Old Mother Hell - Old Mother Hell album review

This amusingly named German trio’s half-hour debut kicked up a stink in their homeland when it was independently released via Bandcamp last year, but happily those discerning tastemakers at Cruz Del Sur have picked it up and turned it into an artefact. Old Mother Hell have zero interest in reinventing the steel, but they – and we – have great fun lurching between epic caveman gallop and downcast doom plod, topped with impassioned vocals and punchthe-air choruses. There’s an endearing eagerness to please, and a wide-eyed conviction that makes a virtue of their well-worn, slightly over-familiar material. But it’s their first recording and they’ve already got their chops nailed, plus some discreetly quirky guitar work and affecting melodies glimpsed behind the hard-riffing Teutonic bravado. Ones to watch, if you can see for headbanging.