Black Spiders
Can’t Die, Won’t Die – Spinefarm Records
Since their reformation in 2020, it has been full-steam ahead for Sheffield’s unkillable quintet Black Spiders. Album number four finds them rocking that “good time groove” they do so well and Can’t Die, Won’t Die serves up a dozen of the very best. Heavy metal used to get bad press, being perceived as aggressive and negative, yet there’s something so very uplifting about the brand of rock this band deliver that it should really be prescribed on the NHS. Any of these twelve songs is like a vitamin shot to the arm, and should perk up all but the morbidly morose. On a collision course with trouble, ‘Driving My Rooster’ pins the pedal to the floor whilst ‘Destroyer’, both heavy and harmonious, seems tailor made for all sorts of Saturday night debauchery. Powered by the kind of riff you wish Angus Young still wrote, ‘Alright Alright Alright’ (so good they named it thrice) is a high-octane rocker that’s sure to leave many a scorched stage in its wake. While Black Spiders rarely hit cerebral highs, sometimes music should just be fun, and that’s what this record delivers in spades. Can’t Die, Won’t Die? With albums like this in the bag, death was never an option.
Review by Peter Dennis