Ernte im Herbst

Hailing from Thuringia, Germany, “Fjoergyn” are a symphonic folk/viking metal-band of tremendous talent. These guys haven’t been receiving much attention even among the folk metal-fans, which is very sad considering their albums, especially debut “Ernte Im Herbst’s”, amazing quality. With EIH, “Fjoergyn” truly shows how mature and one-of-a-kind the first release can be.

When finding a new album, one of the first things one usually notices, is the cover art. The cover of “Ernte Im Herbst” depicts a blue-winged butterfly on a white background. The picture is wonderful: full of pure, simple beauty. However, it’s fascinating how the image contradicts (in a way) with the lyrical themes on the album that concentrates on the relationship between humans and nature and particularly nature’s revenge against mankind. Through these themes, the cover gets a whole new dimension: it’s like a moment of innocent beauty before the wrathful storm of vengeance.

Like the nature is beautiful, powerful, diverse and holds many secrets within it, so is “Ernte Im Herbst” equally multidimensional. The most important word here is majesty. The music creates massive and epic soundscapes with a great mix of melancholic, aggressive and oppressive metal and extremely well balanced orchestral arrangements. There are many beautiful piano-parts and symphonic passages without any trace of metal, which works extremely well creating strong feelings when the music swiftly changes into a metal assault and vice versa. The vocals are a mix of unique growls and smooth clean singing. I have always liked heart-lifting clean choirs and they’re present on “Ernte Im Herbst” also, adding a new layer to the symphonic grandiosity. The musicianship on EIH is stunning. Every instrument is in an important role and there are virtually no structures that are boring, overly used or fillers. Everything has its place, carefully laid within the album’s framework.

Next I’m going to highlight some of the best songs on “Ernte Im Herbst” as well as point out few minor flaws that have sneaked among the greatness. “Vom Tod der Träume” is, in my humble opinion, the best song on the album. It explodes straight from the end of the atmospheric intro, “Monolog der Natur”, and offers us a great experience of majestic folk/viking metal. It’s full of breath-taking images of the hardships of the nature and represents us a great variety of music ranging from fast and epic banging to relatively peaceful chanting-supported folk metal-parts. Very powerful track indeed. “Fjoergyn” and “Der Tag der Wölfe” are long epics impressing with their amazingly beautiful and flawlessly flowing melodies. “Des Winters Schmach” is more rawer but still concentrating on atmosphere and might.

The only weaker moments on “Ernte Im Herbst” are the end of “Veritas Dolet” and the composition of “Requiem (Epilog)”. “Veritas Dolet” is otherwise a great song but the last minute’s disturbing whispering is quite annoying and recorded too close if you know what I mean. It’s an interesting end in a way but usually it only makes me want to skip to the next song. “Requiem (Epilog)” starts very promising but I don’t understand why the guys of “Fjoergyn” have wanted to insert a 10-minute silence into it before it proceeds into a weird but exciting three-minute final. A couple of minutes would have been effective but 10 minutes is way too much.

If you are in need of majestic, melodic and atmospheric extreme metal, then get “Ernte Im Herbst” immediately. But I also recommend this to anyone who wants to experience a unique and emotional work of art. EIH was truly one of my best discoveries during 2008!