It is always intriguing when by reading a promo sheet that comes with an album you still don't understand what is about to be played. Svart Records defined British Baron very vaguely as "rock". But this Finnish powerhouse of a label signs and releases a lot of unusual stuff, so no surprise there. Next, the title of the album, Torpor, is how I have been feeling lately. Or, to put it more precisely, how I wish I would be feeling. Torpor is a state, which some animals in the wild can induce upon themselves, when a being consciously lowers its body temperature thus conserving energy when it is about experience some extreme conditions like cold or hunger. Think of bears and hibernation. How I wish I could just lower the stress and be "chill" sometimes, to slow down the life’s tempo ... But, on to the music ...

It didn't take long to figure out what Torpor will be about. Watery keys of Dragonfly, coupled with steady primal percussion and withdrawn repetitive baritone vocal chants linger along, until more defined guitars and warm bass lines join this slow loopy psychedelia. Mark Maker has more of a rock feel with the jangly guitars walking this shapeless landscape, at least at the beginning. Even the minimal momentum, however, is not to last. The middle of the album just plunges into this faceless not-with-this-world, checked out, static music. This is just depiction of emptiness, albeit of the warmer kind, where you can just drift away unencumbered to this somewhat background music. I can't call Wild Cry, Dark Down and ,i>Stry boring, there is a purpose to all of this, but at least Dragonfly has unmistakable British Isles foggy melody, while many other cuts wonder aimlessly. Torpor is a perfect title Baron chose, I need to be using it more when describing albums like this. The splash half way through Stry, where they turn some chaos on, and the stoner rock opening of Deeper Align are a few moments when Baron shakes the extreme introspection off, but ultimately this is not about rocking out, but projecting a certain mood instead. The band says this is about mythology, old times and melancholy. I get it and I respect it, I just didn't get a feeling I need to hear this more than once. (Yet I did, in order to be objective).