Gargantuan Blade - Gargantuan Blade (Self-released)
Some of you have probably sighed by now, “Oh, so it’s a trad record. It’s trad doom.” Let me speak directly to your concerns: If you are uninterested in the fetal developments of extreme metal, this record may not be for you; on the other hand, if you are uninterested in that insincere and grasping quality to the pop metal masquerading as trad on Bandcamp (lookin' at you, Haunt), then Gargantuan Blade may—in a single downward chop—open your mind to new old thrills. Because you see, the devil’s in the details. The clear-but-not-too-clear mix shows great faith in the simple powers of a tube amp, which lets the bass blast out exactly how you'd want it to, if you were cruising down a freeway playing Deep Purple on your Firebird's tape-deck sound system, windows (manually) rolled down. That Gargantuan Blade’s singer is actually a baritone is also a throwback on top of a throwback, and even if he could never aspire to the range, dynamism, or charisma of an Ozzy or a Dio, one gets the sense that he understands their appeal—and his limits—enough to offer a reasonable facsimile. And really, that's the wonder of the Blade and other 'trad' outfits that actually work: They've read the material inside out, and they get it. When you think a song like "Black Lotus" is too slow, listen closer to the moments of emphasis—to how the singer becomes death-row Daniel Day-Lewis in The Crucible, to belt out, "Oh Lord," and to how the songs kick into a hilariously mid-tempo overdrive in their final third. It makes you want to go back and listen to "War Pigs" and "Heaven and Hell," which do the same exact things to excellent effect. For those and many other less obvious reminders, we have the Blade to thank.