Out of all the Norwegian bands Forlorn is by far my favorite. This EP contains the best mix in Black Metal I've ever heard, polished yet having a soft warm feel that gives it a unique aura. Every instrument is perfectly balanced, totally distinct,& at the same time every instrument becomes one. Lush, Nordic, traditional acoustic passages & clean vocals comparable to Ulver's Bergtatt grace this masterpiece of modern art along with some of the most memorable Metal riffing man has ever known. Forlorn's EP has a strange somber yet uplifting & victorious overall feeling,
which is a difficult task seeing as most bands are one or the other. Don't expect holocaust blasting & some guy screaming Satan every 5 seconds... this is art, what you can expect (if you can find it that is,sadly it's long out of print) is your next favorite.
I must say that I’m quite surprised as to how overlooked this album seems to be. It’s nigh impeccable atmosphere and melodies are quite unrivaled, in my opinion. Many bands have tried to make albums with a medieval or Viking mood and atmosphere, and many have succeeded, however none quite like this album; this album has its own unique interpretation of medieval black metal, and executes this interpretation quite flawlessly.
The album relies heavily on atmosphere; it sounds medieval, orchestral, and epic, and sounds fairly nostalgic as well. It's one of those albums really made for cold winter days. The synth is what truly makes the atmosphere and sound. The riffs themselves are good, however it's the synth that really shines on this album, creating somber and simplistic melodies, and makes the whole album sound huge, in a sense. As for the riffs, they pretty much consist on power chords played fairly slow. The whole album just feels so medieval; whenever I listen to ‘The Crystal Palace’, I get the starkest urge to play ‘TES: Oblivion’, and can’t help but imagining castles and medieval cities and so forth.
As for the lyrics, I don’t really think they’re all that great. They aren’t terrible either, however, but they’re just so meh. Most of the songs are about medieval battles and whatnot, and Vikings or whatever, but there’s nothing about them that really makes them stand out. It’s pretty much just ‘battlefields, swords, slaughter, knights, castles’; it doesn’t seem as if a lot of effort is put into them. Rather it seems, to me at least, that once the instrumentals were written, they just wrote the lyrics in about ten minutes, just to be done with it. Most of the lyrics are in Norwegian, and the Norwegian lyrics is by far the worst. They’re even less inspired than the English lyrics.
As for the vocals, I quite like them. The harsh vocals remind me of the vocals on Gehenna’s ‘First Spell’; they’re low-pitched, raspy, yet still have that aggression that’s needed. There are also quite a few instances wherein clean vocals are utilised, and though the vocals by themselves are just fair, their melodies are great, and add to the music, rather than just singing whatever the synth or guitars are already playing.
I actually really like the production, and it really fits with the overall sound of the album. It feels very soft and pleasant, which, although rarely positive in black metal, works really well on this. It's by no means over polished or bears a feeling of 'commercialisation' or anything. For this album to have a "Nattens Madrigal" sort of 'trueness' simply wouldn't sound right, so I'm very glad they opted for this type of production. Furthermore, one thing I quite like, is how all the instruments seem to blend together into one single entity. Just like with Emperor’s ‘In the Nightside Eclipse’, which instrument is playing what is quite indistinguishable, which always serves atmospheric and synth driven black metal very well. The drums are also quite good. They are skillfully played, yet they aren’t in-your-face; the drummer knows his place, and always uses the drums to enhance the mood of each riff, many times and oft playing slow, yet plays aggressively whenever required.
If I had to compare this album to others, I would describe it as a mix of ‘In the Nightside Eclipse’ and ‘Arntor’. It really is a perfect mix of synthetic black metal and medieval black metal. It consists of beautiful melodies, that I never seem to grow tired of, and brilliant atmospheres that really pull you into the album. I would recommend to any fan of either synthetic or medieval/viking black metal.
Limited edition 100 copies.
Official compilation pro-tape.
Tracks A1-B8 comes from Forlorn - The Crystal Palace.
Tracks B9-B13 comes from Forlorn - Forlorn
Sample: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
