Eluveitie "Slania" (Nuclear Blast)
By Taylor Green
Friday. Jun 13, 5:28 PM
Fails to capture a strong emotion from either side of their musical blueprint.

In the wake of Finntroll's cult success, folk metal has now become as popular as ever, with fans clamoring to get their hands on the latest Korpiklaani, Ensiferum, or Falkenbach album. As a result, a storm of new bands have come to lay new grounds in this young and promising subgenre. Among them are Eluveitie... or so they would like you to believe.

Slania marks Eluveitie's third album and first on metal powerhouse Nuclear Blast. It is being billed as the progression of a budding genre; the definitive folk metal album to date. But in reality, it sounds more like the definitive Dark Tranquillity album, switching out keyboards for the occasional pan flute or bagpipe. As such, it almost abandons the core tenants of folk metal, opting for a much more exacting, mechanical sound that doesn't match with the intrigue and quirk folk metal has been known for.

It is not just that Slania isn't a folk metal album that makes it difficult to listen to. It's the fact that, while it's barely a folk metal album, it's barely a listenable melodic death metal album. Riffs sound like amateur hour at an In Flames cover session. Unlike Finntroll and Korpiklaani, Eluveitie take themselves way too seriously to be enjoyable on simply a novelty level. And unlike Ensiferum, Kampfar, early Amorphis, or even Bathory, their music is far too trite and immature to be considered a deep or moving musical experience.

Eluveitie's inability to capture a strong emotion from either side of their musical blueprint makes Slania a rather hollow and boring album. But it seems that as the popularity of any subgenre of metal begins to grow, so do the cheap knock offs and imitators who believe adding a gimmick can gain listeners. And while Eluveitie have consistently used folk instruments since their inception, it doesn't make their use any more forced and unnecessary. Instead of a mediocre melodic death metal album, Slania ends up a laughable folk metal album.
www.eluveitie.ch
www.nuclearblastusa.com

Click here to buy this album on iTunes!

Click here to download the iTunes jukebox application for Macintosh or Windows!

Taylor Green

Got something constructive to say? By all means, rant away. Gonna blab about something unrelated and/or talk shit? Don't expect your comment to stick around.