Red Fang

Editors’ Notes This Portland quartet bequeaths heavy fantasy metal that would well accompany the wielding of fire-forged broadswords, bloody decapitations on snowy battlefields, and ceremonial human sacrifices to Crom the Cimmerian God of Steel. Red Fang’s self-titled debut is a bearded and brutally heavy rock adventure that could cohesively accompany similarly burly albums by Saviours, High On Fire and The Sword. “Prehistoric Dog” rips it open with brain bludgeoning guitars, bone crushing rhythms, and two different sounding singers in Bryan Giles and David Sullivan — the former inflects with a slight nod to James Hetfield’s tortured timbre and the latter with Ozzy Osbourne’s haunted howls — helping give the already sludgy and watery tune “Humans Remain Human Remains” a murky and semi-psychedelic feel (not unlike Black Sabbath’s “Planet Caravan,” especially on the vocals which could’ve been recorded through one of those old rotating Leslie speakers normally used with Hammond organs). If there is one song here more frightening than the rest, it’s “Good to Die,” a no-holds-barred battle anthem sure to rile up even the most pacific of music fans.