Emergency Rule “King Of Ithaca”
As you wander through a haze of smoke and fog you hear drums pound. They progressively are louder and louder as you’re drawn to them. Searching even. Your vision clears as the double sonic attack of guitar harmonies infect you from both sides while a sledgehammer level of bass punches you from the front. This is Emergency Rule and their opening track Hook on their debut album King Of Ithaca.
To see the band live is to have your hearing numbed, your legs hurting from the vibrations and your neck strained from constant movement. The power displayed at the bands shows is as much a highlight as the music itself.
Can the band replicate that dirty, sludge infested, infectious grooves on record? Second track Garden, already a live favourite, displays the bands ability to switch speeds and remain brutally heavy. Nothing is lost in transference.
Bartender, with its opening line of ‘bartender give me one more drink, I don’t want to think’ invokes images of a fallen hero getting lost at midday in a bar. Lamenting a lost love with a soundtrack that is easy to say is doom or Sabbath but in reality is actually blues. Just downtuned to fuck. It’s quite glorious really.
The metal instrument of the orchestra is the cello, thanks to Johann Sebastian Bach’s insistence of it use during the 18th Century, and Abuse pays homage with an layered orchestral piece underneath the bands dynamite and explosive riffs throughout which starts with a cello and ends in its own world of ‘Spiral Architect’.
From The Grave has a drumbeat from Travis Dragani that makes you want to burn down work and walk away with the leading lady into the sunset, while talking of work, Corporation is a driving insistent foot tapping monster with Doug Clark vocals snarling and bass as sharp as a razor.
The album closes with Ulysses, and one of my personal faves when played live, as the song really gives life to guitarists Christos George and Cal Wegener to take you on a wild ride on the seven seas of metal.
The album hits hard from the opening track and doesn’t let up. You’ll get taken into a world influenced by Sabbath, Floyd and Maiden as much as blues or Bach. It’s that last shot of whisky, it’s that middle finger to your boss, it’s that’s last conversation you say to your girl as you leave her in rear view mirror. It’s Emergency Rule.
Album Review By Iain McCallum
