Esox Lucifer sees the power trio of 10,000 Years hit all the usual stoner rock and metal embellishments with a flair that’s frankly rare to find nowadays.
Release date: August 7, 2026 | Ripple Music | Facebook | Instagram | Bandcamp
It’s true, I’ve fallen out a bit with stoner rock and metal. Between my faves taking a long time to put out new material and others disbanding, it’s left me floundering a bit to latch onto something in what I considered one of my favorite subgenres for a long time. When this happens, the only choice is to branch out and explore. Find new faves, listen to bands you didn’t before or never even knew existed. This was my experience with Sweden’s 10,000 Years.
Popping up on our review list courtesy of Ripple Music (or whoever does PR for them) along with Toni comparing them favorably to Astronoid in feel, I knew it’d be a safe bet. Listen to cool stoner rock, enjoy the melodies and thick instrumentation! Well, I did, but in a way I was not expecting. Simply put, Esox Lucifer is one of the best stoner albums I’ve heard in years, maybe since URSA‘s fantastic stoner doom or when Volcanova found their way to me. Maybe the most surprising part is that 10,000 Years play it pretty straightforward – you get riffs, you get immense instrumental scale, and the atmosphere hanging in the back is nice with a slightly progressive flair. In other words, you get it all without detracting too much from the core stoner ethos.
They dance along that line of being rock or metal too. A song like “Pursuit Special” rocks hard in the truest sense. Performances are locked the hell in, guitars are fuzzy and border on sludge affectation here and there, some faster drumming at the end completes it as a piece with real movement to it. Move onto “Church Of The Red Museum” and you’re treated similarly, but the vocals are fiercer and double bass drumming helps accent the song’s post-rock-esque instrumental break in the midsection along with the soaring guitar leads in a more pummeling manner. This is where the Astronoid feel kicks in and it feels like the ocean under a dark sky, much like the album cover.
That’s not even the best part either. Those songs are great – in fact, all the songs here are great in their own way – but all of them are utterly eclipsed by the ending title track. “Esox Lucifer” is the longest track and absolutely uses all that runway to produce one of the best songs I’ve heard all year and within the genre in many years. Metallic heaviness doesn’t take long to thrust itself onto you with more double bass drumming and thrashy beats. Vocals are emboldened, supported by backing harmonies, and the guitars rip through sections that wouldn’t feel out of place on a nice melodeath record. It has a remarkably turbulent feel, but there’s always this persistent motif of a melody done by the guitars that centers the track between bouts of excess and power. It was genuinely so fun and impressive that I had to run this song back a few times on first listen before it looped over to the first track.
The singles are nothing to scoff at either. Typically, I see stoner bands put their best stuff forward to market their projects which is nice and hooks you, but can also leave the full project feel a little empty as a result. Less often, they keep their best stuff for the deep cuts and while that’s a strategy as well, it’s a gamble if the singles don’t fully capitalize on the moment to show off the greater work in some way. 10,000 Years found a nice middle ground. “Alien Tactics” released in early July and buttered up fans and newcomers like me with hazy atmo and fantastical themes. The hook is the best aspect here musically, quick and delightful with its catchiness. Before that, and the first single I heard, “Two Million Stones” fell to Earth back in May and while I didn’t hear it until the last month, it’s probably the best single from this album with its enrapturing fuzzy texture and vocal progression that really does remind me of URSA a lot. It’s massive even with its tight runtime.
The outcome of checking out 10,000 Years has been overwhelmingly positive, in case you couldn’t tell. It’s exactly what I needed after over a year of not connecting with the stoner genre for one reason or another. It’s resplendent with melody, big-ass performances, and a keen use of space and time that allows you to bask in and appreciate the finer moments the band put forth in between beating the hell out of you. Every song hits like the finest blunt you could roll. It obviously deserves high praise (I promise that was unintentional), but more so it deserves lots of eyes and ears on it, so if you’ve ever enjoyed stoner rock or metal and want to reconnect, I personally don’t know of a better time. Esox Lucifer is pronounced art within its field and a delight to behold regardless.
