500 LTD signed and numbered copies / CD included180G vinylGOAT2CGR135 Coverdesign & Layout by Per Spjøtvold On the 24th of March 2023 Goat the Head released their latest album “Et Lokalsamfunn i Sorg” on Crispin Glover Records. Over the course of twenty years, this Norwegian metal fourpiece has cycled through their fair share of peculiar concepts, outlandish appearances and musical orientations. Death metal cavemen. Thrashtronauts. Heavy metal physicists extreme. On their fourth full length album, however, their thematic approach is considerably closer to home and to heart than ever before. Even so, this might be Goat the Head’s most eccentric endeavor yet. Firstly, all lyrics are in Norwegian. More specifically trøndersk. A dialect native to Trøndelag, the central part of Norway from where the band originally hails. Secondly the music is as experimental as it is haunting. Predominantly rich with almost every color off the metal palette, but darkened with unexpected timbres, twists and turns. At times it is cinematic. Though most often it is heavy, slow and foreboding. Most often, it is doom. It all began with two contradicting intentions. A desire to make a sophisticated concept album, while simultaneously wanting to return to the band’s initial spontaneous, carefree and arbitrary nature. As a result the record resembles both a tangible fable and a feverish dream. We are transported back to the early nineties, to the rural parts of central Norway. A young person is searching for identity and purpose in a cautious and caustic community when tragedy unexpectedly strikes. Hence the title: “A local community in grief.” The journey begins well before the needle hits the groove. At Crispin Glover Records the packaging always plays an imperative part of the experience. On “Et Lokalsamfunn i Sorg” each vinyl specimen comes with a completely unique artwork piece. Vocalist Per Spjøtvold has hand drawn five hundred characters, one for each individual album copy. Each character represents an inhabitant of the fictional community. He or she has the function of a chaperone, the listener’s one-on-one personal link to someone living inside the narrative. In a murmur of starlings we descend upon a small town in the periphery of Trøndelag. Something is brooding here. Something is building. Conflicts culminate as we quarrel our way inwards, towards the center. By the time we reach the core and turn the record over, tragedy has come to pass. The community must suffer through the stages of collective grief. Will normality return in the end? Was this place ever normal? Goat the Head has always been a typical live outfit. Not only on the stage, but also during the writing and recording process. This time the approach was totally different. Like a game of exquisite corpse the album was made in an individualistic and scattered fashion. Each member was to design their given bodypart all by themself, not necessarily knowing much about how the neighboring limb would appear. The process was adventurous, unpredictable and bewildering. At times bizarre. How hazardous is it to put a Kenneth Kapstad on fire in an old gunpowder plant to record explosive doom metal drums? Lethal, that’s how. When riffmeister and main composer Ketil L. Sæther were to record his parts he went straight to the studio of the Wizard ofStrings: Geir Sundstøl. The illustrious multi- instrumentalist even joined in on the recording,adding heaps of cinematic character to the album. In the meantime Per Spjøtvold was plunging deep into the Hammond organ hole. Penning lyrics. Stacking chunky layers of vocals and growls on top of each other. Constantly running out of time. Trond Frønes delivered clever, harmonious and snarly bass lines, completing the topsy-turvy anatomy of the album. It was time for producer Bård Ingebrigtsen to mix it. To sew the various appendages properly together and get the body animated. Ultimately, Brad Boatright mastered the works. The band was finally able to encounter that hulking mass of a body in broad daylight. It had indeed turned out quite exquisite.1.Svart Sol Psykopomp – 4:25 2.Kjiving (Tå Karro) – 4:07 3.Kustus – 3:25 4.Spark og Speinning – 3:55 5. Sluk – 2:20 6. Tornado og Oljesøl – 3:57 7. Innrøkt Åkle – 5:16 8. Faansmakt – 3:50 9. Einn en Hoinn – 3:42 10. Auåpnar – 4:29 11. Aksept (Postludium og Utgang) – 0:41 12. Varra Vanle – 3:44
