King Woman
Created in the Image of Suffering

A meeting between Black Sabbath and Mazzy Star. This is how Relapse Records describes the debut of their King Woman, a band too evil and gloomy to be shoegaze, too ethereal and dreamy to be doom. It could be defined as doomgaze.

"Create In the Image of Suffering" immediately bares the soul of the band, that of front-woman Katrina Esfandiari, already the voice of Whirr in their more twilight version, that of the excellent EP "Around" from 2013, who chants ghostly litanies against a backdrop of psychedelic and atmospheric riffs. A tormented voice that recites verses dissecting years of inner conflicts, religious doubts, and mental instability.

Right away "Utopia" makes things clear; this is a record made of fuzz, heavy riffs, and a voice with ominous tones straddling life and death. Kristina takes the shoegaze legacy of her previous projects and contaminates it with the heavier and more violent side of melancholy, paving the way for "Hierophant," the undisputed peak of the work, the specter of an 8-minute leviathan that rises as an elegy of introspection and doubt and demonstrates that the whole band functions as a well-oiled machine and does not live solely on Kristina's vocal performance but on the ability to place every sound in the right spot.

"Create In the Image of Suffering" boasts excellent production, offered by Jack Shirley, already the producer of Deafheaven, Oathbreaker, and Wreck and Reference, who shapes and gives soul to eight tracks that embody the blackest and most crepuscular side of music for those who gaze at their shoes a lot.

Shoegaze is doomed