Style: Frostbitten Gore Grind
FFO: ULTRA VOMIT, BIRDFLESH, MACABRE, PUNGENT STENCH, BRUJERIA, REPULSION
Clean your underwear, Gronibard is back! After 14 years of deafening silence that nobody has necessarily missed, the grindcore quintet returns with ‘Regarde Les Hommes Sucer’, a new album that smells of the anus and other delicate aromas. Faithful to its original values, Gronibard deliberately remains – given the limited skills of each of its members, this is in any case the communication strategy that the group has adopted – stupid and limited to what happens under the belt.
1998. While the Blues are defending at all costs to catch a World Cup title, the five maniacs from Lille (FR), which is not unlike the backwoods Alabama – attack and decided to record their first demo. Two hours and five guitarists later, this extreme affair is over. 600 copies are sold in stride. Not bad for a title made from excerpts from D-rated 70’s sexploitation films. Without mastering their instruments, without knowing how to compose, without the slightest promotion, our Grindcore Zuckerbergs seem to have found the magic formula.
2001. While towers are collapsing on the other side of the world, Gronibard signs its first contract with a record label. Luck? Coincidence? History will judge. The only certainty is that within just a few short days, the group’s self-titled debut LP is boxed. The result: a big box in the metal scene. Last, but not least, a candidate from Nouvelle Star (France’s version of ‘American Idol’) – the TV show that everyone was talking about at the time – took over one of the group’s songs. Admirably surrounded by their loved ones, Anal Capone and his band fortunately manage to keep a cool head and display a calm that many Scandinavian bands envy. Then everything blurs. Allergic to the outrageous Stakhanovism of the time, Gronibard took some time to relax, too much time, perhaps. Upon dropping an EP in 2005 and a second LP in 2008… the band went completely silent. The flat encephalogram. A cruising speed that could have sent the group to the depths of the Mariana Trench.
On stage, the group will gradually become as rare as a good piece of Ultra Vomit. In its early days, however, GRONIBARD fired on all cylinders and played everywhere: in a festival in Portugal with strippers, in the courtyard of a Belgian brasserie (for the occasion, these art connoisseurs were paid in sausages), Maryland Death Fest in 2005 to which the band arrived in luxury – rolling up in a hot dog van. Innovators and fans of scratching bearded men, the quintet goes so far as to share a date with Corbier (a popular French television animator at the time) from Club Dorothée during a historic “cassoulet show.”
Upon feeling exhausted from playing so many gigs, the underachievers decided, unlike the Rolling Stones, to only do the dates that make the members of the group laugh. Pleasure, pleasure, nothing but pleasure… and just the right amount of auditory sodomy. Returning to the Motocultor festival in 2019, the already cult band sends mud flying through the audience. Generally wearing only their instruments on stage, the members of Gronibard are quality people, which the marital status of the group’s line up proves top notch: Anal Capone (vocals), Albatard (bass), Godemichel (drums), Necronembourg (lead guitar and vocals), Merdic (backup guitar).
2022 might be a French presidential year, but the election lives in the shadows of Gronibard’s unsuspecting comeback, as the band are geniuses when it comes to going viral while making zero effort. Society has vastly changed since the band’s last album, ‘We Are French Fukk You’, which dropped 14 years ago. They too made changes to their lives, finally finding some women to impregnate.
From now on, social networks make the law, without too much discernment. The nuance is no longer relevant. No big deal, that was never really Gronibard’s main quality, any PhD student will agree. A fruitful brainstorm and a few beers end up removing the group’s last doubts. GRONIBARD then diligently leans on the adage of “the third album always being difficult.” Thanks to enormous groundwork (two to three rehearsals per year) and deep reflection on its musical direction (as good fans of Fad Gadget, they considered releasing a synthpop album before giving up), Gronibard is back with ‘Regarde Les Hommes Sucer’, its most successful album to date. All on an exceptional label: Season of Mist.
Stuck at the anal stage since its creation, the group finds itself in perfect harmony with these shitty times. And this album then? ‘Regarde Les Hommes Sucer’ lasts 34 minutes and contains 16 short, compact, and fitting songs. Gronibard respects nothing and targets anything that moves, including itself. Among the many pieces of excellence, let us mention the conceptual “Mon siamois maléfique,” the boiling “L’enfer des zombites,” the fantastic “Sperm Smoker” or the very shady “Le monstre des zizis.”
Message to all headbangers: you are not done with having a headache.
P.S. to fans of the band – hide your dongs well, Gronibard is back!
