Wuthering Heights - Far From The Madding Crowd
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Gather Ye Wild |
| Genre | Folk/Heavy Metal |
Nils Patrik Johansson
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Vocals
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| Tracks | 11 |
Erik Ravn
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Guitar
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| Runningtime | 61 Min. |
Henrik Flyman
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Guitar
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| Label | Intromental |
Erik Ravn
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Bass
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| Release | 19 Jan. 2004 |
Morten Sørensen
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Drums
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| Country | Denmark |
Rune Brink
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Keyboards
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| Similar artists | Skyclad, Elvenking, Falconer | ||
This might very well be the album of 2004 - and the year has barely started. I yet dare to make this statement without blinking since this is one of few albums in quite some years that really blow me away and leaves me almost speechless. If feels like there are so many, many things i would like to mention about this album and so many feelings, moods and atmospheres I would like to describe but I am modest enough to admit that I could never make them justice, so I am going to make this short and just deliver you facts about what this is all about.
The band hails from Denmark, and this album is their 3rd fullength album(by the time you are reading this i am out there looking for the other 2 by all means and to any cost), and it's the last part of the "wanderer-trilogy" that they started with Within(1999) and continued on To Travel For Evermore (2002). Their music has a strong base in traditional Heavy Metal, most of the time with a speed above average with marvellous power metal riffs and a good deal of great harmony solos, and it is all spiced with what makes the band what it is: folk music a'la Elvenking, Falconer and Skyclad.
Vocalist Johansson is simply amazing. His vocals are very powerful and contributes to a massive and majestic sound landscape. It is unique and one of the best i have heard in this genre but if it has to be described as something, a mixture of Jorn Lande and Graham Bonnet on their most powerful days might be close to the truth. The vocallines are outstanding without being singalong or tralala, and are in great symbios with the riffs and leads. It never once get too sugarsweet with the folkelements, which are in majority, but instead it is damn fat, hard and "heavy metal-ish".
Don't get intimidated by the fact that the album contains instruments such as bagpipe, violin, tinflute, banjo(!). It truly rocks and I can garantuee that you'll be positively surprised. The songs all contain much, with a perfect amount of changes and turns but without being destroyingly progressive. From what I have read elsewhere this album is also less progressive and more melodic than its predecessors. There are apperantly also this time more of the folk-music roots into the songs than before, and the album functions lyrically as the last part of the trilogy about "the lonely wanderer". I can't wait until I can start exploring the previous work of this band.
Highlights are hard to pick out as the material overall is first class, but the Longing For The Woods-parts 1, 2 & 3, as well as the opener The Road Goes Ever On, are outstanding with their power and majesticness built up on melodies out of this world. The fastpaced instrumental piece Bad Hobbits Die Hard (you got to love that title.....) is just as good as you can expect from a quintet of skilled musicians as this.
The album is produced and mixed by Tommy Hansen which garantuees a rich, clear and very good sound. Nothing much to add there. I am a big fan of the bands mentioned as similar artists, but this honestly beats the shit out of them all before the opening song has faded out. Wuthering Heights have strong possibillities to become one of my absolute favourite bands of all time along with bands of the likes of Running Wild, U.D.O., Children Of Bodom, Primal Fear, Axel Rudi Pell, Iron Savior. Not bad to basically come from nowhere and make place along names like that.
Buy, and prepare to explore a new and exiting world of interesting and capturing metal.
See
also review of: Salt , The
Shadow Cabinet
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Production
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Vocals
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Compositions
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9 |
10 |
10 |
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Summary
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10 chalices of 10 - Tommy |
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