Conan - Monnos

Artwork by Anthony Roberts.

Monnos, the new album by Conan, has been released on the Burning World Records Bandcamp. Their previous full-length, Horseback Battle Hammer, was a lumbering mammoth of extremely downtuned doom riffing. On Monnos Conan ups the ante, the ridiculously heavy riffing is still there, but the songwriting has gotten more attention, and has been coupled with a much larger range of song dynamics.

Some tracks are relatively faster, there's even a few passages with double-kick bass drum. Due to the clean production, you can hear that drummer Paul O’Neil not only provides the raw driving power, but also lots of finesse and feeling. The drumming is perhaps the single biggest improvement on Conan's previous output, but O’Neil also has more to work with due to the songwriting being more varied. This review by The Sleeping Shaman describes the vocals:

There’s something about the combination of guitarist Jon Davis’ and bassist Phil Coumbe’s vocals atop such an unstoppable wave of uncompromising doom riffs that is entrancing. While Davis chimes out in the distance, Coumbe’s deep, booming growl anchors him to the thick layer of bass-heavy fuzz underlying everything.

Here's a detailed review by The Obelisk. Check out this fantastic album below.

[Go to the post to view the Bandcamp player]