Matti Norlin & Anders Norudde – Blåställ (CD)

Matti Norlin started his career in metal bands like Wizard and Ninja, but soon slided into the blues with solo releases and the excellent band Badge. Here’s another release in the blues school. This time together Anders Norudde on violin, bagpipe, cow horn (?), Willow flute and various odd instruments. ”Håll käft” (shut up) starts off with its cocky attitude dealing with the current machine based music. Cocky up-tempo blues with odd musical coloring. ”Aldrig riktigt nöjd” (never completely satisfied) reminds me of ”Come On In My Kitchen” by Robert Johnson, but when I checked the credits it was actually an old Muddy Waters number. “Flaska kär” (bottle dear) is a classic porch blues, where I kinda feel the fiddle is more in the way than helping. The guitar would be enough here. All in all I really like the songs, I love Mattis vocals and his guitar playing, but I do feel there are sometimes a bit too many instruments, where I feel some don’t really fit in, or at least get a bit too much space in the music. 

Janne Stark

Label: private release
Year: 2022
Country: Sweden

Badge – If It Hurts It Must Be Good (CD)

Swedish cowboy zombie punksters has decided to give us yet another well-aimed kick in the genitals. Imagine you have a venomous Led Zeppelin rat in one corner and a pissed off MC5 snake in the other. You then bring in John Spencer and let him conduct the fight between these two animals. That’s kinda what Badge sounds like. Especially the two opening tracks ”Reap What You Sow” and ”The Game”. The fight slows down a bit in ”Trapdoor” and it seems like they’ve been given some tips from an Australian contestant named Tracer. Ok, we take it down even another notch in ”In The Eye Of The Storm” and bring in the acoustic slide artillery. In ”We Will See The Light” the fight is over and the animals lay in their respective corner, licking their wounds. Some attempts to pick up the fight do occur, but both are way to groggy to even stand up. They slip and they slide, walking heavy back into the corner. ”Traitor” is most likely the victory song with its perky, strutty, guitar picking and busy drumming. In ”Step Aside” we’re back in the game again, loser still as groggy, but mind dead set on revenge. No way this fella can walk a straight line. Falls over, trips, gets up, falls again. Damn, this is getting weird. ”Mapped Out Trail” yep, it may be. But now Raging Slab throws a punch, trying to interfere. Succeeds, too! Game over. ”Yet To Come”. The victor walks out, head high, back straight, middle finger in the air. This is f***ng weird, and I f***ing love it!

Janne Stark

Label: Perennity Records

Year: 2015

Country: Sweden

BADGE – Demo 2012 (4 track CD-R)

Badge is the perfect psycho-blues-power-trio-from-Hell. Raunchy, explosive, dirty, mean and raw to the bone. The band consists of guitarist/singer Matti Norlin (Ninja, Wizard), bassist Gustaf Hielm (Meshuggah, Pain Of Salvation, Charta 77) and drummer Fredrik Haake (Meldrum, God Is My Co-Pilot). I’m not sure what bands to compare them to, as I simply can’t find any. Basically Badge plays hard edged, wild-eyed blues with Norlin playing the shit out of his acoustic guitar or dobro, while Haake bangs the shit out of his drum kit. I think this band would actually be too heavy if you added distortion as well. It’s really cool that a trio playing acoustic instruments can make it sound this heavy. Calculated Moves is dangerously close to psychobilly with its up-tempo craziness with Norlin going slide crazy and Haake going totally wild with Hielm is doing an excellent job backing them up. It’s actually totally impossible to sit still listening to this musical eruption. Bloody great stuff! The band has an album finished and I sure hope they will get it out. This needs to be heard!
Janne Stark
Label: None
Year: 2012
Country: Sweden