It has been fifty four years after the first iteration of Pentagram formed on Christmas day 1971. Thirty eight bandmates have come and gone prior to the current lineup, and, ten years since his last studio album (Curious Volume), Bobby Liebling finds himself in a curious position in 2025.

Along with bands like Saint Vitus, The Obsessed, Candlemass, Trouble, Pagan Altar and Witchfinder General, Pentagram wrote the book on the first defining wave of doom. They directly inspired the second wave – Cathedral’s cover of All Your Sins evidenced this – and the heaviness that was ground breaking on their 1985 Relentless album seamlessly blended in with the crowd on 1994’s under rated Be Forwarned. Their credentials are unchallenged.

As a cornerstone pioneer, Bobby finds himself in a band with guys who are now quarter century plus veterans in their own right. Mos Generator guitarist Tony Reed (who also produced this album) and his long time collaborator bassist Scooter Haslip make up the string section of Pentagram 2025. Henry Vazquez rounds out the lineup having served time on the tubs with Saint Vitus, The Skull, Spirit Caravan and Sourvein, and can now add Pentagram to this all-time doom resume.

The three band members have all cut their teeth in bands that heavily drew influences from Pentagram, or Pentagram-adjacent doom and various tributary genres like stoner rock and sludge. That these bands were downstream of the source that Pentagram was instrumental in creating, Lightning in a Bottle made me think of a line from when Rush appeared on the Colbert Show.

Colbert quipped, “You’re known for some long songs. Have you ever written a song so epic that, by the end of the song, you were actually being influenced by yourself at the beginning of the song?” on the 2008 episode of the show. Seeing the new lineup and approaching the first listen to this record, I was thinking, Is this a modern doom band playing homage to Pentagram, only with Bobby Liebling in the band and putting Pentagram on the tin?

A superficial listen to the surface of the eleven tracks on offer here reveals a thorough comprehension of the musical language that has developed over the fifty years of the genre. The chunking motorbike grooves and twists and turns of the opener Live Again, Sabbath references galore, bluesy driving grooves of In the Panic Room and Thundercrest, psyche freak outs Lady Heroin and I’ll Certainly See You In Hell, hallmark Maryland flavours Wino could have written on Solve The Puzzle and Lightning In A Bottle and of course crushing doom moments exemplified in the closer Walk The Sociopath.

Subsequent listens had me put myself in the shoes of Reed, Haslip and Vazquez. How would you approach writing an album with such an enormous weight of history? How to approach the near impossible task having to try and satisfy almost three generations of fans and do justice to the legacy of founding fathers? Well to start, Reed must take a bow in his production of the album. It’s fantastic, and a quick reference check against the last Pentagram record, I think Liebling was onto something in bringing Reed into the camp as Reed has done a fantastic job both in front of and behind the mixing desk.

Vazquez’ ability I witnessed first hand on three Vitus shows in Australia in 2013 and along with Haslip, the rhythm section supercharges the ensemble’s songwriting here and clearly energises Liebling’s performance. He is clearly having a great time fronting Pentagram 2025.

At seventy one years young he has some seemingly preternatural ability to survive the well documented excesses of his life (2011’s Last Days Here doco is essential viewing). Perhaps he has tapped some kind of ability to gain vampiric life extensions from riffs? I dunno what it is, but this record would go some way to validating this theory.

Whatever the case, the album title is apt for this point in Liebling’s career. Where the new guys could have delivered a safe, stock doom record which would have got them a few festival appearances and ride on past laurels, they one hundred per cent have not. The album title is apt in that Liebling’s managed to somehow capture that energy once again through the new lineup.

They’ve clearly put together an ambitious record that spans the breadth of what has come to pass since the fledgling days of the seventies and answered a cheeky “yes” to the Colbert proposition to Rush. This is a great record to kick off 2025 and well worth some time in the ears of fans of this type of music.

Lightning In A Bottle releases on January 31st.