Nowadays, it feels like the reverence of the era of classic doom is more potent than ever as we’ve gotten absolutely throngs of acts that have sought to recreate that sound as we’ve seen the styles of heavy psych, proto-doom, traditional doom, and other such related sounds blossom in recent years. Such modern takes on classic formulas are something that always interests me because sometimes all you need is some new blood to make an older sound work, and it’s with the likes of Obsidian Sea that we get a brilliant example of just that.

The art of taking a sound that’s been performed for decades upon decades is something that’s been approached by an innumerable amount of bands, and that means that amongst the hordes of those that try there are a select few that manage to embody the style wondrously and help breathe new life into the style for new ears to enjoy. Thus, we’re granted acts like Obsidian Sea that manage to take a sound we’ve all heard dozens of times before, but they tweak it in places and add new things to the mix in order to make their material feel incredibly new and as though it was a wave of fresh air, and the latest gust comes in form of the six tracks that make up the glory that is “Strangers”. Where many bands tend to rely solely on riffs, it’s Obsidian Sea that allows the record to indeed have the ever-coveted riffs, but it’s with “Strangers” that this band allows themselves to meander in such a way that allows the record to feel organic and constantly moving instead of each song just being a simple structure that goes from verse to chorus and so on with nothing dynamic happening. “Strangers” feels wholly interesting as we see this band create something that feels much more than what we’re used from bands that emulate and attempt to refine the classic sounds of doom to varying degrees of success, but it’s here we see it pulled off splendidly.

It’s easy to fall into the very easy pitfalls of simply copy-and-pasting the sounds of legendary bands of the genre to make your job much more easier as a band creating new material but it’s Obsidian Sea that refuses to do that. It’s with “Strangers” that they show there are still plenty of horizons to explore with the style and that they can still be mapped out with delicious quality, and I can’t help but find myself lost in this album even after so many listens.

“Strangers” releases on March 22nd via Ripple Music!

LISTEN to an advanced track from “Strangers” on Bandcamp here.

LIKE Obsidian Sea on Facebook here.