Elvenking - The Pagan Manifesto

Published May 09 2014

*=Staff's pick	The Manifesto King Of The Elves Elvenlegions* The Druid Ritual Of Oak* Moonbeam Stone Circle The Solitaire Towards The Shores Pagan Revolution Grandier's Funeral Pyre* Twilight Of Magic Black Roses For The Wicked One* Witches Gather

Genre	Folk/Power Metal	Damna	Vocals
Tracks	12	Aydan	Guitar
Running time	64 Min.	Rafahel	Guitar
Label	AFM Records	Jakob	Bass
Release	09 May 2014	Symohn	Drums
Country	Italy	Lethien	Violin
Producer	Simone Mularoni
Similar artists	---

Eighth album from Italy's own Elvenking. The music on this record derives from a period that seems kind of dated and pretty much off the scene in this day and age. It's like inhaling the early 2000's in some way, but in this case with fresh air and a more powerful sound. The band presents power metal with several elements of folk metal, both evident and less noticeable. At the same time it shows fairly well hidden rock melodies, or things that even could be named pop sequences, intertwined to form a release that's captivating and exciting. To make no room for mistakes or misunderstandings, the metal foundation is however what shapes this effort and keeps things together.

It's overall pretty fast music with rapid and sharps swings and it's also not surprisingly rather bombastic or epic, although without taking these latter directions to excessive levels. It's the actual songwriting that is the key to success and some of the chorus are in a positive way highly contagious and I think that the Italians are able to create melodies that lighten up the occasion. The songs have consistently a happy direction musically and even though it might be somewhat trite and in the same vein, I'm still a little taken by the empathy that this music evokes within me.

If you don't like power metal with so called medieval elements, it's pretty safe to say that you shouldn't even bother to have a shot at this record, because it definitely includes most of what that type of music represents. Personally I indeed embrace what this effort shows and once again I have to check out a band's back catalogue to see what I've missed along the road. Actually before listening to The Pagan Manifesto, I hadn't heard one single chord of Elvenking's music since the release of the debut album Heathenreel in 2001. I thought that this outfit was a pretty dull moment in the metal community, but obviously I was wrong.

See also review of: Secrets Of The Magick Grimoire , The Winter Wake , Wyrd , Heathenreel

Performance	Originality	Production	Vocals	Songwriting
6	4	7	7	7

Summary
7 chalices of 10 - Tobbe