(((((OPENmind/SATURATEDbrain))))): AVVIKA

Tuesday, 13 January 2015

AVVIKA

Band: AVVIKA

Genres: Punk / Dark Hardcore / Anarchist Crust / Doom / Post-Metal / Post-Rock
Related artists: ?.
Country: Praha/Děčín CZECH REPUBLIC & Stockholm SWEDEN
Years Active: 2013-present
Song: "Fire"
Album: "Avvika"
Year: 2014
Label(s): ?
This post's artist is from the January 2014 Mix. This is track #13.
You can download: the January Mix#12 right here or get the new February 2015 Mix#1 here.
For fans of: The Fall Of Efrafa, Light Bearer, Easy Lover, Buried Inside, Monuments Collapse, Tephra, Titan and Breag Naofa.

Extremely political, emotional, lengthy, powerful and epic crust/hardcore from the Czech Republic and Sweden. The 16-minute song "Fire" catapulted this 12" into my top 20 releases of 2014 - it's that fucking good. I can't believe I actually waited out the nearly 4-minute howling winds and trudging chains intro of this song to actually hear what the band sounds like, and boy I sure was rewarded. The dreamy, eerie, creeping instrumental passage straight out of the gate is quite entrancing and reminds me of Light Bearer like a mofo. At six minutes, the sheer amount of subtle intensity reaches a breaking point and the vocals/instruments really kick in and work as a winding, spiral staircase lacquered in black that leads to the incredible climax beginning at 11:24 of the song (or 7:27 of the condensed version that I posted on youtube - omitting the 4-minute noise intro). The interwoven vocal work here is fucking fantastic when coupled with the rising, falling and always driving guitars. Do yourself a favour and blast that youtube embed below or just go here already.

The 'Avvika' b-side is an even longer song, clocking in at 19:44. The vegan political stance is more apparent than ever on this, "Eternal Treblinka", with movie samples and spoken word passages abound. There's something about the gradual, simplistic builds AVVIKA does that resemble waves, as they continually crash over one another and amalgamate into a crusty, sludgy tidal wave of hardcore. My favourite section of this song follows the "arrogant man" poem just after the 7-minute mark which blasts into a really heavy and moving breakdown lathered with booming bass and some rustic, higher-end guitar compensation. The final four minutes includes a very well-spoken audio clip about the lack of animal rights and compassion which is quite stirring.

A very random band that I'm kind of surprised I took the chance of downloading. Good call, Dave. Good call. Has Halo Of Flies heard this, yet? That'd be a good union.

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DISCOGRAPHY

2013 - Demo (same two tracks as the 2014 release)

2014 - Avvika 12"LP (stream/donate/download here)

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(2014) AVVIKA - "Fire (condensed version)" (from 'Avvika')