Finnish folk-metal! (?)
[Video][Website]
[5.00]
John Seroff: Stop me if you’ve heard this one: Bonnie Tyler and Meat Loaf walk into a renaissance fair…
[3]
Alfred Soto: Jim Steinman would kill for the piano line, but instead of Bonnie Tyler we’ve got a Julia Fordham type cooing histrionic absurdities to a guy who’s supposed to be male.
[4]
Sabina Tang: Expected this to be slow-fast-reallyfastmetalbit; instead it stayed resolutely mid-tempo and flagged noticeably at the shred-free instrumental bridge. I had to click through several songs on the album before I got hold of a stirring Celtic-orchestral-thrash-chant that could actually work as D&D battle BGM. It’s about time I made a contribution to the communal playlist, mind you: my tabletop gaming group won’t tolerate hip-hop, dubstep, most electronica or 21st-century pop, and there are only so many Japanese RPG soundtracks, famous SF movie themes, and jokey folk strummers about pirates I’m willing to listen to on repeat.
[6]
Katherine St Asaph: It’s pointless to approach any new Nightwish song by imagining Tarja singing it. Nevertheless: imagine if Tarja sang this, if the crows and owls and doves and mealy-voiced dudes were dragons and giants.
[6]
Edward Okulicz: Heavy-handed on the lyrical imagery (which Tarja Turunen would have done better with), but melodically quite nimble (which maybe she wouldn’t have). Its portent is quite agreeable because it sounds like it could be a step away from being country until the power metal ballad touches come in two minutes in. Then it makes complete sense. I won’t explain the folksy flute jig section in the middle, but I won’t complain about it either.
[7]
Brad Shoup: Blur out the preposterous text and you’ve got a fine power ballad that lays off the strumming. Somehow I made it this far in life without having an extended fantasy period, and honestly, I envy those of my friends who hear a pan flute as transport, not torture. From the title on down, this song is chockablock with those cliffside-and-chimera signifiers. It’s got my sympathies, if not yet my loyalty.
[6]
Jonathan Bogart: There might possibly have been a time in my life when I would have been able to hear my way into this song, to hear the sweep as majestic rather than trite, the flute as otherworldly rather than dull, the voices as containing meanings deeper than those of mere mortals. But no. Good for them for doing what they want to do, and good for their fans for finding meaning in it; but I’m too old and heavy now to fit into the wardrobe.
[3]
Michaela Drapes: Nightmare scenario: I’m eating at an elaborate dim sum palace with an ex-boyfriend’s brother and sister-in-law (who travel the country selling bespoke leather gear and Sheffield steel-boned corsets at Ren Faires), trying desperately to explain the appeal of the Decemberists, who are stuffed on a tiny stage in the corner of the room playing a set of maudlin anime theme tunes on pan flutes, while everyone at the table screams at me for not making a home-cooked meal.
[2]
Anthony Easton: Everything about this is absurd — but it is awesome, so fucking awesome, like writing the lyrics using white-out on a black Trapper Keeper in grade 7 awesome. Everyone knows that nothing is more awesome than that.
[8]