Disco de Ensiferum: “Victory Songs”

Victory Songs by Ensiferum is one of my five favorite albums of all time, and it is the CD that lured me into the Folk/Viking metal genre. This CD is, in my opinion, a masterpiece with superb guitar, fantastic folk instrumentation, and masterfully written and sung lyrics.

The introduction to this album, Ad Victorium, is epic. Beginning softly with the crashing of waves and the pounding of hooves, it progresses into an almost orchestral piece that steadily becomes faster and more involving.

The second track, Blood Is The Price Of Glory, is a sudden change into a hard-paced song with lyrics regarding honor and battle. This track has excellent, growling vocals and a very catchy chorus. The guitar part is amazing (I'm running out of adjectives).

The third track opens with a high scream that makes me think of Judas Priest, rapid drumming, and skillful guitaring. My only qualm with this song is that I have a slightly hard time understanding all of the lyrics, which isn't a problem with most of the other songs on this album for me.

The fourth track, Ahti, opens much like Ad Victoriam (i.e crashing waves) but quickly becomes hard and furious. This song is about the point I became absolutely hooked into the album on my first listen-through. The song is about a Finnish god of the sea, and I love the mythology of it.

The fifth song, One More Magic Potion, has a wonderful folk-instrument introduction with acoustic strings and what sounds like a flute. (I think it is a flute.) The folk instrumentation continues throughout the song, a nice touch. The song is about a witch/troll thingie. This is an odd note, but I think that this song is the only time I have ever heard the word "weird" actually used in a song.

The sixth track, the Wanderer, is my favorite Ensiferum song of all time and one of my top 5 songs of all time. Opening with a flute and acoustics, a chorus is added shortly after with a tolling bell. Then the song has a hard, simple, and very catchy guitar part that leads to the superb clean vocals of the song. This is one of two tracks on this album with entirely clean vocals. The chorus of the Wanderer is very, very catchy, sung by what I think is the entire band.

The seventh song, Raised By The Sword, continues the tradition of a nice folk-metal instrumentation preceding a sudden shift into a hard and fast guitar part. This is a good song, perhaps with one of the strongest folk sounds throughout. The song has some parts sung by multiple band-members, a touch I always enjoy.

The eighth track, the New Dawn, is perhaps the only song on here that blends together in my head. It's perhaps my least favorite song on here, though I can't particularly say why.

The ninth track, Victory Song, is simply, astoundingly good. At ten minutes and some-odd seconds, it is also simply, astoundingly good. It intros with a long folk instrumentation with a galloping acoustic rhytm and tribal drums. The folk continues for approx. two minutes before entering into the metal part. With a good mix of harsh and clean vocals, this song has a very catchy chorus and vivid lyrics. I can literally see what's going on in the song's story while listening to it. There is a segment in some Scandinavian language as well, which is a pretty nifty touch.

The tenth track, Lady In Black, is also entirely clean vocals. With a very catchy overlying rhythm, the song's chorus is a choral ahh-ahh-ahhh-ahhh that I think sounds pretty good. The ahh'ing continues for about a full minute or so after the end of the song, then there is a long silence. After a few minutes of quiet, the entire band pitches in to sing the choruses of the Wanderer and Victory Songs accapella.

Overall, this is a fantastic album. In my opinion, it is superior to Iron, which is usually touted as Ensiferum's greatest CD. It was certainly good enough to hook me on an entire genre which is now my favorite form of music. (Viking metal.)

I've been curious about this band for a while and finally ran across one of their CD's in a shop in Las Vegas. The sound samples I'd heard on the net were from this album and I'm not sorry I bought it.

The music is definitely Viking metal and very well done. At first, I was wondering where all the clean vocals were supposed to be, as I was expecting more of them, but they finally showed more prominent later on. The harsh vocals are fine, but I would have liked a little more variety. However, that is not enough to knock down the five stars.

Another thing I really like about this album is that there are actually a few guitar solos! I find in so many bands today that real guitar solos are almost non-existent. The trend seems to be "anti-guitar" in that the instrument is always there, but is relegated to riffing.

This is a really great album and especially comes into its own toward the end with the more symphonic tracks. Highly recommended.

Ensiferum's cd Victory Songs is excellent. Brilliant blend of Metal and Folk. In my opinion, they are the next big Metal Band to come from Finland, Look out for them. Come to the United States, please! They have some of the best Artwork on their cd's and T-shirts. Top quality recordings, Highly Recommended.

I had the same problem listening to this album as I did listening to the Wintersun album- it wasn't Jari singing here, and it wasn't Jari in Ensiferum. I knew Petri was there to stay, and I loved the Dragonheads EP, but something about him being in the band for good just didn't sit right. I wasn't sure how the band would do now that they had brought in what was essentially just a screamer. Petri doesn't do any of the clean vocals, and that really bothers me. I knew that the old classics would never sound the same again, and it was that that really made it hard to listen to this album. However, once I accepted that Jari was gone for good and it was Petri's chance, listening to this album became much easier and much more enjoyable. I ended up loving this album. Sure, Petri is no Jari, and Markus and Sami definately don't match up to Jari's clean vocals, but this is a new era for Ensiferum- you just have to accept that.

This is a pretty good CD if you like warrior metal. I prefer TYR's style but this is pretty good stuff. This is the second CD by this artist that I have.