Hornets’ nest guitar buzz, dark, doomy riffs and rhythms as foreboding as torrential thunderstorms are what make High on Fire heavy. What makes them stand out from their stoner-metal peers, however, is the way they imbue Sabbathian sludge with ’80s metal hooks, thrash attitude, psychedelic swirls and authentic Turkish folk melodies.
“I never wanted to be just a doom band,” says frontman Matt Pike, who cut his metal teeth in the ’90s with drone legends Sleep. “When we formed High on Fire, I was thinking we’d be more like Celtic Frost with maybe a little black metal in there. But that was just a starting point.”
