Album Review: Lee Scratch Perry's Guide to the Universe by New Age Doom

You'd be forgiven for not yet being aware of New Age Doom: The pet project of a bunch of Vancouver doom-metal hippies and mainstays of the city's indie scene (Limblifter fans of the world, unite!) generated some buzz with last year's Himalayan Dream Techno, but they only really turned heads recently, upon revealing that they'd somehow convinced Lee "Scratch" Perry to record a prog-jazz-dub album with them; the Jamaican icon died just weeks after the announcement. The band thankfully takes full advantage of this serendipitous last act of generosity on Scratch's part, pulling on a far broader palette of local and prestige talent than Himalayan Dream Techno did, notably including key players from David Bowie's Blackstar band, tenor saxophonist Donny McCaslin and drummer/synth player Tim Lefebvre, whose presence lends a haunted quality to the performances. Together, on Lee "Scratch" Perry's Guide to the Universe, New Age Doom use the dub founder's commanding presence as a lightning rod for channeling a syncretic new type of heavy music, one that draws equally on the jagged, glacial chords of distorted guitars, the viscous, amniotic fluidity of dub, and the churning orbital dynamics of Afrofuturist jazz.

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