01. Live Again
02. In The Panic Room
03. I Spoke To Death
04. Dull Pain
05. Lady Heroin
06. I'll Certainly See You In Hell
07. Thundercrest
08. Solve The Puzzle
09. Spread Your Wings
10. Lightning In A Bottle
11. Walk The Sociopath
12. Start The End [bonus]
13. Might Just Wanna Be Your Fool [bonus]
14. Lady Heroin [pre-edit rough mix][bonus]

Will a cracked and chipped bottle suffice?

Is there any band as infamous as Pentagram? A band as unstable as a jenga tower atop a plate of jelly in an earthquake, a band whose story can be summed up with the phrase "and then it all fell apart again". Pentagram were victims of their own making thanks to the actions of their own front man, an enigmatic figure who, for all his flaws, was an integral part of the band's success. Lightning In A Bottle is a reminder of what could have been. While the band are capable of conjuring sonic thunder and lightning, they unfortunately are not able to do it on command as the title would suggest, with Lightning In A Bottle being a good album, but not amazing as a title like that might suggest.

Still, there is plenty of fun to be had with Lightning In A Bottle, with its stripped-down retro doom harking back to the band's earlier work. The opening five-track blitz is a storming reminder of how doom became the established genre it is: droning guitars, rumbling bass and thundering drum work alongside pained vocals. While some may see Pentagram as merely being the Bobby Leibling show, what with him being the sole member who has been a part of the band longer than a track off of Sleep's Dopesmoker, it would sell the rest of the band short, especially as they share as many, highlights as Leibling, if not more. Chief among them are Vasquez's performance on the drums on a track like "I Spoke To Death", peppering the track with fills and personality, the kind of performance that elevates a good track to a great one. Reed knows how to write a killer riff, with "Thundercrest" sounding like a lost page from the Iommi riffbook.

The production on tracks like "Solve The Puzzle" is a mixed bag; while audibly doing nothing wrong, such that you can hear everything perfectly, the flipside is that it's sterile and lacking in personality at the same time, too clean for its own good. "Thundercrest" has a killer riff, but it's begging for a dirtier sound to really add to the vibe; if you're going to do retro, you need to sound retro too.

The main issue with Lightning In A Bottle is that, for the most part, the tracks don't step up from being good; they're fun and enjoyable for sure, but nothing that you haven't heard done better before (by both Pentagram and the legion of bands they've inspired). This is especially evident around the middle of the record when the track quality dips; there's little reason to return to songs such as "I'll Certainly See You In Hell".

If Pentagram indeed have Lightning In A Bottle, then that glass is chipped and cracked, not the full package a title like that would suggest. An enjoyable listen, but nothing special and one unlikely to be in regular rotation anytime soon.

Performance:	7
Songwriting:	6
Originality:	5
Production:	6