Although they seem to have sprung onto the scene from seemingly nowhere, Stoneghost have already made quite a name for themselves. Metal Hammer debuted their first single off this album ‘Faceless Ghost’, and Team Rock Radio and XFM have been all over these tracks like a London pigeon over an unattended sandwich. This being their first album, it can be a little difficult to believe all the hype surrounding them – one listen to this album and all of your negative preconceptions will be dashed immediately.
New Age of Old Ways manages to achieve something that many bands go their entire careers trying to achieve: sounding at the same time both classic and timeless, as well as something completely new. Take a look at ‘Faceless Ghost‘. Many of the moments and riffs could easily have come from some of the finer works of early Mastodon; others sound like they could conceivably have walked off a more recent Lamb of God album. Nothing exceptionally new there.
But combine it all, and something clicks.
It’s not just those bands as well. ‘Devil’s Motion’ might as well have walked right off a Down CD, with it’s sludgy heaviness and thundering vocal hooks. There is enough variation in here to make each and every listen a rewarding experience in finding something new that you like. Whether it be hardcore heaviness, groovy riffing, screaming like a goat with it’s arse stuck in a bear trap or top-notch clean singing, there will 100% be a point on New Age of Old Ways where you can find it. And even if the minutia of how talented this band are at incorporating influences from all of the bands you already love, these details will become more and more apparent as you slowly get addicted to the album and end up listening to it over and over again.
Words like ‘genre-breaking’ and ‘revolutionary’ are thrown around a lot by the music press, but it would seem that in New Age of Old Ways, Stoneghost have genuinely managed to find something that transcends mere genre, and is more a statement about heavy music as it stands right now. This is defining proof that you don’t need to pick one thing and get good at it in order to make good music. Your USP can simply be the fact that you can play all types of heavy music, from hardcore to prog-sludge, and absolutely nail it.
