Album Review: Tomahawk - Oddfellows

Almost six years after their last record, Tomahawk return with a re-jigged line-up and tighter focus on fourth studio album, Oddfellows. Gone are the Native American influences that marked 2007's Anonymous as one of Mike Patton's more out-there sonic experiments as the band focus on the experimental, metal rock they were originally known for. According to guitarist Duane Denison (Jesus Lizard), Tomahawk's main purpose is for the band to simply play music, rock out and have fun. As a result most of the material here is pretty accessible and may even stray pretty close to Faith No More territory.

But where the 2013 version of Tomahawk differs is that FNM allowed their songs to develop and gave experimental sections time to be explored. This doesn't happen on Oddfellows, where most of the tracks clock in at three minutes, meaning many of them feel like unfinished classics that could have been so much more. The best examples of this are the brooding A Thousand Eyes, which finishes without any fanfare, and its follow up Rise Up Dirty Waters – powered by The Mark Of Cain and Battles drummer John Stanier's jazzy backbeat, this song could have gone in a million cool directions yet instead simply winds to a close. But there are still some quality moments here. Opener Oddfellows launches the album with a metal guitar assault wrapped around a 7/4 time signature, while first single Stone Letter would almost be a boring verse-chorus jam but for Patton's snarling vocals. But the band truly gel while tearing through the big riffs on album highlight South Paw, a song given space to breathe, showing what could have been if they had done that for all these tracks.