VINTERSORG

This is quite a special album in many ways, as it not only looks back to the debut from 1998 both in title and style, but even includes music from before the very first EP. As bandleader Andreas "Vintersorg" Hedlund (vocals, guitars, bass, keyboards, programming) says, 'To write a sequel to the first Vintersorg 'Till Fj'lls' album was something that many people wanted me to do after its release. The second album ''demakens Son' was in the same direction but still something different. So, throughout the years that same mantra was often mentioned again and again 'you need to do another album like Till Fj'lls'. As an artist I've always followed my heart much more than my mind, so inspiration and passion has taken us on a journey through different atmospheres and different musical spheres. From the very folk- music-drenched metal in the beginning, to more progressive and complex textures and structures. As time passed by I just started to write more folk music oriented music again, just out of that same inspiration and passion. On the last three or four albums, we've in a way spiraled back to the starting origin, but with new experiences and a different stronghold to rest our art upon. So, I wrote some music and it came over me that it was somewhat 'Till Fj'lls del II' (part II) and after that fire was lit in our hearts it was a very easy choice to put it in that perspective. It's not an attempt to do a classic sequel, much more like a lost twin finds its other half after many years. They're connected to each other but with different experiences and perspectives. The included EP 'Tillbaka till k'llorna' (Back to the Sources) is an attempt to portray the time before Vintersorg was Vintersorg. The songs are written in that transition period when Vargatron was put to rest and Vintersorg was given life. Still, these songs didn't make it to the first EP 'Hedniskhj'rtad' due to different reasons but has survived in the back of my head, and on some worn-out tapes. When we decided to do the part II of 'Till Fj'lls' it came to me that it would be nice to really do a new take on these songs, trying to keep the basis of them but just put them into the Vintersorg perspective.'

Joining Andreas was Mattias Marklund (guitars), who joined not long after the debut, and Simon Lundstr'm (bass), who has only been there a few years. This is classic folk/Viking metal, with strong riffs and walls of sound, although they do also bring in some black metal influences here and there. The result is an album that is incredibly powerful, and although I would much prefer a 'live' drummer (as they use when they gig), even I must admit that the programming has been done well and isn't too painful to listen to. They remind me more of classic Dimmu Borgir than Amon Amarth, but that isn't a bad thing in my book, as this just screams class from start to end. That one man is responsible for all the writing and much of the instrumentation is quite something, and by singing everything in Swedish they add some mystique. They can be emotional and ambient, or powerful and in your face, often within the same song, and it is the use of dynamics which really make this album stand out from the rest.

It has been three years since their last release, but it has been time well spent, and this is an album that any metalhead could do well to discover.

The music is heavy as metal uses to be, but not too heavy. All the time, it's driven by folk inspired melodies and mystic lyrics which seem taken from the folk world. It's very melodic music and I guess this is an album that could grow for me. The reason why I don't give it four stars is that I don't like growl. It's a lot of growl, but a lot of normal singing as well, but growl allways destroys according to me. However was this a fresh and interesting album for me that perhaps open new doors to the metal world. Many songs on the record are very good such as "Elddraken" (The fire dragon) which has a hypnotic text(8/10) and the whirling "Ur aska och sot" which should catch the interest(8/10). "Överallt och ingenstans"(7/10) and "Natten visste vad skymningen såg"(7/10) are also tracks I recommend. The others are good as well. My average rating ends at 3.28 which makes it a solid three star record which though has intentions upwards.

Vintersorg is a band I would love to have been introduced to whilst I was still in the nascent years of my experience with the 'extreme' end of metal. Regardless of the era you're looking at, they've always allotted melody to surge to the forefront of their craft. The familiar warmth and Jungian nostalgia of the Viking folk style was an easy sell to me in younger years, and though clean vocals comprise the Vintersorg's characteristic lifeblood, there has always been an echo of the extreme in their music. They frequently allude to the tone and aesthetic of black metal, but never mean to grasp the common extent of the genre's extremity and abrasion. From a purely stylistic standpoint, this solo project of Borknagar's Andreas Hedlund's might fashion itself a perfect gateway to black and folk metal alike.

