CHIEF CITY is a Sludge/Doom/Stoner Metal band formed in Mississippi very recently. This is the band’s debut album (or is it an EP?), and it has five songs. “Cold Hearted” is first. It begins with what sounds like an old recording of spoken word that is drowned out by thick, slow bass notes, and the riff dives down into the earth so far, you can’t even see it. The amount of fuzz generated by the band is impressive, and the vocal are harsh…fitting in quite well with the cold nature of the music. It segues into the next song, titled “A Few Bullets More,” which is another powerful, brutal sound of cold sterility. Horrid, harsh vocals paint a landscape that is trippy, desolate, and hopeless.

“Price is Right” has a speedier pace, but it still a pretty slow grinding of gears, and screeching lead guitars add a layer of noise to the song. Save for a few screams in the beginning, this is largely an instrumental. “Primal” is another low and slow, crawling song like a waking giant slumbering towards his breakfast. Again, it’s largely an instrumental piece, and there is a bit of variation here and there, but it’s fairly straightforward. “Jazz Apple” closes the album…a little tongue-in-cheek title, because there is very little jazzy about it. It’s a straight up bruiser where you feel like you’ve been in a fight for the entire day, gaining little ground on your opponent.

Overall, this was a fairly typical Sludge/Stoner Doom album that showed peaks of creativity, and was easy to enjoy. I always applaud a new band’s debut effort, because it takes a lot to get there. For their next outing, if they can work in more of their own unique personality, it could go a long way. Oh, and do away with the spoken word samples, that would be great, as they are just a little distracting.