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Harkonen: Grizz
09/11/09 || Khlysty
Burly, noisy metallic hardcore is the name of the game on this nifty little CDEP (which also came out, back in the day, as a cool 7”) and if anyone’s heard such music, one probably knows exactly what I’m talking about: meaty guitars, a bass with great presence, caveman drumming, lots of shouting and screaming… the works. The three guys that comprised Harkonen back in 2001 were already veterans of the hardcore scene, although this here little piece of music signified a slight change for their audial attack, since the band took the foot off the pedal a little, preferring a less speedy and a more groovy approach towards their chosen genre.
As a sidenote, if you read Khlysty’s reviews carefully, you’d know that he has a real different point of view towards the discussion of what “hardcore” is. See, I’m old enough to think of hardcore as the music played back in the late ‘70s – early ‘80s by bands like Fear, Circle Jerks, Hüsker Dü, Black Flag et al. That is, hardcore, to me, is inexorably tied with punk and not with metal. Of course, I know that almost from the beginning there’s been a tendency for “cross-overism” (look, mamma, new words!!!!), but, hey, one’s got to live with one’s fixations, right? Anyway, on with the show.
On “Grizz” Harkonen seem to abandon high-velocity excursions into hardcore, going for a more groove-oriented approach, which is totally enjoyable to these ears. The music is mid-tempo’ed and the clear, punchy production lets the guys in the band explore the more headbangingly-satisfying aspects of their chosen genre. If there’s one band Harkonen remind me the most here, that’s The Jesus Lizard, but without the mathy/jazzy excursions of this band. Instead, our boys seem content to play their instruments full-throttle, creating a low-endy, noisy landscape and avoiding useless tricks of the hardcore trade, such as breakdowns and moshing choruses.
This is as straightforward as it gets: the guitars are grizzly (ha,ha, yeah, pun intended, now fuck off), the vocals are of the shout-scream type, the bulldozer bass is a real blessing to these ears and, even when things speed up a bit (as in “Townache”), the groove is ever-present. Bottom line: this is a good 15-minutes-long investment on great hardcore music by a band, whose career never really took off. So, it would be good, if your interested in this kind of music, to give Harkonen some –late in the game- attention.
- Information
- Released: 2001
- Label: Hydra Head Records
- Website: Harkonen MySpace
- Band
- Ben Verellen: bass, vocals
- Casey Hardy: guitar, vocals
- Matt Howard: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Grizz
- 02. Kildow’s song
- 03. Thunder appeal
- 04. Townache
- 05. Hey, you millionaires, get out of that garbage
