Godhunter – City of Dust (Battleground Records)
Monday, 24th March 2014
Straight out of the Arizona desert, Godhunter give their take on the heavy stoner doom thing and at nearly an hour long, City of Dust is a tiring and ultimately forgettable listen. The opening track, “Despite All,” opens things up with a slow repeating riff for about a minute until the drums kick in and they pick up the pace a bit. Then come the vocals and it’s there it goes from bad to worse. Sounding like a poor Phil Anselmo knock off, the song becomes almost laughable it’s so bad.
Unfortunately that’s exactly how the rest of the album goes; cliché stoner doom with a desert rock twist. Think Anselmo fronting a boring version of Bongzilla and that about sums it up. There is a slight reprieve about halfway through with “Shooting down the Sun” where they bust out the acoustic guitars to provide a few laughs as they get moody and emotional. Then it’s right back to the boring, tame, and predictable for the remainder of the record until you can finally make you way through the 10-minute long closer, “Plague Widow.”
The fact is that there’s just a ton of other bands out there that do this much, much better. The aforementioned Bongzilla or Weedeater, for starters. They at least provide a somewhat original or unique take on a classic formula. The stoner rock/doom arena is getting to be a crowded space these days and Godhunter lack an edge or anything that makes them stand out. City Of Dust is just tame without any sense of style or substance. With so many better options out there, Godhunter is left in…the…dust.
