Bifrost - Heidenmetal
Bifrost are an extreme folk metal band that blend harsh black metal riffs and vocals with more harmonized folk melodies. Hailing from Austria, the music on their latest output is very similar to their debut album from 2006: cold and brutal yet eerily cheerful. The keyboards do a great job at creating the folk inspired atmosphere, making it sound like there's plenty of violins or flutes going along with the crushing riffs and drums. If metal fans enjoy bands like Eluvetie, Finnitroll, or Turisas. then they'll know what this album entails to the last drop. The music here isn't exactly as hard as some heavy hitting folk metal bands like Primordial deliver, but it isn't cheap or cheesy at all either.
There's a good balance of hard and melodic here. Tracks like "Normannenzorn" or "Odins Söhne" are heavy hitters in the way they are very guitar driven, letting ferocity drive the music more than melody. The solos are about the most melodic parts of tracks like these. The drumming is simple and primitive, but very effective in the sense that the band tries to convey this old school, mystical feel to their music. The vocals are done in a mid paced snarl that is certainly recognizable in the vein of black metal, but there's a few tone pitches that could qualify the music as 'pagan death metal' too. The bass is suprisingly clear and crunching, especially near the end of a track like "Odins Söhne." Then there's the more melodic tracks that are just saturated in keyboard lines. "Der Rächer" has one type of melody where the keyboards are symmetrical to the guitars and complement the music rather than try to drive the track altogther. Then there's more uppity songs like "Die wilde Jagd" where one can definitely hear the folk influences loud and clear, and while some of the edge is taken away, overall it is still an enjoyable listen. The keyboards especially sound like accordians and flutes during the interlude.
The lyrics are all in the band's native language, but again, that adds more mystical qualities to Bifrost's music. With not much lyrical content to understand, the musical part becomes all the more important to pay attention to, and Bifrost does a decent job at displaying a good range of skill in the range of brutality along with beauty. Certainly worth checking out for any fan of viking or pagan metal.
There's a good balance of hard and melodic here. Tracks like "Normannenzorn" or "Odins Söhne" are heavy hitters in the way they are very guitar driven, letting ferocity drive the music more than melody. The solos are about the most melodic parts of tracks like these. The drumming is simple and primitive, but very effective in the sense that the band tries to convey this old school, mystical feel to their music. The vocals are done in a mid paced snarl that is certainly recognizable in the vein of black metal, but there's a few tone pitches that could qualify the music as 'pagan death metal' too. The bass is suprisingly clear and crunching, especially near the end of a track like "Odins Söhne." Then there's the more melodic tracks that are just saturated in keyboard lines. "Der Rächer" has one type of melody where the keyboards are symmetrical to the guitars and complement the music rather than try to drive the track altogther. Then there's more uppity songs like "Die wilde Jagd" where one can definitely hear the folk influences loud and clear, and while some of the edge is taken away, overall it is still an enjoyable listen. The keyboards especially sound like accordians and flutes during the interlude.
The lyrics are all in the band's native language, but again, that adds more mystical qualities to Bifrost's music. With not much lyrical content to understand, the musical part becomes all the more important to pay attention to, and Bifrost does a decent job at displaying a good range of skill in the range of brutality along with beauty. Certainly worth checking out for any fan of viking or pagan metal.
- Normannenzorn
- Berserker
- Der Mönch
- Die wilde Jagd
- Fest der Trolle
- Ragnarök
- Der Rächer
- Weingeist
- Odins Söhne
- Herr des Waldes
- Schlachtklänge
- Heimgang
Einheit Produktionen
Reviewer: Colin McNamara
May 17, 2010
May 17, 2010
Next review:
Low Twelve - Splatter Pattern
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