Album Review: King Witch - III
Reviewed by Richard Oliver
Edinburgh based trad doom trio King Witch return with their third album “III” and their first new material in five years (bar the “Worship The Riffs E.P. in 2021 which was made up of two covers). The trio of Laura Donnelly on vocals, Jamie Gilchrist on guitar and Rory Lee on bass are joined by drummer Andrew Scott for this release and despite an unimaginative name for the album, the music more than makes up for it with the band’s mix of classic doom, traditional heavy metal and hard rock as effective as ever.
The album starts off in ferocious style with the driving duo of ‘Suffer In Life’ and ‘Deal With The Devil’ and are guaranteed to blow the cobwebs away. ‘Swarming Flies’ has a bit more of a hard rock edge to it and there are some definite grunge influences peeking out whilst personal highlight ‘Sea Of Lies’ has a sludgy and dirgy quality to it as well as a soaring epic doom sound. ‘Behind The Veil’ slows and calms things right down for its acoustically driven first half before ascending to a powerhouse of a tune whilst ‘Digging In The Dirt’ chugs along with might and power. ‘Little Witch’ brings us back to the acoustics and is a nice soulful breather before the dramatic and doomladen finale of ‘Last Great Wilderness’.
My introduction to King Witch was seeing them perform at Bloodstock in 2021 and what caught my attention were the awesome doomy metal riffs but especially the jaw dropping powerhouse vocals from Laura. It’s safe to say she hasn’t lost her touch and will have your mouth agape multiple times throughout the duration of this album. The rest of the band also put in an excellent performance but Jamie really does shine on guitar with an array of varied and different riffs from the doomy to the bluesy to the chugging to the grooving. His lead work is also sublime with a collection of killer solos dotted throughout “III”.
This is another great album from King Witch which whilst similarly rooted in what they have done before also shows a greater variation in the songwriting with a nice mix of sounds and moods and also dabbling into the band’s calmer and more serene side. This is an album that will appeal to doom fiends, trad metal enthusiasts and the hard rock crowd. Powerful, melodic and soulful, “III” is the most accomplished album from King Witch so far.
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