Evolved as One: When Grinders Go it Alone

In a nation of nearly 5 million souls, it's mathematically unlikely that Papirmollen is the only grind fiend calling Norway home, but you wouldn't guess that from his music. The Parlamentarisk Sodomi/PSUDOKU multi-instrumentalist prefers to operate solo. Think of it as a form of quality control.
"Bands with more than one person can have a bigger chance of low-quality results because of mass suggestion,  misunderstandings and contagious diseases," he said. "The members make each other believe they are creating beautiful  masterpieces when it truly is godforsaken stupid vomit music. When you're alone, you have a unique awareness of the  fact that roughly everything you make is tragic, unlistenable, no-quality shit, forevermore. You dislike most of your music so much that you wouldn't even play it to your worst enemy or their friends and loved ones, or anyone else. The  rest of the music you release."
The popular conception of the one man band probably involves some tortured black metal misanthrope whose Nietzschean soul shrivels at the thought of contact with the untermenschen. But the last decade has seen a boom in solo grind projects. Driven by necessity, aided by technology and pursing a single-minded musical focus, solo musicians are holding their own with full bands and pushing grindcore further into the uncharted edges of the map. Along with Papirmollen's outfits, Gigantic Brain, Body Hammer, Standing on a Floor of Bodies, Jesus of Nazareth, Liberteer, Exploding Meth Lab and Wadge have all filtered grindcore through one man's idiosyncratic vision.

G&P Review: Wadge

Wadge
Grindcore Lu’au
Grindcore Karaoke
Wadge’s tiki-tickling Grindcore Lu’au is covered in as many layers of deliberately lofi noise and scuzz and Dick Dale’s surfboard was covered in layers of Sex Wax. For all its colorful art and goofball conceits, Grindcore Lu’au is not an overproduced bit of throwaway fluff. Grindcore’s Don Ho starts with a hilarious rip on Napalm Death’s “Multinational Corporations” that extols the virtues of Hawaiian vacations and starts surfing 40 minutes of double picked surf rock grind. The Hawaiian elements and aquatic surf style guitar are organically blended into the grind in a way that makes perfect sense on “Extremity Jet-Planed/Eyes of Crust/Obstinate Erection” and “Drink for a Minute (Suffer the Distilled Men).” Proving the lofi scratch of the sound is purely deliberate, “Frenzied Suffocation” builds to an ear-bleeding static tsunami before the waves crest and break over the sudden clarity of surf-death hybrid “Demon Dogs of Waikiki.”
At nearly 40 minutes, the only criticism of the album is this is a hefty listen. In fact, Wadge could have easily pulled a Solomon and halved Grindcore Lu’au and passed it off as two full lengths of Slayer-approved proportions. I don’t see myself pulling this one out on a regular basis, but there’s no point in bitching about too much of a good thing. Pass the poi.