Before we dive into Hives in Decline, the debut LP from The Ditch and the Delta allow me a moment to lament the original introduction to this piece, which I thought was a fair and funny bit about how a successful sludge album is a lot like a Reece’s Peanut Butter Cup™. I’m not saying it was comedy gold, but it was clever and fun and served to set the theme for the review. Alas, when doing digging into their previous EP I saw that another publication essentially used the same joke (and better, to be fair).
So farewell, original intro. I thought you were funny, but so did someone else, and almost two earlier to boot. At least you served as fodder for this new intro. Now let’s talk about massive riffs and grooves instead. Continue reading