ALBUM REVIEW: Champain – High Fighter

Think about the defining characteristics of Champagne – dry, bubbly, outrageously expensive, smashed all over the side of a boat, hailing from a specific protected region of France, and liable to give you a sore head if overindulged in. Champain, the sophomore effort from Hamburg’s HIGH FIGHTER is similar only in that it will absolutely do the latter of these things. And a sore neck, besides.

Opener Before I Disappear comes in clean, sitting in lots of space, lonely, twanging guitars wandering before the rest of the instruments come in like a hammer, uniting in a brief stomping riff. Building into an infectiously no nonsense straight drive, powered by unstoppable kick drums, all instrumentation is locked in tight before taking a left turn into a drifting, snaking section. Shine Equal Dark needles with thin, whining tremolo, Mona Miluski’s viperous vocals rasping and crowing like Gollum under torture. Building frantic tension, interspersed with noodling guitars, a squealing guitar solo climbs out from under punishing kicks.

Interlight lives up to its name with airy, distant guitars swallowed by quivering amp swell before morphing into a bouncing, rhythmic groove. Another Cure is all ponderous toms and wistful guitars before swinging into a sliding riff and soaring clean vocals. Kozel rises and falls with a big sludgy roll, combining trad-metal flair with modern sludge dirt, stuttering into an effects drenched solo. I Will Not is all pounding, looping drums and growling, scuzzy bass. When We Suffer phases with guitar straight from the SOUNDGARDEN playbook, building into an up-tempo stoned out drive, swaggering through dense layers to a close.

Champain is bubbling with HIGH FIGHTER’s effervescent energy; the band executing some serious turns of speed and injecting things with pulsing grooves whenever the opportunity arises. Blending disparate flavours from across the metal spectrum, from the grandiosity of trad metal to the snarling hooks of thrash and the scuzzy weight of sludge, the finished product slips down smooth. Dry on the palette due to a production job that lacks heft, crisp and polished (perhaps overly so, smoothing out some opportunities for more jagged dynamics) it’s nonetheless a solid effort that will have the desired effect; a bangover come morning.

Rating: 7/10

Champain is out now via Argonauta Records.

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