WITCHPIT is a Stoner/Sludge Metal foursome out of South Carolina. They formed in 2015 and released three singles in 2018. Some four years later on March 25, 2022 the band released their debut album, "The Weight of Death," on Heavy Psych Sounds. While the singles from 2018 don't make an appearance on the album, and there have been a few small lineup changes, the band's foundational sound and core ethos remain the same-the temperament of aggressive Doom, the social consciousness of Thrash, and groove inferences of Stoner Psych.

The album comprises six tracks and clocks out at 35 minutes. Thomas White's riffs come on like a grave digger's boots through a rotting coffin, perfectly accompanied by Denny Stone's gravely vocals which add a Hardcore intensity to the down-tuned but aggressive tempo of Hanley and Smith. Stone's vocals are in no way clean but they also aren't Black or Death-you know, the type that might suggest demonic wickedness-rather it's fluid and fast, casting livid indignations and scathing indictments. I want to say Thrash, but not quite as shouty or didactic. In style, very reminiscent of Ben Ward (ORANGE GOBLIN).

With five of the six tracks weighing in at over five minutes, these are multi-movement compositions which explore a variety of motifs. If you lean toward the aggressive and discordant, standout tracks will be found on the front end with "OTTR," "Blackened Fee," and "The Weight of Death." If you know the band's 2018 singles, these will feel like familiar ground. If you are more inclined to Sludgy Doom, "Autonomous Deprivation" and "Mr. Miserum" will scratch your itch. With that said, I have to call out a very cool break in "Mr. Miserum" (at the 4:55 mark) where the bottom drops out and the band goes full mode Hardcore with fists-in-the-air chants and mosh-inducing riffs. I wish there had been a full track devoted to this particular phrasing, but I'll take what I can get. And that leaves us with only one outlier track, "Fire & Ice," which has, as the title suggests, aspects of both the wildfire and the glacial, thus showcasing the band's two primordial styles.

Like the carrion bird and horned goat on the cover (incredibly rendered, btw, by Nino Andaresta), WITCHPIT's debut, "The Weight of Death," traverses a world filled with carnage and decay-sometimes creating chaos, sometimes feeding off of it, but never falling victim to it. A very good debut album, this one. Will be interesting to see where their follow up will take us. Until then, this is definitely an album to check out and a band to see.