Throughout the years High On Fire‘s legions have continued to grow and given the strength of their recent material, it’s not hard to see why. But while their expansions in influence and admiration from their peers have certainly been prosperous for them, they haven’t exactly equaled a considerable increase in finances or namesake.
Enter then E1 Music, who have picked up the band from their longtime label home of Relapse and aim to finally move them from direct support to headliner status. To this extent “Snakes For The Divine” serves as one hell of a statement of intent.
Flush with gnarled riffs, bellowing vocal refrains and a heady momentum, the album finds High On Fire at their most refined. But while the group may sound like the three horsemen of the stoner metal apocalypse, there are exceedingly clear limits to their scope on display.
True the band still proudly light their bongs with hellfire and brimstone and emerge with a twisted wreckage of Motorhead-like grit and hessian rage akin to Black Sabbath being lit on fire. But after two already similar albums, the incorrigible riffing and fearsome barks of band frontman Matt Pike and the ever beefy rhythm section that backs him can only go so far.
The pseudo prog elements the band incorporate and expound upon here have already been exploited by Mastodon and Baroness for starters. And the songwriting, while wholly intoxicating, seems stunted, whether it be through some dense lyrics or an already well worn song formula.
There’s no denying Pike and co.’s place amongst the pantheon of today’s underground riff lords. But with an album as canon as “Snakes For The Divine“, it’s hard to really justify the purchase.
Much like the weed that is ingrained in the mythos of the band, one can only take so many pulls of High On Fire‘s aging crop before developing a tolerance for it – suggesting that maybe it’s time for the band to start harvesting a more potent strain.
