It’s been four years since their last release Darkness Come Alive, but now Doomriders is back with their third full-length release called Grand Blood. As expected, this album was also recorded at God City Studios with Nate Newton’s bandmate in Converge Kurt Ballou. Doomriders isn’t busiest band in the world, as all members are involved with other bands, family life and full-time jobs. Yet they know how to impress nevertheless.

Their style hasn’t really changed within the years but definitely evolved. There are two things that caught my attention while listening two this record. First one is the double guitar harmonies that are almost gone, which makes this record less melodic and catchy. Where the other records have a more classic rock and metal vibe to it, this new record is more dark and has more sludge and punk twists to it.

The up tempo tracks like ‘Mankind’, ‘Bad Vibes’ and ‘Back Taxes’ have a very present punk attitude and  ‘Black Taxes’ and ‘Live In The Darkness’ bring you back to the older Doomriders records with the harmonic double guitars. The real raw sludge tracks are ‘Death in Heat’ and ‘Father Midnight’, also the two longest tracks of the record. They will grind your brain with the slow but energetic sound! The track ‘Dead Friends’ has a kind of weird story attached to it: while recording the vocals for that track, Nate read on Facebook that a friend of him was murdered in a skateshop. This song is about four of his recently deceased friends.

At the end of the line, this record is more darker than Doomriders’ previous releases and doesn’t contain the melodic tracks that have become the band’s trademark. It is the heaviest record they have made until now. For people that know Doomriders already will be a bit surprised but absolutely not disappointed, and for folks that never heard of these guys before: give it a spin and be amazed by this raw energetic band called Doomriders!

Track list – Grand Blood:

01. New Pyramids
02. Mankind
03. Grand Blood
04. Bad Vibes
05. Dead Friends
06. Death In Heat
07. We Live In The Shadows
08. Gone To Hell
09. Back Taxes
10. Father Midnight

Doomriders: Facebook / Order Grand Blood

Written by Gert-Jan van Aalst