Skull-stomping sludge metal from these Floridian heavy-hitters, originally known for being an offshoot of sludge legends Floor. Over the years, though, Miami's Dove (which featured Floor's Henry Wilson on guitar) has established itself as a major riff-beast all its own. There hasn't been much output from the band in recent times, but this 7" popped up a little while back, dropping two jams of major crush-rock which had initially appeared on the 2001 compilation South Of Hell released by Berserker Records, showing up on vinyl for the first time ever.

A-side "Eight Letters" comes on freight-truck style, a flurry of bone-bashing drum rolls and gnarly distortion right before Dove quickly recombine into a fuckin' massive sludge-metal riff, somewhat akin to the early Sleep stuff but with that recognizable bellowing vocal style that marked the early Floor releases. It's more churn than drone, a punchy chorus rising up and down out of the halting riffing, slamming your skull into the mulch for ahile before it disintegrates intp a wall of feedback, out of which comes an unexpected pretty guitar melody. This tune really reminds me of the early, rougher Floor stuff with its killer contrast between earthmover slo-mo power and gentle melody. The whole latter half of this song has an almost Codeine-like majesty to it, these guys some of the few musicians who were able to tap into that unique style and feel. The ending of "Letters" is achingly beautiful, tapping into something strange, a nostlagic glow that wraps around you in a vast, fuzz-filled blanket of sound.

They go a little harder on the flip "What Is Best In Life", the title of which should resonate with any of you Conan-fanatics out there. It's more of a knuckledragger of Sabbathian-style minimalism and crushing down tuned angst - nothin' drowsy or doped-out with this, the guitars are set in concrete, those awesome gang vocals howling over the slithering six-ton groove, while still winding some of those signature arpgeggiated chords around the calmer moments, combining chorus-drenched mega-crunch with that monumental melodic pull. Epic. It's a cosmic tragedy that these didn't bloom into an entire album.

Limited to a mere one hundred fifty copies.