Krux, Krux (2002, Mascot)

The skull:
Sweden’s Krux have been firmly committed to the skull, and this same image appears on their Live DVD of 2003. This skull has lost his lower jaw, and sits amongst a psychedelic wash of green with yellow edges. Comfy in its plainness, it’s just a skull. A big dumb skull.

The music:
I am a huge fan of Candlemass, but never got totally into Krux. They’re good, I like the vocals and keyboards especially, both of which set this apart a little from Leif Edling’s main band. (Although Krux does bear a lot of resemblance to Candlemass’s Dactylis Glomerata era.) Krux is built on what sound like stripped down Candlemass riffs, which are usually pretty simplistic to begin with. Minimalist doom, maybe. This is also reflected in their consistently unimaginative album titling and totally simple artwork concept (but we love it!). There’s also some Candlemass crossover here: the song “Nimis” was first recorded by Candlemass in 2001 and it appears again here. Heck, this might as well have been called Candlemass. Best thing about Krux is we get to hear Mats Leven at the mic, a guy who never got to sing on a truly classic metal album, but should have been on tons of them. An amazing set of pipes, this guy. I’ll listen to Krux just for his work alone.
— Friar Wagner