KROM: Music Is My Enemy – EP Review

KROM

Music Is My Enemy

Cracked Ankles Records

DL / Streaming available here

The House Of Evil Blizzard are at it again! Gothenburg band KROM are the latest signing and hit us with a brooding post punk debut full of gothic twists and psych. Wayne AF Carey checks it out…

When speaking to the Cracked Ankles label boss about this release he informs me that one of KROM is an Alty lad who moved to Gothenburg, Sweden years ago and surprise surprise, was a bass player in Evil Blizz. He describes their sound as Goth meets Psych, Goych? Psoth? Fuckin’ ell. We have enough genres to deal with mate!

Anyway, first track Music Has Become My Enemy kicks straight in with a great bass sound and tribal drums before the anthemic vocals come in like a Goth classic. It got me straight away from the start. A rolling tune, catchy as fuck and short and sweet. Adolescent Goth Anthem rolls in with a dirty bass and haunting synths. Exactly what it says on the tin. Dark and brooding with a touch of Killing Joke threatening your senses. Itch is the sound of psych doom washing over you, minimalist tribal drums that sound huge. It’s another dark number that chills your bones with that wash of guitar effects to make it really sinister yet uplifting. Unaware ups the tempo with more dirty sounds coming at you from all angles and a cracking drum beat flowing through the layered ear battering guitars. Peter Hageus has a great vocal that really compliments the brooding noise full of shoegaze psych goth necking a can of Red Bull.

Aim To Please is a really close cousin to the sound of Blizz with the eerie keyboards, up tempo beats and drone bass we all know and love. Highlight of the album as it gives me such a rush. Fuckin’ tune. Side (Blizz vocalist) will love it. All Is Well is a blast of psych drone that doesn’t hold back and motors along like a German car with dysfunctioning brakes. A slab of experimentation at its best. If you download this from Bandcamp you get the pleasure of two remixes from Haq 123 (Kav from EB), and an Evil Blizzard remix. Darkness is a mad slice of industrial drum n bass from the Haq 123 lads just to fuck you up. It certainly surprised me and sounds mental. A top slice of techno jungle fuckery. All Is (Not So) Well is given the full Blizz treatment, nearly four minutes of unsettling horror soundtrack straight from the rotten bowels of Filthy Dirty and his unsavoury crew. You’ll feel like you’re being followed by a murderous cult looking for your virgin blood (I’m fuckin’ safe then). A nice EP from a Swedish band with no bones about being groundbreaking, just writing tunes for the goth punk contingent who love a bit of darkness with a kick. Expect a lot more in 2022…

Bandcamp

Words by Wayne Carey, Reviews Editor for Louder Than War. His author profile is here