge and horror influences. The DIY spirit of these resourceful desert rats is baked into the band’s DNA. If this EP greases your gears, then the band’s previous EP, End Transmission, is also worth a listen.