It is with some consternation, then, that I've had such mixed luck listening to Vintersorg. Cosmic Genesis was a fine piece of Nordic progressive metal, and Solens rötter still lingers in my memory as an excellent record by any definition. Other classic albums of theirs- namely the crowd favourite "The Focusing Blur"- I remember as being anaesthetic and generally inconsistent. The biggest disappointment however came on the coattails of Solens rötter; after a four year break, Vintersorg unveiled Jordpuls, a bland folk metal album stripped of the surprise and ambition that made the band potentially interesting in the first place. Three years and two albums later, and Vintersorg have had to get themselves out of that rut. Naturbål is an album almost entirely based around the merit of its vocal melodies, the likes of which feel sadly contrived and stale. Hints of Vintersorg's ambition and quality remain, but I'm finding it difficult to paint the album as anything but another misstep in a growing line of disappointments.

As early as Hedlund's mid-90s days with Vargatron, he's advocated for a strong presence of clean vocals in black metal. I like to imagine Naturbål was crafted with that bold stance in mind. When you stop to realize the genre of black metal has been spliced with virtually every style under the sun (hell, there's even a KFC commercial out there, capitalizing on all things grim and kvlt), it's actually quite surprising that we haven't seen more artists write black metal around clean vocals. All puritanical delusions of keeping the genre limited to its roots aside, I'd argue there could be a great case made for this choice. Vintersorg, however, is not that great case, nor is it anywhere near convincing in this regard. I've always had a bit of this problem with Vintersorg, but with Naturbål and the work since Jordpuls especially, it seems like the vocals have overwhelmed the sound, thereby marginalizing the rest of the instrumentation. Both in the uneven mixing and songwriting on Naturbål, Vintersorg have invested every hope in the vocals. The abundant folk passages are relatively full-bodied and unscathed, but the actual metal instrumentation often falls back on predictable cliche and simplicity, buried somewhere underneath the vocals.

Once again: there is nothing inherently wrong in Vintersorg's choice to have placed such weighted emphasis on he vocals themselves. It's much moreso the fact that the vocals themselves aren't particularly compelling. Andreas Hedlund's voice is admittedly pretty good in of itself. He's got a rich timbre to his voice that meshes nicely with the style, and hearing an entire album sung in the Swedish language is always a welcome exception. Although Vintersorg's black metal influence has been further marginalized on this album, Hedlund's occasional harsh snarl (close in sound to Grutle Kjellson of Enslaved) is fairly strong as well. My internal debate still rages as to whether Hedlund's clean singing voice is truly strong enough to be worth an entire album's showcasing, but the real problem with Naturbål has to do with the songwriting itself. Listening to the album, I feel a hazy recollection of my consistent ambivalence for the two albums that came before Naturbål. The album is saturated with upbeat vocal melody upon melody, but the hooks are rarely ever memorable. "Själ i flamma" closes the album with some strong melodic writing, but most of the songs blend together into an uneven mess. In most cases of this marginal success with hooks, a band would fall back on their instrumentation. Sadly, with the unbalanced, vocal-centric way Vintersorg have written and recorded Naturbål robs it of that opportunity.

Vintersorg isn't so far down the path that they're beyond the merit of redemption, but this is the third time in a row I've been let down. Even from a technical standpoint, Naturbål sounds downright mucky and amateurish compared to Solens rötter. The songwriting is dry and lacks dynamic, and the stylistic drift appears intent on reducing the band to the status of a less catchy Tyr. To add insult to injury, Andreas Hedlund is indeed a good songwriter- probably better than most within the folk metal sector- but I'm not hearing much evidence of that. My apathy for post-2007 Vintersorg has only been consolidated with Naturbål. For what it's worth, I hope we see a change someday.

