Say that this fourth album from Sweden’s Domkraft was eagerly awaited would be an understatement. After the major slap in the face provided by “Seeds” two years ago, we wanted more. And they are definitely giving us more with “Sonic Moons”
The Stockholm trio doesn’t disappoint, for “Sonic Moons” is the most massive and well-written album I’ve listened to this year. If some people see their repetitive patterns as a black point, to me this is one of the album’s strengths. Domkraft has crafted a sonic sanctuary that is a vehicle for trance, induced by heavy driving rhythms with an undeniable tribal edge. There’s no need for psychotropic substances to let your mind wander to the edge of this interstellar travel: just let yourself be carried away by their psychedelic anthems.
Their 2022 split with Slomatics was a lysergic testing laboratory, then Domkraft chugged hallucinogenic mushrooms like Lemmy threaded Jack and Coke to come up with a formula that only one band had managed to produce so far: Sleep.
The seven mantras that form “Sonic Moons” lie on a combination of possessed vocals and hellish drum pummeling. Martin Wegeland’s vocals reach their apex and like a shaman, he repeats his doomsday incantations without ever slowing down or retreating into zen. For Domkraft’s psychedelia isn’t about smoke-filled lightheartedness. Domkraft is a flying steamroller that crushes everything in its path, regardless of dimensions, and Martin Widholm’s riffs are perfectly interwoven with Wegeland’s bass lines. Domkraft owes this power to drummer Anders Dahlgren, who blasts colossal rhythms while staying utterly groovy at all times.
Not only does each track represent a new step into this cosmic journey, but they can conjure up that primal, visceral energy from deep within our guts that triggers that irrepressible urge to get on cloud nine (literally and figuratively) every time we listen to the album.
Rarely has a doom album combined such ferocity and psychedelia, and induced such headbang and trance. “Sonic Moons” definitively establishes Domkraft as the new titans of the Riff, unquestionably among the best in today’s heavy fucking music.
Last modified: 2 December 2023
