Årabrot are a Norwegian noise rock trio who operate in a seriously '90s-besotted style; their rumbling, jagged guitar and pummeling, semi-tribal drumming are all equal parts
Unsane,
Jesus Lizard, and
Knut. Vocalist/guitarist Kjetil Nernes doesn't have
David Yow's magnetic personality, but he's got vitriol on his side, and his two partners, drummer Vidar Evensen and effects-meister Stian Skagen, match the waves of noise coming from his instrument with a raw throb all their own.
Årabrot patently reject black metal, which has somehow become their homeland's primary musical export over the last 15 years or so; instead, they keep their heads down and make an Amphetamine Reptile-style racket, occasionally turning positively hypnotic (but in more of a cobra-staring-down-a-mouse way than a you-are-getting-very-sleepy way). "The Dolorous Years" is over 12 minutes long, and the last four or five minutes of that are taken up with a pounding drum pattern, over which electronics hiss and roar; it's like a collaboration between
Merzbow and
Shellac. The final track, "The Primrose Path," is a death march/dirge that crosses
Knut's relentless battery with the trudging resignation of Alex Newport's post-
Fudge Tunnel band
Theory of Ruin. This is an album for people who like their rock to rock, but in the ugliest, meanest way possible. ~ Phil Freeman