OF SOUND MIND

Ancestors play an interesting mix of stoner metal and 70s psychadelic/progressive rock and in addtion to guitars, drums, bass and vocals, there are keyboards, electronics and an omnipresent organ featured in the music. The vocal style varies between raw and clean (when the vocals are most mellow they remind me of the vocal style on the early seventies releases by Pink Floyd). The band´s debut album "Neptune With Fire (2008)" was quite a mouthful, as it consisted of only two 15 - 20 minutes long tracks of stoner metal with long sections of jamming and only limited use of vocals.

Ancestors have developed their sound significantly since the debut though and while most tracks featured on "Of Sound Mind" are still very long (out of 8 tracks on the 71:26 minutes long album, 4 tracks exceed the 12 minutes mark), the tracks are much better composed and more structured than the tracks from the debut album. There are still some long jamming parts on the album, and I have to admit that some of the parts in tracks like "Bounty of Age" and especially the 17:34 minute long "The Trial" go on a bit too long for my taste.

I wasn´t exactly expecting to be blown away by "Of Sound Mind" as I found "Neptune With Fire (2008)" a bit unfocused and lacking structure. "Of Sound Mind" has really surprised me though and to my ears it´s a quality album, featuring solid musicianship, an organic sound production and some well written material. I still find some of the jamming parts unnecesarily long but that´s ultimately an aquired taste so I won´t hold it against the album. A 3.5 - 4 star (75%) rating is deserved.