ALBUM REVIEW: Múr - Múr

Every year throws new discoveries your way, if you have an appetite for current releases. The plethora of bands that emerge from obscurity is astonishing and those hidden gems that tick all your boxes can come in a variety of genres. Be it a new thrash or death metal outfit, or something a little more expansive and progressive, it’s a given that by the end of each 12-month cycle, most people will have found at least one new band to follow going forward. 

In 2024 there has been a range of new music that has really taken me by storm, and the latest of these discoveries is Icelandic quintet Múr. An outfit that I’d never heard about until this album dropped in the in-box, they now are in my crosshairs with a support slot to Finnish / English band Wheel in Bristol now on the list of forthcoming gigs. This is a band who have already stirred the scene, with an impressive fourth place in the international finale at Wacken Open Air in Germany in 2022. 

The collective parts of Múr have impressive credentials. Comprising frontman Kári Haraldsson (Vocals, Keytar, Synthesizers), guitarists Hilmir Árnason and Jón Ísak Ragnarsson, bassist Ívar Klausen and drummer Árni Jökull Guðbjartsson, this is a band who have already created much. Haraldsson’s resume included scores for two projects, the Icelandic feature film Harmur (Come to Harm, 2021) and the Icelandic TV series, Gestir. Alongside that he’s already released a solo project Bláþræðir, in 2020, part of a larger collaborative project in which he and director Hrafnkell Tumi Georgsson made an animated short film with an original score. Árnason and Ragnarsson are classically trained but have an education on the electric guitar thanks to Skálmöld’s Þráinn Árni Baldvinsson and have studied jazz at recognised Icelandic music schools. With Klausen and Guðbjartsson also possessing strong musical credentials, this is a formidable line-up. 

Múr’s sound is creative, technical and complex. They carve sonic soundscapes that craft atmospheric imagery, blending textures. Few bands would have the courage to open their debut album with a nine-minute song, yet this is exactly what Múr have done here. And it works magnificently. It’s easy to see why they are supporting Wheel, for the intricacies on Eldhaf feature similarities as the song weaves its way forward. Although Múr have long songs here, they cleverly blend them with shorter tracks which helps with the fluidity of the release. The title track sees the introduction of powerful death growls, whilst Vitrun and Messa shares links to Meshuggah, Devin Townsend and even elements of industrial n with the electronica beat. The band describe their music as “a wall of sound and emotion”, but as they say, it’s down to the individual to draw their own conclusions. Haraldsson is clear that it is for the listener to make their own mind up. “I’m not sure whether it’s our place to fully define it, as people seem to take vastly different things away from experiencing it, depending on who they are and what they like in music”. He’s right, for on the several times I listened to Múr before starting this review I found myself considering many strands as the music washed over me.

Lyrically the band centre on human emotion and experience, facing your fears, breaking the chains of your inner restrictions and letting oneself go. Over 54-minutes, the seven songs provide multiple cinematic soundscapes with which to lose oneself. They finish this debut with two huge pieces of work. The 11-minutes of Heimsslit with its evocative synths forging an evocative atmosphere that builds in epic fashion. There are elements of Gojira in the mix but ultimately, this is a band who are forging their own genre-free approach. This is evidenced in the sprawling finale of Holskefa, which sees ferocious death roars over a rolling riff mixed with soaring clean vocals and an immense wall of noise that builds majestically. Tinges of black metal, technical death metal and post-metal litter this track, a defiant final message that Múr is not a band to be labelled. Clever, complex, emotional, compelling. Múr is one of the best albums I’ve heard for a long time. A true force of nature, this is truly brilliant stuff. 

Múr is released on 22nd November via Century Media 

Review by Hutch