{"id":13875,"date":"2020-11-05T05:00:10","date_gmt":"2020-11-05T05:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=13875"},"modified":"2020-10-31T11:34:50","modified_gmt":"2020-10-31T11:34:50","slug":"henrik-palm-poverty-metal-svart-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=13875","title":{"rendered":"Henrik Palm \u2013 \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 (Svart Records)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201cFuck Genres\u201d proclaims Swedish multi-instrumentalist Henrik Palm in the press blurb that accompanies his second solo album \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019. Reflecting on this statement whilst also chuckling at the fact that the album title was derived from a term he\u2019d heard being used to describe the type of cheesy bargain bin 80s metal that labels like Mausoleum used to release was enough to get me to give this eight tracker a cautionary listen, and by Hades am I glad I did.<\/p>\n

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I have to admit I had no idea that Henrik had once been a member of (the rather splendid) In Solitude or that he was once a Nameless Ghoul in Ghost but one listen to \u2018Bully\u2019 the opening track on \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 (and without knowing Palm\u2019s past) you\u2019d perhaps be forgiven for thinking he was lifting influences from both of these bands with the post-punk\/gothic background of In Solitude\u2019s superb \u2018Sister\u2019 album very much present and the track also topped off with the dramatic melodic pomp and ceremony of Ghost. In many ways it has the same immediate appeal to me as Zeal & Ardor\u2019 \u2018Stranger Fruit\u2019 did a couple of years back and that\u2019s probably why I\u2019ve played little else other than \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 since I first discovered it just a day or so ago.<\/p>\n

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\u2018Sugar\u2019 is up next and it\u2019s a tune that initially brings to mind noughties UK progressive alt rockers Minuteman before it dissolves into the larger-than-life rock sound that characterised the early major label days of Ghost. \u2018Concrete Antichrist\u2019 continues the underlying theme of the opening trio of tunes, twisting and turning into your psyche, heavy on melody whilst never being what you might call an \u201ceasy listen.\u201d At 3 minutes and 36 seconds its actually ready made to be a single but given the fragmentated state of conventional rock radio right now it\u2019ll sadly never be aired on anything other than specialist stations.<\/p>\n

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A track that very much could breakthrough into the mainstream though is \u2018Given Demon\u2019, released as a video in the run up to the release of \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 many existing fans of Palm\u2019s work were quick to point out this track has more than a hint of QOTSA about it, but then again didn\u2019t QOTSA have more than a hint of Masters Of Reality about them, and Masters Of Reality just a hint of The Doors? I hope you catch my drift? Whatever the influences \u2018Given Demon\u2019 is a wonderful slab of psych-pop especially the dreamy end sequence which actually sounds like it could have been written by Andy Partridge during XTC\u2019s studio only days.<\/p>\n

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Being something of a huge fanboy of Twisted \u2018fucking\u2019 Sister, Palm\u2019s cover of \u2018Destroyer\u2019 (originally from the \u2018Under The Blade\u2019 album) which crops up just after the record\u2019s halfway mark is not only something of a surprise but also a huge revelation, slowed down to sludge like speed but with a vocal that actually seems to float over the menacing bass throb this is exactly how a cover version should be done as it leaves me shocked and sniggering at the audacity of it all. I hope Dee and the boys like it too.<\/p>\n

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It\u2019s then, just when think I have the measure of Henrik Palm\u2019s \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 sound that up pops \u2018Nihil\u2019, a short and gentle stand out that segues perfectly into \u2018Nihilist\u2019 a tune which harks back to the gothic majesty of In Solitude and gives me goosebumps just thinking about it. and sat alongside Division Of Laura Lee\u2019s recent \u2018Apartment\u2019 album it reinforces the fact that Sweden is once again producing some of the most refreshingly essential music out there in 2020.<\/p>\n

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Closing things down we have \u2018Last Christmas\u2019 (no not that \u2018Last Christmas\u2019) a largely instrumental track that initially draws heavily on the influence of Black Sabbath before spiralling off into another rock galaxy altogether.<\/p>\n

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At just 37 minutes long \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 is a record that leaves me wanting more, (so much so I immediately went out and also bought Palm\u2019s 2017 debut \u2018Many Days\u2019) and in an age when the mainstream rock media seems to think that regurgitating the term \u201cClassic Rock\u201d is some sort of quality mark, \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019 sticks a huge middle finger up at that assumption.<\/p>\n

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Fuck genres, this is poverty metal and I fucking love it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy\u00a0Here<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cFuck Genres\u201d proclaims Swedish multi-instrumentalist Henrik Palm in the press blurb that accompanies his second solo album \u2018Poverty Metal\u2019. Reflecting on this statement whilst also chuckling at the fact that the album title was derived from a term he\u2019d heard being used to describe the type of cheesy bargain bin 80s metal that labels like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13877,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[6050,6049,761,2399],"class_list":["post-13875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review","tag-poverty-metal","tag-henrik-palm","tag-johnny-hayward","tag-svart-records","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13875"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13878,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13875\/revisions\/13878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}