Album Rating: 2.5

Turns out after all this, after all of Jari's insolence, his insistence on 25 tetbaytes of RAM, his remarks that he has never been totally satisfied with an album until this one, that he was unhappy with his previous guitar tones, that he needed a full scale studio brand new from the ground up which was literally the only possible way to fullfil his vision...



And the fact that every Kickstarter backer took him at his absolute word for all of this. Meanwhile we have Nuclear Blast calling Jari's bluff, putting their cards on the table, calling him out for the unreasonable diva that he is, The instinct for a ton of people was that, should Jari's terroristic list of demands be met, he would undoubtedly deliver on everything he said (the product being something akin to a 21st century Finish Sistine Chapel). The instinct for perhaps an equal number of people was that NB did everything they could to accommodate this high-maintenance man within reason, under the instinct that the further sinking of funds surely would not make the difference in yielding the masterpiece Jari swears will come. Finally you have a camp of people that concede there is probably truth from both sides, but to what extent the balance is shifted is uncertain--but that nonetheless, if Jari just found a damn way to finally release something it would surely be phenomenal from almost every front, brand new sauna studio or not (but if so, then the product would undoubtedly be something for the ages). I would count myself as being in this last camp, which in a real sense is the moderate view, despite being privy to just a touch of Jari worship.



Regardless. At last, in mid July of 2017, the music would finally speak for itself.



And just like that, we got our answer.

Album Rating: 2.0 | Sound Off

"Unlike most of you, I wanted and even expected to like this."



Same here, but Time I already disappointed me so much that I became skeptical pretty quickly

Album Rating: 2.0

Only heard the Spring track, but it was boring af.. I don't think I even want to hear the rest of the album.

Album Rating: 2.0 | Sound Off

Does anyone on this site actually like this album

Album Rating: 2.0 | Sound Off

This is basically gonna be the No Man's Sky of music... empty promises on top of lies on top of empty promises on top of lies...

Album Rating: 1.5

I like few parts of it, but overall no.

Album Rating: 1.5

I don't own a music studio So I'm not familiar with it's technical requirements but do music studios really need all that special high tech?

Simple answer: No.

Also, in this day and age you can even fuckin self-release albums that are WAY better produced than this.

Album Rating: 1.5

I bet my 16 gb's ram can handle all raw uncompressed music samples and my i5 can manage all the mixing and binding without breaking a sweat, All i need is a decent recording equipment



Now video editing+rendering+ content creation is another thing.

Very likely, yes.

But video editing (or 3d rendering) and all that jazz is a wholly different animal and no musician requires that much technical horsepower.

Album Rating: 3.0

I hear a lot of what Ocean of Noise already said in these comments.



"I feel like people's (admittedly warranted) exasperation with Mäenpää is interfering too much with their enjoyment of his music tbh"



it's a great album. not as great as i expected, still great tho. it will grow on you after a couple of spins. what ppl forget or plainly ignore: crowdfunders did also get a remaster of the debut (which sounds amazing) and of time 1 which now sounds closer to what it should have from the start along with a live album and standard gimmicks. that is worth 50 euros, at least for me.



production on time 1 was initially way worse than what we hear on the forest seasons (which has a pretty clean production for my ears), so i don't get the rant on this aspect of the album either. some ppl need to get over their hate for jaris attitude or at least seperate that from his music. he's a diva - agreed. but he's also a great musician. a lot of guys who commented here and gave it something around a 2 freely admitted to not having even heard the whole damn thing. sounds to me like you heard the first five minutes of the opening track max and saw yourself confirmed in a negative attitude towards jari thus rating with a huge negative bias. personally, i can't take that serious and only see ppl transforming their opinion on wintersun and the whole crowdfunding thing in a rating which has nothing to do with the music which is actually present on the album. what i can agree on with harsh critics: some riffs are overstaying their welcome. otherwise, it's a great album with lots to discover as you keep spinning it.

you must be tone deaf if you don't hear the glaring production issues on here

Album Rating: 3.0

definitely found those on time 1, here not so much.

Vox are too high in the mix and the rhythm guitars are muddy (tho iirc Jari said he was after a rawer sound on here). You can hear a bit of frequency masking when the choirs and synths all coalesce etc. but fr you guys are exaggerating the production issues big time.

The fact this is averaging 0.5 higher on RYM than here says it all lol

i hear an abundance of metal records that sound worse than this every year

I just listened to the new Decrepit Birth record which sounds infinitely worse than this does

A ton sound better as well, what's your point?

Album Rating: 3.0

what are people's opinions on the remaster of the debut?

it's bad, he actually fucked up the DR.

A ton sound better as well, what's your point? [2]

Album Rating: 2.0 | Sound Off

"Vox are too high in the mix and the rhythm guitars are muddy (tho iirc Jari said he was after a rawer sound on here). You can hear a bit of frequency masking when the choirs and synths all coalesce etc. but fr you guys are exaggerating the production issues big time."



The production isn't the only problem, as the songwriting sucks as well. Every song is a meandering, directionless mess