Listening to Electric Wizard’s latest album requires preparation. You can’t just throw on the record in the background and expect it to woo you. It requires a certain setting, a certain mood, a focused attention and an acute sense of perception. Time To Die is the long awaited eighth full length release from Electric Wizard…
I have been listening to Time To Die over and over again for the past days and the first thing I have to say is that Time To Die is not Dopethrone and it’s not Black Masses; it’s just as good, but a different type of journey. Electric Wizard again manages to deliver a 9 track adventure through an incredible dark, satanic, and heavy sludge sound. Exactly as they are only able to do.
The band’s founding member Justin Oborn said, all the previous albums were focused on the themes of revenge, drugs, and black magic while the theme of Time To Die is death, death seen as rebirth to be precise. To use the Osborn’s words “Time To Die is a manifestation of a very primal occult belief in the final sacrifice” This premises makes this album very captivating and I think that it’s a must have for your collection.
“Incense for the Damned” opens Time To Die with almost 11 minutes of satanic and death influenced doom. The vocals are diabolic and powerful as always and the Sabbath-style guitar riffs are simply superb. “Incense for the Damned” is a great way to start the album and immediately reminded me how much I love this band. Time To Die is a very loud LP and listening to the title track as well as “I Am Nothing” through headphones is like smoking the best weed you can find; they are a trip to hear for anyone. Heavy riffs along with the crushing bass resonate from everywhere and you’ll get lost in them. Oborn’s vocals emerge and they are the only guide in the monolithic, macabre composition. The 12 minute sounds of “I Am Nothing” is going to conquer fans of the band. It’s sludgy and slow with a dark psychedelic style. “Funeral of Your Mind” is my favorite track from Time To Die for its psychedelic and pursuing rhythm and its intense jam with the vocals screaming out maniacally. Press play and start riding the wall of sound that only bands like Electric Wizard are able to deliver.
I would have to say that all the songs on Time To Die are a bit heavier than those on Black Masses and are characterized by simple instrumentation, dense sound, and as bleak as possible.
The final highlight of the album is the closing and fully instrumental “Saturn Dethroned” that is characterized by the sound of an old organ. It’s slow and it decays into a mesmerizing spacey drone section. Time To Die starts in a perfect way with “Incense for the Damned,” and it finishes even better according to the Electric Wizard’s dark psychedelic style.
Final thoughts: Fuck off, weak doom… Electric Wizard rules!
Rating: 3.5/5