Band:	Forefather
Album:	Ours Is The Kingdom
Style:	Black metal, Folk metal
Release date:	2004

01. The Shield-Wall
02. Ours Is The Kingdom
03. Proud To Be Proud
04. The Golden Dragon
05. Smashed By Fate
06. The Sea Kings
07. To The Mountains They Fled
08. The Folk That Time Forgot
09. Threads Of Time
10. Keep Marching On
11. Rebel Of The Marshlands
12. Wudugast

Forefather is an unique band, really, this is their fifth album and the first one under the banner of a big label, Karmageddon Media, it took years to these guys to get signed, but finally we get "Ours Is The Kingdom" a fine piece of Anglo-Saxon Metal.

Wait! Anglo-Saxon Metal? What the hell is that? I don't know if we're dealing with the first Anglo-Saxon Metal of the world, but is a matter of concepts, think of Viking Metal, but instead of placing them on the Nordic peninsula, place them on the United Kingdom.
As a matter of fact, in the middle ages, the Anglo-Saxons had to fight off the attacks of the Vikings, so you might call this anti-Viking Metal.

But musically, Forefather uses some of the elements that many Viking Metal bands use, epic chants, heroic melodies, even some grunting and shrieking, this is definitively less bombastic and pretentious than your regular Viking band, and that's because if they're trying to define a new sub genre like Anglo-Saxon Metal, they have to use a differential advantage to win over.

Anyway, this album show us a really mature band, production s great, musicianship and songwriting is good also (taking in count that the band is conformed by only two members), the cover art is also superb, done of course, by CA interactive, widely known in the scene for their work with some other bands.

We have everything in this album, heroic rhythms, brave chants, some blast beats, excellent keyboards, ambient passages, and nationalist exaltation, songs like the opener "The Shield Wall" comes bursting in with blast beats and heroic vocals, countered by some shrieks; some raspy vocals dominate the scene on "Ours Is The Kingdom" while "Proud To Be Proud" has an epic feeling to it.

The album contains a fantastic instrumental track, "The Sea Kings" watch for the keyboards in this one, another surprise is "To The Mountains They Fled" this is a song with that flamboyant feeling that many Power Metal bands have, hell, this could be easily be described as a Power Metal song! (along with "Threads Of Time")

Forefather deliver to us an album full of moods, interesting passages and some other surprises along the way, if you consider yourself a fan of Viking Metal, please try this rather antagonistic genre, Anglo-Saxon Metal! I'm sure that a lot will like this album.