Vildhjarta – Måsstaden under vatten
Release Date: 15th October 2021
Label: Century Media Records
Pre-Order
Genre: Progressive Metal, Thall.
FFO: Humanity’s Last Breath, Stoort Neer, Meshuggah, Damned Spring Fragrantia, Uneven Structure, Reflections, Ion Dissonance.
Review By: Ryan Shearer
Don’t you love those TV shows where the seedy underworld is shown by a slit in a door, opened by someone on the other side who asks for the password to get in, so the main character can get on with their shady shit? If gigs ever started to do this, I’d bet my depressingly small life-savings on the password for a Vildhjarta gig:
Thall.
You either understand what this is, or you’re outside the elite group of metal nerds who ‘get it’. Thall is Vildhjarta, Vildhjarta is Thall. With those thunderclap riffs and naughty dissonant bends across time-warping polyrhythmic grooves, Vildhjarta bring the heavy on their newest, highly-anticipated album Måsstaden under vatten. A pseudo-follow-up to 2011’s Måsstaden, Vildhjarta’s third album uses the same thematic elements as the former.
Album opener lavender haze doesn’t waste any time introducing the rapid-fire gallops on the kick drums by Buster Odeholm, and chaotic riffing. One thing which will be of no surprise is when Daniel Bergrstrom and Calle Thomer abuse the lowest strings on their guitars, it is the nastiest fucking shit you’ll ever hear. Absolutely huge, testicle-exploding heaviness. The breakdown is somehow as beautiful as it is aggressive, with ambient melodies creating a beautiful soundscape under which the lower range instruments comfortably sit.
The second track, när de du älskar kommer tillbaka från de döda, introduces Vilhem Bladin’s primal growls and more thundering brutality and kaos2 introduces the first few moments of clean vocals.
The first single released, den helige anden (under vatten) starts off slower before pounding into a fast, abrasive verse. The band have a reputation for sepulchral melodies swathed in tension. The riffs sometimes evoke feeling of melancholic discomfort with the harsh bends, and other times evoke an underlying feeling of bittersweet hopefulness. den helige anden (under vatten) does well to represent both sides of this throughout the 5 and a half minute song length.
Passage noir leans further into melodic metal with a longer clean section after absolutely devastating blast beats. The closing harsh vocals are disgustingly guttural, a real highlight to a relatively diverse track on måsstaden under vatten. Vagabond goes hard for half the track, dials it back and fucks you so hard in the outro it makes the intro sound like Katy Perry in comparison. It’s heavy as all hell. Mitt trὅtta hjarta gives the bass a bit of time to shine before pummelling you with an expected level of guitar riffage.
It would be harsh to call måsstaden under vatten formulaic, but each of the 17 tracks (Yes, 17; 1 hour and 21 minutes worth of new material) might bring something mildly unexpected into the mix, but overall sound broadly the same. In circumstances where this was pretty much any other musical style/ genre, or even a sound that was often compared with others, it’d be a massive drawback. However, as Vildhjarta are so damn unique in how they go about their music, writing 17 tracks of this specific style is simply more of the good stuff you’d struggle to find elsewhere. It’s similar to Meshuggah in that respect; if Meshuggah stopped doing what they do and switched it up, there would be a huge void of their unique style of groove metal you likely wouldn’t find elsewhere even remotely near the same quality; it’s the first side of a double edged sword.
The production and mixing are both strong. The vocals sound absolutely disgusting, drums are punchy and the guitars (especially in the lower register and when palm muting) sound just so, fucking, heavy. Sunset sunrise gets so world-shatteringly weighty it becomes sludgy, and at that point you begin to question if black holes in our far-out cosmos are created by dank riffs played by aliens who heard Vildhjarta on interstellar radio.
While I do take this into account, 17 tracks is a lot. No particular song stands out as being filler, but none stands out as being clearly the best. None of the tracks are poor, but none are the exact opposite either. About 10 tracks in where a normal album would end, you’ve essentially experienced everything måsstaden under vatten has to offer, but it keeps going. It at times felt like a struggle and began to take on the form of white noise after a while. Tracks as standalone songs feel much more digestible, but with so much chaos and not much in terms of musical diversity (the other side of the double edged sword), you might start to get bored if you’re not a Vildhjarta super-fan.
It’s far from bad and an album that purists of Thall will not be disappointed with, but it’s an unforgiving listen. It’s inaccessible and so specifically Vildhjarta that unless you’re already in the fan club, this likely isn’t going to convince you to give the password to the slit in the door. 
(3.5 / 5)
