Rakbladsvalsen

Sweden's Hypothermia represent the most excessive example of depressive/suicidal black metal based on torture like, slog paces, dreadful atmosphere and desolate, totally minimal arrangements. Essentially a solo project of guitarist Kim Carl Martin Carlsson, also founder of Kyla, Life Is Pain, Isolationist and the much more famous Lifelover, the guy recorded various demos with guesting drummers and possibly no bass, and most of them had very limited re-issues or were not released in CD format. The project didn't release much material during its timeline, just five full-lengths as of now, including three just in 2006-2007: after then, hiatuses and minor EPs/splits followed, and most of such production stopped in 2015, when Carlsson founded even more solo projects devoted to dark ambient and industrial (A Symphony to the Void, Consider Suicide, Ritualmord, Horns Emerging).

Little is known if Carlsson has ever had some struggle with depression, melancholy and suicidal ideation besides the imagery adopted and occasional posts on Instagram, but one thing is certain: the project's 2007 album, Rakbladsvalsen, is not exactly easy listening. The album is essentially a jam on a few riffs/grooves repeated over and over surpassing the hour duration: on the whole album there may be 5 riffs in total employed, especially because the final instrumental replicates the same ones of the opener in clean, non-distorted, quieter setting. With just guitar and drums, the four Del tracks are based on skeletal, very essential licks based on extended harmonies exploiting open-string full chording, which sounds a bit peculiar due to the D standard tuning.

The atmospheres evoked are slightly more reminiscent of Joy Division, Slint and Bauhaus than black metal in general: there's only occasional double-bass stomping, but the pacing remains medium-slow, very lazy-sounding due to partial out-of-sync recording performances and some recording mistakes left out in the mix. There are a few vocals consisting of hoarse, croak-y falsetto shrieking and lyrics about enjoying self-cutting, seeing blood flow through the skin and losing consciousness: some may find them repulsive, others claustrophobic, while others may even find them an ironic way to get some sleep instead of taking melatonin... just kidding.

The 34-minutes opener is enough to make all listeners running away disgusted long before its duration, since the mood, the melodies and the pacing absolutely never changes, apart of a single change halfway through that gives way to even more riff repetition. The other two tracks are similarly minimal and lazy-as-hell (track 2 even features imprecise alternate picking, while the third one is based on a single seventh-major arpeggio), but despite being shorter they don't encourage as well further listening, quite the contrary.

Here is the paradox: this is the worst album of all time that I listened quite frequently over the years. There are occasions when I absolutely need something very lengthy and noisy to cover up surrounding noise or after getting up by interrupted sleep in the early hours in the morning (I will keep more details myself, it's privacy), and I usually end up taking early Hypothermia releases or something similarly-minded. I can't absolutely see any other reason to listen to this stuff than doing something else around, else I wouldn't even get through the first 10 minutes. I still don't like this album and the moods it is supposed to evoke (and I'm not even a fan of Kim Carlsson himself, I prefer Trist for that matter), yet there are moments where I actually NEED stuff like this.