Review: Håndgemeng ‘Satanic Panic Attack’
I initially became curious about Oslo, Norway’s self-described ‘doom and roll’ Håndgemeng (a rough and tumble scuffle in Norwegian) via one of my esteemed colleagues after his review of their excellent Ultraritual. I was intrigued by the band’s approach, which I found to be unique in a genre that can sometimes feel as though it is overflowing with regurgitated Black Sabbath and Sleep riffs.
Musically, the band display some specific influences, like the tumbling, driving, riff-heavy, Scandinavian desert rock of bands like Greenleaf and Lowrider along with proto-punk, like The Stooges. Add in a decent dose of straight-up metal and epic flourishes of cosmic, spaced-out, passages along with general rock and roll weirdness, you have one of the more interesting bands in the European heavy rock underground.
However, where they really stood out for me was the vocal approach of frontman Martin Wennberg. His singing can go from a throat-scraping hardcore delivery and cadence to a trippy croon, sometimes within the same track, and coupled with his bandmates obvious skills on their instruments, Håndgemeng was instantly a fun and unique listen. In addition, Wennberg, can remind me a bit of the late Riley Gale of Power Trip, or Nate Newton of The Doomriders and Converge. But with Gale and Newton, those vocals are totally suited to the music, wherein with Wennberg’s vocal stylings, coupled with Håndgemeng’s instrumentation, it can be aurally taken of context, but it doesn’t take long before the band unveil their multi-faceted approach to heavy rock and roll, and to awesome effect.
With that, I was eager to dive into their latest release, the amazingly titled Satanic Panic Attack, a title that instantly hits you and makes you wonder why it hadn’t already been used by another band and at minimum for a song. The cover art is also next level, boasting a black and white picture of the band members, nude, wearing corpse paint, sitting and embracing each other hippie-style in front of some amplifiers. I mean, before we even hear a note, the title, and cover alone are certainly enough to quip even the most jaded of rockers curiosity. Satanic Panic Attack is also evidently a concept album, centered around the public hysteria of heavy metal, and the occult in general in the ‘80s, known as, you guessed it, ‘Satanic Panic’.
Opening with the crunchy fist shaking, NWOBHM charge of The Cauldron Born, which also manages to incorporate everything from blast-beat action to a soaring, melodic, sing-along chorus with the whole attack reminding me a bit of old-school, late ‘90s Turbonegro. The next track also offers a fantastic title in Medieval Knievel and as the song unfolds into a desert rock rambler that’s complete with The Stooges style single note keyboard bangs and the unstoppable chorus, wherein the entire band yells ‘hail Satan’. It doesn’t get much more metal, nor tongue-in-cheek, than this, and it’s all at once both awesome and hilarious.
Everything about Satanic Panic Attack was awesome, from the title and the cover to the next level sonics within these grooves…
The title track, Satanic Panic Attack, also has late ‘70s, NWOBHM vibes but steamrolls along with an urgency and nastiness that feels like it can all go off the rails at any time, while A Path Less Traveled begins as a spacey, stoner rock palette-cleanser, wherein Wennberg shows off his mellower vocals, while the song ebbs and flows into a colossally heavy, tripped-out planet crusher.
Earthwoman, meanwhile, begins as a stoner-punk pummeler, complete with Håndgemeng’s now-familiar shout-along vocals, before abruptly dropping into gnarly stoner blues breakdowns that would give any southern sludge band a run for their money. There’s also plenty of cool, swirling guitar noodling that gives the song a spacey feel, but, as is their wont, Håndgemeng keep the listener on their toes as the track winds down with another crunchy, rock groove, before finally giving way to a cosmic, epic breakdown.
Elsewhere, The Sundrinkerboasts a killer, raucous, Scandinavian desert rock groove that drifts into weird, cosmic territory and back again with deft fluidity. Down Below, also takes the listener on a journey, as the track initially masquerades as a desert rock head-nodder, but somewhere down the line morphs into a driving rock and roller, while closer Supermoon proffers some cool, clean, echo-y guitar as Wennberg croons away but soon enough, the song turns into a rollicking, dunga-dunga-dunga bouncer, before, not surprisingly, kicking into an up-tempo, stoner-prog breakdown that brings this wild album to a close.
Everything about Satanic Panic Attack was awesome, from the title and the cover to the next level sonics within these grooves. There’s a fun, weird, rock and roll, tongue in cheek vibe running throughout the album, and that coupled with Håndgemeng’s killer, unique approach to desert rock make the album undoubtedly one of the better releases I’ll encounter this year.
Label: Ripple Music
Band Links: Facebook | Bandcamp | Spotify | Instagram
Scribed by: Martin Williams
