Tag Archives: Pentagram

Pentagram – Lightning in a Bottle Album Review

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Pentagram – Lightning in a Bottle 

Heavy Psych Sounds Records 

Release date: 31/01/2025 

Running time: 49 minutes  

Review by: Alun Jones 

8.75/10 

Pentagram are a band that refuse to die.  With roots going back some fifty years, and every kind of catastrophe from band splits, arrests and hard drug addiction, it’s some feat that we’re here to discuss a new album at all.  Like a bizarre hybrid of 80s slasher movie antagonists, Pentagram keep coming back to life.  Now, with “Lightning in a Bottle”, the band are back: the life support has been thrown on, this time by mad scientists Heavy Psych Sounds.   

The band’s only constant member is founder/frontman/vocalist Bobby Liebling, a complex and controversial character.  On this excursion, he’s joined by a new bunch of musicians who are venturing to keep the name and legacy of Pentagram alive.  Tony Reed is on guitar and production duties, Henry Vasquez on drums and Scooter Haslip handles bass.  All three have sturdy pedigrees earned from other bands, and their contributions here make them light years past being mere hired hands. 

Liebling’s story is both chaotic and scandalous, but this isn’t the time or place to cast stones.  Interestingly, on the track ‘Lady Heroin’, the singer explores the theme of his addiction in a mournful, self-torturing manner.  There’s no bravado here, with Liebling openly pondering on the destruction that addiction has wrought.  Musically, the song marries a solid riff with a forlorn middle section. 

‘I’ll Certainly See You in Hell’ follows this track, with a strutting pace and Liebling wailing like a deranged preacher.  After that we get ‘Thundercrest’ with its ruthless, pounding riff – forming a triumvirate of the best songs in the middle of the album.  Not that the rest of “Lightning…” is lacking: whether its aptly titled opener ‘Live Again’ with its head nodding urgency or the crawling doom fest of ‘Walk the Sociopath’, Pentagram have all bases covered. 

The biggest fear was always going to be Pentagram pissing on their legacy.  They are, after all, one of the great Doom Metal bands that are responsible for the development of the sub-genre.  Absolutely no fear of that here, though: “Lightning in a Bottle” sees this version of Pentagram releasing a reassuringly strong album.  The musical reputation of Pentagram continues to thrive. 

Check out Pentagram on Facebook, Instagram, Spotify or their website.

This review is presented by Platinum Al in association with Ever Metal.

Misty Grey – Album Review

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Misty Grey – Chapter II

Interstellar Smoke Records

Release date: 20 November 2020

Running time: 39 mins

Review by: Alun Jones

9/10

Can you think of a more apt genre than doom metal for the times we live in?  It’s crazy out there.  From a global pandemic, civil unrest, ecological destruction and lunatics in the most powerful seats in the world, the 21st century becomes more and more apocalyptic day by day.  Party music doesn’t seem right.  On the other hand, the retro stylings of bands like Misty Grey hark back to cosier times of the seventies and eighties when we just had nuclear destruction – and yet more lunatics in power – to contend with.

Misty Grey is not the name of a US mattress actress (don’t bother Googling it, just in case), they are in fact a four-piece doom metal band from Spain.  They deal in extremely authentic, good old fashioned heavy rock in the Black Sabbath/Pentagram/Saint Vitus vein.  We’re in thundering, enormo riff territory, and by ‘eck it’s good stuff.

Originally receiving a CD release back in 2018, “Chapter II” is now available on vinyl from Interstellar Smoke Records.  And a very welcome re-release it is, as “Chapter II” could well have been lost in an Atlantean cataclysm of some type, which would be shameful.

Deceptively pretty Spanish guitar opens the album with a laid-back space-jazz feel, before “Spellbound” erupts with Juan’s raw, grinding guitar.  The chugging riff is illustrative of what to expect from this album; it’s Iommi worship all the way (and bless Misty Grey for it).

If that first track is the first Sabbath album, “Strangers on a Train” is a missing Masters of Reality cut.  It rolls and grooves along, powered by Robin’s bass and Javi’s drums.  On the other hand, “Rebecca” is more like The Obsessed or Saint Vitus, there’s a rough, organic, yet aggressive feel to it.

The musicianship is great, the production has atmosphere and pays homage in a credible, affectionate manner to the band’s influences – without becoming a parody.  The vocals of Beatriz Castillo really help define an individual sound for Misty Grey, she is both tender and terrifying in equal, devastating measure.

I apologise to the band for my crass comparisons to the old masters.  But hey, I don’t listen to this type of music for radical innovation.  The last thing anyone wants to hear is some kind of nu-doom, with samplers and turntables.  Keep it slow, keep it weird, keep it trippy – but most of all, keep it riffy.  Heavy, repetitive and riffy.  Misty Grey do just that on “Chapter II” and it’s all kinds of awesome.  

Check out Misty Grey on: Bandcamp, Facebook, Instagram, Spotify and YouTube.

This has been a Platinum Review for Ever Metal.