Wall of Sleep – …And Hell Followed With Him

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impulse buy

I Hate Records
Produced by Fido & Tamas Schmiedl

Hungarian doom outfit Wall of Sleep (presumably named after the Black Sabbath song Behind The Wall of Sleep?) are now on their fourth album, and it’s hard to imagine they’ve made a better one.

They are the perfect amalgamation of all of the best elements of early Pentagram, Witchcraft and Place of Skulls. And of course early Sabbath. Heavy riffs laden with groove of the kind it would have been nice if Clutch had managed to produce with their latest offering and a voice like a combination of Scott Weinrich, Michael Poulsen and Magnus Pelander.

Throw in a Cathedral-esque rhythm section and the kind of fast-paced doom metal approach more recently adopted by Grand Magus and you’ve got a pretty good idea of what Wall of Sleep sound like. Driving tracks like Crusade, complete with fuzzy leads, could easily be on the last Magus album and the elements of stoner rock, doom rock and old-school musicianship means they could fit on a bill with any band under consideration for the now legendary Roadburn festival in Holland, while slower numbers like Unchanged and the magnificent Signs exude some of the epic-doom feel of Candlemass.

The best way to describe Wall of Sleep is probably as a doom version of Witchcraft. They’ve got the same retro ’70s feel and reverberating voice, but with the heaviness and pace of a doom band. …And Hell Followed With Him is a late entry that’s crashed straight into the site’s top ten albums of 2007. Finally out in the UK on January 21, 2008.

“ old-school musicianship ”

Tracklist: Buried 1000 Times / Nails of Crucifixion / Crusade / November / Unchanged / Cain / Signs / Stabat Mater

Written by Andy Lye
More: 2007, Albums, Doom Metal, Wall of Sleep