King Buffalo – Acheron

 

 

King Buffalo – Acheron
Stickman Records – 2021
Rock, Prog, Stoner, Psych
Rated: *****

We were fast, on time and prompt, if you will, for the Burden of Restlessness album release and wrote a little mention about it in May of 2021. But when their second installment of the trilogy arrived it turned into a totally different affair. Cause the promo, back in October 2021, for that second album had the master volume all mixed up; which made the entire record a muddled and barely audible experience. It took me a while to get over that experience and it in fact took me till December, when the official release had come and gone, all the year-end lists floated in and the Stoner HiVe Top 20 Countdown of 2021 absorbed all of my time. Indeed, it was then that I had to get back into my beloved King Buffalo. A band that has been growing in my heart ever since they started; but which came to fill it completely with Dead Star and then make it burst wide open with the, in my opinion, best album of 2021, Burden of Restlessness. And now, there’s Acheron. An album that is even more atmospheric, meandering and of looser composition than the one that came before. That looseness does not make it sloppy, but just adds to the vistas it creates and the room it inhabits. It all floats, it flows, it feels entirely free and it fills your being completely. The compositions like a free-flowing river; opening up into a wider and a lighter sound, offering you as much solace as possible while escape still feels impossible. Not from yourself, the universal state of everything or the fact that you are listening to pure instrumental virtuosity. The way they make the guitars bounce, the sound reverb around you like a never-ending whirlpool and their approach to contemplative rock, psychedelic prog and disorientating stoner. Masters of their craft, the King Buffalo three have delivered yet another brilliant or even ‘best of’ album in 2021. And the completion of the trilogy in 2022 will surely be the highlight of the year… And surely another best of album for that year… 

(Written by JK)

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