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Long reviled, understandably hated, doused in adjectives and superlatives, Maniac has long borne the cloak of rebellion and reaction. From the ashes of former band Mayhem which propelled him to the forefront of the foreign media with his intense live-performances (often ending in stages soaked with blood, lawsuits and visits to the ER) he now returns with his latest project Skitliv.

Aided by such notable contributors as Current 93’s David Tibet, Shining (Sweden)’s Kvarforth and Attila Csihar their first full-length Skandinavisk Misantropi was released Oct 19th.

I am almost at a loss for words.

“I’m stuck in this world of shit-stained tears”. Am I supposed to take that seriously? Is the joke on me?

“Luciferon”: A disastrous intro-esque track which strangles the listener with 5 painful minutes of “attempted” spooky muffled poetry over a “haunting” sample which then inevitably erupts into a predictable and spineless nothingness.

“Slow Pain Coming”: Drizzles in like an unwanted rain with Maniac’s growling voice hardly managing to lift a repetitive and boring song from its shit-stained grave.

I can’t even be bothered to review it track by track… I will, however, say in passing that limited heights are reached during the song “Densetsu”, though predictable and rather monotonous, it manages to carry a certain amount of fury and energy until the godawful guitar solo’s break in…

Music like this makes me want to shove my tongue in a blender, pop in a couple of bull testicles, give them a good blitz for 2 minutes, then pour them into cake moulds, bake cakes and pass them out to people at a Skitliv concert.

Amateur guitar riffs bloodied by years of over-indulgence, drums that sound predictable and lacking invention, dodgy production. It seems to me the entire premise for this record was based around the strength of Maniacs voice, which in some cases is truly noteworthy. The music, the arrangements, the songs, the lyrics, the sounds, the instruments were all just meant to lay down a soundscape for him to unravel his tirade of screeches and screams. In short, there is no meat in this record. It’s just a collection of ideas played for far too long and sung over in “relatively” convincing fashion. Even David Tibet’s whiny dirge cannot breathe life into the bedroom soundtrack of “Towards The Sea of Loss Vultures Face Kain”. Maniac’s voice bursts in, predictably, the song lifts with heavier drums and distorted guitars, but it just feels like it was the “thing to do”… «Oh yeah, David — you sing and whine for a bit, and then I will unleash the fury of my satanic voice and the drums and guitars will kick in and things will be evil and huge… sound good? Yeah.. yeah… press record and start reading these words. Here… wrote them while dipping ravens blood in the excrement of untainted babies while urinating onto a church from a passing airplane heading to an occult convention obscured by ancient trees in Romania. 3,2,1… and go…»

These songs will never make it on a mix tape.

These songs will never make Skitliv famous (except in Germany).

These songs will never be used by David Tibet to further his career.

These songs are just bedroom frustration, impish rebellion wrapped in cathartic titles and uninspired vitriol.

You’re going to have to try harder, much, much harder.

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