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Eluveitie - Slania review



Reviewer:
8.0

876 users:
8.54
Band: Eluveitie
Album: Slania
Release date: February 2008


Disc I
01. Samon
02. Primordial Breath
03. Inis Mona
04. Grey Sublime Archon
05. Anagantios
06. Bloodstained Ground
07. The Somber Lay
08. Slanias Song
09. Giamonios
10. Tarvos
11. Calling The Rain
12. Elembivos
13. Samon [acoustic version] [bonus]

Disc II [Limited Edition DVD: Ragnarök Festival 2007]
01. Andro
02. Your Gaulish war
03. Song Of Life
04. Lament
+ Inis Mona [video]
+ Photogallery

Hail the new wave of folk metal with Eluveitie as one of the bands spearheading this charging attack on the world of metal. "Slania" brings the second of the band's full-length albums in strong but typical form as another album is added to the ever-growing pool of folk-influenced bands. Eluveitie set their sound up with plenty of layers of real folk instruments that intertwine with the metal, which adds a very pleasant and often beautiful mood to parts of the album but also compliments the heavy metal core of the album. In-between onslaughts of folkish instruments the backbone of the album seems to be heavily influenced and similar to many of the Göthenburg-sound melodic death metal bands around today.

Eluveitie seem to have everything you would want to be looking out for in a band of this style. As well as the folk-laced extreme Göthenburg sounding sides we have moments like the delightful instrumental track "Anagantios" which leads into one of the highlights of the albums in the In Flames reminiscent "Bloodstained Ground" providing pounding metal with strong folk elements woven amidst the crushing metal. Title track, as-it-were, "Slanias Song" also introduces female vocals which work splendidly giving the album yet more diversity that sometimes eludes other bands in the scene. "Slania" taken how it is, is a very enjoyable album offering plenty of standpoints from where you can stand to listen to it. The album is far from monotonous and it would seem each track attempts to bring something slightly different to the picture, albeit still all with a strong smack of Göthenburg death metal.

However folk metal is far from being a new thing in metal, although with the last few years the popularity of the genre has risen and shot through the roof which has in-turn caused the creation of seemingly masses of bands jumping on the originally unique sounding little subgenre and turned "folk metal" into one of the staples of metal these days. Yes, Eluveitie sound very talented in putting together opuses of grand folk metal as well as performing it but at times the, quite frankly bone dry and overused Göthenburg melodic death metal guitar riffs come into the picture and you are left in somewhat of an ambivalent state as "Slania" is both refreshingly original with the folk instruments and arrangements, but also nauseatingly predictable when it comes to the Soilwork and In Flames sounding guitar riffs chugging the music along. It would just be a shame for the original elements to be lost as time goes by and this "folk metal" becomes the next ignoreable, mass of mediocrity that becomes widely popular among metallers.

As with Eluveitie, "Slania" is a superb album of many dimensions and elements that are brought to shining life with the inclusion of all these folk instruments. The bland Göthenburg riffs included in the album can mostly be forgotten about but may rise to be a cause for concern in the future. Fans of this genre should definitely pay some attention to this album, everything you could ask for is in there somewhere, the album emits energy from start to finish and stays constantly busy in one way or another, this will surely please many camps in the metal world.





Written on 15.02.2008 by Member of Staff since 2006


Comments page 2 / 2

Comments: 38   Visited by: 531 users
26.12.2008 - 08:25
Rating: 8
Shadowcross
The Summoner
Id say about 8/10 too... accurate review. Fun album i put it on at work a lot.
I haven't heard tell of a better Göteborg style album released this year.
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18.02.2009 - 20:29
Rating: 7
Paradox0
Unasuming Madnes
Not a bad Album but kind of reminded me of Spirit, alot of songs which are semi forgettable with two songs (Slania's Song and Calling the Rain) being the highlights. I'm actually listening to Spirit right now and I must say I REALLY miss the over riding folk elements of it. Still pretty good and listenable, if not very memorable. 7/10
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02.03.2009 - 17:12
Rating: 9
Dominus
The Shooter
Doubtless , the best 2008 folk album .This album is awesome and my favorite of folk metal !!!
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03.03.2009 - 13:16
Eternal Flames

Written by Samael on 18.02.2008 at 16:43

The only impression I got when I listened to this band for the first time was like if Dark Tranquillity did an album with flutes and violins. The song writing is so similar as well as the sound. I can give them another chance. And nice review.


Exactly my thoughts. I honestly think this album is very overrated. Despite having a few good folk tracks, a fair bit of it is mostly standard, recycled Gothenburg/melo-death. And I thought Spirit was a pretty good album, so it disappoints me that Slania turned out to be so poor.
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27.04.2009 - 19:46
Rating: 8
Morphis

I feel bad that i had this album in my collection for many months and the 1st time i listened to it didnt really catch my eye and i was so into others bands that just ignored this one.
Out of nowhere i just gave other change to this album and im feeling good about it now lol.
I had a rate of 6 on it, just rased to a very deserved 8.
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08.05.2009 - 20:03
Rating: 10
Heart_of_METAL

In my opinion is Slania far better than Spirit, very, VERY awesome album, it is. Rating 8.0 is underrated, 9.2 it´s my.
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24.09.2009 - 18:26
gocasaca

I recently found out about music of this awesome band, and, yes, they are definitely the best folk metal ones!
Since I like negatively skewed distributions, I give them 10 for Slania !
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08.02.2011 - 00:21
opeth771

One of the best albums ever, and Grey Sublime Archon is probably one of the best songs ever as well
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