Sons Of Otis - Exiled

  by Andrew Carver

published: 4 / 4 / 2009

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Review

Sons of Otis have been churning out doom-laden space rock from Toronto for almost 17 years. They crawled their way through the guts of three different record companies, each one succumbing to some fatal ailment in their wake before landing on heavy rock label Small Stone with ‘X’, their 2005 return to form. Now they’re back with ‘Exiled’, and once again the band is on a monolithic trudge to the boundaries of outer space. The Sons have already got their glacial thunder riffs down more or less pat, so you know what you’re getting from song No. 1: Frank Sargeant’s slumbering bass line gives way to titanic chords that trudge forth from some black hole of doom, mainman Ken Bluke’s vocal growl echoes out from the shadowy depths and Ryan Aubin hammers his cymbals and bass drum keep pace with the heartbeat of a very lethargic titan. That said, the 10-minutes opuses Sons of Otis favour don’t ever devolve to the level of Sunn0)))’s drones – they’re more like Monster Magnet after several hours of Quaalude abuse. They do pick up the pace a smidgen for covers of Lynyrd Skynyrd and Motorhead (‘Bad Man’ and ‘Iron Horse’). While 'Exiled' isn’t quite up to the standard of the epic ‘Spacejumbofudge’, it’s in close orbit and deserves a listen to anyone who likes to bang their head at a very slow nod.

Track Listing:-

1 Haters
2 Lost Soul
3 Bad Man
4 Oxazejam
5 Tales of Otis
6 Iron Horse

Label Links:-

http://smallstone.com/
https://twitter.com/ssrecordings
https://www.facebook.com/smallstonerec
https://www.youtube.com/user/SmallSton
https://smallstone.bandcamp.com/