I don’t think babies should be allowed to smoke marijuana. They can’t roll their own for a start…
NOT the Kyuss rip-off you might expect with a bandname and EP title like that.
Instead we get satisfyingly fearsome crusty, sludgy hardcore-inflected metal that draws from the same wellspring that nourishes great bands like Black Breath and Trap Them.
While these Ohioans (is that even a word? Google says yes, so that’s good enough for me) certainly share traits with some popular beat combos du jour, their take on this sound feels their own.
Not quite as breakneck and demented as Black Breath, nor as grinding yet groovy as Trap Them, Earthburner instead take the rusty bulldozer approach as their brand of sonic assault and battery.
It might be a little less frenzied but nevertheless they thoroughly and completely flatten all before them.
The guitar tone is beefier than a skip full of roast dinners, the drumming, while rooted in hardcore, is fucking pummelly and the vocals are a manic howl that will fire your blood.
The riffs may not be immediately memorable but they sock it to you with such granite-fisted solidity that it’s easy to forgive.
Stoned at Birth is many, many good things but varied is not one of them.
You essentially get six versions across 22 minutes of the same heavy, screamy, punky, chugging sludge that, like lava, leaves nothing but scorched earth in its wake.
Yet if you are in the mood, it certainly hits the spot and I can see myself coming back to this again and again.
It’s only their second EP – available for pay what you want on Bandcamp – so there’s a shit-ton of potential.
I’d like to see them develop a greater sense of dynamics and drama in their song-writing but there are plenty of cool little touches and moments of light and shade that suggest they could develop into something really exciting.
Monkey Defies Gravity 
Wow, this is fun stuff. Like your “granite-fisted” descriptor, this is a tone that somehow sounds like concrete to me, rather than metallic (like much thrash); it reminds me of someone, but I can’t think of who. Very cool stuff.
Concrete! Yes, I like that. The guitar tone fills out the space, like pouring concrete. As you say, it’s definitely solid rather than sharp (that’s how I think of thrash, like spinning blades) or abrasive.
Yes, well said– this is a lurching beat of poured concrete that abraids and crushes, rather than slicing….