Across Corpses Grey

Hot on the heels of the impressively staffed, yet extremely short, Die Hard EP, Metatron and his merry band of pagan folk metal miscreants known as The Wolves of Avalon are dropping Across Corpses Grey, the project's third full length album. Those familiar with Metatron's work with The Meads of Asphodel will immediately recognize his signature all over the place, but, by and large, The Wolves of Avalon project has tended to be a little less experimental in nature than the recent output from The Meads.

Perhaps it was time for The Wolves of Avalon to branch out with something a little more adventurous. There really wasn't much wrong with the band's previous two full length albums, but they didn't really capture that off the wall style that has made Metatron's writing so damn intriguing over the years. Truthfully, the album doesn't stray all too far from where The Wolves of Avalon were at on the last album, but structurally this is in a completely different league. The album is presented as a single, thirty minute track. It waxes and wains between thundering pagan heavy metal to progressively-tinged folk music.

It's nearly impossible to describe how the track plays through without resorting to a play by play, so it should suffice to say that it's constantly moving, flowing and pulsing. Short sections of catchy, hard hitting riffing and rollicking percussion merge with airy passages of somber melodies and take a left turn into crunchy, almost thrashing riffs. Metatron's gruff, barked vocal delivery sounds harsh and unyielding, yet a subtle barrage of clean oohs and aahs take away the edge. Although it's a beast of a track, a wide array of traditional folk instruments, including cello, flute and violin, piece together the movements into a seamless, thirty minute run through the fields of war.

While Across Corpses Grey does feature two additional tracks, the previously mentioned Venom classic “Die Hard” and Nokturnal Mortum's “The Voice of Steel”, the centerpiece and main focus is certainly the sprawling folk epic. The Nokturnal Mortum cover offers a fine rendition, yet one can't help but wonder how it would have sounded if they ramped up the folk elements a tad. As much as a I love the band's cover of “Die Hard”, it feels a little out of place next to the more somber and ponderous moments of the other two tracks, but, damn, did they nail that song.

Across Corpses Grey continues the band's pagan-tinged attack, with a bevy of folk instruments lurking throughout. It's The Wolves' finest hour, for sure, as the thirty minute playtime passes by quickly, with no time wasted. Perhaps by linking all of these movements into one rock solid song, it forces the listener to become enveloped in their world and not miss out by abusing the skip button. Thirty minutes of somber, progressive, pagan-tinged metal, plus two covers; you can't go wrong.

Written for The Metal Observer.