OFF: my Cathedral review

[Amphetamine Embalmer]

Cathedral fans,
Go to the Cathedral website at
http://www.geocities.com/~witchblaster/ and click on
'Treasures Left Behind' for my tasty review of their
'Caravan Beyond Redemption' CD. Enjoy!

Cathedral - Caravan Beyond Redemption
(1998, Review by Charlie Yuga (christmu at eunet.no)

Having in the 80's paved the way for underground UK
doom and death metal along with other bands like Bolt
Thrower, carrying the occult traditions of heavy metal
to new underground audiences, Cathedral's modern move
towards outright groove-rock still retains the heavy
Ozzy-era Black Sabbath fascination of their earlier
material, but with perhaps more of a nod towards The
MC5 and Blue Öyster Cult's 60's & 70's biker rock
aesthetics, as wildly demonstrated by heavy
freedom-rockers like "Revolution", "Freedom" and
"Heavy Load". Still, themes like black magick, human
sacrifice, apocalyptic medieval war machinery and
other unholy witchery of mass-technological slavery
remain the essence of Cathedral's typically dark
science-fiction fables of this fine 1998 release,
being yet another concept-type album in grand
Cathedral tradition, "Caravan Beyond Redemption"
perhaps being something of a quest for sanity in the
very insane world in which we dwell, of our ancient
and ever-weaving civilization living in fear at the
end of an era, a heavy infection of millennium fever
seemingly building to mass destruction. "The Unnatural
World", "Satanikus Robotikus", "Voodoo Fire", "The
Omega Man" and the wonderfully hippy-psychedelic
celestial ode to LSD, "Kaleidoscope Of Desire", show
Cathedral at their finest, in the latter case the
band's love of psychedelia having become more and more
expressed over the years. Indeed, if Cathedral ever
decided to cover any heavy acid classics in eternal
tribute, then certainly Hawkwind's "Master of The
Universe", Amon Duul II's "Archangel's Thunderbird" or
Cream's "Tales Of Brave Ulysses" would make some very
heavy tunage under Cathedrals' supreme vision, the
cosmic realms of modern doom metal -and stoner rock
remaining in some creative debt to the rumblings of
early 70's heavy metal spacerock and the underground's
immortalized psychedelia.. Perhaps this album, along
with "Carnival Bizarre" (1995), showcases Cathedral at
their finest, "Caravan Beyond Redemption" taking the
mantle of modern doom -and stoner metal's flirtations
with biker rock and boogie to new heights, the genre
never having sounded as refreshing and appealing as
now. Cathedral, never losing their cutting edge
despite making headway in today's more commercialized
climate, and heralding and influencing the arrival of
modern-generation doom metal and boogie-spacerock like
Orange Goblin and Spiritual Beggars, as well as the
heavy rock'n'roll
stoner-boogie of Fu Manchu, Cathedral declaring with
authority that stoner-rock and doom-metal remains
vital and fresh at the end of the century and headed
for a new millennium, in truth, modern heavy metal
must have taken a rogue lesson or two from these heads
in Cathedral a long time ago, as this blistering solar
flare of an album will make any reptilian boogie and
contract like a horny and evil old witchdoctor
trancing out on magick blotter acid... "Its only
freedom-rock, baby!"

--


-Christian

tastefully abridged rambling idiot monk signature:
everybody get hammered and drop your silly knickers
for some tasty speedfreak powered action, especially
all you beautiful young heavy metal tarts and rambling
derelict deadheads on motorcycles... go visit the
Hawkwind Electric Library at
http://bloomingdation.dreamstation.com/hawkwind.html
just for me, and your own sake too, of course, and you
still won't regret sitting on your arse getting
completely wasted all day in front of your naked
woman!



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