(written by Islander)
The name of Hatchend‘s debut album is Summer of ’69. As you can see, the cover art is a collage of Charlie Manson’s face covered with what appears to be Marilyn Monroe’s hair, or maybe it’s Sharon Tate’s. It was in the summer of ’69 when Manson’s cult murdered at least nine people, including Tate.
Hatchend‘s drummer Rikard Wermén asks, “Where were you in the Summer of ‘69? You got any proof of that?” I know where I was. I was alive then in Texas, and sentient enough to remember learning about the Manson cult’s murders as they came to light, along with a lot of other things happening that summer, including the Apollo 11 moon landing, Woodstock, and the release of Bowie’s Space Oddity. Vanity prevents me from showing the proof, because it would reveal how old I was then and thus how absurdly old I am now.
Interestingly, as far as I can tell, the members of Hatchend weren’t alive in the summer of ’69, though they’re definitely not young kids. Also interesting, I haven’t found anything which explains why they chose that title for their album. Now that I’ve written this, maybe it will be revealed.
But regardless of the title’s inspiration, the music on Summer of ’69 kicks a big boatload of ass, as wild in its own way as the wildness of the turbulent times some of us lived through in that summer of 55 years ago.
L-R: Dan Widing (bass), Rikard Wermén (drums), Elis Edin Markskog (guitar), Kalle Nimhagen (vocals)
photo by Abdul Alhazred
This Swedish band’s lineup have a past history of getting wild, having previously performed in such bands as Deranged, Razorrape, Birdflesh, and Deathening. As for what they’ve done together in this new group, drummer Rikard Wermén tells it this way: “It’s thrash metal, it’s hardcore, it’s crossover fuck you music, it’s… Whatever the fuck you want it to be. Please do have in mind, if it’s too fast you’re too damn slow.”
It sure as hell is fast, and it sure as hell is furious. Musically, they filled 8 jugs with gasoline, stones, and nails, lit the sweat-soaked rags stuffed in the tops, and hurled them into the air, one after the other.
“Shackled Humanity” is the first detonation. Here’s what drummer Rikard Wermén said about that one: “You know that black eternal void you feel in your stomach? It’s like a wild beast you just need to tame as you’re scared to death what would happen if you let it loose. You’re falling deep into your own personal abyss of darkness and there’s… No return. We tried to transform that feeling into music, and ‘Shackled Humanity’ came close.”
In that song, the guitars maniacally scream like sirens on fire, the bass rumbles and thunders, the drums spray bullets, and Kalle Nimhagen spits the words with larynx-ripping ferocity. The music sears and batters, blazes and blares. It’s mean and it’s mad, and driven to even higher delirium by the soloing (courtesy of a guest appearance by Leon De Muerte of Phobia, Murder Construct, and ex-Intronaut). If it don’t get your blood rushing right damned quick, seek medical care ASAP.
Hatchend lean into their grindcore affinities in that ripper. From there, they keep the throttle wide open, racing and raging through “Who’s The Foe Today?“, which swings and swirls as well as bludgeons, and it gloriously blazes, outrageously exultant. One can easily imagine just how berserk the mosh pit will be when they cut this one loose on a crowd.
One can also imagine a brass section augmenting this crew, because the music both on that track and elsewhere often sounds like an old-school big band blasting out the exhilarating melodies. But no big band ever drove with the kind of visceral, fast-swinging, hard-knuckled punch that Hatchend‘s rhythm section mete out in their gallops, nor did any big band vocalist ever scream his guts out in a red-eyed rage like Nimhagen does.
From track to track, all that makes for a thoroughly electrifying (and thoroughly wild) experience, melding the bone-breaking belligerence of hardcore, the high-speed mayhem of grind, and the cattle-prod jolts of balls-to-the-wall thrash. The thrashiness really comes to the fore in tracks like the fire-breathing “Scapegoat“, another advance single from the album:
But over and over again, another thing that really stands out is that brazen and blaring quality of the riffing. It makes the music sound explosively grand, like one joyous fuck-you after another. And yeah, it really is a violent kind of joy, the joy that comes from uncorking a fury you’re tired of holding back.
The songs also pack plenty of whirling-dervish fretwork, creating adrenaline-fueling and head-spinning swirls of sound within the blazing fireballs and gut-punching, turbocharged rumbles around them.
And if you want to get your head pumping like a piston powered by a supercharger, you’ll get those chances too, especially in “Feed This Emptiness“.
photo by Abdul Alhazred
One thing you won’t get is a chance to slow your heart rate. Hatchend stay in the fast lane almost all the way through the album (the only exception being the bleak opening moments of album closer “First Blood“), careening with abandon, flames jetting out of the exhaust. Which is to say, Summer of ’69 is a non-stop, hugely cathartic, and criminally addictive thrill-ride, as big an antidote for complacency and boredom as you’re likely to find this summer (or any other).
And so, we are very damned happy to premiere Summer of ’69 in advance of its August 23rd release by Selfmadegod Records.
Summer Of ‘69 was recorded in two days at HoboRec (man, what a two days those must have been!), with the vocals recorded at Wheelmust Studios by Elis Edin Markskog. The record was then mixed and mastered by Ulf Blomberg.
The record was completed with cover artwork and layout by Rikard Wermén and Elis Edin Markskog and photography by Abdul Alhazred.
Selfmadegod will release the album on CD and digital formats, and you can pre-order now via the links below. They recommend it for fans of Birdflesh, Exhumed, Rotten Sound, Phobia, Toxic Holocaust, D.R.I., Suicidal Tendencies, Nuclear Assault, and Haemorrhage.
One final note: We’ve been imagining what kind of mayhem these songs will trigger in a live setting, and some lucky people will get to see that for themselves, because Hatchend will make their live debut at Malmö Massacre on August 25th. (Check the poster below.)
PRE-ORDER:
https://selfmadegod-store.com/product-eng-16865-HATCHEND-Summer-Of-69-CD-PRE-ORDER.html
https://selfmadegod.bandcamp.com/album/summer-of-69
HATCHEND:
https://www.facebook.com/hatchendofficial
https://www.instagram.com/hatchendofficial
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