Label: Impedance Records

Verdict: Enjoyable, but not entirely memorable.  5.5/10.

Ten years into their career, Warrnambool natives Cockfight Shootout are set to release their debut album through Impedance Records. 

Despite numerous setbacks along the way, ranging from line-up changes to labels going bust, the band’s new record Asleep In Exile is finally ready to see the light of day.

On the whole, the Cockfight Shootout play a brand of hard rock that appears to be equally indebted to grunge as it is to stoner rock. Despite the competing elements of these disparate influences, the whole album is neatly held together by lead singer Keelan Gallogly’s melodiously gruff vocals.

Although Asleep In Exile is a fairly entertaining listen overall, it unfortunately suffers from a slightly muted production and performance; the riffs are huge and the group’s loud/soft dynamic transition is effective, but far too often the music simply lacks the crunch, distortion and intensity which could propel the record to the next level.

This becomes most apparent on those tracks which tend to rely heavily on a Nirvana styled sonic attack; “Named and Shamed” and the album’s title track in particular could have been simply monstrous had Cockfight Shootout been brave enough to jack up the distortion and feedback to Houdini­-like (or funnily enough, even In Utero-like) proportions.

Perhaps the finest moment on Asleep In Exile comes in the form of “You’re Dead, Let’s Disco”. Sounding like a merge of Rated R-era Queens of the Stone Age mixed with Soundgarden, the group’s intertwining guitars and ethereal vocals manage to burst forth from the stereo in a psychedelic rainbow of sludgy glory.

At the end of the day, fans of 90s-era alternative rock should be fairly pleased with Asleep In Exile. Over the course of the record’s 35 minute playtime, Cockfight Shootout manages to produce a fairly consistent slab of hard rock with its fair share of melody and tasty guitar licks.

It’s a shame really, because given just a bit more grunt, the release could have been even better.