Sweet Cobra have spent the past decade, plus change, doing two things: pumping out noise, and pissing off genre purists. Steeped in Illinois' mid-'90s alternative rock boom—Local H, the Jesus Lizard, et al.—the trio gave off a grungy first impression, only to dash it by incorporating out-of-town touches: a hint of New York hardcore, a tinge of post-hardcore á la Unwound, and on their most recent outing (2010’s Mercy), some splashes of Savannah sludge.
On their fourth LP Earth, the Chicago crew push their sound even futher, aided by Hum’s Matt Talbot and Converge guitarist Kurt Ballou on co-production duties. Cuts like "Old Haunts" and "Complaints" pack enough firepower to compete with peers like Torche and Doomriders; but where the aforementioned bands would rather barrel down the cliffside first and ask questions later, Sweet Cobra regard the speedometer with a careful, cumulative eye, with occasionally poppy results: "Repo" sounds like a Snow Patrol song on steroids.
One of the most underrated tools in Sweet Cobra’s arsenal is their sharpened sense of restraint: a necessary, and yet frequently overlooked, step in building a proper sludge assault. "Future Ghosts" guides a soft-spoken melody down a gurgling, muddied undertow of a bassline. The anxious post-punk of "Sunburned Sons" provides a master class in momentum, and the album’s warm, six-minute closer "Walls" feels concise and organic.
Earth isn’t perfect, and Sweet Cobra’s charisma and compositional prowess don’t except them from the occasional flat note. Without a clear dynamic arc, "He Tall He", the album’s puffed-up ode to self-loathing and being "[sent] down the river with... shit ideas," stumbles and buckles under its exaggerated weight. Meanwhile, lead vocalist Botchy Vasquez’s supple tenor lacks the substance to make glammier, radio-ready cuts like "Flight Risk" and "Stiff Fits" really shine. Despite his bad habit of tacking on unnecessary sharp notes to the end of his phrases, the guy's one of the most underrated vocalists in his niche, eschewing the throaty styles of Torche’s Steve Brooks or Baroness’ John Dyer Baizley for a headier approach that, in turn, makes the music feel less stifling. A little breathing room goes a long way, and in an atypical move for swampy albums of its ilk, Earth succeeds because it doesn’t attempt to downright bury the listener—it’s a slow, sweet smothering.
