Overlord - Overlord EP

(Self-released, 2012)

Overlord, a new stoner rock band in Oxford, were recently turned away from a local venue they were booked to play at by the management. Not because they had showed up too late, not because they had set fire to the backstage area. They were turned away for being too damned fresh-faced and young.

It’s a shame that age restrictions in venues prevent young talent from being able to play to audiences outside of the youth centre circuit because Overlord are really rather good. There’s still a sense that they’re very much the sum of their influences, but they pull off their pastiches so fantastically well that it doesn’t bloody matter. Opening track ‘Crawl On’ sounds like a catchy combination of Sleep and Electric Wizard, with a chorus so slyly infectious that I found myself singing it two, even three days after I’d first heard it.

‘What The Hell’ is an amalgam of Desert Storm’s southern-style stoner rock and Mother Corona’s sand-swept desert grooves with a few prog and cock-rock guitar flourishes thrown in for good measure. On ‘Blind’ the band bring in some mellow Chili Peppers sections to provide some contrast in the otherwise stonerific (it’s a word) sound of the EP. Likewise, closing track ‘The Valley’ begins with a lengthy chorus-effect guitar intro that could only signify that you’re in for an epic trip to the ‘valley of the damned’, singer Tal Fineman ringing out like Jimi Hendrix on top of the mix.

Overlord aren’t doing anything new just yet, but give it time and I’m sure these guys will continue to grow into a force that local stalwarts like Desert Storm and Mother Corona will lose sleep over. They have a few great songs here (particularly ‘Crawl On’) and some more live experience will lend more conviction to the vocals and more confidence to the band as a whole. This EP is an impressive opening gambit from this young band – hopefully on future releases they will begin to tone down the pastiche and come up with a sound that is all their own. With the Overlord EP the foundations have already been set.

[Originally published by Music in Oxford, 04/07/2012]
http://www.musicinoxford.co.uk/2012/07/04/overlord-overlord-ep/