 |
Skogen – Skuggorna kallar1. Det nordiska mörkret Label: Nordvis Produktion |
When editor of a magazine approached me with a request for review of Skogen’s new album, I was a little bit skeptic about it. I knew of the band Skogen but I was never a die-hard fan of their music and I didn’t ever thoroughly go through their discography.
Every fan of European black metal music knows that Nordvis Produktion in their roster keep bands with high influence in atmospheric black metal enriched with doomish elements. So I knew that there is some atmospheric piece of black metal art in front of me.
Here is a few lines about “Skuggorna kallar” (eng. “The shadows call”) album. First of all, here you have around 42 minutes of nearly perfect black metal so loaded with atmospheric elements. Fans of this type of black metal will be highly satisfied with this full-length material.
The first that sticks out is that a greater part of the album is performed on Swedish language. I like when bands use their native language in lyrics. And here we have a few songs in their language and they sound awesome.
Vocals are also par excellence made here. We have from almost screams til death metal-ish growl type of voices. But the best vocal moment for me was when vocalist started to sing a clean vocal in a few occasions. He nailed it with clean singing, really powerfully built pieces of album.
“String instruments” made their parts very well on the album. Bass was perfectly dosed to make almost a ghoulish background for guitars. Guitars here playing classic stuff for this type of music. Slow but well driven long riffs that lead you through the songs and whole album. Guys really took their time to made vigorous riffs for this material. Also on few parts clean guitar took leading role and it exploited it very well. Clean guitar riffs are so strong and give you the real insight in potency of this album.
Drumming on this audio pleasure were done perfectly without a single bad second. From start til the end of the album, drums are there to make the rhythm section atmospheric and yet, enough deep to create a perfect combination of guitar sound in front and their sound in background .
If you are into atmospheric black metal, you will be amazed with this album. Shadows definitely calling you to check this full-length out.
