Husqwarnah
Front Towards Enemy

You should have the front towards the enemy, says Italian death metallers Husqwarnah. I guess that it a sound military strategy, it would be bad if the enemy was inside your lines or shooting at you from behind. Personally I don’t care much for battles, wars, violence, and that sort of thing, I can’t think of anything more detrimental for human evolvement. Instead I wonder a bit about the name, if the Husqvarna company somehow inspired their name – perhaps it is just because they are a big Swedish company. But if they were inspired, I doubt it is the automatic lawnmowers these military guys found inspiring, perhaps it is the chainsaws or something like that. Maybe the forest helmets?

They make death metal of the more powerful and classic kind, growly vocals, heavy riffs, massive sound. They might not break new ground but sound relatively fresh, and most importantly they aren’t as predictable as much of the genre tends to be. I like the singer that sounds slightly less generic than most of the singers in the death metal style, their variation of songs is otherwise typical of the genre, the playing time is sensible and they end with a Rush cover featuring Mikael Stanne of Dark Tranquility on vocals – how is that for fresh thinking?

Nice colour scheme on the artwork, it is made by a good artist, the war theme is not quite to my liking but I can see the appeal. And there is strong appeal in the music as well with great songs coming throughout, I might not have a favourite song as they are all very strong, and I see not weaknesses worth mentioning when going through the album again and again. The thing I probably find most appealing is that it doesn’t feel tired and old the first time I hear it, like death metal do way too often. This is a fresh injection to a very tired genre where most releases feel very irrelevant, and that alone could make it worth exploring.

I recommend checking out this one, the Italian band certainly knows how to make great death metal. That they end the album with a Rush cover just adds to this feeling and though that track may be the one I like the most, they have eight tracks of their own that are really good – so why not check it out?

HHHHHHH