Hello readers! Hurray for generic opening statements! Anyway, today I am reviewing some Waylander. Waylander is a folk metal band from Ireland and one of the greats of the genre. They take classical Irish folk and turn it into some kickin' death metal. This band has a really amazing sound due to a couple of cool aspects. The primary aspect is the guitar that helps to add the heavy metal sound, the roaring guitar is immediately offset by the more acoustic aspects of the guitar. In addition the flutes can give quite a bit of a folk feel when used in the proper place. The bass is pretty good but does not shine, the drums are solid but unoriginal. Overall this is a great band with a nice guitar sound.
The guitar is typically thrash and black metal influenced. There are solid chunky riffs that make up the majority of the songs and then some roaring riffs. However at times the guitar steps back and becomes an acoustic instrument and completely changing the songs feel. The guitar riffs are often a bit Irish in feel which creates a cool contrast, mega distortion with Irish riffs. The mandolin and flutes are beautiful, they are the most folklike aspect of this album and help add the folk feel. They are given a part in almost every song, however sometimes they seem to be a bit too much. It feels as if the flute is saying 'Hello we're folk metal remember' and shoving the concept in your face. However the flutes are well done so it balances out. As I said before the bass and drums are bot solid but rather uninspiring and nothing to scream about.
The vocals are typically done in the form of death growls. They are very solid and enjoyable and add a good black metal vibe to the album. On the grand spectrum of death growls tese are good but nothing to scream about. One of the best parts about the growling is that the growls have a lot of passion behind them and thus are excellent. Occasionally though this passion turns a bit to much towards anger when it probably should not. All in all the vocals are pretty solid. The lyrics are beautiful fantasy lyrics about all manners of tings but mostly Irish mythology, in particular te Gods of their mythos.
Overall this is an excellent group with a great sound and I strongly recommend their album to you my beloved reader. There are a lot of factors that contribute to this album to make it very good but also some factors detracting from it. The main factors for it are the fantastic guitar and flute parts, they are inspiring and beautiful. The detracting factors are solely detracting because they are generic. These would include the bass and drums. As for the vocals and lyrics those can be said to be very well done, as they fit perfectly with the album. I would recommend this album to any metalhead because it pretty much rocks.
OVERALL 8/10
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