Phi + 1

Truckfighter's 2006 album, Gravity X, harkened back to the heady days when stoner rock was at it's pomp in the late Nineties. It had the hard, driving riffs, the spacey, muffled vocals and the relentless heavyosity of those bands. Unfortunately it didn't quite have that spark the classic stoner bands possessed. However, Phi definitely does have it.Truckfighters really have upped their game on this one. The songs are tighter and cleverer, the querkiness which showed itself on Gravity X has been solidified and now flows into the riffs and verses, not too dissimilar to Queens of the Stone Age. Truckfighters have much more power than QOTSA though and whereas some Queens stuff seems flat and contrived the material on Phi seems genuine and natural. Riffs flow in and out of each other into solo sections and quality, memorable choruses. And that's just the first track.They're not afraid to spread their limbs either; `Chameleon' is an eclectic, 10min long jam epic. Whereas Gravity X pummeled itself amost into boredom and lacked subtlety, Phi has bucketloads of it. And not just the quiet verse/loud chorus type, it's quite an eclectic and varied album.Atomic and Fortyeight have some great catchy choruses; Dysthimia and Slacken have some quality melodic riffs and Below the Sun is something, within the genre only Truckfighters could pull off.Overall, Phi is a fantastic stoner rock album which definitely is worthy of placing in with the greats of the Nineties. It isn't too melodic, therefore the riffs come through first and foremost carried by the excellent guitar tone. It also has exactly the right amount of subtlety and variation to make it interesting for the duration and for it to jump out from the rest of the diminishing crop of modern stoner bands. Unfortunately, they may be the only proper, decent stoner rock band left.

The album kicks in with the track "atomic;" a fuzzy opening riff before breaking in with John Garcia style vocals. Its stoner rock paint by numbers the riffs are present and accounted for and makes for a promising opening to the album. "Fortyeight" is mid tempo affair with a good little groove to it. The intervals between the singing has nice little breakdowns. "Kickdown" carries on much the same way. The riffs are reminiscent of KYUSS and NEBULA. "Chameleon" takes things a step further lasting over ten minutes. The song moves along at a slow pace. It's a pleasant song with mellower sections before breaking back with the fuzzy wall of noise and picking up the pace about half way through. It then ends on relaxing string section part. At times it was losing my interest, but still a solid song. "Dysthymia" is one of the mellowest tracks on the album distracting from the hard rocking of the rest of the album. "Slacken" gets things back on track with one of the most infectious openings of the album. "Slacken" pretty much flows into the next track "warhead". "Warhead" is just an instrumental jam that isn't adding much to the album. It's just a filler track to get the album up the acceptable 10 song point. "Traffic" has a slight eastern vibe about the opening of the song. Track 9 will either be "slides" if you have the EU release of the album. "Slides" is another instrumental jam that blurs into the rest of the album. The album is winding down now as we reach the final song "The game" which raps up the album well enough.The album is all solid stoner fodder. The first half contains most of the strongest songs with the instrumentals and weaker songs on the second half not really adding much. The weaker songs aside it's still a good release. It may not be up there with KYUSS "welcome to sky valley," but then QOTSA aren't producing music on that quality anymore either so it's a good effort. Basically whether you like this album will come down to whether you object to hearing another band that sounds exactly like KYUSS, FU MANCHU or NEBULA or the many other countless stoner that were products of KYUSS and MONSTER MAGNET. Personally it's a welcome album as I'd rather hear this than hear another poor quality metal core band or poor quality band claiming to be bringing thrash back. But you have be warned this doesn't score any points for originality but it is packed with enough fuzzy riffs and groovy tunes to make up for it.

New to the truck fighting scene! Great kick back and tap your foot music. Excellent musicians. Could not decide which of there albums to buy first so I bought the first three. Great decision! Everyone has there preference, but I liked Mania the best, then Phi and then Gravity X, although every one of them is great, this was my "If I Had To Rate Them" order. You cannot go wrong with any of them.

This is simply a great rock album. It's heavy, and the guitars do most of the talking. What surprises me is how fresh it remains after repeated listens. There's nothing necessarily new on this record, just an abundance of ear crunching riffs, and powerful choruses, all with a surprising knack for melody. The production is very nice too, as long as you like buttloads of fuzz. Stand out tracks are Traffic, Atomic, kickdown, and Slacken.

"In fuzz we trust" That was a quote from the sleeve out of the Universal CD and these guys are the masters of fuzz!!!!!!!! Make no mistake this band is in a league of their own, and in the world of "metal" that is hard to come by since most are clones and there's no creativity or original sound!!!!! Mike

It's Just Amazing, Gravity X May Be Better, But This Band.. It's Just Awesome

Loved it!!