El Paramo's self-titled debut is more along the lines of what I'd expect from Alone Records, namely heavy, psychedelic stoner rock with a metallic edge,

but like the label's other new releases from Beiruth and Cuzo, this album also incorporates a heavier prog and 70s psych influence than we've heard on older

Alone titles. The other thing that El Paramo have in common with the albums from Beiruth and Cuzo is that this Spanish band is entirely instrumental, and

with vocals out of the way, El Paramo opts to focus their attention on the all-powerful RIFF, playing a kind of heavy stoner metal crossed with krautrock

with an emphasis on massive desert-baked riffing and mighty propulsive drumming. Kind of like Argentina's Los Natas, actually. These guys have a similiar

style of riffy, Kyuss-worshipping heaviness as Los Natas, mixing in proggy, spacey psychedelia and huge motorik-like beats with the big stoner rock riffs,

but El Paramo are waaay heavier and more metallic, taking that sunbaked Kyuss style and adding a big dose of sludgy metal to the mix, sometimes even coming

near Sleep/High On Fire territory as heavy as this gets, but then they focus on a single riff, maybe two, and just jam them into infinity, crafting massive

stoner metal epics that sprawl into infinity, bits of Sabbath and Kyuss coiled around a heaving, propulsive krautrock rhythm, propelled by a driving snare

drum, like some Teutonic version of Welcome To Sky Valley. Sounds pretty killer, right? It's not all heavy and crushing either. The band drifts into plenty of stoned, laid back jamming with trippy meandering fuzz guitars and druggy percussion, spaced out drones, and billowing clouds of slide guitar and roaring amplifier ambience that push El Paramo even further out into a thick opiate daze.

This could have come out on Ektro and I wouldn't have batted an eye. Whether laying down super heavy metallic hypno-riffage or mellowing out with their softer, effects-heavy krautrock inspired jamming, these seven songs are all about repetition and percussive groove, and fans of both Circle and Los Natas should love this stuff. I can't get enough, this along with the rest of Alone Records new output is kicking my ass, and I can't wait to hear another album from these guys. Definitely recommended to fans of heavy, hypnotic stoner rock, fuzz-coated acid rock guitar, Black Sabbath at their most zoned-out, Boris, Kyuss (obviously!), 5ive, Los Natas, all of you should check out El Paramo's crushing circular desert metal!