EP REVIEW: Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico – Sugar Horse

SUGAR HORSE are letting their long and tedious flag fly free. Or at least, that’s how they describe their brand new EP Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico. The doomgaze Bristolians have never truly embraced pop structures or hooks, and it’s amassed them a dedicated and steadily growing following who admire their ability to take heaving doom and pair it with far more melodic, shoegazey moments. With two genres that aren’t renowned for their hooks, they still manage to create something distinctly memorable, and entirely their own. 

The EP’s name doesn’t describe what it is, at all; it is, in fact more of a meditation on the note A, exploring as much of what it has to offer as they possibly can. It’s also not entirely an EP, rather a single 20-minute song chopped into six more easily digestible passages that make sense on their own but are far more when taken together. Given this, the band instead opted to simply title each section after a word of the title – including IV – Comma. I – Truth is the sedate opener, vocalist Ash Tubb’s morose voice layered as an almost liturgical chant. 

It’s from there that the song/EP gradually builds into its first crescendo until II – Or swings in like a sledgehammer, all thunderous chords and screams. There’s a difficulty in accurately summing up SUGAR HORSE; the band move between scathing heft, epic doom and more, as shown across Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico. In particular, III – Consequences is a moment of calm in the storm, blissful melodies assuaging the thunder of before, until IV – Comma heaves its sludgy bulk into view, churning through two sinister minutes. There’s something of a false ending, too, with V – New sounding like a natural endpoint until VI – Mexico expands one last time. 

As a simple proof of concept, Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico is a roaring success that shows SUGAR HORSE can limit themselves to the note A and all its permutations without being remotely tedious, although the long is certainly accurate. The only nitpick with it is that debut album The Live Long After offers a little more variety, but that’s hardly fair when the band have limited themselves to just exploring one note. Instead, Truth Or Consequences should perhaps be seen as SUGAR HORSE simply exercising their significant songwriting chops to craft something long, certainly, but just as engrossing as ever. 

Rating: 8/10 

Truth Or Consequences, New Mexico is set for release on November 3rd via Fat Dracula Records.

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