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Wintersun: Wintersun
27/10/11 || Judge Edo
I’m not going to lie; I came across Wintersun when I was looking for a band to be the Viagra to my Children of Bodom inspired flaccid penis. Well, well, well…. Look who’s ready to fuck no matter when the metal mood strikes. Over the top atmosphere and production? Check. Blackened screams and synth lines? Double check. Face melting solos that give Alexi Laiho a perma-rection? Oh my, yes! Ladies and gentlemen, we have Wintersun. Forget the laughable SEVEN years and counting it’s taken to craft a sophomore album – we’re here for the original.
Jari Mäenpää is one talented motherfucker, let’s get that out of the way. The guy can provide chilling growls and some pretty good clean vocals as well as some deep multifaceted songs that he composes himself and he handles nearly all duties on the album, including producing. This album has a diverse background to provide a landscape for all of these ideas, bringing some folk elements, death metal, power metal, and a bit of black metal. Mix all of this together and forget metal up your ass, you get one giant ice-penis. It’s a nice feeling, and all that icy-goodness really keeps the listener on their toes and makes them say Oh myyyyy.
Like I said in the beginning, this album has atmosphere built in through ever expanding riffs with synth lines filling in all the holes … aaaawww yeeeeaaaaaa. It also has the Finnish cheese that so many albums tend to have. It’s okay though, it works. Tell me it doesn’t fall into place when you hear Jari screaming out the chorus to “Winter madness” like he fucking means it, or shredding the fuck out of that amazing solo. This track is a standout and-a-half. The last time I was that convinced of anything my Dr. told me his hands were toasty warm as he reached for my testicles. Never again.
You’ve got memorable melodic engaging riffs everywhere, whether it be in a thrashy number like the opener “Beyond the dark sun” or in a slower frothy piece like “Sleeping stars”. One of the most engaging songs on the album is “Starchild” with its kick ass riffage capturing the feeling of the subject matter. You’ve got hella-inspiration behind songs like “Beautiful death”, which was written about Jari contracting tuberculosis and having part of his lung removed-that’s up there with Tagtgrens’ heart stopping (although it results in a better song). If you want some damn fine arpeggios, that’s the song for you.
I’m jumping around and I know it, but there’s just a huge amount of great music here. There are just so many moments to sit back and feel satisfied, or happy that a song or riff takes a direction you’d actually like it to, or a jaw dropping shred fest that comes out of nowhere-but it also fits into the song without feeling totally self-fellating.
Yes, there are some flaws in the album itself; I was getting to that you cocksucker. Some of the riffs under the leads or solos could use some variety from time to time. This would also be beneficial when the synths follow closely with the vocals. The other is, as good as Jari is, his clean vocals aren’t the greatest. I applaud him for creating a diverse soundscape – and some can chock it up to the cheese factor – but there are some clean parts that just shouldn’t be in there.
Despite all of this, this is a near perfect album for the long winter months. It really captures the frigid blackness of the winter sky and the bitter cold of the freezing snow. This album is in heavy rotation for the winter months, and for good reason. In my book it’s damn close to a classic, just needs a few more years to fully ripen….just be careful with all that ice jammed up your ass, spring is a looooong way away in this hemisphere.
- Information
- Released: 2004
- Label: Nuclear Blast
- Website: www.wintermadness.net
- Band
- Jari Mäenpää: guitar, vocals, bass, synth
- Kai Hahto: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Beyond the Dark Sun
- 02. Winter Madness
- 03. Sleeping Stars
- 04. Battle Against Time
- 05. Death and the Healing
- 06. Starchild
- 07. Beautiful Death
- 08. Sadness and Hate
