LORD VICAR (Fear No Pain) CD
The long anticipated debut album from LORD VICAR is here at last what will be a cheerful incident for a lot of doom fans. In the meantime the band were signed to The Church Within Records shortly after the first 7" EP has been released through I Hate Records. Guitarist Peter Vicar, who renamed himself into Peter Inverted, has gathered a strong team whereby vocalist Chritus aka Christian Linderson (ex-Saint Vitus, Count Raven, Terra Firma) is the one who put his stamp on the music because his charismatic vocals are unmistakable. 'Fear No Pain' consists of seven tracks and fortunately the band endeavours not to fulfill all the stereotypes in doom. Most of the songs are based on irresistible grooves with strong melodic vocal hooks, and not very often the band slows down for maximum slowness. The guitar sound is fat and crunchy, but the entire production has a rich sound, although the bass is a little bit too quiet for my liking. Sadly LORD VICAR mostly forgoes the use of guitar solos 'cause that would make the music more diversified.
On the contrary, songs like 'The Spartan', 'Born of a Jackal' and 'The Funeral Pyre' attract attention with acoustic guitars and especially 'The Funeral Pyre' belongs to one of my favourite tracks here. This epic masterpiece is saturated with melancholy and passion, but the songs becomes never to weepy and wimpish. 'A Man called Horse' is another highlight where LORD VICAR pool their strengths and manage a playing time of ten minutes with ease. A very few songs as for example 'The Last of the Templars' attract my attention with a mediocre performance, but blessedly such moments are rarely to find. The lyrics deal with topics like history, religion, personal experiences and can be found in the informative booklet. My conclusion is that almost everyone who likes Count Raven, early Black Sabbath or Saint Vitus should buy a copy of 'Fear No Pain'. It's a charming album and a few things are improvable, but this is more than just a solid start and I can imagine that the second or third album could be a classic.
(KK)