Released: January 12, 2018
No Cross No Crown doesn’t register as a comeback record, despite arriving after a long absence. It sounds more like a band resuming motion without announcement, settling back into a familiar weight rather than reintroducing themselves. There’s no urgency here, no sense of reclaiming space or proving relevance. The album moves deliberately, confident that time has added mass instead of dulling the edge.
The opening stretch establishes that posture immediately. “Novus Deus” unfolds slowly, almost cautiously, its central riff circling rather than striking. It doesn’t declare intent so much as allow momentum to form on its own terms. When “The Luddite” follows, the album’s priorities come into focus: groove-first, patient, and unhurried. The riffs repeat without escalation, pressing forward through persistence rather than force.
That approach defines much of the record. No Cross No Crown favors length and repetition not as indulgence, but as method. “Cast the First Stone” leans into a mid-tempo crawl that gains weight the longer it holds its ground. The riff doesn’t evolve so much as deepen, digging further into itself with each cycle. The effect is grounding rather than hypnotic — it pulls downward and stays there.
Blues and Southern rock elements surface naturally, without signaling a shift. “Wolf Named Crow” carries a loose, almost conversational swing, its grit coming from feel rather than distortion. It doesn’t soften the album or break its continuity. Instead, it reinforces the sense that this heaviness is lived-in — muscle memory rather than stylistic choice. Nothing here feels blended for novelty; it feels recalled.
The title track, “No Cross No Crown,” functions as the album’s gravitational center. Expansive without feeling indulgent, it settles into a sustained state of tension rather than building toward release. Each section reinforces the last, creating pressure through accumulation instead of climax. It’s not a thesis statement so much as a condition the album repeatedly returns to.
Later tracks maintain that discipline rather than disrupting it. “Nothing Left to Say” strips things back further, relying on space and restraint to carry its weight. “Matre’s Diem” drifts closer to doom territory, its slower pace reinforcing the album’s preference for mass over speed. Even here, the band resist dramatics. The heaviness feels routine — deliberate, steady, and unadorned.
Vocals function as presence rather than performance throughout. Pepper Keenan delivers lines with conviction but without excess, moving with the riffs instead of hovering above them. On “The Luddite” and the title track, he sounds less like a frontman commanding attention and more like a component embedded in the machinery, pushing alongside the instruments rather than directing them.
The album’s runtime becomes part of its identity without overstaying its welcome. At just under an hour, No Cross No Crown still resists casual listening. It asks for patience rather than immediacy, letting tracks stretch and settle without rushing toward payoff. Songs bleed into one another through shared tone and pacing, creating continuity instead of peaks. Even when individual cuts push past conventional structures, they don’t feel indulgent — they feel committed to holding their ground.
Production reinforces that commitment. The guitars are thick but unpolished, the drums authoritative without snap, the bass present without flash. There’s no gloss here, no attempt to sharpen edges for modern clarity. Everything sounds grounded and intentional, built to withstand repetition rather than impress on first contact.
What No Cross No Crown ultimately offers is persistence. It doesn’t rewrite Corrosion of Conformity’s history or freeze it in nostalgia. It extends it — slower, heavier, and more patient. This is an album that treats longevity not as reinvention, but as the ability to keep moving under your own weight.
By the time it ends, nothing has been resolved or softened. The record doesn’t escalate, and it doesn’t retreat. It simply remains, planted firmly in its groove. No Cross No Crown isn’t a return to form. It’s evidence that the form never left — it just took its time coming back into focus.
Written by Rob Joncas for DeadNoteMedia.
Artist information and music courtesy of the band.
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