Hræ is a one-man Icelandic wrecking machine and its creator, I, has launched an apocalyptic tirade onto the black metal landscape with his premier opus ‘Þar Sem Skepnur Reika’, a monumental complex beast of a release.
The album has a slow, doomy, and depressing start, and the album doesn’t pick up much pace but keeps within the realms of a beautiful gloomy dark ritual.
The whole package is sadistic and blasphemous, and it is as raw as you would expect from the more prolific Scandinavians in black metal terms. Hræ has infused some real black magic into the spawn of this one-man orchestrator, and it is done with some real swagger and confidence
The path well-trodden isn’t strayed from too far with I’s masterpiece, and this is an album which you will find yourself compelled to listen to track after track, perfect for a dark stormy night, and atmosphere is certainly warranted here, one which will allow you to sit back and give the album the respect it dutifully commands. Images of Darkthrone and Burzum are conjured up, ignited in flames, and subconsciously referred to in the reflection of the guitar riffs and bass lines throughout.
During the whole production there is atmosphere and ambience which makes for compelling listening with the execution of each track becoming spellbinding and fascinating in equal measures. This almost feels like I has held a little back in reserve, just titrating enough into the album to spawn an offspring worthy of a place in any black metal collection, yet leaving just enough in reserve to encroach on us with his next album and morph into an ever growing monster
(7.5/10 Phil Pountney)
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