It's usually very interesting to hear a reinvention of a genre, whether its taking the existing sound of the genre in a new direction, or using abnormal means to make the same point. Vintersorg are one such band that have done alot for their style, that being the sort of music most often called 'viking metal'. This genre typically revolves around a narrow band of topics, ranging from Viking mythology, to Viking culture, and giants. Although I have boundless respect for some of the best viking acts- Bathory and Enslaved come to mind- most bands are copycats that try to revive both the glory of their war-torn ancestors, and the artists that made it such a popular trend in metal to begin with. This is largely why Vintersorg stand out, why they have all of the qualities of viking metal, they are not afraid to experiment with trying new things. As promising as that sounds, this has led to a rather uneven career, and their fifth album 'The Focusing Blur' is right evidence of this. Despite having plenty of potential for brilliance, Vintersorg's ambition leads them to create something that feels more scattered than anything, leaving me to wonder what this could have sounded like if things were a little less, err... blurry.

In the style of many viking metal bands, Vintersorg use very clean vocals over the sort of instrumentation that someone might first associate with black metal. There are extreme vocals here, but they are used very sparsely. The vocal duties instead aim for either melodic singing, or theatrical spoken-word dialogue. The singing of Andreas Hedlund is probably the best thing that Vintersorg offers here; as usual, his voice is very strong, and offers the listener plenty of incredibly melodic choruses around every corner. Although incredibly harmonious and well arranged, few of the melodies are all-too memorable, although I will admit that some of the lines here can get pretty catchy after a few listens. As for the spoken- word pieces that are so prevalent on this album, Hedlund warbles on as if he was some philosophically-inclined ringleader, and it does not work quite as well as Vintersorg thinks it does. Usually, these parts pass by as being too heavy on the cheese and even pretentious, especially considering that there are song titles here like 'A Microscopical Macrocosm'. The lyrical content is probably more interesting than typical runes-and-giants fare, but this could have been done so much better.

The keyboards fill in for the folky elements here, and while they might attempt to sound like classical string sections and medieval instruments, but the synths are far too shallow to stand as a valid replacement. The way these folky sections are played sounds very thin, made more of a shame by the fact that the composition itself is very good. 'The Focusing Blur' does not enjoy the same memorable songwriting, but there are parts here where Vintersorg is showing their adventurous spirit, and it's ironically usually shown through the cheesy keyboards. Through the fairly typical melodies, drums and guitar parts, it usually comes as a big surprise to hear them drop a prog rock keyboard solo in the middle of a song. There are even moments- particularly an eerie moment that felt almost plucked out of a circus show- that nearly verge on the avant-garde.

What I envision most for Vintersorg here are two guys with a bunch of musical ideas, throwing them all down in a row, and calling it an album. Admittedly, some of the stuff here is brilliant, but I cannot call 'The Focusing Blur' an excellent album for the fact that for every idea that does work here, there is another that does not fare nearly as well. Put simply, 'The Focusing Blur' needed more focus. Less forward-thinking albums by this band have had a greater impact on me, simply because there was a clearer sense of flow to them.

Although beginning as a fairly black/folk metal oriented project, Norwegian duo Vintersorg has since tread quite far from the label, instead more recently being quite a bit more melodic and mellow in their music. The seventh album 'Jordpuls' was described to me as an album that takes the band further back to their roots, but still greatly evident is the strong presence of clean vocal harmonies. After a brilliant impression with the previous Vintersorg output 'Solens Rotter', I was quite intrigued to hear what these guys would have to offer now. 'Jordpuls' greatly disappoints me in the sense that it feels like it is a step backwards in virtually every respect for the band, despite the fact that Vintersorg has still maintained some of their strengths here.

There isn't too much of an evident development in Vintersorg's sound on 'Jordpuls'; rather a regression in the pejorative sense. The songwriting feels somewhat dumbed down from the dynamic, melodic and powerful presentation given on the prior album, but 'Jordpuls' does generally pull through. There are still some of the same great black metal guitar riffage here in parts, but the highlight of the sound remains frontman Andreas Hedlund's beautiful clean vocal harmonies, which had me fall in love with 'Solens Rotter' originally, and now do make up an even greater proportion of what there is to like about this album. Despite the shortcomings concerning how memorable the melodies here may actually be, Hedlund still stands strong as being a master of harmony.

