Lawgiver
s/t

The label says: “Destined to wreak havoc upon the expectations of the listener and ready to fuck with any given scene regulation, Malmö, Sweden is proud over its new misbehaving trouble-kid: Lawgiver. Effortlessly tougher than those who spend half their band energy on trying to be tough, spontaneously combining everything and nothing into a new breed of fight-music where contradictions are allowed to work freely as driving forces instead of anxiously being polished off to create an image: Lawgiver serves us cross-over like we never heard before.” Grand and strong words like fucks regulation, wreaks havoc on expectations sounds great and all so what about their five-track debut album?

Thrash metal, hardcore, metalcore, something like that can be used to describe the sound of this album. Thrashy and groovy metalcore has been heard before and it sounds kind of like this, I hear no problem child or anyone fucking regulations or wreaks havoc on expectations. It feels kind of expected from the get go, the girl singing is not really impressing me even though she has some grit. The band has some rough raw edges and good energy, and a gritty sound, kind of like bands that play music of this style usually has. This eighteen minute EP has five tracks that are easy to take in and easy to like, they also sound very familiar.

Good EP, it has a fair deal to offer, especially if you like this kind of music. All of the tracks work and I like the production, the raw sound it offers. But as a critic it is hard to be that ecstatic about it, it doesn’t offer anything that fucks with the rules of conduct when it comes to this genre, if you know this kind of music you will recognise and predict how this EP sounds. There are no hit songs either, the songs are good but none of them really draws you in like the really great songs do.

In the end I think Lawgiver gives us a strong debut, it offers no real surprises but it works and it works well. I can recommend it for the fans of this genre, I am quite sure they will like this as it presses all the right buttons. And once upon a time this would be considered youthful and rebellious, while nowadays I would describe it as cautious and kind of mature. A solid effort plain and simple.

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