Hailing from Portland, Oregon, Troll (not to be confused with the Australian stoner band of the same name) released their first demo in 2015. Not long after came Troll, their debut album, which was originally self-released on cassette tape. Its original edition sold out quickly, and soon came to the attention of Shadow Kingdom Records. Duly impressed, the label simply had to release Troll’s album on more widely-available physical formats and get the band the attention they so truly deserve.

And even just one spin through Troll and you can immediately detect the magic coursing through Troll’s molten stomp. Reverently within the doom spectrum, there’s a particularly swampy groove to their thundering chunder that’s less like something rooted in the American South and more like primordial ooze that’s been bubbling eerily since time immemorial. Likewise, Troll largely steer clear of regular rock-rooted verse/chorus structures and instead build rolling, rumbling epics that nod to classic prog more often than not. But, let it be known that Troll has a wealth of hooks across its concise and fully satisfying  thirty four minute running time – and much of that stems from frontman John, whose pipes have that hauntingly forlorn quality of Ozzy Osbourne in his early seventies prime.

Ready for a trip through the eldritch slime? Then hop on the shoulders of this Troll!

A brand-new Troll album will be released by Shadow Kingdom later this year, so best to hop on the bandwagon now!

The band parted company with vocalist Rainbo as recently as the end of last month and are currently looking for a replacement to help them through what they now refer to as their ‘Dio years’ – head over to the band’s Facebook page if you like what you hear here and think you may be the human for the job – and, of course, don’t forget to tell them that Sentinel Daily sent you!