The Obsessed - Sacred album review

Doom pioneers’ first album in 23 years

Cover art for The Obsessed - Sacred album

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Scott ‘Wino’ Weinrich is one of rock’s great fringe figures. As the leader of Washington DC doom metal pioneers The Obsessed, he was bridging the nihilistic 33rpm grind of Sabbath with Motörhead’s speed freak attitude as far back 1980, and he’s got the cult cachet to prove it – if not the platinum records.

But even legends need to pay the bills, hence The Obsessed’s reappearance more than two decades after their last album.

Sacred picks up where they left off with 1994’s The Church Within, ramping up the grinding riffs and Wino’s tortured Ozzy-esque wail. You can smell the patchouli-soaked denim on Sodden Jacket and the title track, while their version of Thin Lizzy’s little-covered It’s Only Money shows nothing if not immaculate taste.

Those platinum records will remain out of reach, but a world with The Obsessed back in it is a good place to be.

Dave Everley

Dave Everley has been writing about and occasionally humming along to music since the early 90s. During that time, he has been Deputy Editor on Kerrang! and Classic Rock, Associate Editor on Q magazine and staff writer/tea boy on Raw, not necessarily in that order. He has written for Metal Hammer, Louder, Prog, the Observer, Select, Mojo, the Evening Standard and the totally legendary Ultrakill. He is still waiting for Billy Gibbons to send him a bottle of hot sauce he was promised several years ago.