|
|
|
|
Bands, this is how you spend your downtime: rehearse and refine the way Viperia clearly has. The last time I heard this Swedish quartet, it was making a fine but tentative impression with its 2006 demo The Fimbul Winters. All three songs therein are reprised on this eponymous full-length, but are fine-tuned and developed to much greater effect. The band’s sound is varied but seamless: traditional metal that makes passing but committed nods to death, doom, goth, thrash, power and alt-metal without seeming like a grab bag of musical influences. Basically, it’s everything I love about ‘90s Anathema, Soundgarden and Taneli Jarva-era Sentenced: the truism that metal can provide both accessibility and heaviosity without emphasizing one to the detriment of the other. There is still much work needed here in the still-improving vocals department, the mix is unfortunately muffled at times and a song like “F.U.M” is mindless filler. But the eerie, bizarrely Egyptian riffs and classy, shimmering guitar leads all over this thing just bespeak a group that aspires to greatness. You know what? I’m recognizing the greatness, the beauty, the effort and the realization.
| Tracklist |
| 1. Blood |
| 2. Evil Jay |
| 3. The Fimbul Winters (The Dying Embers Part I) |
| 4. F.U.M |
| 5. Blue Sky |
| 6. The Last Battle (The Dying Ember Part II) |
| 7. Tyrannizy |
| 8. The Warlords |
| 9. A New World (The Dying Ember Part III) |
: 49:33
| Buy other Viperia albums |
