Ensiferum - Ensiferum

Finland's Ensiferum are one of the more successful bands playing in the loosely-defined Viking metal genre, but also one of the more repetitive and unadventurous. Their debut album is a fine collection of rousing folk metal anthems centred on Viking subjects, that harks back to eighties heavy metal in its prevalence of guitar melodies while also incorporating elements of the folk metal tradition started up by Bathory at the turn of the nineties. While Ensiferum have never been one of my favourite Viking metal bands, lacking the individualistic sound of bands such as Bathory, Månegarm and Tyr, their take on the genre is perhaps the most accessible and easily ...  Read the complete review