To Oak Woods Bestowed

To Oak Woods Bestowed is basically a shorter version of Heathenreel with worse production. Now, before I continue, it is necessary to explain why I scored this higher than Heathenreel. It is because there is a song on here called Banquet Of Bards, which was not on Heathenreel (go figure). This song happens to kick ass. It boosts this demo's score considerably, because it is probably one of the best folk/power metal songs ever, yet it was forced to dwell in a quagmire of obscurity. Elvenking sure knows how to fuck up when they get a good thing going.

I'll get the bad out of the way first. White Willow and Oakenshield blew cock when they were on Heathenreel. Here, not only do they blow cock, but they blow cock in a poorly-produced, minimalistic manner. We've heard all of this before. I don't know what in the hell a Tree of U'sdum is, or why abyone would be under it, but I wouldn't if I had to listen to that piece of crap while I was under it. These are the songs that aren't worth the plastic they're printed on.

The good? Banquet Of Bards. Holy shit. This song has good riffs! That opening - wow, that is some quality stuff. Then the vocalist comes and and actually DOESN'T SUCK, and it continues for a while. Then the solos come in and move the song into a different direction! This is how this stuff is DONE, folks. I just can't understand why this thing wasn't on Heathenreel, because it completely blows everything else Elvenking has ever done out of the water. Oh, and To Oak Woods Bestowed is a cool intro as well.

Oh man. Elvenking doesn't totally blow after all! Well, about half of this does, but the two songs I mentioned totally make this worthy of finding on Soulseek or Direct Connect.

Now if they would only follow To Oak Woods Bestowed's lead and make a quality album...