Ensiferum - Ensiferum - review
Ensiferum - Ensiferum - review
Tracklist
01. Intro02. Hero In A Dream
03. Token Of Time
04. Guardians Of Fate
05. Old Man (Väinämöinen)
06. Little Dreamer (Väinämöinen Part II)
07. Abandoned
08. Windrider
09. Treacherous Gods
10. Eternal Wait
11. Battle Song
12. Goblins' Dance
A review by
Pierre Tombale Viking metal is a kind of melodic death with typical melodies from the northern european countries from former times. In Ensiferum I discovered the only imaginable incarnation of that. Soon I found out that compared to clean vocals, growls have a certain strength that cannot be achieved with clean ones. Combined with beatiful melodies, furiously fast drumming, great keyboard musical background, choirs and clean vocals, acoustic parts, well just anything you can imagine, not to forget the northern folkish influence Ensiferum let the cold icy winds from Finland blow out of the speakers of your stereo! On their debut they have managed to play so many good songs that do themselves rock a strong 10 on the richter scale of metal. 'Hero In A Dream' is a great example of this, 'Windrider' my personal favourite, 'Treacherous Gods', 'Eternal Wait' and 'Battle Song' all match this category, but the performance on the other of the 12 songs is not less remarkable. Only song number twelve 'Goblins Dance' falls behind. The latter is musically and lyrically the most aggressive and least melodic, thus not comparable to the other eleven quasi-masterpieces on a masterpiece.
All in all the albums features are great songs, with great melodies, technically brilliant and in uncomparable composition (the only similar song I know is Crimson Rain from Einherjer), thus refreshing the listener from the usual suspects of metal. After Esiferum I rarely found songs out of the extreme genre that I really enjoyed.
With 'Goblins Dance' forcing down the rating and few other songs that I cannot give a full ten this album deseves a strong 9.0 and everything out of this genre that meets my ears has to be measured with comparison to this fantastic milestone in my personal history of musical experiences. I can hardly wait for the successor any more.
Written by Pierre Tombale
Rating:
9.5
9.5
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Rating:
9.5 |
2001 was just about to become history when I received this cd in the mail. It was three days before 2002 and I found myself on an airplane home to spend the New Year. The plane had just taxied off the runway as I placed Ensiferum's debut self-titled album in my cd player. I had not heard much about this young Finnish band before I had ordered the CD but was told, since I like Moonsorrow and Finntroll, I would eat this cd up for breakfast lunch and dinner. Well, I am still eating it and it sounds better every fucking time. Read more ›› |
Comments
Comments:
16
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| bluemobiusx
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Posts: 948
Great album, that's for sure. Those were the good old days with Jari..
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best album ever!:beer: 
---- Life has given me much, maybe taken more...
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Its great, I find it lacks alot of the catchy riffs found in Iron but its still great, wouldnt agree with the rating but i can see where your coming from.
---- "I got a lot of really good ideas, problem is, most of them suck." - George Carlin
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| Opium
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| peterjohnvernon
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| Posts: 9726 |
Posts: 9726 Written by [user id=12867] on 26.11.2007 at 08:30 Agree about the 7.5. I don't know why but there was that much that was too gripping about this album. Maybe because it embodies a lot of the Viking type metal cliche's but lacks the grandiose production values that makes cliche viking metal enjoyable.
---- "I got a lot of really good ideas, problem is, most of them suck." - George Carlin
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Posts: 777
one of the best albums ever a hero in a dream a breathtaking song:maniac:
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Posts: 8703
I have to apologize for what i said, this album isnt that great...it is...
---- My rest seems now calm and deep Finally I got my dead man sleep 
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Posts: 2955
Ill never give more than an 8 for this one. Seems exaggerated. Its good enough to enjoy. Funny how the Battle Song resemble the Tuatha de Danann's own Battle Song...
----  ---- member of the true crusade against old school heavy metal, early 80s thrash, NWOBHM, traditional doom, first and second wave black metal, old school death metal, US power metal, 70s prog rock and atmospheric doomsludgestoner. o/
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| Beastofmetal456
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Well I dont hear so many grows here, well seems nowadays when I am old dart, I dont like anymore DM grows. I like BM singing melod Dm whit a bit softer vocals, such music, but we have no here so many growls.
---- I stand whit Ukraine and Israel. They have right to defend own citizens. Stormtroopers of Death - "Speak English or Die"  I better die, because I never will learn speek english, so I choose dieing
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