"Let there be doom" reads the back of Church of Misery's Master of Brutality, and over the course of 40 minutes, the band unleashes some phenomenal doom metal that hearken back to the glory days of Black Sabbath. Since the real Black Sabbath can't seem to pull it together to make another a studio album, and since Ozzy has been coasting on his reputation for about the past 20 years, this should fill the void in the lives of Sabbath fans everywhere.
Church of Misery is a Japanese band with several fine releases under their belt a serious obsession with serial killers. They released an EP and several split albums with bands like Sheavy and Iron Monkey, but this is their first full-length album. And what an album it is. The first two tracks, "Killfornia" and "Ripping into Pieces" sound like they could have come straight off of Black Sabbath's Volume 4. Yoshiaki Neghishi's raspy vocals aren't as distinctive as Ozzy's, but you'llbe so blown away by the music you won't care. The third song "Megalomania" is a fairly up-tempo tune, and my favorite song on the record. After a short instrumental, the band delivers an excellent cover of Blue Oyster Cult's "Cities on Flame" and ends with the title track, an 11-minute ode to John Wayne Gacy. If Church of Misery was somewhat obscure before, this album should catapult them into the big leagues.
At this point, anything Black Sabbath does in the studio will inevitably injure their reputation (We’ll leave aside the question of whether there's much of a reputation for Sabbath left to ruin after Never Say Die!, ,Seventh Star, and Forbidden). So rather than trying to resuscitate a band that should probably just stay dormant at this point, I encourage fans to check the new wave of bands who are carrying on the Sabbath legacy better than the band itself could. And one of the best place to start is with Church of Misery.
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