MAAÄET

In the limited blogosphere catering to ambient downbeat neo folk, this third offering by TENHI tends to be regarded as their pinnacle. Certainly they have honed their mastery over melancholia and found a sweet, or, er, at least less bitter spot when combining juxtaposing morose vocals with sparkling instrumental themes. This reaches its apex on the album's best tracks: "Viimeiseen", the even better "Vahainen Violettissa" with its preternaturally bowed strings, "Sarastuskaviia", and "Tuulenkaato". Unfortunately, the same vocals, never technically a strong suit but previously exploited to near perfection, now insist upon themselves, and have reached new nadirs of atonality, resulting in a perception that the singer is not merely suffering but expiring. And I don't mean the melodrama of death in the operatic sense, but that far less harmonic croak of authentic demise, which really should be reserved for family members and close friends. When not offset by intensely harmonic passages, they fall flat, so to speak. "Maa Sytty", "Salain", and "Uuuvu Oravan Luu" all cross over that line, but I appreciate that some might revel in this style, just as some enjoy death metal growls.

Not quite up to the high standards of prior releases, "Maaaet" plays sufficiently to the band's strengths to garner high recommendations if you are partial to well earned despondency, Nordic style.