Texas Platters

The Flood

The culmination of a six-month-long public smear campaign, the Flood's debut, Power to the Sheeple, assumes the role of the evil empire, polluting feeble minds with a lethal dosage of sludge metal. Modeled after the Melvins' Gluey Porch Treatments, the local trio layers on the riffs thick as a brick, particularly the opening title track, JFK's vocals mimicking King Buzzo's, and "Jaded Waterlooen," an attack on record-store clerks. Longer selections like "Infidel" and "Teacher" go over best, leaving room for some interesting guitar pyrotechnics, but at nearly 80 minutes, the Flood's oppressively heavy gloom-and-doom propaganda seriously grates on the nerves. "Listen Now! You Shut Up," 33 seconds of electronic filler, separates the album from the five-song Drugs EP, which is bookended by the stoner metal cut "You're High" and closing buzz-kill "We're High," 11 minutes of droning and contorted feedback. Fight the power.