Harrow
Fallow Fields

Harrow, could be a Chinese man trying to say hello, kind of like they say lice and such things. It could also be a Canadian band that released their second album a little while ago. It is called Fallow Fields and it follows two years after the debut album. Other than that I don’t really have much else to say about this band and this album, it was not much in terms of information included in the email I got and if there was more I guess I have lost it somewhere in the digital wasteland that is this computer.

Musically it is an intoxicating mixture of black metal and folk metal, according to the label it is. I don’t know how intoxicating it is but it has fairly dramatic sense in that it is built around sweeping long somewhat monotone atmospheres. I don’t think that it is particularly heavy, it isn’t very varied the four songs, clocking in on over 40 minutes, melt into one another and it all becomes more of a unity that four distinct tracks. The sound I varying from a bit blackish metal, to a little acoustic and epic things but the moves and changer are so slow that you barely notice them until they have happened. The sound and production is very good, as are the vocals for the most parts. I think that it is a solid production, a good one in fact.

The album itself isn’t very good though, it is too slow, too monotonous and it lacks depth. I hated it at first play, I kind of liked it for a short while before turning very indifferent to it, and there just isn’t anything there in those songs. The songs lack idea, sensation and feel. Music like this can be really good if done right, they do the sound right but they didn’t quite muster up the songs to go with that sound – too bad, this could have been pretty good. In the end though I think it ends up being a pretty drab album, kind of like a painting without the soul of the artist.

Fans of the band or the genre might find this album quite agreeable, I on the other hand think that it is 43 minutes of background noise, music that just doesn’t want you to listen – kind of like today’s radio pop music, well produced with great sound but boring songs. A tired product, a tired album that sounds really good but is impossible to really listen to – that is how I see Fallow Fields.

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