Welcome back to Bandcamp Buried Treasure! Can you believe we've just completed nine months of this article? That's friggin' crazy! I may or may not have a big one-year anniversary extravaganza set of posts for it too. You'll see. Anyway, you know the rules of the article by now:
- I hunt down awesome artists on Bandcamp that have their album up for Buy It Now/Free Download and give them a write up. I'm not explicitly telling you to download the album for free since I'm a big supporter of buying your music, but I like the option for my readership to be there.
- The goal is to introduce you to smaller bands or obscure side-projects you might not have heard of. Anything to expand your musical horizons by just a little bit each week!
- And of course, for there to be a conversation about similar bands or bands you think I should be covering. I check the comments section!
Like I've been saying, I switched the format up a bit with two new sections, titled "The Basic Idea" and "Why I Love It." The former is a short news-style lead that paints a vivid picture of what you're about to hear to get you interested and help you understand a little why I chose the record, while the latter serves simply as a review piece.
Let's get heavy with Karhu now, right?
The Basic Idea
I always wondered what it would be like if Lamb of God's Randall Blythe, Opeth and Black Stone Cherry got into a studio to duke out a sound. Survival of the Richest is a riff-fest, head banging good time with a truckload of groovy bits and sing-a-long choruses that won't be leaving your rotation anytime soon.
Why I Love It
To be blunt, this album fucking rocks. The guitar duo of Joseph Parry and Osku Kinnunen is something to be reckoned with and is easily my favorite aspect of the record. Each song has quite a few riffs that will blow you right away, and just when you think you can settle back down for a few seconds another gust of insane fretwork will knock you right back on to your ass. With the album being out for a little over a year now I'm shocked this due hasn't been more widely recognized.
Then there's the aspect of the vocals. I like that there really doesn't seem to be any kind of boundaries on them in that stylistically anything seems to go. Clean chorus with some ridiculous lows to follow it up? Sure! Bluesy, ballsy swagger right in the middle of a death metal jam? Yeah man! The album sounds like it was written to be fun, but also be taken seriously enough that someone would pick it up. It's just a good time that also happens to be amazingly written.
If Karhu aren't on a major label by next year at this time I will eat my shoes.
