Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Album Review: Slavland - "Echa Wieków Pradawnych"

Slavland - Echa Wieków Pradawnych

Artist: Slavland (Poland)
Album Title: Echa Wieków Pradawnych
Label: Eastside (Poland)
Released: 2007

Although many pagan metal fans have just recently discovered Slavland, Echa Wieków Pradawnych is actually his sixth album. Only the last three of his albums are readily available, as the first three were either self-released or had very limited distribution. The one-man project of Belzagor has been gaining a following over the past few years since signing with the great Polish label Eastside, so hopefully the older albums will see a re-issue someday.

Anyway, Slavland came to my attention in the summer of 2006, when I purchased the CD Szepty Starych Dębów very inexpensively from Drakkar in France. I was immediately drawn to the folk sections of the album, but the extremely raw and underproduced black metal (and Belzagor's vocals) initially put me off. After a few solid listens, though, I wised up and became a fan of his music, soon purchasing the 2006 album (and now one of my favorite pagan metal CD's) Tarcza Swaroga ("Swarog's Shield"). I was greatly anticipating the release of Echa Wieków Pradawnych, and it didn't disappoint me.

Belzagor is one talented multi-instrumentalist; that much is obvious to me. On this album, he not only handles all the guitar, bass, and drums, but also a long list of traditional instruments. I'm not sure what all of them are, but there are a number of flutes, bagpipes, percussion, and stringed instruments on this, as well as other, Slavland albums. The live drums are an element that are new to this release. On previous Slavland albums (at least the two that I have), Belzagor used a weak-sounding drum machine, so this new element is welcome. The metal sections of the album are still somewhat under-produced, though, but there have been improvements since Tarcza Swaroga.

Slavland is a bit of a difficult band to get into, even to seasoned veterans of the folk and pagan metal scenes. It combines very raw and aggressive black metal (complete with the shrieking vocals) with strong folk elements. Many fans of black metal will not welcome the folk sound, while many fans of folk metal will not enjoy the raw black metal sound. However, for fans of both (and the open-minded), Slavland's music is unique and very cool. I love the way the songs transition between and sometimes blend the disparate metal and folk elements, though it was something I had to get used to, admittedly.

Another feature that will take some getting used to, even to long-time Slavland fans, are the frequent sung (as in, not shrieked) vocals on the album. Belzagor has always sung at times on his albums, but on Echa Wieków Pradawnych it is obvious that he is trying to incorporate them into the Slavland sound even more. Whether or not that was a good idea is up to the individual listener. Sung vocals are fine, but Belzagor's singing voice is, well, an acquired taste. He's not always on-key, and he tends to use a fake vibrato at the end of phrases. Once I got used to his style, though, I can't imagine the songs without those vocals. Strange or not, they are an important part of the sound (as well as the charm).

There are twelve tracks on the CD, but half of them are folk songs without any metal elements. Some of these folk tracks have vocals, but some are instrumentals. They are certainly not filler, though, as they are written, assembled, and performed with great care and quality, and I wouldn't remove a single one of them from the album. The remaining songs are metal, but with frequent folk parts, and none of the songs escape without any folk elements, so those of you who don't like that side of Slavland are going to be out of luck. He packs a lot of great music into the 50 minutes or so that makes up Echa Wieków Pradawnych, so the album should be quite satisfying to fans of true folk metal.

Though I wouldn't put Echa Wieków Pradawnych quite as high on my list as Tarcza Swaroga, it is a very solid follow-up that also finds Slavland in a state of progression and improvement. The production could still improve quite a bit, but the metal parts no longer seem as if they were transferred from a low-bitrate sound file, and the live drums certainly add a needed "punch" to the sound. Slavland is also continuing to improve in the way the metal and folk elements blend and add to each other. It makes me very optimistic and excited about the future of the project.

If you have overlooked Slavland up until this point, I recommend you check it out and give it a solid chance.

Album Review: Walknut - "Graveforests and Their Shadows"

Walknut - Graveforests and Their Shadows

Artist: Walknut (Russia)
Album Title: Graveforests and Their Shadows
Label: Stellar Winter Records (Russia)
Released: 2007

The walknut, better known as the valknut, is a symbol used to signify a person being bound to Odin and his service. It has been found on ancient runestones in Scandinavia and other areas, and is used by neopagans today. It is appropriate, then, that this Northern-themed Russian pagan metal band would adopt the name for their moniker. According to their label, Stellar Winter, Walknut features members of Nitberg, Forest, and Temnozor, the former two bands belonging to the Russian black metal circle Blazebirth Hall. Little else is known about Walknut, but the band has managed to cause quite a stir in the black metal realm with their debut, Graveforests and Their Shadows.

First of all, let me say that the artwork for the CD is fantastic and completely appropriate for the music it represents. The packaging consists mostly of grainy pictures of forests, as well as a photo of the band members themselves. The lyrics, which are in English, are printed in the booklet, which is helpful, and a nice runic font is used.

The music itself is atmospheric, droning black metal inspired by bands like Burzum. The closest modern reference point I can make (considering my general ignorance of any black metal-related music that is not pagan in nature) is the band Drudkh. Both bands have long, repetitive, and atmospheric songs with melancholic, nature-based lyrics. Graveforests and Their Shadows has six tracks, but only three of them have vocals. The remaining three tracks are instrumental (one being synth-based, the other two being metal). The three tracks with vocals, though, are all around 10-12 minutes long. The vocals are distorted and ghostly, like the howling of the wind, and they are fantastic. According to the insert, they were performed and recorded in the forest. I don't know if that's true or not. The lyrics paint a gray picture of dead forests, the ghosts of warriors, and men who have forgotten their roots.

