It’s not often I come across heavy Italian bands (Lacuna Coil being the most well known) and I don’t know why as there is no reason why great music shouldn’t be coming from the area. Sure enough what we have here is Chronic Hangover’s brilliant take on the stoner rock and doom genres, mixing them seamlessly with ease with a few sprinkles of classic rock, blues and alternative rock just to spice it up a bit. Never a dull moment on this record from the opener “Vituperio” to the closing number gloriously titled “Lucifer In The Sky With Diamonds”, no doubt referencing the classic Beatles song. This album grooves, it’s hooky, it sounds fantastic and mixed with some interesting and weird moments is an all round solid effort.
There’s the obvious references to Black Sabbath here of course, stoner rock and doom tend to have those traits almost always so the inevitable Sabbath riffs are bound to find their way amongst all the sludge. “Sociopatia” has that but it blends it brilliantly with some bluesy rock riffs that leap and bound through the song that initially starts out with a swampy doom intro. “Villa Triste” and the closing track follows in that tradition but with a little more emphasis on the stoner rock take, either way all these tracks have that one thing in common – hooks. The riffs are so catchy it’s addictive listening and all the songs here have it. “Homuncullus” is a short but sweet classic rocker, “Regretudo” is more traditional heavy metal with a great mid-tempo back beat while “Tossine” takes the cake for it’s awesome chugging riff layered on top of a lengthy bass solo situated in between some alternative / punky riffs.
For the more eclectic stuff, “Alamo 2012” is a doom laden track that starts off with a weird 60’s psychedelic sounding intro that almost makes you believe that would be the whole track while the title track has again another lengthy intro that makes you think what drugs were snorted during the writing sessions while all at the same time referencing some cool late 70’s / early 80’s styles with some acoustic parts and a few massive riffs. Yeah there’s some variety on this album that’s not always found on your usual doom driven stoner rock stuff but damn if Chronic Hangover have really got something great here, if you love solid, catchy riffs and a good beat then you need to check these guys out.
TRACKLIST
Vituperio
Homuncullus
Sociopatia
Regretudo
Tossine
Villa Triste
Alamut 2012
Nero Inferno Italiano
Lucifer In The Sky With Diamonds