Album Review: THE OBSESSED - Sacred

01. Sodden Jackal
02. Punk Crusher
03. Sacred
04. Haywire
05. Perseverance Of Futility
06. It's Only Money
07. Cold Blood
08. Stranger Things
09. Razor Wire
10. My Daughter My Son
11. Be The Night
12. Interlude
13. On So Long (Bonus Track)
14. Crossroader Blues (Bonus Track)

The Obsessed are one of those band that have been around for a very long time, but haven't released very much. They formed in 1980 and have split up and reformed a couple of times, and now in 2017 they're releasing their fourth album Sacred.

Fronted by Doom Rock legend Scott 'Wino' Weinrich, who also sang for St Vitus for a chunk of the 80's, The Obsessed has become known as one of the pioneers of the Doom and Stoner scenes. If I'm honest, those scenes are basically a bunch of bands who seem to want to sound as much like early Black Sabbath as possible. That's cool with me, but I rarely hear anything from those scenes that I haven't heard a thousand times before. Consider it a form of Heavy Metal recycling. However, The Obsessed are a bit more interesting than many of their peers because they inject a small bit of Punk into some of their material to give it a bit of spice.  They are also on top of their game in the song writing department too.

Sacred doesn't really display anything much in the way of musical progression for The Obsessed. They do what they do and do it very well. It's still 90% Sabbath and 10% Motorhead which I'm sure will guarantee them an audience at biker rallies from now until the end of time. Wino's vocals still sound great, and he sounds a little like Deep Purple's Ian Gillan at times.

When all's said and done, Sacred offers nothing new, but really hits the spot if you want to hear some badass Classic Rock delivered by true masters of their craft. It's also worth pointing out that their label Relapse Records have put the entire album on YouTube (link below) to listen to for free.