ITP REVIEW: ENSIFERUM: FROM AFAR

BAND: ENSIFERUM (FINLAND) GENRE-FOLK/DEATH/EXTREME METAL LABEL-SPIKEFARM RECORDS RELEASE DATE: 9/9/09
PREVIOUS RELEASES (CATALOG):Demo I (1997)
Demo 2 (1999)
Hero in a Dream (Demo 1999)
Ensiferum (2001-SPIKEFARM)
Iron (2004-SPIKEFARM)
1997-1999 Best of/Compilation, (2005-SPIKEFARM)
Dragonheads (EP, 2006-SPIKEFARM)
10th Anniversary Live DVD, (2006 SPIKEFARM)
Victory Songs ( 2007-SPIKEFARM)
From Afar (2009-SPIKEFARM)

BEST RELEASE: ENSIFERUM (2001), VICTORY SONGS ( 2007-SPIKEFARM)

TRACKLISTING: ENSIFERUM "FROM AFAR":
01. By The Dividing Stream
02. From Afar
03. Twilight Tavern
04. Heathen Throne
05. Elusive Reaches
06. Stone Cold Metal
07. Smoking Ruins
08. Tumman Virran Taa
09. The Longest Journey (Heathen Throne Part II)
10. Vandraren (limited-edition bonus track: NORDMAN cover)

ITP RATING: ** 1/2
PRODUCTION: ****
SONGWRITING: ***
PERFORMANCE: ****

The Finnish are notable for a quality extreme metal scene, good beer, snow, good humor and a viking heritage? The Viking Heathen heritage is highly ironic since the Vikings were historically enemies with the Finnish. Finland being so close to the other Scandinavian countries, it is no wonder the Nordic winds have blown a cultural heritage rich in folklore, musicianship and Heathen culture over to the Finnish.
Finland's ENSIFERUM are making the Finnish proud with their potent mixture of melodic folk death metal, with clean and raspy black metal vocals.
So get on your Viking helmets, get out your swords, and let ENSIFERUM take us to the Nordic land of Finland as we at ITP review the bands up and coming release "From Afar".
Uh, oh.. What we have here is a Viking/Heathen band that integrated melodic death metal with Nordic folk lore alienating their fan base for a power metal orchestral feel ala DIMMU BORGIR meets DRAGONFORCE.
ENSIFERUM's "From Afar" opens unassumingly enough with an instrumental track entitled "By The Dividing Stream" with it's beautifully strummed acoustic intro and featuring a cool flute.
The title track of "From Afar" blasts in majestically, with epic vocals, keyboards, blast beats, and enough ahh, ahh back up vocals, to lol. Orchestral power metal? Yep :Shakes head:
"Twilight Tavern" blasts in with quality guitar work, and at 2:18 a clean female vocal break interrupts the pompous warriors: "Life is so short, son of the North.."
"Twilight Tavern" blasts on with shouted Heathen back up vocals, and ugh.
"Heathen Throne" enters in at a more mid pace with dramatic keyboards and at 2:32 a mid song acoustic break with flutes, and orchestral keyboards, and some Heathens singing about raising their swords, a sort of Viking war lord tune..
These Viking dudes singing in the back round need to stop and sip an ale, the Heathen Warlord Viking brotherhood vocals are distracting and cheesy, I want atmosphere and musicianship.
"Elusive Reaches" breaks the mid paced monotony of the previous track with more Dimmu Borgir like power metal, and again, the Heathen WarLord Brotherhood vocals (Markus Toivonen, Sami Hinkka, Emmi Silvennoinen) ruin the atmosphere of the song and are a distraction from Petri Lindroos vocal rasps.
"Stone Cold Metal" is a slightly better tune, minimizing the keyboards, with a nice Nordic folk melody wandering in the background. At 3:08 "Stone Cold Metal" takes a mid song acoustic break with a whistled melody progressing to an almost U.S. Cowboy Western feel with a piano solo. However, "Stone Cold Metal" is a little to cheesy with the spoken word, and orchestral parts, ruining a good experimental idea for a tune.
"Smoking Ruins" opens with a nice acoustic guitar melody and light keyboard interplay flowing seamlessly into a good melodic guitar lead until the cheesy background vocals come in. However, "Smoking Ruins" is not nearly as bad as the aforementioned pompous orchestral power metal on ENSIFERUM's "From Afar". Little or no keyboards are used in "Smoking Ruins", focusing on a nice Nordic folk guitar melody, and an acoustic interlude at 5:15. In fact, ENSIFERUM countrymen KALMAH (FINLAND) perform the melodic death folk metal far more tastefully, although without the acoustic folk interludes, as DRUDKH (compared to ENSIFERUM) are far more compelling in the acoustic folk/flute department.
"Tumman Virran Taa" is a 52 second a capella chant in Finnish (I assume) and the intro for the last track on ENSIFERUM's "From Afar" entitled "The Longest Journey (Heathen Throne Part II)".
"The Longest Journey (Heathen Throne Part II)" closes ENSIFERUM's "From Afar" at a long 12:49 seconds of more pompous power metal, with a Viking folk melodic metal feel. At 6:00 an uninspired thrash riff enters the mix, as this entirely boring and long tune drifts off the war field as in boredom the Vikings lose there battle.
The limited edition of ENSIFERUM "From Afar" features a cover of NORDMANS "Vandraren", btw.
Yes, ENSIFERUM's "From Afar" is quite disappointing with it's orchestral power metal feel, dull acoustic interludes, and annoying background vocals.
Sure ENSIFERUM's "From Afar" is well produced and polished with competent musicianship but the release sounds like pretentious, cheesy, uninspired garbage.
If ENSIFERUM minimized the keyboards, ditched the background vocals, added more well written acoustic interludes and combined that with good melodic death metal riffage and thrash ( yeh, like ENSIFERUM's first and self titled release ), that would be a more genuine way to salute their Nordic Viking/Heathen heritage.

ITP RATING: ** 1/2
PRODUCTION: ****
SONGWRITING: ***
PERFORMANCE: ****

Thanks-Stay Metal, Stay Brutal-\m/ -l-