Legacy of Heathens

Finnish band Ensiferum managed to build quite an extensive fanbase thanks to their folky conception of Scandinavian melodic death metal and I find it rather suprising that there was no real outbreak of newly formed bands playing something in the vein of Ensiferum (at least I haven't heard about any band). Perhaps that was the reason for Falchion to be formed (by the way, the band is a side project of Juha Kuppinen, who is the accordeon player in in a really succesfull band Korpiklaani). Falchion's music is similar to the one of Ensiferum (in general you can spot elements of Scandinavian metal) with the difference of not using any other instruments than guitars, bass and the drums. All „folkiness“ is taken care of by the solo guitar that plays characteristic melodies for this kind of music on the background (necessary to say that unlike many other bands, Falchion can create an imaginative and catchy melody). Many reviewers will definitely point this out as a flaw, but I see it more as a positive thing. Especially nowadays when many new „folk/viking“ bands arise and they all base their music on well-known already many times reused formulas, Legacy Of Heathens made a really good impression on me.

Now something about the songs themselves. Both first and the second one will grab you and all you can do is look forward to the following ones. First half of the instrumental track Folk In The Golden Town is rather boring, but the second half makes up for it more than sufficiently :D It's difficult to expand on single songs, they all possess something, that will make you enjoy listening to them (actually Burning The Gates is the only weaker song …). At times it sounds blackish, sometimes you hear pagan metal, then CoB, simply really varied :-) Black Crown closes the album in a majestic way.

Well … do you like Ensiferum? Do you want to hear how you could do it differently? Get hold of Legacy Of Heathens. Despite a couple of weaker moments it's a record of a high quality.

Written for http://www.metalzone.info