Produced by Moonsorrow
Released: 2003
This is about as close to perfect an album of pagan Viking metal can be. With this, their third album, Finland's Moonsorrow have made a truly epic record that can proudly stand alongside Bathory's legendary Hammerheart as a benchmark for all future work in this style.
Kivenkantaja is a sprawling but strikingly cohesive album that makes use of traditional folk instruments and choir singing without compromising the metal elements in any way. The album opens with the marathon 13-minute 'Raunioilla', a sweeping musical saga that sets the tone for the rest of the album perfectly. This track virtually strips away all traces of the black metal element found in earlier work in favour of a more epic, progressive metal feel, but the grimness returns almost immediately with the next song, 'Unohduksen Lapsi', and continues to make its presence felt throughout, mingled with snatches of folk music, accordian, choir arrangements and that most distinctive of instruments, the Hammond organ, that gives the album a touch of 70s progressive rock here and there. The keyboards are most apparent in the sprawling 'Jumalten Kaupunki', but wherever they are used they only further the conjuring of the album's grand, majestic atmosphere and sweeping vistas of glorious battles on snow-covered fields, victorious celebrations and a mighty, insurmountable pagan spirit.
Released: 2003
This is about as close to perfect an album of pagan Viking metal can be. With this, their third album, Finland's Moonsorrow have made a truly epic record that can proudly stand alongside Bathory's legendary Hammerheart as a benchmark for all future work in this style.
Kivenkantaja is a sprawling but strikingly cohesive album that makes use of traditional folk instruments and choir singing without compromising the metal elements in any way. The album opens with the marathon 13-minute 'Raunioilla', a sweeping musical saga that sets the tone for the rest of the album perfectly. This track virtually strips away all traces of the black metal element found in earlier work in favour of a more epic, progressive metal feel, but the grimness returns almost immediately with the next song, 'Unohduksen Lapsi', and continues to make its presence felt throughout, mingled with snatches of folk music, accordian, choir arrangements and that most distinctive of instruments, the Hammond organ, that gives the album a touch of 70s progressive rock here and there. The keyboards are most apparent in the sprawling 'Jumalten Kaupunki', but wherever they are used they only further the conjuring of the album's grand, majestic atmosphere and sweeping vistas of glorious battles on snow-covered fields, victorious celebrations and a mighty, insurmountable pagan spirit.
- Raunioilla
- Unohduksen Lapsi
- Jumalten Kaupunki
- Kivenkantaja
- Tuulen Tytär
- Matkan Lopussa
Rating: 94%
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