Moonsorrow - Viides Luku - Hävitetty (2007)

Moonsorrow's 2007 offering, ‘Viides Luku - Hävitetty’ is but only two tracks long and curiously fifty six minutes total, yet this last full-length release from these Finnish folk metalers carries on in a very similar vein as the previous album, ‘Verisäkeet’ back in 2005.

A lot of the same ideas that were expressed on that album and even the albums before it are all present here again however it’s all crunched together as two long songs. Naturally these songs could have been split up into several shorter songs since there are several slow and faster sections, sometimes at the beginning, sometimes in the middle, sometimes at the end. There’s a bit of everything in this recording too; brutal black/Viking metal moments, softer progressive melodic rock like moments, even brutal death metal like characteristics and of course some ambient and folky moments, which when formed together make up a rather decent recording. Of course it should be known that this diversity is mostly only present in the first song, ‘Jäästä Syntynyt / Varjojen Virta,’ while, ‘Tuleen Ajettu Maa’ seems to, at least after the folky opening and mostly typical Moonsorrow heaviness, concentrates more so on just being brutal.

What I really enjoy about the album is that it has a sense of voyage and wonder to it, like going on a journey through some fantasy world and at the end it feels like this journey is complete and I'm a new man, a changed man, maybe. It could also be said that this is truly the, 'Crimson' of viking/folk/black metal albums, but of course Edge of Sanity's ol' masterpiece was a single forty minute piece, so perhaps Moonsorrow will take their next albums song lengths to even longer times.

Jäästä Syntynyt / Varjojen Virta is definitely the highlight of the album and indeed one of the most epic and progressive pieces Moonsorrow has composed to date, while Tuleen Ajettu Maa is great but not nearly as pleasing as its big brother. Still, the first song is thirty freakin’ minutes long and it definitely warrants a purchase if you’ve enjoyed Moonsorrow release in the past.