Sólstafir - Köld (2009)^{Release ID: 3845}

I like to think that enough time has passed for me to believe that their are more people who are familiar with Sólstafir as a post-metal band and not as a black metal one. And it's clear to see; those early albums are not received well even by today's standards, and like with many strains of extreme metal, many of their fans abandoned them after their more accessible pivot.

Now calling Köld "accessible" is using the term incredibly loosely. This album is long and with only eight tracks, includes some very slow and brooding pieces. It's obvious that these guys are coming from the atmospheric side of black metal with the use of guitars as melodic instruments and pleasant harmonies. In addition to brooding song structures, this album does a lot of borrowing from sludge metal as well. I think that "Necrologue" is the album pushing the bands sound to the limit of what could possibly constitute as metal.

Unfortunately, a lot of these tunes tend to be extended beyond what they should be. And it starts on the opening instrumental, "78 Days In The Desert", which sounds more like an amalgamation of fractured ideas pushed together without cohesion or direction. And that continues on "Pale Rider" and "Necrologue" as well. Fortunately the album does get slightly better later. I like the melodic ideas that are present on tracks such as "Köld" and "She Destroys Again", and for as long as "World Void Of Souls" is, the composition of that song is excellent, the buildup is painstakingly slow, how it diverts your expectations by anticipating an explosion of sound, but not getting to that point until absolutely necessary. When the drums entered, I literally took a sigh of relief knowing that the band were not going to leave me hanging! Unfortunately, despite its best efforts, "Goddess Of The Ages" did not resonate with me in the same way.

Now from a sonic perspective, the album is produced quite well. The wall of sound guitars are usually fruitful and energetic (with the exception of the tinny effect on "Necrologue"). The percussion is pretty decent and only provides authoritative punch on occasions. Blast beats are practically non-existent on Köld and have been replaced with what sounds like more traditional punk grooves. The bass is prominent in the mix and during the albums highest points, give these tunes great forward momentum and don't drag. And the vocals are pretty good. Imagine if Tom Araya went for a more melodic vocal delivery, and spent way too much time with Elder's Nick Disalvo (how appropriate).

While I did enjoy Köld, I won't go so far as to call it a classic. There are some great moments to be found within this album, but is held back by some of post-rock and post-metal's worst traits, particularly in the songwriting. For as "cold" as this album claims to be, I believe that Sólstafir could have sunk even deeper.