Kadavar (The First Album) (Anniversary Edition)

Hailing from Berlin, Germany, Kadavar is a trio of stubborn Rip Van Winkles who refuse to let go of their ‘70s proto-metal dreams. The credits on the band's eponymous debut for Teepee Records may read 2012, but it's always 1972 inside these timeless vinyl grooves -- no matter what digital format happens to be reproducing them. To quote Saint Vitus, these dudes were literally born too late. Too late, certainly, to have personally imbibed from the foreboding lysergic fountain of Black Sabbath, Leaf Hound, Pentagram, and other forefathers of their chosen musical blueprint; so the Kadavar boys obviously had to make do with the more recent chemical concoctions of neo-traditionalists like Witchcraft, Graveyard, and possibly Dead Meadow. These bands' heavy-handed but still Spartan attack and somnambulant daze definitely play a role in first half tracks like "All Our Thoughts," "Black Sun," and the roiling "Forgotten Past." But subsequent numbers like "Goddess of Dawn" and "Creature of the Demon" tap into a far more aggressive, head-banging energy, suggesting fret-board scorchers old and new -- think Buffalo, Captain Beyond, the Atomic Bitchwax -- also infiltrated Kadavar's iPod playlists. The LP's closing extended acid jam, "Purple Sage," throws Hawkwind's hypnotic, deep space dementia into the mix, and to cap off Kadavar's dual-decade influences, Wolf Lindemann's vocals blend the shamanistic charisma of a Bobby Liebling with the monochromatic slacker-isms of the Sword's J.D. Cronise -- go figure. All of which boils down to a consistently entertaining, nostalgia-inducing listen, and never mind the fact there's obviously very little originality involved. Don't forget though: it's actually 1972 in Kadavar's minds, and back then, this was cutting-edge stuff. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia