Hagl | facebook |
Released on March 30, 2015 via Folter Records
Until I got this album, there was a large black metal-shaped hole in my music collection. And it was totally intentional: I refused to touch it with a bargepole. It was just too darn scary, for two reasons. One was the first black metal I heard was bloody awful and accompanied by shots of cheap tepid vodka in a basement bar frequented by spooky people. The venue featured a coffin for a table and a cheap plastic mummy as a wall feature, for goodness’ sake.
The second reason may have been the fact that the music is linked with murder, arson and general mayhem – especially when the word “Norwegian” prefixes the genre. Life’s too short to listen to abrasive noise from a bunch of anti-religious zealots. Or so I thought.
Then I heard Hagl – which is not to be confused with the Russian black/pagan metal outfit that apparently has been spewing out some kind of cacophony for the last 10 years or so. This incarnation of Hagl has been around for a mere three years and Lenket til Livet‘ (chained to life) is their debut.
And man, is it unnerving. From the grey album cover to the raspy roar that joins the minor-chord arpeggio at the beginning of ‘Askefast’, the opening track, it is bleaker than a snowstorm enveloping a rubbish dump. And that is even before you find out what the song means – ‘ashen’, apparently. But then the atmosphere begins to form. And amid the icy guitars, some melody creeps in. It helps that Hagl never commit the sin that so many extreme bands do, which is to make a massive racket with no regard for anyone who might want to listen to it more than once.
The second track, ‘Den Sorte Porten’, malevolently arrives with a double-kick onslaught then swiftly breaks down into discordant stop-start slabs of guitar. Which, apart from being brilliantly alliterative to describe, gives an additional colour to the band’s palette. Track three, ‘Ulvehyrde’, could be construed as doomish, given the glacial pace and veerings towards a groove. But then you translate the name of the song and you find it is called Wolf Shepherd. Which is frankly scary.
Track four, ‘Fra Kulden Til Flammene’ (from the cold to the flames), begins with acoustic guitar then opens into a grandiose phrase, again at a slow pace, which brings to mind experimental noise rather than metal in any guise. Track five, ‘Helvete Ligger Så I Lende’ (something to do with hell, if I remember rightly from old Nasum albums), sounds in parts like a plain old garden variety metal song. Except the voice, which is as spooky as it has been throughout the album. One thing the band may be shocked to hear is the guitar trill in the verses actually sounds quite nice.
‘Ondskapt’ and ‘Liksoek’ keep up the oppressive, aggressive yet simultaneously melodic theme going, before ‘Sjelefiend’, which could be a pun on sjelefrend, the Norwegian for ‘soul mate’, ups the pace somewhat and brings a sprinkle of death roars into the equation. It is these pluckings from metal’s broad range – without falling into any ‘prog’ or ‘fusion’ trap – that raises this album above another wilfully scary Scandinavian noise-fest. In fact the final song, ‘Endelikt’, is the only time when a tune is dominated by near white noise and blast beats.
Make no mistake, this is one for a night of misanthropy and it is at times bleaker than a mid-winter’s afternoon in Rjukan when all the shops are closed, especially as it is sung entirely in Norwegian – we presume at least. But amid the chill there is a tinge of melody and some welcome variety. It converted me.
