KVELERTAK, Truckfighters @Academy 3 11/3/13

The first band that RTM saw play a proper gig was LA glam band Love/Hate. Their bass player at the time, Skid, used to cavort around the stage before the rest of the band joined him. We found ourselves musing on this while watching Sweden’s Truckfighters, as they start their gig tonight.

That, you see, was exactly the way the three-piece start their show too. A topless Dango races around playing a huge riff before being joined by his bandmates to play more, well, huge riffs.

Their half an hour is an entertaining one if you like heavy stoner grooves (which we do around here), but they do get just a trifle samey as they jam their way through. Singer/bass man Ozo has a fine voice for these type of songs, though and by the time they have dangled their guitars into the crowd to let them play their instruments, you feel that they have won plenty of new friends.

We can still vividly recall the moment we first saw Kvelertak. August 2010 we found ourselves at Sonisphere to see Iron Maiden. The disabled viewing area was, frankly, rubbish. So instead of pretending we could see (or hear) Slayer we toddled off to the Strongbow tent to check out a band we had never heard of. The singer ran out wearing an owl mask. The group appeared to be bellowing death metal songs in a foreign tongue, but equally appeared to be doing so over punky, hard rock riffs, with the occasional Mastodon groove thrown in.

We were excited, enthralled and captivated all at once. And, if you want to know what Kvelertak sound like, then that, ladies and gentlemen is about it. In a world where most new bands belong to a scene or are “core” this or “post” that, Kvelertak stand alone as totally unique. They seem, gradually to be crossing over into a more mainstream rock way. Certainly there are more here than when last we sat in this room and watched the band around 12 months back.

This tour is to celebrate the upcoming release of album number two “Meir” which is out later this month. They play plenty of it, and happily it sounds just as fresh and exciting as the self- titled debut CD. Full of riffs and energy, the new songs (which are not named by the band on stage) sound fantastic.

Actually, song titles don’t matter, since RTM can’t speak Norwegian at all (except for knowing the band name means “Chokehold” in their native tongue, watching a Kvelertak gig is more about a visceral feeling of excitement. Their hour long set flies by and ends – like last years did – with “Utryyd dei svake” but this is a band that is improving all the time – and bear in mind they were pretty good to start with.