Crippled Lucifer (CD)

• Category:  Music  »  Hard Rock & Metal  »  General/Heavy Metal
• Format: CD   Learn more about the CD format using Tower WIKI.
• Release Date: January 15, 2008
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Southern Lord Records
• UPC: 808720000221
• WAPI (Tower ID): 111514691
• Average Customer Review: There are no customer reviews yet. Be the first to write a review!
• Tower.com Sales Rank: #103892 in Music (See Top 100 Music Bestsellers)
• #4385 in Hard Rock & Metal (See Top 100 Hard Rock & Metal Bestsellers)
• #3228 in General/Heavy Metal (See Top 100 General/Heavy Metal Bestsellers)

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Uncut (p.75) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "The effect is strangely awesome. Like being engulfed by lava, only slower."
Mojo (Publisher) (p.109) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "Gollumesque vocals are submerged by feedback-scarred guitar, sludge bass and grindingly slow anti-rhythms."

Audio Mixer: Randall Dunn.

Liner Note Authors: Chris Dodge; Aaron Turner.

Recording information: Robert Lang Studios, Edmonds, WA (09/1996-03/1997).

Photographer: Seldon Hunt.

Exactly ten years after the original release of Burning Witch's only full-length album, Crippled Lucifer, comes this expanded two-disc edition from Southern Lord -- the label that was essentially founded by this greatly revered document of '90s crust-doom-sludge. Fact is, the initial version of Crippled Lucifer, released in 1998, was actually a compilation of seven tracks culled from two separate EPs, named Rift.Canyon.Dreams and Towers..., and so the primary goal of this two-disc reissue is to present them in their original sequence while adding a pair of rare tracks previously available only on long out of print split singles. In short, the 2008 edition represents a bona fide, near-career-summing Burning Witch anthology that successfully reinforces their lasting impact on the funeral doom/sludge underground -- the group's wider cult status having only been achieved some years after their breakup. A decade on, seminal creations like "Sacred Predictions," "Sea Hag," "Stillborn," and "Communion" still awe with their frightening commitment to unfathomable darkness; darkness emanating from Stephen O'Malley's decayed, severely detuned guitar thunder, Edgy 59's disturbing, alternately haunted or tormented, throat-destroying wails, and the terminally ill percussive pulse that deliberately pounds iron spikes into each song's freezing cold, Ninth Circle of Hell atmosphere. And as for the two resurrected bonus cuts on display: the bludgeoning, soundtrack-to-a-murder that is "The Bleeder" swerves into feedback-infused Southern sludge terrain (think Eyehategod, Cavity, etc.), while "Rift Canyon Dreams" (the song) harks back to the earlier project Thorr's Hammer, with its hopeless, primeval drones. Incidentally, fans familiar with that short-lived outfit will actually find Burning Witch far easier to stomach and, arguably, also far more enduring in terms of their subsequent influence upon the extreme doom underground. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia

Oh, the agony: Purveyors of sickening, plodding doom metal will want to search out Burning Witch's Crippled Lucifer, a generally overlooked tar-coated shriek of pain completely in line with the Southern Lord label's modern-takes-on-Black Sabbath philosophies. Formed by Thorr's Hammer guitarist Stephen O'Malley, Burning Witch is the logical musical step between said group and his subsequent projects, noise-drone belchers Sunn O))) and, especially, Khanate, which is carved from the same block of impenetrable granite, so to speak. Crippled Lucifer compiles seven tracks from two separate recording sessions; the first three tracks, from the original release dubbed Rift.Canyon.Dreams, were recorded in 1997, and the final four are from Towers..., laid to tape in 1996 by none other than Steve Albini. Regardless, all of Crippled is from the same, torturous valley of despair: Painfully slow rhythms collide like tectonic plates with droning, feedback-encased guitar riffs and truly heinous screeching from vocalist Edgy 59, all recalling the swamp-doom of Crowbar and Exhorder mixed with some Cathedral-style lunacy and a healthy dose of Eyehategod's flaking eyeball crust. Oh, and heaping handfuls of expired Vicodin, no doubt. Regardless, this extraordinarily noisy, anti-melodic "art" is sure to clear the room, "Sea Hag" and "Stillborn" pushing 15 and 12 minutes respectively, sounding like the soundtrack to depression, bringing to mind images of men trudging along bleary-eyed through a bleak existence of hard drugs, repetitive manual labor, and constant breathing of lung-coating industrial soot. Still, Burning Witch is so conceptually over the top, it must have been conceived and birthed with a sly wink; if not, you're better off tying a plastic bag over your head and just calling it quits. Crippled Lucifer is a minor classic of sorts, and definitely a love-it-or-hate-it affair; doom fans will be riveted to their seats, and everyone else will extract more joy from having their heads wedged in a clogged toilet. ~ John Serba

Exactly ten years after the original release of Burning Witch's only full-length album, Crippled Lucifer, comes this expanded two-disc edition from Southern Lord -- the label that was essentially founded by this greatly revered document of '90s crust-doom-sludge. Fact is, the initial version of Crippled Lucifer, released in 1998, was actually a compilation of seven tracks culled from two separate EPs, named Rift.Canyon.Dreams and Towers..., and so the primary goal of this two-disc reissue is to present them in their original sequence while adding a pair of rare tracks previously available only on long out of print split singles. In short, the 2008 edition represents a bona fide, near-career-summing Burning Witch anthology that successfully reinforces their lasting impact on the funeral doom/sludge underground -- the group's wider cult status having only been achieved some years after their breakup. A decade on, seminal creations like "Sacred Predictions," "Sea Hag," "Stillborn," and "Communion" still awe with their frightening commitment to unfathomable darkness; darkness emanating from Stephen O'Malley's decayed, severely detuned guitar thunder, Edgy 59's disturbing, alternately haunted or tormented, throat-destroying wails, and the terminally ill percussive pulse that deliberately pounds iron spikes into each song's freezing cold, Ninth Circle of Hell atmosphere. And as for the two resurrected bonus cuts on display: the bludgeoning, soundtrack-to-a-murder that is "The Bleeder" swerves into feedback-infused Southern sludge terrain (think Eyehategod, Cavity, etc.), while "Rift Canyon Dreams" (the song) harks back to the earlier project Thorr's Hammer, with its hopeless, primeval drones. Incidentally, fans familiar with that short-lived outfit will actually find Burning Witch far easier to stomach and, arguably, also far more enduring in terms of their subsequent influence upon the extreme doom underground. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia

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