Opium Warlords — We Meditate Under the Pussy In the Sky
Meditate is comprised of five songs. While they're all fairly different from each other in composition, they work well enough together that you probably won't notice. Overall, this album has a nice, heavy guitar sound. This is probably why some people call this album "doom," but it's not; It's just a heavy guitar. This guitar is featured on each track and is the most consistent piece of the album. It's at its best on "Lament For the Builders of Khara-Khoto" and "The Wind Is a Gift From a Distant Friend." Lament is a heavy, drony, mystical type number. The first half of Wind is heavy and plucked with nice, punctuated drums. This then breaks into a nice little groove that reminds me of a high school band covering Radiohead's "Creep."
The first song on the album, "Sxi-Meru," is the weakest of the five. It's sparse and uninteresting and exactly what I figured I'd hear when reading the press release. "Slippy" is the main minute thief of the album. There are a lot of interesting sounds and motifs in it, but they're slapped together almost willy nilly. The awesomely video gamey organ and drum intro breaks into something that reminds me of "The Destroyer" from Legend's From the Fjords (minus the guy that sounds like Phil Oakey from The Human League). It then falls victim to the pressure to be chaotic and erratic. It's too bad, too, as the opening showed a lot of promise. Why not make a few songs shorter songs that work well instead of one long song that's randomness undermines the song's whole purpose? YARGH!!! It's my pet peeve, for sure.
While not the mess the press release led me to believe, We Meditate Under the Pussy In the Sky is far from a masterpiece. Most of the songs could use some work to tighten then up and some need to be broken down, but it was an alright listen. Maybe the Opium Warlords should've spent less time meditating and more time working on their album.