Danava

Named after enemy beings in the Rigveda and the Bhagavad Gita, the members of Portland, Oregon's Danava are clearly adherents of the heavy psychedelic rock in vogue of late. Unlike many of their peers, however, the guys in this band were smart enough to realize that stoner rock and sludge metal have serious limitations on their own. While adding synthesizers to already anthemic rockers might cause their music to border on the type of musical excess perpetrated by latter-day Deep Purple, Danava never quite crosses the line into delusional self-indulgence. Instead, the trio performs its music with a zestful intensity rather than trudging through murky darkness. Many outfits charting similar musical territory forget that Black Sabbath was electrifying and never trudged a doom-laden riff into the ground. Likewise, Danava's prog-psych sludge blade is sharp and never dull.