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Valient Thorr - Old Salt review



Reviewer:
7.0

10 users:
5.9
Band: Valient Thorr
Album: Old Salt
Release date: July 2016


01. Mirakuru
02. Lil Knife
03. Cut And Run
04. No Count Blues
05. The Trudge
06. Worm Up
07. Spellbroke
08. Linen Maker
09. The Shroud
10. Looking Glass
11. Jealous Gods

Even on album #7, Valient Thorr has a pretty raw, unpolished sound that livens up the store-brand rock'n'roll. The band's unexpected attitude may certainly catch the listener off-guard long enough to plant the seeds of appreciation; at the end of the day, that attitude makes for a lot of Old Salt's appeal.

With the chomping, metallic edge of the guitars and the purely hardcore punk vocal delivery of Valient Himself, I get the sense that if Valient Thorr were heavier, it would be a sludge metal band. As it is, the band storms in packing more grit and aggression than these very old school, blues-influenced hard rock songs can handle, coaxing as much overdriven distortion out of the riffs themselves as out of the amps fueling the show. Fun tracks like "Lil Knife" remind me as much of Bad Brains and Mastodon as of the more traditional hard rock bands that have helped to shape Valient Thorr's sound. Even with the piss and vinegar flying everywhere, the guitars still come out pretty jangly and the hooks communicate that this band's roots lie squarely in much older artists than the aforementioned.

I'm reminded of BitterCOld's review of Valient Thorr's 2010 album Strangers; I don't doubt that in a live setting, when the band can really let loose, Valient Thorr sounds fabulously rambunctious and vigorous. The loose assortment of loud noises that constitutes the beginning of "Cut And Run" sums up the most attractive qualities of Old Salt; energy rolls off this band in waves, and I can picture the rollicking musical paroxysms that Valient Thorr must enter onstage. I won't even say that the studio recordings fail to convey the wildness the band aims for, because that wildness has kept my reception so positive. Even so, sound reigns over substance here, and I'll remember the rough-cut swagger of Valient Thorr long after these admittedly forgettable songs have faded from my memory.

For me, the fittingly-entitled "The Trudge" is where things start to fall off slightly. The momentum slows, I become more acclimatized to the rough sound, the songs become a little less impassioned, and Old Salt begins to lose its charm. The album remains a pretty fun listen and finishes with one of its strongest tracks ("Jealous Gods'), but I feel as though everything I'm going to get out of Old Salt I've already gotten out of the first few songs, or maybe the first half. It certainly doesn't help that the second half clearly lags behind in terms of memorable songwriting. I can tell how much fun this band is to see live, and with its unpolished production, Old Salt gives you a better taste than usual, but the album just leaves a little something to be desired in the songwriting department.


Rating breakdown
Performance: 8
Songwriting: 6
Originality: 6
Production: 8





Written on 27.09.2016 by I'm the reviewer, and that means my opinion is correct.


Comments

Comments: 1   Visited by: 48 users
29.09.2016 - 02:08
Rating: 6
BitterCOld
The Ancient One
You were a tad more generous on this than i was. didn't like it as much as Immortalizer or Stranger.
----
get the fuck off my lawn.

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