While "Last Day Of Babylon" is only his first album, we have however the impression that The Sonic Overlords is there since always and that he accompanies our daily life since a long time. Why? Because its main instigator, Morgan Zocek, is not really a newcomer, guitarist within Sideburn, a veteran of the Swedish stoner.
Because The Sonic Overlords pays an obvious (and claimed) tribute to the hard rock and heavy music of the 70's and 80's in general and to Black Sabbath in particular. This explains this feeling, not of "already heard" (a little bit though but it's not so serious) but of warm familiarity, felt when listening to this trial run. And when the former and unloved singer of the Black Sabbath appears on 'In My Darkest Room', both heavy and lyrical, the filiation with Tony Iommi's band can only pleasantly jump to the ears. "Heaven And Hell" and "Mob Rules" are not far.
As for the title of the opus, it refers in an equally obvious way to Rainbow and therefore to Dio. Moreover and without equaling the irreplaceable and late elf, Marcus Zachrisson Rubin is in the lineage of these powerfully melodic voices which melt admirably in an epic melting pot. He is typically the kind of singer that Yngwie Malmsteen could recruit if he accepted, as in his (distant) great days, to delegate the microphone to someone else than his precious person - but this is another subject.
In fact, "Last Days Of Babylon" navigates between the brilliant hard rock of a black flamboyance ('Fools') and the sabbathian doom (Sands Of Time') while 'Children Of The Night' or 'Lords Of No Tomorrow' poach on the seismic lands of the Candlemass of the Robert Lowe era. A light FM tinge, detectable at the bend of 'Shine' with neo-classical arabesques as well as the choirs and the majestic flights of 'World On Fire', that neither Ritchie Blackmore nor Spiritual Beggars (for its sparkling solo) would deny, complete this picture, a perfect combination of dark melodies and robust vitality.
The Sonic Overlords doesn't invent anything, doesn't renew the music to which it is linked, but the fact is that "Last Days Of Babylon" raises very high the colors of an epic heavy doom extracted from a coal mine. In the Black Sabbath genre, it stands out as one of the most enjoyable offerings of the year.