DUSKWOOD – The Last Voyage
Release Date: 12th May 2023
Label: Ripple Music
Bandcamp
Genre: Stoner Rock, Hard Rock, Desert Rock.
FFO: Kyuss, Wolfmother, Clutch, 1000Mods, Queens of the Stone Age.
Review By: Paul Franklin
If you go down to the (dusk)wood today. You’re sure of a big surprise!
Not a collection of toy grizzlies dining alfresco, but four bearded blokes from Somerset channelling the likes of Kyuss, Clutch and Wolfmother into a bombastic barrage of stoner grooves and hard rock riffs.
The Last Voyage is the first full-length release from Duskwood, following a pair of well received EPs, and will pose as the final piece in the epic saga of a time travelling space cowboy that the band started telling on their debut. Don’t worry, unlike Matrix Revolutions, you won’t be completely lost if you are only just getting on board for this third instalment. Also, unlike Matrix Revolutions, this is fucking amazing!
What the band do is establish some seriously impressive solid stoner/desert rock foundations and then instead of sitting back in an easy chair with a relaxing smoke and a cold beer, they just keep on building. Adding layer upon layer of heavy riffs, blistering solos and more grooves than Bruce Campbell could shake his boomstick at.
It’s like the band deliver on your expectations and then just give you more and more until you are stuffed. Case in point, the wonderful Gammon Lord that is dished up satisfyingly thick and juicy, only for them to come back to the table and slap a pineapple ring AND an egg on top! Whilst, She Calls arrives fully stacked and loaded, hurling itself out of the speakers with an intensity reminiscent of Kyuss’ 100 Degrees.
A great album then, and even if this is the last voyage for their time travelling space cowboy, let’s hope and pray that Duskwood themselves have bought a return ticket!
(4.5 / 5)
