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Review: Vôdûn, Crofters Rights
Kerr-chunnnng! Now that’s how to open a show. Bristol’s very own Age Decay summon a mighty doom chord from the bowels of Hell – or the very first Sabbath album, according to perspective – then repeat it and add doomy keyboards.
Witnessing many doom bands is like watching a glacier forge a fjord in real time, but these self-styled atmospheric blackened doomsters (personally I’d subdivide the genre still further to stick ‘melodic’ in there somewhere) not only vary the tempo but also add some neat little touches – like a song that appears to be constructed around a Roger McGuinn jingle-jangle guitar figure which has been slowed down to 16 rpm (remember that, vinyl enthusiasts?) so it sounds extra-sinister.
is needed now More than ever
A cynic might be forgiven for suspecting that Vôdûn‘s songs about slavery and African folklore, together with a manifesto that embraces “a tribe of mixed gender, ethnicity and sexuality”, are a naked bid for the zeitgeist. But if that’s your intention, you don’t then sabotage a pitch for the sensitive, Guardian-reading, world music enthusiast audience by sending them screaming for the exits with a set of crushingly heavy afrobeat doom. Vôdûn have earned rather lazy comparisons with Skunk Anansie, though this reviewer was put more in mind of indefatigable US soul-funk-metal veterans Mother’s Finest – a great band who’ve struggled with stereotyping for nearly 50 years now and once titled an album Black Radio Won’t Play This Record as a howl of frustration. (Seek it out. You won’t be disappointed.)
Doom is not a genre characterised by much in the way of showpersonship. Vôdûn seem determined to break that mould too. On one side of the stage, striking blue-haired vocalist Chantal Brown (aka Oya) is a flurry of motion, surrounded by percussion and an occasionally deployed keyboard. On the other, similarly war-painted Linz Hamilton (aka The Marassa) shimmys around slinkily, dressed like an extreme metaller who’s lost a bet. But it’s sometime Test Dept drummer Zel Kaute (aka Ogoun) who initially grabs our attention centre stage, holding down those thunderous afrobeat rhythms while contributing sufficient cowbell abuse to satisfy Christopher Walken.
Chantal belts out these songs like a hurricane-force soul diva battling for supremacy against proper metal guitar and a rampaging drum monster, this proving particularly effective when each member of the trio is going full-tilt.
Impressive second album Ascend dominates the set and for the most part Chantal permits the songs to speak for themselves, though Started From is introduced as being about the marginalisation of women in general and women of colour in particular. As on the album, this proves to be one of the highlights, with Zel contributing the spoken word section while impressively continuing to hit every beat. With no bassist, Linz handles much of the musical heavy lifting, deftly employing pedals to facilitate a variety of tones while also adding occasional death metal backing vocals.
The presence of Turbowolf frontman Chris Georgiadis lurking in the audience alerts us to a likely guest appearance – and sure enough he steps up to join in on New Doom, just as he does on the album. After he departs, flashing peace signs as he goes, the band rather trustingly hand out percussion instruments to the audience and it all goes a bit Doom Santana for a while (This is in no way a criticism; who couldn’t love the concept of Doom Santana?), the show climaxing in incendiary style with elf’n’safety-defying Zel setting fire to her cymbals. A Hendrix-style accelerant was involved, in case you’re wondering.
But they’re not done yet. With no time for the encore ritual, they launch into the rollicking Spirits Past, which builds to a delirious speed metal climax and remains arguably the best song they’re written. Had they arisen back in the bad old days of record company supremacy, it’s easy to picture some slimy marketing suit urging them to tone it down in pursuit of big bucks. Times might be harder for bands now, but at least Vôdûn are ploughing their own furrow without interference. And they rock.
All photos by John Morgan
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