Darkness, Violence, and Death
Sounds pretty grim, right? It si, but it’s not as hopeless as you may be imagining. While this may not be the most “diverse” line-up we have had, these albums interestingly juxtapose and compliment each other simultaneously…at least when you are trying to listen to all three during the week. Confused? Intrigued? Then get listening…
Reviews:
Katatonia – The Fall of Hearts (Peaceville)
Weekend Nachos – Apology (Relapse)
Gutter Instinct – Age of the Fanatics (Prosthetic)
Katatonia – The Fall Of Hearts
Weekend Nachos – Apology
Gutter Instinct – Age Of The Fanatics
The Sideshow Podcast 
Since we no longer have Google Plus for this type of stuff, I feel the need to post here that Ne Obliviscaris just announced a tour with BCI playing Gramercy Theater in NYC on July 29. That’s almost as good a pairing as BTBAM, Devin Townsend, and Fallujah in September.
Apology by Weekend Nachos is pretty good. There are actual riffs on the album, as opposed to just blindingly heavy guitar noise. However, I can’t help but notice that Weekend Nachos has used a formula quite similar to “Abandon All Life” by Nails. It’s as though Apology and Abandon All Life each take the basic grindcore formula of short, fast, chaotic songs and add in one song that is slightly longer that has some actual guitar riffs (“Wide Open Wound” by Nails and “2015” for Weekend Nachos) and then ends the album with a long, extended doom-y guitar riff (“Suum Cuique” by Nails and the song “Apology” for WN). Coincidence? Influence? I’d be hard pressed to believe that the guys in Weekend Nachos never listened to Abandon All Life by Nails. Not that there’s anything wrong with Weekend Nachos being influenced by Nails (that’s how music works in that “everything is a remix”), I’m just saying that I found it noticeable in this case.
Here’s what I’m starting to realize about grindcore/powerviolence for even the best of this type of music: I can rarely ever identify the song, album, or even band if I hear this music randomly. I was at a coffee house in Philadelphia called “Grindcore House” where they play grindcore as the background music of the store (it was being played at a fairly low volume when I was there). It occurred to me that even if they played something I have listened to such as Weekend Nachos, I wouldn’t even be able to recognize it. Maybe if they played the songs “Wide Open Wound” by Nails or “You Suffer” by Napalm Death then I’d be able to identify the song, but that’s about it. I suppose what I’m trying to say is that even though I enjoy some good powerviolence while I’m listening to it, it doesn’t seem to stick with me and make a lasting impression after I listen to it.
Now that I’ve been listening to Nattesferd by Kvelertak for a full week, I can conclude that it is not as good as their previous two albums. Most of the songs are good, and those extended riffs aren’t bad, but they just aren’t spectacular. One thing that I noticed about most specifically their previous album Meir is the lyrics and vocal tone. Even though the words are in Norwegian, my brain still wants to make sense of the lyrics and perceive them as english. For example, in the song “Evig Vandrar” on Meir there is a refrain in the chorus that sounds like they are saying “heavy… metal.” Then on the song “Kvelertak” for the words right before they say their name it sounds like they are saying “it’s called”, so that it sounds like they are saying “it’s called, Kvelertak!”. This association of the lyrics with english words and phrases gives my brain something more to latch onto in Meir as opposed to Nattesferd where I don’t make any of those type of associations with the lyrics. I’d still rate Nattesferd a 4, but after Meir was my number 5 album of 2013, Nattesferd comes in as a little disappointing.