Hammerhead - The Sin Eater

Hammerhead The Sin Eater cover
Hammerhead
The Sin Eater
High Roller Records
2015
7
I have to actually in part agree with the fact that cumbria’s Hammerhead (not to be confused with their Dutch or American namesakes) were one of the better, lesser known bands that came out of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal movement. Coming together after the demise of local acts Judas, Bitter Harvest, and 8 Hertz various members of the aforementioned bands formed Hammerhead, and released a demo tape and following some decent response a self-financed 7” single (with a circulation of 1,000 copies). “Time Will Tell” (with “Lonely Man” on the B-Side) was released on Linden Sounds in 1981, while the band disbanded shortly afterwards, only to regroup towards the end of the decade and then disband again with only occasional regional performances in the 90s.
 
In 2005, a retrospective album by the name of “Will to Survive” was issued, followed by the band’s first studio album “Headonizm” on High Roller Records, which was well-received. Taking their time some ten years later, Hammerhead return with a sophomore release in the form of “The Sin Eater”.
 
The band still maintains a good portion of their original members since their “reunion” and despite their advancing age, seem more than capable of “laying down the law” at least in the studio. While significantly heavier than what they sounded some 30+ years ago, the band stays quite true to the style and era with some quite atmospheric tracks that never really get too fast paced…
 
Opener “Angels Fall” is a quite epic and doom laden track, while the ten plus minute title track, “The Sin Eater” also has those qualities, exemplified.
 
“Faithless” gravitates a little more towards hard/heavy rock, stylistically… while “Behind Your Eyes” (avail only on CD/DL) is a nice slow ballad.
 
“Raindancer” is heavy but also has this somewhat stonery vibe, a quality that the very 70 epic-hippy-psych heavy “Closer to the Grave” also shares.
 
Last but not exactly least comes “Psilocybin”, a 4 minute jam thing that trippy and almost happy in contrast with the rest of the songs on the album followed by another eight minutes of bizarre trippy-ness… OK…
 
Can’t really go wrong with this band and album, but I would hardly expect a new album before 2025 from them at this pace…