ENSIFERUM - Winter Storm
Metal Blade Records
In all honesty it's been quite a while since I checked out an album by this Finnish Folk Metal act. Actually I liked em back in the late 2000's when the whole Viking Metal / Pagan Fest type of stuff was going on. I've still got two full lengths from em, Victory Songs from 2007 and From Afar which came out in 2009. I did hear the band's 2012 full length Unsung Heroes and wasn't thrilled with it. Then again by 2012 I was not so enthralled with the whole pagan metal genre trend.
So here I am over a decade later back with ENSIFERUM with their ninth album and I think fourth on Metal Blade Records. And here's a shocker I actually like this one. Now just for the record ENSIFERUM were never a Viking Metal band or even a real Folk Metal act. Basically their sound was always melodic death metal and power metal with a load of songs dealing in medieval Finnish battle metal. It's all about fantasy as opposed to history lyrically. These guys were always swinging their would be swords for a Wacken stage spot as opposed to underground coolness.
With that said Winter Storm pretty much fits the whole epic sound structure. The production on here just amps up everything this band is known for. You've got these galloping rhythms, massive power riffs, harsh and clean vocals plus whispered vocals as well as gang vocals, guest female vocals by Madeleine Liljestam, subtle keyboards and a mighty rhythm section. I know welcome to the mainstage at Wacken.
Yeah this is a cool sounding album. ENSIFERUM in the past were never a perfect band for me. But they've always came out with a few cool as fuck songs on the albums I liked. On this one inbetween the un-neccissary instrumentals there's cool cuts like "The Howl", "Fatherland", "Winter Storm Vigilantes", "Scars in My Heart" with Madeleine Liljestam and the really epic eight and a half minute "From Order to Chaos". So hell yeah I'm a ENSIFERUM fan again.
https://www.metalblade.com/us/
LISTEN HERE:
https://ensiferum.bandcamp.com/album/winter-storm
No comments:
Post a Comment