Anyone that dismisses Viking metal as risible has obviously never heard Thyrfing. Heavy as granite and as animated as an English monastery the day the dragon ships arrive on the nearby shore, these Swedes combine some very recognisable pagan metal elements with grim, blackened grooves carved from decades of rigorous adherence to their art. The earlier releases contain more of the obvious Viking elements while later efforts have taken on more of a mystical, tableau feel, similar to more recent Moonsorrow releases, but with an unmistakable, hard bitten, Thyrfing grit rubbed in to spice up those atmospheres. After more than eight years since De Ödeslösa and several other meaty releases under their belts (2002’s Vansinnesvisor is great but 2005’s Farsotstider is probably the go to album for noobs and should tell you all you need to know about Thyrfing and the direction of subsequent releases) it was hard to imagine Thyrfing wouldn’t come racing out of the mists once more with swords glinting and a few bottomless barrels of fortitude to help them hone something sharp and pleasing to behold.
Once again Thyrfing manages to seamlessly blend rawness with sweeping keyboards and the occasional acoustic drops to build atmosphere and create some distinctly elemental passages. The result is one of the band’s more consistently vivacious releases to date. While the last couple of releases delved into more mist strewn and grainy territory in their passionate search for a classic dark ages sound – notably the bleak Hels Vite but also the frosty, and very 90s almost Kampfar harshness, of De Ödeslösa – here the band takes De Ödeslösa’s journey towards the light into more technicolour realms worthy of Bifrost itself. Vanagandr blows away the eerie gloom of those immediate predecessors and replaces it with something that manages to be distinctly dynamic and lively while staying well within Thyrfing’s deeply committed and convincingly incorruptible blend of black metal Vikingness.
Yes, the orchestras feel more orchestral than ever and the band bravely does not shy away from incorporating fiddle and flute. But it’s all well under the control of a band comfortable in its own chosen wolf skin as the more pagan metal influences are battered against Thyrfing’s sonic brutality as Jens Rydén snarls along to some fairly gigantic riffs, welcomingly heroic solos and gleeful instrumental sweeps on tracks like the skittishly excitable bounce of Rötter and the epic Håg Och Minne. The result is a rousing effort successfully tempered with the band’s carefully crafted grimness that reeks like a portentous warning. In that respect, Vanagandr is more clearly balanced than some of the band’s other darker and dour efforts – expansive while some others have run into deeper, uncompromising exploratory furrows. More than ever the band mixes all the elements at its disposal together. Anyone that’s dipped into the likes of Moonsorrow, Einherjer and Månegarm might feel close to familiar ground, but – like Moonsorrow – Thyrfing always remaining firmly on the blacker side and takes care not to slide too far into predictability or cartoonish caricature.
Vanagandr may just be Thyrfing’s most open and accessible release to date with its clear attention to light and shade. It’s could perhaps be seen as an attempt to encompass all of what Thyrfing has to offer but it loses little of the band’s darker nature in doing so and comes as a welcome addition to what must now be one of the most solid and respectable back catalogues in the Viking black metal scene. While some tracks stand out, there are others that blend them together creating a nice sense of overall spectacle – again, similar to previous releases. And the album finishes on a very memorable high with a thundering Gjallarhorn sound of Jordafärd that paves the way for rolling drums, tortured vocals and a doomy epic that slows the pace of the album to an elephantine march while at the same time finishing on an indisputable high. Typical of Thyrfing to be a band of contrasts and contradictions. Thyrfing once again manages to be thought provoking and thoroughly enjoyable at the same time.
(8.5/10 Reverend Darkstanley)
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