Vintersorg – Jordpuls (2011)

After a 4 year absence, today we have another very solid release by Vintersorg titled ”Jordpuls”. In this release we get 9 tracks of typical Vintersorg full with epic vocal arrangements and great musicianship, and the overall Vintersorg sound imprinted in every second of this release.

While fans of Vintersorg and Borknagar will rejoice with this release, we think is just more of the same with a few changes here and there. After the ‘experimentation’ phase that Vintersorg took in the last few albums, it is nice to her him coming back to the Progressive infused Viking Metal.

In the course of 9 songs we have brilliantly crafted vocal melodies (the Vintersorg way), excellent instrumentation and overall solid song writing. While this is an achievement for any ‘regular’ band, is what Vintersorg has always been doing since the last decade. We are not easily impressed and “Jordpuls” feels like more of the same in our opinion.

The acoustic passages of “Kilppor Och Skar” are very well crafted and mingle perfectly with the clean/harsh vocal attach of Vintersorg himself. The guitar riffing is simple yet elegant and catchy. With a more Viking Metal feeling, we have “Till Danet Av Forsar Och Fall”. Weaving back and forth between acoustic passages and vocal driven sections, you can hear Vintersorg at its best in this track.

As the songs pass by, you will get the déjà vu feeling very quickly since all songs feature the trademark sound of the band. With “Skogen Sover” you get the cliché vocal arrangements from Vintersorg and after this track we got a bit fed up since we have heard all of this before just shaped a bit differently.

The organ-like synths on tracks like “Palissader” and a few other give you that Borknagar feel that we all love about that band. Closing with “Eld Och Lagor”, the band finishes up the album on a very melancholic (and progressive) note. As you have read, there is nothing really new or revolutionary about this album, just more of the same.

In general, we like Vintersorg and their music since their first few albums. But we feel that the band’s gotten to comfortable with their sound and stopped pushing things further. We have always advocated that more of the same is not bad if it’s good, but with this release we found ourselves wondering what was next on our playlist more than a few times.

Release: April 5th, 2011

Country: Sweden