Ogre plays stoner doom with that 70’s feel incorporated in an excellent way. A fat heavy guitar sound, grooving riffs and solo’s that take you back to the Woodstock festival, the one in ’69 of course. Bluesrock is a word that keeps popping up in my head too (although I basically don’t know anything about that genre), especially when they play long instrumental parts where the guitar solo does the talking. Seven Hells surely offers a great variation in styles which makes it very pleasant to listen to.

 

But, yes there’s a but, but not a big butt. Uhm…..? Well, as you start the first track and you’re grooving along with the riff, suddenly a stop occurs in which the vocals make their first appearance. This encounter isn’t a pleasant one I must say, and the vocals in the rest of this song remain a bit irritating to me. Bassist Ed Cunningham sings in a classical rock kind of way and he has a pretty high voice, so it took me some time to get used to his voice. As the album progresses I am less and less bothered by this aspect, and he appears to be able to apply some other types of vocal sounds as well, varying enough to keep my irritation at bay. Might also be the fact that drummer Will Broadbent also does some backing vocals, but it’s hard for me to point out which voice is his.

 

Well at first I thought I was going to dislike Seven Hells because of the vocal issue, but in the end it won me over quite easily. The combination of heavy stoner doom with old rock influences appeals to me and I think with those sunny days coming up, I just might chill out with this one pretty soon again. Fans of stuff like Wino's The Hidden Hand should check this out.