Elmsfire
Hour of the Wolf

German metal heroes of Elmsfire are back with a new album, their second one, which is a one that takes us to the hour of the wolf. It is a time I often live through but let’s not talk about me, let’s talk about Elmsfire. A band I thought was interesting when they released their debut and in my review of that album I described as sounding like Blind Guardian with a good vocalist – something I cannot really say about this album though. But let us not get ahead of ourselves now and lets instead say something more about this band who released their debut album in 2012, now they have a changed line-up and a new label. So what about this hour of the wolf then?

Heavy/power metal with a touch of the epic, quite melodic and varied is how you can describe this new album. Cool artwork is another reflection I have when I go through the stuff with this album. I like the vocalist who isn’t the typical singer of the genre, I think that kind of selection of vocalist is great. Great is also that these guys sounds rather fresh and that is despite the fact that they aren’t really breaking any new ground. They float somewhat outside the absolute middle of the mainstream; I think that is good as it increases their chances of actually being noticed amongst all the albums that see the light of day each and every day.

There are nine tracks on this album and it plays for a little under fifty minutes and it is quite varied, probably enough to keep the listener interested for the entire playing time. I really enjoy this album, the tracks are really good and the album is very enjoyable throughout. Well, perhaps it is somewhat long and perhaps one could argue that their music is a little bit familiar but that is just a critic pointing out some details – details that don’t really make too much of a different to the whole picture. I think that this is a rather great album that I have really enjoyed playing through several times over.

With nine strong tracks what’s not to like here? One can like the second track Dead Night Misery and the ending track Ashes a little bit more than the other tracks and if one is really picky one can argue that they should have dropped one on the other tracks in order to make the album even more dynamic. The latter is of course just a critic speaking and no one can really argue away that this is a great album, perhaps the best thing to listen to when one want to pass some time during the hour of the wolf. The four years between albums seems to have done Elmsfire good, their new album is a great one – well worth checking out.

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