[rating=8.00]
For practically their whole career, but specifically dating back to their fantastic Der Vermis Mysteriis in 2012 when High On Fire first partnered up with producer Keith Ballou, and continuing through 2015’s Luminiferous, the trio of Matt Pike, Des Kensel, and Jeff Matz have been blazing, releasing nothing but killer full length metal offerings. Electric Messiah continues the group’s winning ways blasting out with their now patented smashup of Black Sabbath sludge doom/gloom and Motorhead speed/ferocity.
The record serves as a tribute to Lemmy himself and the band dives into their influences from the drop as “Spewn from the Earth” is a powerful blast of motoring chaos. The group’s stoner rock ways arrive for “Steps of the Ziggurat / House of Enlil” which is led by the marching and double bass pedal blasts of Kensel’s drumming before switching back to the fast, taught and the blistering title track, dedicated to Kilmister.
Warning the listener to “Hold on tight, we are in for a ride” the band gets mind-blowing with the huge “Sanctioned Annihilation”. Pike’s guitar and his vocals are sent screeching to exasperating heights around lines like “All is drowned in the waters of murk/The bomb explodes and scorches the earth”. The song is a glorious centerpiece to a stacked record of monstrous metal tunes.
The pummeling assault gets galloping/groove based with the intricate low-end work from Matz and Kensel for “The Pallid Mask” and “God of The Godless” allowing Pike to continue to soar above the fray on shredding guitar. Kensel’s drumming, in particular, should be noted as he is constantly engaging the listener, pushing and tugging the sound and direction of the trio with rambunctious patterns.
The straight-ahead assault returns with the headbanging speed metal of “Freebooter” which still manages to insert a mid-song gorgeous scenic break while driving at 120 miles down the freeway of your skull. “The Witch and the Christ” explodes with bombast while the seismic cataclysm of “Drowning Dog” is a gloriously huge way to end a record with zero weak spots.
If anything the band has proved over and over that they are beasts when it comes to this style so fans looking for an evolution in sound won’t find one here. However, High on Fire remains one of the consistently great metal acts going today and Electric Messiah proves the band is in peak form as their string of powerful albums thunders onward.
