WALK THROUGH FIRE – Vär Avgrund
- Posted on 20-04-2020
Walk Through Fire? And where might that fire be? All I hear is the least interesting parts of Ulcerate-ian doom severely minimalized to the point of sounding like a guitar novice rehersal. This could all be done between lunch and dinner on any given day by beginners. Why even bother with vocals? The only good thing is the atmosphere but that doesn’t work for too long because the mind simply drifts off. Are these guys even alive or is an unknown supernatural force animating their dead bodies?
Whatever you may think, though, this is not the band’s debut. Having formed in 2008 in Gothenburg and Västra Götaland in Sweden (yes, home of some of the sweetest metal music you won’t even smell on this disc) they have made not 1, not 2, but 3 albums before this one, the eponymous (2009), "Farthest From Heaven" (2011) and "Hope Is Misery" (2014). I will spare you the lineup.
Every single track, and they have made 7, has a single riff played at a speed of Donald J. Trump’s response to COVID-19 threat, with a background semi-melody. Most horrifyingly they don’t play it for 5 or even 6 minutes, but for 13 and even 19! What could be the possible point of that? It is the height of an artist’s hubris to expect anyone to sit through that! One track, an instrumental, sounds like someone literally played squash throughout to a strumming of a base acoustic riff, and that actually does not sound too bad as minimalistic and simplistic as it is. Sure, there is some attempt at melody in the final track (Tragedin) but I deserve that in a 19 minute one-riff track on a loop like some type of parody of Testament’s "Last Call".
In short, "Vär Avgrund" is too long, too simple, too base and thoroughly boring and a few attempts at variety is the only thing that accounts for any points given. Adjö.