Review Summary: On its second LP, Windir cements its identity once and for all, but in so doing proves itself to be devoid of any but the most banal of merits.
What most obviously separates this music from the heights metal can achieve in its greatest moments is its aesthetic of mood. Whereas metal is most commonly known as angry music, this is mostly happy. Not expressive of the joy of conquest common to power metal, or the appreciation of beauty common to certain niches of black metal, but simply HAPPY. These tracks sound more like drinking songs than anything else, which relegates them to occupying the same conceptual space - mindless, bouncy expressions of having a good ol' time, without a care in the world, because nothing needs to be taken seriously anyway. By expressing this aesthetic and being a metal album, it fails massively.
Composition continues to be simplistic, as in the band's previous output, although there are obvious occurrences of ambition sprinkled in. "Svartesmeden Og Lundamyrstrollet" at least attempts to develop itself linearly, eventually rescinding its irritatingly goofy lead hook for an atmospheric transition that is punctuated by the appearance of an arpeggiated couple of chords before gradually leading back into that main hook for a sincere, if trite, attempt at a conclusion. The ridiculously overlong-for-its-content "Saknet" takes a similar approach by moving its atmospheric section towards the end of the track, providing a lead-out that would close the album on a tolerable note if not for the following final track that, aside from its possibly being the worst song here, is also jarring in its overindulgent intensity that would be better placed at the beginning of this work.
As before, Windir's primary compositional approach here is to layer lead hooks comprised of overly dichotomous notes over two- or three-chord drawn-out rhythm riffing. Although there is some improvement in this album's desire to be expressive, with interstitial "heavy" riff sections to space out the songs a bit and occasional more dynamic uses of the rhythm section, it remains a boorish affair overall that is only made worse by Windir's full adoption of being mind-numbingly light. What little there is to like here is drowned in sappy melodies that carry nothing beyond their face value, and sound more like Disney music than anything else. This is the kind of metal that is not metal, and as such even mopey one-dimensional teenage pop is better than this. At least that has the decency to decline pretending to be something it's not. Windir is children's music made for adults, and as such this will be popular with man-children and nobody else.
