SPACESLUG (PL)
"The band’s full-length debut, Lemanis, does not sound like a rookie effort. The trio’s focus is steady and consistent, admirable if not surprising traits given the record’s likeness to a smoke-billowing hovel"
While slugs are presumably not picky in their vegetative tastes, Spaceslug no doubt gorge themselves fat, happy, and healthy on wanton strains of cannabis greens. This diet has aided them aplenty, lending an inviting psychedelic atmosphere to the band’s innately strong song-writing.
Unsurprisingly, the overall demeanor is quite lax, with big dreamy riffs that don’t overstay their welcome nor change too abruptly or drastically. The songs here are organic, and as all adherents to the almighty jam must do, Spaceslug let things ride until, well, things end and it’s time to hitchhike elsewhere. The calming and hallucinogenic effects are evocative of a band like Sleestak, but the trio avoid the staple pitfalls of genre diehards by utilizing robust yet modest running times. Not so unlike Sweden’s Moon Coven, the band fill their seven songs with just another spirit and head-swaying groove to keep even the most easily distracted of stoners dialed in.
While Spaceslug are comfortably nested in the stoner/doom subgenre, a grunge vibe often seeps its way into Lemanis, one most palpably gleaned from the vocal work, a position seemingly held by all three members. The catchy refrains on “Hyper Mountain” or its successor “Supermassive” drift in and out of the fuzzy din like space dust, a cool mixture of the indifferent and the oddly sonorous, adding further charm to an already entrancing album. Going slow and heavy with the best of ‘em, Spaceslug manage to keep the gastropod train pushing forward, ever so hungrily, gradually, towards the next unsuspecting lettuce patch of doom !
