FORGE - Heimdall
Self Released
I don't receive as much Viking themed metal as I did years ago. Obviously the fad has died back and only a few of the original long standing bands are still around. But low and behold we have FORGE from Switzerland who take things to the hilt. Now when I think of Switzerland I am not thinking of vikings. Actually I'm thinking of banking. By the way here's a band photo below. That guy on the bottom left looks like the dude who prepared my taxes last year.
Now with that said FORGE are actually damm good at the whole viking metal thing. First off they're not pushing the total melodic death metal sound meets Asgard type of shtick. FORGE have a base firmly planted in traditional folk meets metal and have a symphonic touch that's not overwhelming. Their metal portions are exceptional. To hear a band in this genre at this stage of time do so well at not being cliche is a plus to me.
The violin playing as a full on instrument that takes a song to heights is where I was like, Yeah! So you've got full frontal violin playing meets extremely guttural vocals and a melodic death metal template. But who's doing the keyboards? Also why are the vocals so brutal DM style? Not at all like traditional viking metal by the way. That really failed on my expectation. Look you've got the music pure, the song structure exciting and then you muck it up on the vocals. Oh well, great music with a different vocal style.
No comments:
Post a Comment