Possibly the most disappointing element of 'Jordpuls' is the folk instrumentation, or- in this album's case- programming. From the very beginning, I was immediately put off by the cheap, fake sounds that seemed as if they were trying to emulate such instruments as the violin. Although I am generally appreciative of the fact that many bands do not have the resources to have all of the instruments they would like on their album, there does not feel as if there is an excuse for Vintersorg in this case; albums in the past have heard the folk element sound much less contrived and fake. If this has been an artistic decision on the band's part, it sadly does not work to their benefit, and tends to have me think that this may have been a step backward for the band. On the other hand, the drum machine here is done fairly well; sounding often as if there is a real session drummer behind the kit.

I cannot wholeheartedly recommend 'Jordpuls' as a listen, due to the fact that Vintersorg has disappointed the fan in me with this one. Although it scarcely compares to the last couple of albums they have released, 'Jordpuls' does retain some of the things that had me love the project to begin with, so I'm not left entirely discouraged.

In what can be described as a 'return to their roots,' Vintersorg has arguably created their most consistent album to date. Moving away from the avant-garde leanings of the previous two albums and making a return to the viking folk metal sound the band was founded on, there is still a level of progressive ambition retained that should appease those that found themselves moreso drawn to the stranger-sounding, more recent material. Despite their potential labelling as 'black metal,' 'Solens Rötter' is a deeply melodic journey, and seeks to break Vintersorg out of the genre almost entirely.

The album's strength relies greatly on the strong clean singing abilities of Andreas Hedlund. While there are the typical black metal growls here as well, much of the songwriting is centered around the immense vocal harmonies the man can produce. Meaning 'roots of the sun' in Swedish, 'Solens Rötter' is also the first album in almost a decade that Vintersorg writes completely in their mother tongue. While this may rob the average english-speaking listener of the firsthand abililty to delve into the subject matter being sung at hand, the language is phonetically very well suited for the music, and gives the album an even more Scandanavian vibe to it.

The generally optimistic (yet beautiful) clean singing and polished production gives the music a light feeling overall, despite obvious attempts in places to be 'dark.' As has been said before, Vintersorg gets back in touch with the concept of 'folk metal' here, and the typical metal instruments are mixed in with much more traditional sounds; giving 'Solens Rötter' a very medieval feeling to it. While there is certainly progressiveness to the music here (comparisons to prog death giants Opeth is not unfounded), many of the songs here are generally straightforward in their structure, although each track is very strong. The album certainly opens with one of it's strongest pieces however; 'Döpt I En Jökelsjö.' Through an array of acoustic guitars, black metal growls, rapid fury and finally the great harmonized clean vocal work, the opener is a perfect crash course in everything that a listener can expect from 'Solens Rötter.'

The album's sense of flow isn't particularly great and the sound is generally quite uniform throughout, but 'Solens Rötter' is an immense journey. Anyone under the impression that metal lacks melody as a genre, should certainly check out this great album from Vintersorg, and possibly reconsider their opinions.

In progressive music circles, the genre of black metal seems to get a treatment as if it were the plague. Even many metalheads themselves can't bring themselves to develop a taste for it, although diehard fans of the genre swear it is one of the most atmospheric and emotive styles of music in existence to date. With Vintersorg's 'Cosmic Genesis,' it appears as if there is a perfect album for those who aren't into black metal (or other extreme forms) but are interested to look into it. Strong melodies and intelligent instrumentation mixed with some more primal, heavy sounding riffs makes for a very well rounded metal album that a much wider variety of listeners should find appreciation for.

One of the biggest points of contension people seem to have with black metal are the high pitched screams which dominate and help define the genre. While these are indeed present in 'Cosmic Genesis,' the main form of vocal delivery rests on the deep and strong clean singing of Andreas Hedlund, at times verging on being operatic in nature.

