The Quill
Hooray! It’s a Deathtrip
SPV
Sweden’s the Quill play classic blues-based hard rock in the vein of Black Sabbath, Mountain and Deep Purple, with the modern touch and scope of newer acts like Monster Magnet and Queens of the Stone Age. It’s all been done to death, of course, but the Quill throw in some great songs alongside mammoth performances, not least by soaring lead singer Magnus Ekwall, making this a more than worthwhile effort. The band’s lyrics are ambitious, if perhaps a bit too vague and nonsensically metaphorical for their own good. But musically, this is pretty down to earth stuff. Not to say that the Quill suffer much from strict genre-restrictions, favoring width and introspection over the dumb cock-rock posing to which so many of their peers resort. From the anthemic “Spinning Around” to the subversive “Hammerhead” and on to the drawling “Control,” the Quill demonstrate their versatile and inclusive approach, and the consistent strength of their performances and songwriting. The Quill don’t reinvent rock, but that’s hardly what they’re aiming for. Hooray! It’s A Deathtrip is yet another surprisingly strong Swedish classic hard rock album.
SPV: http://www.spv.de/
