Quest For Fire — Quest For Fire

The problem with most stoner rock is it lacks restraint. Take Black Mountain's In The Future, for example. It's a mostly great album that could have been a classic minus the 17-minute wankfest "Bright Lights." Enter Chad Ross and his second post-Deadly Snakes band (Nordic Nomadic, more of a solo project, is the other). Quest For Fire's debut is quite simply everything a stoner rock album should be. It's plenty diverse — they rock out on "Bison Eyes" and "I've Been Trying To Leave" and keep effortlessly cool on "Strange Waves" and "Hawk That Hunts The Walking." The riffs are consistently changing and engaging at the same time. But most importantly, while the songs are long — they average about seven minutes apiece — they never stay in one place long enough to get stale. There are only six of them and the album's total run-time is just 43 minutes. It almost feels like Ross and company are wagging their fingers at bands who can't find their limits, which makes this ballsy, bluesy affair one of the year's best debuts.

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