Strong melodies and some rocking guitar riffs are the order of the day for over half of the album. The second half of the album has some golden moments, but it doesn't seem to quite measure up to the high level of consistency and quality that was blessed upon the first four tracks. The only track here that could have been left off is the cover of the Uriah Heep track 'Rainbow Demon,' which while performed admirably (and having a very good medieval- sounding intro,) is weak from it's irritating chorus. 'Naturens Galleri' is another track that doesn't match up to the stronger tracks, but it has some interesting folk segments that I wish the band would have elaborated on, on 'Cosmic Genesis.'

The album is full of great black/folk metal tracks, although the highlights would undeniably include the opener ('Astral & Arcane,') the title track, and the powerful ballad 'The Enigmatic Spirit,' which incidentally convinced me to check out this album after hearing it. While I think the highly melodic nature of this album will help at least a few people open up to black metal as a whole, an established listener to extreme metal might find this a little tame.

This is because while it does have many of the key features of black metal such as heavily distorted, distant guitars, simple drumming often using double bass and blast beats, (which was recorded on a drum machine) and one guy taking of everything, (mostly) resulting in layered tracks. Also, this album has a pretty bad sound quality. While most people do not like this obviously, black metal bands pride themselves, (and go out of their way) to make sure their albums have poor sound quality. This is so it has a raw, brutal feeling.

All that being said, this is NOT a black metal album. True black metal has long, repetitive songs that are simple and really have no structure. This album is actually fairly progressive. There are several sections in each song that are quite abrupt and different. In any song you may hear acoustic melodies with lovely keyboard or blistering blast beats and brutal intensity, and everything in between.

There is also a level of musicianship on this album. While black metal does not require much musical skill, (it is almost all tremolo picking and simple, brutal riffs and in fact they often do not care about musical talent) Andreas really does have some musical talent. Also black metal uses exclusively harsh vocals. This album is the complete opposite, using mostly clean vocals. It should be noted that Andreas' vocals are epic. Literally. It sounds he could lead a Viking war march! When he does use harsh vocals it is not the typical high pitched shrieking of black metal, but more a shrill growling. These are often used during very intense sections, and it is perfect. A ten minute song of blast beats and shrieking is going to get boring, but since it is not overdone on this album when you DO get to an intense part you can really feel the intensity of it. Moderation is always the key to success.

I spent a lot of time trying to explain why album is not black metal and why I do think it is indeed prog-metal. However, the best way for you to decide is to listen. I would highly recommend this album for ANY fan of prog-metal as well as some more open minded proggers. This album is not that "extreme" in reality and if you listen to it, I think you will be rewarded.

My favorite songs from the album are "Norrland" and "Hednaorden". However, "Stilla" is a nice song but frankly gets boring. This album, (which is really an EP) is quite short, and the sound quality is pretty poor. So while it is a good album, it certainly has its downsides and is not meant for anyone. However, if you like prog-metal I think you should give it try.

Three Stars

It may seem crazy to think an album could use elements of Black Metal, progressive rock, folk music and avant-garde but we are prog fans! We should know anything is possible. Indeed, this album uses it all. Beautiful acoustic guitar melodies, heavy riffs, clean vocals, growls (sometimes the two at the same time!) tremolo picking and blast beats, fairly complex drums beats and guitar riffs, keyboard, and folk instruments. Often all of these are used in the course of a single song!

While this could be considered a "Folk Metal" album I think that is silly and pointless. There are so many sub-genres out there and often they have major overlap, (and some are not even really different!) I guess it could be called "Extreme Prog" maybe do it's sometimes harsh vocals but really, I like to keep things simple and I am 100% confident in calling this album Prog-Metal.

This is a really good album and some stand out songs are "Perfektionisten", "Spirar Och Gror", and "Att Bygga En Ruin". While all of the songs are good, and the ones mentioned above are real gems, some songs are just not really that great.

I think this is a great album for ANY fan of prog-metal and I do think more open minded prog fans can really enjoy this album. It is truly progressive and compared to some other bands, it is really not that brutal or extreme. Great for prog metal fans and more open minded proggers in general.

Four Stars