Artist: Grimmd
Album: Demo I-II
Record Label: Signal Rex
Anonymous Icelandic group's demos buried by the past emerge with plenty of thrilling darkness
Mysticism and anonymity arguably doesn't contribute half as much to any other genre as it does to black metal. Apparently recorded between 2010 and 2011 and re-released early this year by Signal Rex on limited edition cassette, Icelandic group Grimmd's Demo I-II leaves as much to the imagination of the listener as it does come across like a transmission wrenched from the darkest cavern of the deepest forest.
The seven tracks on offer here certainly presume a chameleon-like approach within the bleak, raw-as-hell confines of the band's sound. There's the thick, off-kilter ugliness of opener 'Hvarf', the beautifully frost-bitten, cascadian epicness of 'Kvika' while 'Skjatti' adopts the same classicism but in a more condensed, demonic form.
The following four tracks are all entitled 'Onefnt' and sound even more distant and tortured, especially the first which features this release's most nihilistic riffing and howling. The second is a rampaging, groove-ridden blast, while the fourth is a devastatingly slow and funereal crawl.
There is plenty of black metal of Grimmd's ilk out there, and those well versed in the scene's anti-social fringes will find nothing particularly forward thinking here. All the same, this is fiercely secretive classicism generously distributed with often thrilling darkness. It also adds to the seemingly ever-increasing richness of Iceland's BM scene.
7/10
Key Tracks: 'Kvika', 'Skjatti', 'Onefnt IV'
For Fans Of: Xasthur, Nidingr
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