Review: Kaleidobolt - Kaleidobolt

The seventies gave us many dubious things - unusual facial hair arrangements, football hooliganism, The Osmonds, nylon shirts and disco amongst others. It also gave us many good things including punk, glam, the Sodastream and krautrock. It also saw an explosion in heavy rock, be it psychedelic or blues based, that would later expand into what we lovingly call 'heavy metal'. Bands like Blue Cheer, Iron Butterfly and Vanilla Fudge laid the foundations in the late sixties, built upon by Sabbath, Zeppelin etc leading to (cruelly) lesser known bands like Buffalo, Night Sun and November releasing albums that were as heavy as fuck. It was bands like these that, along with the bigger players...Sabbath...etc, eventually lead to the subgenres of metal/rock evolving: doom, sludge, stoner etc. There is a point to this preamble....stay with me!

Kaleidobolt are three dudes from Helsinki (there must be something in the water in those parts at the moment...so much good music coming from there!) and their debut, self-titled album has seventies stamped all over it, and I mean in a VERY good way. They have taken the feel, sound and ethos of those early seventies rockers, mixed in a bit of psych, a pinch of doom, a smidgen of stoner and even a dash of spacerock to produce an album that can serve as both a rock history lesson and as a high water mark for anyone releasing a rock/metal album in the near future.

The six songs that make up 'Kaleidobolt' show a level of intelligence and nous sometimes missing from the metal scene at the moment, and there is plenty of variety to keep the listener interested. The opener 'Rocket To The Moon' is straight up heavy psych with some serious riffage with a nice bluesy breakdown in the middle and at the end. Everything about the track smacks of the seventies...the structure, the guitars and even the vocals. 'Momentum' starts with an almost thrash intro which sets a hectic, full pelt tempo for the remainder of the track . At one stage the track comes almost to a standstill before some wonderfully groovy, psychedelic guitar, imbueing the track with an unexpected mellow and blissful vibe which carries you along until the pace picks up via a finger-shredding solo and ends in a fuzz-laden climax. 'Into The Crevice' has all the signutares of seventies rock once again but structurally it seems to take its cue from prog, another seventies staple. There are some nice doomy touches in the downtuned guitars and slow repetitive riffs at one stage. Things take another turn with 'Liskodisko'...the intro is jazzy....that distinctive jazzy guitar sound and drum rolls. Needless to say it doesn't take the band long to get back into the rock..more prog influence can be heard, especially when the vocals kick in, albeit with some kickass guitarwork. 'Mountain Man' is another doomy number...the guitars sounding sludgy at first, but soon take a stoner turn. Towards the end of the track, via another scorching solo, there are even some fleeting flourishes of spacerock. The album closes with 'Showdown' which is a slowburning psychedelic number....the guitars starting hazy and woozy before picking up the pace and the track closes out as a heavy, and I mean heavy, psych track.

These guys have taken some well-worn highways through rock history and produced an album that is vibrant, exciting and cliche-free...no small feat. The LP is not released until August 14th so you all have time to save your pennies. It is released on Pink Tank Records, an ever-reliable source for all things heavy. It will be limited to 300 copies of the vinyl (100 opaque purple, 100 black and 100 white) and also on CD. The digital download will be available on the band's bandcamp page