ORTHODOX - Baal

Preceded by the utterly negligible 7" EP "Matse Avatar" (released by the Czech label Doomentia in June of last year), "Baal" continues the normalization of what, back in 2007, with "Amanecer En Puerta Oscura", was still an excellent and rare example of jazz-doom in progressive guise.

Marco Serrato Gallardo (vocals, bass), Ricardo Jiménez Gómez (guitar) and Borja Díaz Vera (drums), while showing a clear tendency to ramp up the intensity of their sound, have creatively backed themselves into what, for now at least, looks like a dead end. Doom survives here and there across these five tracks (above all in the mighty "Hani Ba'al" and in the slow-motion agony of the lengthy "Ábrase la Tierra", buried under a tsunami of distortion and feedback), but it's mainly a muscular, vaguely esoteric heavy-psych variant that makes up the bulk of a solid album that nonetheless falls short of the band's past peaks.

With the spiritual nuances of their first two works almost entirely erased, the Seville band splits its time between panoramic flights with raga-tinged psychedelic dilutions and the obligatory chimes ("Alto Padre"), hostile, noisy escapes with electric climaxes ("Taurus"), and yet another variation on the immortal legacy of Black Sabbath (specifically, "Iron Man", which shines through on a genuinely decent "Iatromantis").

Granted, this is a less sprawling work than the previous "Sentencia", but compactness isn't always a plus, especially when talent gets squandered, perhaps in the hope of winning over a wider audience.

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16/03/2011