More Norwegian fighters coming up! Our pal here, mr. Sverre Stokland or Gard sings and plays the guitar, his wife is bringing the dark lyrics and 3 more guys fill up this puzzle called ‘Khold’. This is their 5^th work and probably their best production to date.

Don’t expect to hear hyper fast, primitive black metal! ‘Khold’ are slow or mid-tempo influenced by ‘Satyricon’ (especially in their sound), ‘Celtic Frost’ (in their modest guitar ideas) but sometimes the Norwegian blood dominates and kind of speeds things up! The lyrics are also in their mother tongue and they seem to enjoy this (try saying no to your wife…) but with Gard’s voice being on top of the other instruments and the lack of English the band can’t be pushed too far commercially.

One strange thing is that some riffs will remind you ‘alternative’ hard rock/metal bands of the early ’90s! A tip for experienced listeners! The CD flows with the same technique as far as the set of songs but the heavy and ‘dirty’ guitar sound will shake some heads. An even more funny thing is that I didn’t like it when I first heard it but it got into me the more I heard it and I can’t find a reason to bark about it!

I have the slightest idea if black metal fans will like this CD (or this band). They try a different approach but nothing close to masters of risk like ‘Arcturus’ or ‘Virus’. It’s much more comprehensive without becoming weak or dull. And this Norwegian ‘negativity’ in their guitars keeps pushing me back to it. That doesn’t mean that some won’t get bored of it, ok?