Every once in a while an album will take you completely by surprise and knock seven shades of shit out of your musical sensibilities with no apologies for leaving you a shuddering mess. One such album was Canadian four-piece Priestess's 2004 debut album 'Hello Master', a cataclysmic celebration of everything fantastic in music that somehow melded stoner sensibilities and garage attitude with melodies that etched into your mind with indelible authority.

Off the strength of this platter RCA plucked the band out of relative obscurity and sent them out to tour the world with the likes of Converge, Mastodon and Motorhead to name but a few, before doing what most major labels do with great bands, yup you guessed it... they dropped them.

Regrouping in Los Angeles in 2008 with producer David Schiffman (Mars Volta, Nine Inch Nails) the Priestess that set about recording their sophomore release was now a must different beast, hungrier, supremely confident and much more experimental. As such 'Prior To the Fire' is a bold voyage of rediscovery for the band, and as a result is much less 'Tender Is The Savage' and much more 'And Justice For All'.

Kicking off with the 1-2 aural attack of 'Lady Killer' and 'Raccoon Eyes' the band's ability to pen a killer tune is still very much evident, it's just that the overall vibe of the tracks are a touch more straight ahead heavy metal this time around, which is no bad thing as the riffs simply thunder during the likes of 'It Baffles The Mind', 'Sideways Attack' and 'Murphy's Law', the latter a spiralling avalanche of chaotic sounds.

Priestess's much lauded move into a more progressive sound on 'Prior To The Fire' is only really evident during the just under eight minute epic 'The Gem' which moves like some huge rock monster looking to flatten your town in its path to ultimate glory. 

Stand out tracks, if I'm pushed to choose, are 'The Firebird' and 'We Ride Tonight', and they also just happen to be the ones that go direct for your musical jugular, illustrating the more immediate side to the band's repertoire 

Having recently witnessed Priestess live, it is astounding to think that the band sounded even more vicious delivering the 'Prior To The Fire' tunes in that environment.  Heaven help us all, when they return to the UK sometime soon.

'Prior To The Fire' then is something new for fans of the band's debut, a challenging and uncompromising voyage of sound and musical discovery, just make sure you buy your ticket before they are all sold out. 

(Oh, and before I forget the 2 LP and 7" set is a collector's dream)

http://www.myspace.com/priestess