Snakes Don’t Belong in Alaska hit it out of the park with their latest release on Up In Her Room records. There is a certain feel of darkness on this one with its heavy bass grooves, wailing vocals, spoken text samples, and primal drumming. Not quite as improvised as previous releases like Mountain Rituals. There is a sense of better production values and song structure while still keeping the free-flowing feeling. I have a thing for those deep repetitive bass grooves that extend for eternity and we certainly get a lot of that here throughout the 4 extended tracks.
The LP kicks of with a monster of a track in “Through the Darkest Dimensions We Find the Light” twelve minutes of bass-driven bliss kicked off with a spoken sample, driving bass and primal drumming we launch into a spacey epic journey. Fuzzed-out guitars and 70’s style organ keys punctuate the somewhat desperate vocal wailing. “Elektrische Zeitreise” follows with its quicker pace and standard rock rhythm section sweeping effects and tremolo guitar with flourishes of vintage keys. Side two kicks off with “The Holy Mountain of Fire” again slowing things down and taking a darker approach with deep dueling vocals heavy on the fuzz guitar and dense driving bass. The album closes with the epic twelve-minute “The Horned Serpent”. A five-minute intro of pure evil consisting of demonic choirs and spoken word ritual and some low and slow drumming before kicking into the wailing vocals and dark bass groove that wanders into a primal ceremony with chanting and vocals reminiscent of The Fall.
Love this release. Solid tunes and the artwork impresses as well. This one requires some serious volume. I’m not sure if a repress is coming but it’s going to be pretty hard to find with only 150 pressed on red vinyl and 100 on black.
Available from Up In Her Room and The Bands Bandcamp Page
