Review Summary: If I had to fight a tiger, I'd do it listening to this.
In the contest of strange band names, some contenders don’t even stand a chance. With Germany at the forefront, laying claim to such gems as
Cock and Ball Torture (a curious predicament, their output is as detestable as their moniker), it is a blatant given that no (sane) person could be knowledgeable of all less than gloriously named bands. It is more dutiful, then, that the more self assuredly meritorious musical entrepreneur should, at the least, know the atrociously named bands that do the minimal aesthetic favor of at least producing good music. Enter Norwegian grind outfit,
Parlamentarisk Sodomi. Guess at the translation, not the meaning. Probably a wasted effort, but worth a try. The band released
Har Du Sagt "A" Får Du Si "Nal", their debut album, in early 2008.
Now, previous rants on aforementioned topics aside, the band is a one man Norwegian project putting out extremely groove based grind assault on the listener. It’s hard to imagine a more obscure description of a band; a lone man putting out short, spastic songs of an extremely volatile political social nature who almost never shows his face in public. The music, however, more than makes up for whatever alleged image there might be of the sole member. The end result is balls to the wall grind with no need for shiny production or unnecessary breakdowns and one hell of a vocal style.
Make no mistake; this album has a lot of energy. In all likelihood, any chance listener will find their self head-banging. The album is arranged in the standard million mile an hour ordeal, with pummeling riffs coming at the listener so fast it’s nigh upon impossible to keep up. Woven into the fiery siege of brutality is an uncompromising, unspeakably awesome sense of groove. Every single song is made to keep the listener’s head bobbing and fists raised high. Although the production isn’t professional, it certainly shines through where necessary. Everything is mixed equally, and that is to say, dirty. It gives the album a very visceral feel; the album ends up hitting even harder, sounding even more intense than it otherwise would.
The album is loaded with riffs that could beat an elephant to death and ironically maul a tiger.
Parlamentarisk Sodomi has a knack for very groove oriented guitar lines, which the band ends up coordinating very well with simple extreme drum patterns. The riffs end up excelling at sounding louder than they should by drawing the listener’s attention from everything else. The only thing that draws the listener back into the whole experience is the very vitriolic output in the form of the band’s vocals. Let’s take a moment to approach this differently.
Make a sound like “Oo graaah!”
Now, make a sound like “DOo ah Doo aDooaoDoo!”
Without oversimplifying too much, take those noises, amplify them by a thousand, and imagine a Norwegian man grunting them extremely swiftly. That is, more or less, an exact description of what the vocals on
Har Du Sagt "A" Får Du Si "Nal" sound like. The craziest part of it all is, for some reason, this unique delivery makes the lyrics, which are sung strictly in Norwegian, even more fun to listen to. While the listener may not be able to comprehend what is truly being said, they may make an attempt at sounding out the lyrics regardless.
The only fault with the album is that when it’s done, the listener is left wishing there was more to hear. Even though a standard grind release isn’t supposed to be very long, when it’s of such a high quality as this, exceptions can be made. It’s not like a
Nasum length release is expected, but with music this good, 26 minutes just seems like not enough.
Anyone that finds themselves a fan of grind needs to get this album immediately.
