Vattnet Viskar are one of the countless new black metal bands that have taken the once vilified and ridiculed genre and are helping to breathe new life into it making it once again one of the most exciting heavy metal genres. The trouble is, when a genre of music starts to become popular every man and his dog is at it (remember grunge?) and among the genuinely masterful acts one or two are sure to have slipped through the net. Vattnet Viskar are not an awful band, certainly not one of those that slipped through, but on the basis of Sky Swallower (Century Media) they could pop out.

This debut album from the Plaistow, NH gang is a strange and sometimes irritating mixture of thrillingly evil black metal and strolling clean-channel-amp guitar fannying about. The bleakness and the heaviness don’t quite merge as well as some of their genre markers. The first three minutes or so of ‘Breath Of The Almighty’ is a stubbornly dirty attack but the next few minutes are a dull guitar picking exercise. ‘Ascend’ sounds like a studio outtake that was only tacked on to get the numbers up.

It should be noted that to sound bleak doesn’t necessarily mean you have to pull out the old acoustic. The staggering ‘Mythos’ blends the most desolate soundscapes with frighteningly vicious black metal – it’s the helplessness in the guitar tone that sends shivers down the spine. A misfire as far as Vattnet Viskar are concerned, but there is enough on display to prove that when the balance is found, VV are going to tear things apart.

5/10

Dan Bond

Vattnatt Viskar – Facebook