Kev Rowland Recently a few of us were asked to recommend some recent albums, and one that came up was this by S.N.O., a band unknown to me. Now, as I admire the writings of the person who made this recommendation I thought that it would be worthwhile checking them out and I am glad that I did. This Swedish band have been gigging and recording since 2004 but sound as if they would be much happier if they had been around forty years ago as this is music that belongs very much to the early Seventies. It is easy to label them as a doom band, but that is much more in the original context as opposed to Cathedral or Candlemass. Here we have some doom –laden rifss to be sure, but we also have plenty of metallic and even psychedelic influences. Sabbath are important of course, but so are Black Widow, Iron Butterfly, Mountain, Free and a whole load more. I mention Free not so much for the blues influence (as there isn’t much), but far more for the importance of the depth of vocals and guitar. Singe has a very wide voice, which provides strong balance against the meaty musicianship that is going on behind him.

This music contains much more complexity and layers than one may expect, and the more this is played then the more the listener will get from it. There is one beefy number after another, but with loads of variety and atmosphere, so that each one is greeted with eager anticipation as one doesn’t really know what to expect. A very strong album indeed, and I can see why it was recommended as I am going to do the same. Well worth investigation. www.snoband.com