Raise The Red Lantern

Comprised of one-part progressive metal outfit Yakuza and three parts creators of the Emperor custom guitar cabinets, which acts such as Pelican and Trap Them use to craft their sonic girth, it's no wonder that swaggering behemoths Raise The Red Lantern happily wallow in the pits of sludge metal. Still, despite maintaining such admirable status outside this project, the band aren't resisting on members' laurels. On their latest eponymous full-length, the band grapple with the same aspects of fluctuating tempos and atmospheres that have given the likes of Baroness or Planes Mistaken For Stars such respectable catalogues, and High On Fire an enviable descriptor: apocalyptic. Yet they provide enough unique twists to ensure these eight tracks are all their own. Raise The Red Lantern may be comfortably slotted in the well-established genre of progressive doom metal, but it provides enough pride, passion and power to be its own entity.