Review by Alex on June 13, 2019.

Polish sludge metal sect Black Smoke are a new bunch to intoxicate the already drugged up scene. Usually when I see the sludge metal tag next to a band’s name, I assume they’re from the States, and after listening to Black Smoke’s debut full length-record, Holy Reptilian Mother, I was shocked at the least to find out they are a Polish group. The reason for this generic small-minded approach I take when it comes to sludge is due to the fact I’m not enthusiastic at all about the genre and most of the bands I’m familiar with are from the United States of America. What also pulled my perspective and initial conceptions of the band is that Black Smoke, on Holy Reptilian Mother, have a very heavy southern sludge/stoner metal sound, something I was not prepared to hear coming from a Polish band. Another element worth mentioning is though the material is listenable in terms of its production not (excluding the music), Black Smoke makes Holy Reptilian Mother sound dirty as a result of their vocal approach.  By means of death metal growls, abrasive, deranged, drugged-up sounding screams and use of extraterrestrial electronic sounds and even a saxophone on Holy Reptilian Mother, they hatch a crepuscular, eerie body of music. This striking sound helps to grasp an idea of the themes discussed here. With regards to their antecedent work on their debut demo, Fuck Society, a clearer idea is given as to what message/s Black Smoke wish to transmit. 

The early moments of Holy Reptilian Mother took some time adjusting to, not the rawness of the approach rather the outlook of the music as a whole. And though the mixture of abashed yelling and deep guttural growling were delighting, I was worried for the following songs to come as I was yet to find a purposeful concurring flow. That all changed after “Iron Lung”, with “Stormtripper, Shroomtripper” being the first entry to divulge song structures that would exude climax. At this point the material began to gel, in so creating a reintroduction of sorts to Holy Reptilian Mother. With “Ethanol” following the same path, Holy Reptilian Mother grew to greater strength in consistency, whereby songs would have all those diverse elements like the psychedelic electronic samples, stoner doom tuned guitars and a mashup of contrasting vocals and still keep a keen hand in ensuring it possessed adhesive continuance. Every entry henceforth got better, especially with catchier power-chord driven grooves coming to fruition on “Acid is Not a Cheap Wine” and “Release the Cocken”. By the time those tracks have passed you don’t even realize that you’re almost through listening to a 41-minute sludge/stoner doom record. Keeping in mind it’s easy to feel tired of pedal distortion, but Black Smoke keeps interest by lowering, increasing and decreasing the pitch of their music either to facilitate ambient sounds or add a mellow contrast to the harshness of the vocals and instrumentation in which the self-titled track is a good example of.                

I'm impressed to say the least, I was not expecting such a pleasing degree of sludge/stoner doom metal. Give Holy Reptilian Mother a spin, it will take a while before the acid kicks-in, but it is worth the wait. Black Smoke has delivered top-tier hallucinogens from Poland.

Rating: 8.3 out of 10

Review by criscool623 on June 14, 2020.

Despite not having listened to every Alestorm studio release (or at least with close attention), I consider myself as a follower of their music and career. I have in mind albums like Black Sails at Midnight (an inconsistent album with some great and other awful songs) and Sunset of the Golden Age (which is, to my eyes, the best album of the band so far), and I have always liked the combination of folk elements with the typical melodies and songwriting of power metal, which gave that particular pirate-inspired style to the band.

Curse of the Crystal Coconut (a strange and kind of stupid name) is the first album that I listen to from the band since Sunset... I totally ignored No Grave But the Sea mainly because of singles like 'Mexico' and 'Fucked with an Anchor'. The first one was AWFUL and the second one was nothing special, so I was afraid I'd lose my time listening to an inferior release to its previous album. In addition, I could notice that the band started to manage a more immature and less serious approach within their music. Such things made me believe that the band's career would start deteriorating, but after listening to this album, I admit that I was (kind of) wrong.

I enjoyed  this album a lot. The songs are pretty catchy as there are really good melodies that are easily memorable. When I realized, I was whistling or humming the melodies of several songs (in particular the singles of the album [except 'Tortuga'; we'll talk about that song later]). In this sense, the songs feel more oriented to power metal, and as a fan of the genre, I found this aspect great.

Another thing to highlight are the keyboards. The sound of trumpets and flutes adds more epicity to this album and enriches several songs to make them more complete and gripping. 'Zombies Ate my Pirate Ship' and 'Wooden Leg Part Two' are the most remarkable songs in this aspect. The keyboard makes these songs more epic and can delight to more than one listener. Check this while listening to these songs.

This album gambles with numerous types of voice and each one is collocated in the precise moment to make it more effective. Christopher Bowes's voice rough tone sounds very characteristic of a pirate, which is one of the aspects that give more personality to the band. However, I want to stand out the participation of Gareth Murdock at the growls and his guttural voice. He's not a top-notch death metal singer, but the moments when he sings are the most savage ones, and this is a success. The choirs, which are sung by all the band, are perfect to sing along the band, and this will be something great to sing along at the concerts. There's even a little participation of female vocals in 'Zombies Ate my Pirate Ship', which adds more points to this song.

Despite having enjoyed a lot of the album, I have to say that it's not a musical marvel nor a masterpiece. It's enjoyable, catchy and perfect to party, but it's not anything that you will want to buy in a physical format and keep it as a great oeuvre, and here is the reason why I think that.

Most of the songs are very formulaic. Many songs start with a catchy melody that after two chorus repetitions, the melody is just repeated with a different keyboard sound, which feels redundant and devoid of imagination to write a different thing. This is the same formula that uses their "classic" songs like 'Keelhauled' and 'Drink!', and I think the band is abusing of this structure when writing their songs.

There are 4 songs that quit shine to the album as a whole. 'Tortuga' is a strange experiment that despite not being necessarily a bad song (you have to be kind of open-minded to be able to enjoy it), it breaks the rhythm that the album has. I see potential, but the song just remains as an odd curiosity. 'Pirate's Scorn' and 'Shit Boat' are pretty boring and flat. You can skip these songs and it would not affect your experience listening to the album. 'Henry Martin' is an inconsequential song and it would have been better if the album had finished with 'Wooden Leg Paet Two', as this one just demerits mere the album as well as the previous songs, you won't miss anything special if you don't listen to it.

For me, the best song from the album is 'Wooden Leg Part Two'. It has a great variety of sections and elements as blast beats, tremolo picking, 8-bit sounds and the final part (reminiscent to the first part of this "saga") that make it intense the most complete song.

The lyrics are another topic that everyone will have an opinion about. I don't have any problem with a more childish approach as long as the music is good, but if you take into account them to enjoy a good record, this particular aspect may be unpleasant.

To conclude, Alestorm has done better things. This album is like eating chewing gum; you will enjoy it or a while, but after that, you will want to try something better. I still consider Sunset of the Golden Age as their best album. Most of the songs here are just good, but nothing really outstanding. Hope they regain the greatness they once had.

Rating: 7.2 out of 10