Sara Hammerzmith

So, the time has come. The Falu-based eight-piece band Brothers of Metal is finally, after some long-awaited time, releasing their sophomore album. For me personally, this has been a long time coming, and I’m sure I’m not the only one. With songs like “Yggdrasil” and “Fire, Blood and Steel” they spellbound the audience, and managed to grow themselves a following. And now, it’s time for “Emblas Saga”.

The album opens up with a simple yet intriguing spoken intro which tells us the tales of a brother who was so upset with his own kind that he initiated the “Ragnarök” and are directly thrown into “Powersnake” which is a slower, more doomy kind of epic anthem which is a relatively epic, yet not as bombastic as the song following, “Hel” which on the other hand takes it all to a whole new level as far as epicness and speed goes, and not to mention the harmonies in the chorus.

“Chainbreaker” serves as a party tune which has a very interesting build up in the chorus bringing the thoughts back to the 80’s almost in a way, with a more dramatic take on the song rather than epic, with a rock-out chorus.

Ylva’s enchanting voice opens up the next song, which is more of a hymn in the vein “Defenders of Valhalla” which is pretty nice, even though it’s relatively lowkey.

In “Theft of the Hammer” we finally see their sense of humor with, especially in the line “Or else I’ll tell my dad!”. I’m pretty sure most of us who are in them have at some level fallen for their humours approaches at certain stuff, such as “Loki is my brother, he has no sex appeal” from “Son of Odin”.

The mood is slowed down a bit in “Weaver of Fate” which is a beautiful power-ballad that grows more and more epis as the song proceeds, and then straight into probably one of the more epic tracks on this album – “Njord”. It has everything. I guess it was chosen as a single for a reason, am I right? It’s Brothers of Metal just as we know them, just a bit turned up.

The most epic of tales of the album though, we find in the seven-minute-long track “Emblas Saga”. Telling the tale about what went down in a dramatic and epic setting making it the ultimate thrown down – like the whole album has been building up to this exact moment.

The hymn coming after slows down the tempo a bit, as well as the epicness about standing uniting, before it was time for another one of the major songs of the album – “One”, which comes the closest to compete with “Yggdrasil” as far as massiveness goes (And if we are really gonna compare). But letting every one of the vocalists shine the way it does, and not to mentions Ylva’s little moment weaved together in an epic breathing arrangement makes it the most epic post-battle hymns.

The album then wraps up with another few party songs that carry the vibes from songs as “Siblings of Metal” and “The Mead Song”, at least music-wise.

So.. What do we make of this?

What I make of this, is that they simply made it again. While it may not reach the entire level as the first one – and to be honest, I have yet to see a band that does, and it may as well be my “Nostalgia” kicking it, but it is a MORE than amazing follow-up. I love the fact there is more dramatic elements in the songs, making the whole album quite a trip to go through. Highs and lows, fast and slow, and lyrics digging more deeper than done before in the Norse mythology.

Well done, Brothers of Metal.

Favorite song:  “Hel” or “Njord”. A bit torn.
Least Favorite: Real hard to pick one. But I’ll put “Powersnake” here.

CDON I Amazon I Ginza I Label: AFM Records

// Sara

This entry was posted on January 3, 2020 at 10:41 am and is filed under CDs, Music, Uncategorized with tags afm records, brothers of metal, in cooperation with. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.