Hyperbole has been a part of my reviews of HC records and shows for as long as I’ve been writing about them. The twin influences on my writing in this manner are Pushead (of course) and Matt Summers (maybe less apparent). Both guys are dudes who are known for deep knowledge of various aspects of the scenes they were a part of and the scenes around the world that came before them. They also had a way of drawing absurd comparisons or making bold, superlative statements that seemed beyond criticism. Pushead’s review of SS DECONTROL’s “Get It Away” is noteworthy enough that it gets special attention by being featured in the 2024 reissue of that album. I mean, come on. Part of it reads, “SS DECONTROL bulldozes your cranium with crunching force and immaculate power of eminently enjoyable expectations.” No one talks like that. No one writes like that. Matt Summers (singer of SHARK ATTACK / label guru of My War Records) was maybe less familiar with a thesaurus, but his all caps style of writing matched the power of the records he featured on his label.
I engaged with this kind of description when I reviewed the first KRIEGSHÖG LP in 2011. In the fifth issue of zine I was doing with my buddy Matt at the time, I wrote “When I listened to this record for the first time, it started a tornado. The bass tone sounds like someone being thrown onto the third rail. The riff on ‘Heathen (Code Z)’ sounds like an electrical storm having a tantrum. It’s not even fair that this record exists.” (A few issues prior, Matt reviewed their first 7” with a one-liner; “This record made me quit my band.”) To be real, there might be something to that weather angle in my review. There was a small tornado in central Ohio around the time I first received the LP in the mail; the day this record made it into Illinois on its way to me was the same night that a dust storm swarmed across the greater Chicagoland area…
Speaking of Chicago, AC/DC are playing at Soldier Field this weekend and there's an article in the Tribune about how they’ve made the same album over and over and over again, and that the incessant repetition is a form of timelessness. Of course KRIEGSHÖG does not have that kind of longevity (yet) but they have already changed their sound enough that I wouldn’t feel comfortable saying this album is just like their first one. As the hype sticker claims, they are “moving at a slower tempo but still pummeling their riffing sound.” This is evident as clearly as possible on “Grey Agony” and the closing track “冷たい人間” (“Tsumetai Ningen”) which has a number of riffs that sound something like that band from Norway whose third album is titled “Ass Cobra.” This isn’t just the tactic of doing a slow song just to have contrast with the fast ones. They are comfortable in this mid-tempo groove and know how to make it sound powerful and dynamic, not just heavy for heavy’s sake.
The fullness of the sound is also key. It’s not a piercing guitar tone and a fuzzed out bass clashing with harsh, reverbed vocals over d-beats. The band feels cohesive, not just tight. God, that bass tone on the first LP, though. I remember being in the car with my friends’ band and listening to it once a day (only once, due to its power) on a five-day tour from Columbus to the east coast. When their bassist, a guy who loves playing HC but maybe didn’t keep up with the scene as much as the others, heard the tone on “Evolution,” the disbelieving guffaw that left his lips said it all. It is wild to think that music like that could even exist. How to top it? Just like SLAYER slowing it down after “Reign in Blood” because they knew they couldn’t go even faster than that while keeping the songs and “parts” intact, KRIEGSHÖG have found a similar power in a moderate tempo on their second full-length. Funnily enough, both of their records clock in at just over 22 minutes, but there are four fewer songs on “Love & Revenge,” than on the debut. It feels like it goes by quicker, too. That illusion of having achieved speed without having gone fast is a real cool trick. Can’t wait to see what other ones they can pull off in another 14 years.
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