By Jim Rowland
Originally rising from the ashes of Godspeed, New Jersey’s Solace celebrate their 30th anniversary this year with the release of their fifth studio album ‘Fading Failing Ruin’, their first in seven years. They’ve just completed their biggest run of gigs in those 30 years with a successful European tour including a prominent appearance at the Desertfest, so fans may already be familiar with one or two of the new tracks from what is a huge new chapter in the band’s career.
Solace like to mix up influences from metal old and new, particularly evident on the belting opener ‘Spiral Will’, which fuses a very Maiden-esque twin guitar motif with their trademark stoner metal vibe, a vibe that continues with the melodic and lengthy ‘Fettered To A Stone’. Most tracks here are on the lengthy side, aside from the heavy juggernaut of ‘A God Changes His Plans’ and the up-tempo heavy and grooving stormer ‘Culling the Herd’.
Central to the album is the epic 14+ minute ‘Wrath’s Object (The Big Fall)’, fusing lysergic atmospherics with crushing stoner/doom, and the 10+ minute album closer ‘Ridden’, upping the ante in stoner metal heaviness. Elsewhere, the complex rhythms, light and shade moods, and intricate guitar work lend a progressive flavour to ‘Malengine (The Scaffold)’ and ‘Beyond Below’ is a good marriage of doom and melody.
Indeed, amongst all the doom, stoner, sludge and metal heaviness, there is plenty of room for melody across the whole album thanks to relatively new recruit Justin Goins’ impressive vocal delivery.
Five albums in 30 years may not be considered prolific, but it’s the quality not the quantity that counts, and ‘Fading Failing Ruin’ is most definitely quality.
- ‘Fading Failing Ruin’ will be released on Friday (3 July).