Hard rock record review: Sandrider – Godhead

Sandrider is a band from Seattle, WA, a town well known for its hard rock bands. Their sophomore album Godhead was released in November.  They liken their sound to Akimbo among other bands, it’s not surprising then that Sandrider has two ex members of Akimbo in their trio. Matt Bayles, a legendary stoner rock producer, produced godhead.

The album start off with “Ruiner” a song with a “We will rock you” sounding drum intro. At first listen I had a hard time hearing their self-comparison to Red Fang and Baroness. The music is certainly similar but the vocals are mixed so far back and are so much less melodic that the recording lost some power for me. It’s not until track five; “Godhead” that the album seems to find its footing. Here the band seems to gel beautifully, nothing forced, nothing underdone. For me it’s the Goldilocks track for me- just right. It’s reminiscent of a Mastodon Leviathan track, melodic, tempo changing, epic. The rest of the album is steady and solid Northwest rock. 

Here is their video for the fourth song  from this album “Gorgon”:

http://youtu.be/VEeXNnDqTSY

Here’s a great performance they did on KEXP last year:

http://youtu.be/WyIudlxwIEo

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