Lungs - 'Lungs'

Though their self-titled EP contains only three songs, sludge metal quartet Lungs also delivers 32 minutes worth of music. That’s 32 minutes of rocking, screaming, ethereal noodling, and slow-and-sweet-as-molasses chugging. Here’s a quick RIYL for ya: pick any metal band that ever wrote a droning tune – Jesu, Deftones, Isis, Neurosis, Black Sabbath, and so on and so forth. Hell, even post-rock bands like Mogwai and Ghost of the Russian Empire. If you like any of those bands, check out Lungs’ MySpace and stream the EP. It’s good and grungy and stirring. Also, it’s free.

I should also probably mention that these songs are mighty long. Middle track “A Green Sea Dusk” clocks in at nearly 16 minutes in length, while bookends “Eunomia” and “Kinsman” both break the seven-minute mark. Yet somehow Lungs never comes off as masturbatory or too prog-rock-y, although one could argue that these songs could have been broken up into smaller, easier to digest songs, a la Portgual. The Man. Still, as is, Lungs is a heavy heaping of pounding, swirling metal for kids who don’t care about Satan or dragons or whatever, and more than just a teaser for the band’s eventual full-length debut.