Band:	Heulend Horn
Album:	The Saga Of The Draugr
Style:	Viking black metal
Release date:	2003
A review by:	Undercraft

01. The Rise Of The Unresting One
02. The Dead Wanderer
03. The Master Of The Winds
04. The Raid Of The Drakkar Wolf
05. Duel And Epilogue

Nordic themes done by tropical people

Let's begin saying that this is a Viking Metal album from Argentina, wait! Did I said Argentina? The land of top quality red meat and endless plains? Yep, you read it right, this project from Friedrich Curwenius explores the Viking culture, even though the brave Nordic warriors never reached South American shores.

Let's begin by saying that this is not your regular Viking Metal album, the Cd has only 5 songs, each one lasting somewhere between 8 and 12 minutes, all instruments are handled by Curwenius, while the (guest) vocals are handled by Vargulf and Lord Edwar.

With songs as long as those you have to come up with some good ideas to keep your listeners entertained right? Sadly, the record fails miserably in keeping me interested more than half an hour, at first, later on I can't even put on the Cd on the player.

The drums are programmed and the different instruments are synthesized (flutes, horns etc.) the vocals are awful and the production leaves much to desire. With these major setbacks can one sit back and enjoy this? Not likely, the record is quite bad in my opinion.

I've seen this band compared to Summoning. That is a mistake, while the band shares with the Austrians the instrumental/atmospheric sections, the whole atmosphere is quite far away from Summoning's trademark epic, vibrant sound.

Oh, the artwork. Basic, pretty basic, neither the logo or the front cover are impressive, the booklet is quite confusing because all the colors don't let you read clearly the lyrics, if you include lyrics, why don't you let people read them?

I won't continue here, my advise would be, avoid these at all costs, but if you happen to like Viking stuff, take a sneak peek at Heulend Horn first before buying, this is definitively not for everyone. Maybe with better production and real instruments?