In their loudest, most obtusely howling provocation to date Utrecht, Netherlands-based black metal duo Wrang make their return without the fear of death or the strictures of metamodernism in mind as they scale back their production values for the sake of creating a painfully manic veneer hovering its rawness atop a fairly substantive trio of songs. As suggested ‘Haatspraak‘ does well to communicate its irreverence towards life and a violent nihil in action but this needn’t give the impression their tunefully swinging sense of movement and rhythmic austerity has been bludgeoned away, only that this EP should feel like a necessary devolution in grip of the cudgel, a devil may care attack.

Wrang were founded circa 2013 by way of drummer Valr (Bodyfarm, ex-Grafjammer) and guitarist, bassist and vocalist Galgenvot (Nevel, Sarastus) the two of which’ve brought in various folks to their live and studio sessions to round out variously ambitious recordings including two full-length albums. The style explored on those records is typically acknowledged for the fringes of black n’ roll and oaken melodicism it’d toyed with, avoiding the usual retro-tourism for the sake of a sound often compared to Taake or even more recent records from Horna. ‘Haatspraak‘ was recorded about a year after their most recent LP (‘De vaendrig‘, 2022) released and I’d say the juxtaposition between these two releases is stark at a glance since that’d been the most refined and accomplished work from the band to date and these three pieces are cut from a more raw tangent and do not focus on the fidelity of the recording or, eh, the perfect vocal take as the duo rip through each song.

Whereas the most recent full-length album from the band was split between nihilistic pessimism and irregular bouts of hopeful enthusiasm the tone of this roughly twenty minute EP is suggested as forlorn and resentful, a heightened state of defiance and of course getting this point across involves plenty of skin-crawling howling and retching to kick things off as opener “De Cirkel Vervolmaakt” shows us that Wrang can still put together a haunting melody, a decent riff or two, while generating a certain imprecise rhythmic splendor by cadence alone. That is to say that the vocals here are strained, uncalculated in this bluntly hoarked introduction and will soon become grating but this doesn’t entirely defeat the stride of their introduction with its cello-stoked midpoint in galloping refrain.

The title track has an almost Finnish uptick (think something like Malignament) to its movement as its rhythms intensify into a quick hook and a swerve around ~1:53 minutes in a moment which acts as the main chorus when it repeats minutes later to complete the thought. This might seem simple enough in its pacing upon direct analysis but within a series of repeated listens a song like “Haatspraak” acts as a testament to the tactful melodicism available to Wrang‘s work and how this fits in with the greater black metal scenery these days. The most tuneful and torrential piece on the full listen is “Bodemdrift” but this time the guitar hook isn’t necessarily the brunt of the interest generated so much as the shift in tone toward the sentimental but also swinging black n’ roll feeling push applied to their sound, a trait which is helped along by some cleaner shouts and wailing (see: ~4:24 minutes in) as the nigh modern rock feeling movement of the song begins to fizzle within the final third of the song;

One one hand ‘Haatspraak‘ offers a reasonable cut of three songs which represent the band well enough going forward, though some of the detailed immersion of the finer piece on their second full-length isn’t served here so much as a simpler and more graven tonality, however subtle it may be. The best entry point for Wrang‘s body of work is thusly still ‘De Vaendrig‘, but if you’re left wanting something entirely more direct, or, scaled back to a raw but still memorable station ‘Haatspraak‘ does benefit from its directness in this regard. Though I’m not sure this EP will stand out or hold my interest in the long run it’d made its case quick enough that I’d been compelled to give it some considerable listening time up front and shows the band still has a bit of fire in their step. A moderate recommendation.

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