The structure of the songs is pretty minimalistic. Each of the three songs with vocals have a small number of riffs that are repeated throughout, and each song has its own great hook that is placed at the perfect moments throughout the track. This kind of music is bound to leave some listeners bored, but I found its simplicity to be refreshing and effective. The guitar tone is thick and manages to evoke the melancholy and despair of the lyrics. Although the production isn't entirely clear, it's perfect for the music. It manages to sound almost timeless. This is not lo-fi garage black metal recording, so you won't have to crank it up to hear it over the background hiss (as there isn't any).

Walknut has already managed to find a pretty wide and appreciative audience, so chances are that if you're a fan of pagan metal then you are already aware of this band by now. For fans of Drudkh, Burzum, or Hate Forest, there's really no question that Graveforests and Their Shadows is a CD that should be in your collection. Hopefully this band will continue to record and release music, because, although the ingredients of their sound are not very original, Walknut has managed to mix those ingredients into a very compelling and satisfying debut album. My #3 favorite metal album of the year, after Moonsorrow and Menhir...

Monday, April 14, 2008

Album Review: Menhir - "Hildebrandslied"

Menhir - Hildebrandslied

Artist: Menhir (Germany)
Album Title: Hildebrandslied
Label: Trollzorn (Germany)
Released: 2007

Das Hildebrandslied, or the Lay of Hildebrand, is a poem in Old High German about a father and son who meet and fight each other on a battlefield. The ending of the poem is lost to time, so the outcome of the battle is not known. This ancient tale forms the centerpiece of Menhir's fourth album, Hildebrandslied, one of the best metal albums of 2007.

Menhir is one of the forefathers of German pagan metal, having been around since 1995. They are a prominent part of the incredible Thuringian pagan metal scene, which features such great bands as Fjoergyn, Die Saat, XIV Dark Centuries, Helritt, Surturs Lohe, and Odroerir. In my opinion, Menhir is probably the best of the group. They took a lot of time between their third album, Ziuwari, and their newest, Hildebrandslied, but, judging from the finished product, it was time well spent.

The music of Menhir is epic and heroic, led by the soaring baritone vocals of singer/guitarist Heiko. I've always enjoyed his singing voice, imperfect though it has been throughout the years, but on this album his vocals have become a force to be reckoned with. It's mighty, booming, and proud... definitely a perfect fit for this kind of music. Heiko doesn't always sing, though. Like on past Menhir albums, he sometimes employs a harsh vocal style, though on Hildebrandslied it is not used nearly as often as his singing voice. The rest of the players are great as well. Guitarist Fix (also known for his excellent second band, Odroerir) returns, but the remaining three members appear for the first time on this album. I suppose it's difficult to keep a band together during a six year period between albums. The band sounds tighter than ever, though certainly Heiko's vocals are the focal point of the album. There is also a violin on a few tracks, which reminded me of the band's classic folk EP Buchonia.

The packaging for the CD is pretty elaborate, being one of those oversized digipacks that doesn't fit in my CD bookcase. The digipack is one of the nicest I've seen, as far as artwork is concerned. There are a lot of great photos of the band and members of Ulfhednar, a pagan re-enactment group. The cover of the insert is a reproduction of the first page of Das Hildebrandslied. It's all very well-thought-out, which is a perfect match for the quality of the music itself.

The album doesn't take long to get moving, as the vocals start 20 seconds into the first song. I'm used to pagan metal albums containing long instrumental intros, so it's refreshing to hear a band get right to business. The album starts strongly with the first two excellent songs, "Das alte Lied des Windes" and "Des Kriegers Gesicht (Ulfhednar)," but it manages to get even better when the album's centerpiece, the two-part "Das Hildebrandslied," begins. This section of the album begins with a brief but beautiful intro (featuring violin, acoustic guitar, and gentle synths) and then moves into what is perhaps the high mark of Menhir's already-strong career, "Das Hildebrandslied - Teil I." This nine-minute song is my musical highlight for the year 2007, hands-down. It manages to contain some of the most beautiful softer moments of the album and the most epic moments, and Heiko puts on an incredible vocal performance. Both this and the second part are sung in Old High German, and it is basically a word-for-word musical rendition of the Lay of Hildebrand, although they took some liberties with the text for the sake of flow. "Das Hildebrandslied - Teil II" finishes the tale, and it is a great all-acoustic track.

The next song, "Dein Ahn," is the weakest, in my opinion, but that's only because the rest of the album is so good. Things pick up again with the last track, "Weit in der Ferne," and the album ends as well as it begins.

Hildebrandslied would have been a shoe-in for my favorite album of 2007 if it hadn't been for the unstoppable force known as Moonsorrow's V: Hävitetty. There is just so much great music packed into the 41 and a half minutes that make up this album that no pagan metal fan should ignore it. I would even go as far as to recommend it to metal fans of more mainstream tastes, because I feel that the album could have really wide appeal among metal fans.

Due to its complete lack of availability in North America, I had to order the CD from Germany. However, their label has plans to issue the album in a regular jewel case version, which will be easier for them to distribute over here. For American listeners who are interested in Hildebrandslied, and cannot wait for the possibility of a jewel case version, it will probably cost you quite a bit to ship the digipack version over here, but for Menhir fans (and fans of epic and powerful pagan metal in general) it will likely be worth the cost.