Lothlöryen
Principles of a Past Tomorrow

One might be forgiven to imagine that this band has been somewhat inspired by the tales from that Lord of the Rings thing, even though they misspelled the forest of elves. There is quite easy to figure out what these guys musical direction is just by looking at their name and their cover art – it explains a lot. Although not everything I should point out, they are from Brazil and this is their fifth album if you were wondering. But don’t feel like you have been out of touch with the world in case you haven’t heard about them as they haven’t exactly been on large international labels and their music has probably had most attention at their native market. This is an independent release so I doubt that it will change much but using a European PR-agency might be wise and could open up more eyes in Europe.

Folk metal is probably good description of what you get from this album, they mix folk music with power/progressive metal. Lots of melodic touches, slower passages and such things, kind of an adventurous spirit I would say. The singer is more like a folk metal singer than a metal singer, and that creates an interesting dynamic to the album. But it isn’t all in la-la-land either, they have some space elements as well, something best illustrated by spoken word parts by Stephen Hawking and Carl Sagan who are people that shouldn’t need any further introduction. Their spoken word parts are really well integrated into the overall sound of the album as well, that in itself is a commendable feature of the album.

And then we have the variation of the album; it is great and should keep you interested for the entire duration. We get a dozen tracks and a bit over 50 minutes on the playing time. There are some buts however, something that is very illustrated by the opening track that doesn’t really start until after two minutes, that can be scaring away some of the listeners. And there are more such parts where the album loose the direction and goes of the trail it seems to have set, and that is not in a good way like a surprising exciting way but rather in a way that makes you loose interest for a while. That is a major problem for an album that really doesn’t have any other weaknesses but with a bit of lost dynamics the album loose the flow and the feel – especially if you compare it with the best folk metal albums.

So, not as good as it could have been – it could have been fantastic. Now it is just great, it has most of what you can wish for and these flaws may seem large in print but they are a lot less obvious if you are only casually listening to the album and I will keep this one in my music player because it is an enjoyable album to listen to. Folk metal with an adventure that is larger than the most threaded parts in the genre is fantastic, and little flaws doesn’t take away from the fact that this is a great album that I can recommend, especially for fans of the folk metal genre.

The tracks are generally quite solid, some of them have a bit pointless passages where you lose interest but in general they are all very good. The second track is probably my favourite, it has great dynamics and energy, and it is what I think this album should be all about. I think it is a great album, maybe not quite up there with the best in the genre but it is still a very enjoyable album to listen to.

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