Review: Vokonis – Odyssey

Style: Progressive Stoner Metal (mixed vocals)
Review by: Sam
Country: Sweden
Release date: 7 May, 2021

Once upon a time, a band got invited by a fan into the woods, and they thought “why not?”. As the band met up and followed the fan over tiny gravel roads, they got lost. Being lovers of sci-fi and scary stories, they must have gotten suspicious. After all, you can never be sure your fans aren’t aliens. Unfortunately, however, an alien the fan was not, as they treated the band to pancakes at their house and they listened to music the whole time. The band in question was Vokonis, a stoner metal band from Sweden. This story has little to do with my review but I thought it was fun to mention nonetheless. We featured this band before on this blog for their previous album Grasping Time, and so as their popularity hasn’t exploded into the stratosphere (yet?), we are here featuring them once again.

I mean, just take a look at that album art. It’s beautiful. I love the fantastical vibe of stoner imagery. Not that this album is particularly dreamy or fantastical musically, but a good album art always enhances the experience. And that experience is a good one. This band has a great propensity for sick stoner riffs. There’s a good amount of fuzz on them, but not enough that it becomes smothering. It fits with the up tempo pacing of the album. It’s fuzzy enough to make you high, but bouncy and light enough to keep you on your feet, making Odyssey an easily digestible album.

The songwriting follows suite in the digestion factor. A space brownie this is not, but rather a light hash joint you smoke for the vibe. Every track is laden with easily digestible hooks, but also enough depth to be rewarding on multiple listens. This balance is reflected in the track lengths with half of them barely clocking in at four minutes. The longer tracks are interspersed in a way that makes the album very well paced. And honestly I barely even noticed their length with how well constructed they are. The band understands dynamics very well. In the title track, we get a guest spot on keys from Per Wiberg (ex-Opeth most notably), giving another layer to the band’s sound with some delicious Hammond keys. The album skips along nicely through peaks and valleys of intensity, while always keeping it light on the ears. Those looking for doom and gloom in their stoner metal won’t find it here. The album also only takes 40 minutes, and it’s over in a blast.

I guess I haven’t delved much into the specifics of how they sound. I mentioned the quality of the riffs, but I also really need to shout out the vocals (heh). They use a very multi-faceted vocal approach with clean singing and two different types of harsh vocals, one being more typically stoner, and the other having a more hazy sludge style. The singing is not very technical, but it’s earnest and very soothing. All three styles were used effectively to my ears, mostly thanks to the excellent vocal writing. This band also really knocks it out of the park when it comes to their guitar solos. They’re moving and really progress the songs, having zero “show-off” feel to them. Even the five-minute ending solo to album closer “Through the Depths” feels totally in place with the vibe. Big props to their guitar player for pulling it off.

Vokonis have really knocked it out of the park with this one. Odyssey does everything a prog fan would look for in a light-hearted stoner album. It has the riffs, the hooks, the guitar solos, and the fuzz to glue it all together. Not to mention a healthy dose of ambition in the song lengths. There’s also a big Mastodon-energy in this that I couldn’t find a place for in the review to touch upon, so I’ll leave that to you to find out the specifics. If this band ever comes to where I live in The Netherlands, I suppose I’ll have to trick them into eating some pancakes at my house as well, but then with some extra weed, because they surely deserve it after this one.

Recommended tracks: Odyssey, Blackened Wings, Through the Depths
Recommended for fans of: Mastodon, Elder, Kylesa, Astrakhan
Final verdict: 8.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page

Label: The Sign Records – Bandcamp | Website | Facebook

Vokonis is:
– Simon Ohlsson (sludge vocals, guitars)
– Jonte Johansson (bass, clean and stoner vocals)
– Peter Ottoson (drums)