Swamp Witch – The Slithering Bog (Review)

Swamp Witch are a doom/sludge band from the US. This is their debut album.

Sludge heaviness mixes with psychedelic hypnotic grooves to create slow, torturous music that takes the listener on a tour through forgotten swamps, populated by hideous witches, (do you see what I did there?).

Deep growled vocals act as a guide on this foul journey, paving a path through the murk with sheer force of diseased will.

The songs are gloomy and dark, the kind of things that you could become entranced with and drift away too. Bleak melodies and despondent riffs power the songs through the grimy sea on which they sail, providing a focal point of corruption for all manner of dark things to coalesce around. That’s what this sounds like in some ways – a grim rallying call for all of the things that slither in the night.

The songs are relentlessly slow and engaging; before you know it the band have completely drawn you into their world.

Heavy sludge shot through with bleak hypnotic guitars has rarely sounded so good. Swamp Witch really, really know what they’re doing it seems.

Slow, nasty, compelling and repugnant; The Slithering Bog is the soundtrack to lost nightmares. You may not realise it yet, but this means it’s utterly essential.

For fans of Cough, Electric Wizard, Yob, Conan, Abstracter, Primitive Man, etc.