Amon Amarth
Versus The World

THE REVIEW

If there's a type of Metal that I truly adore, it's the "cerebral" kind. There are few pleasures as delightful and invigorating as lounging in a leopard print robe on a canopy bed while listening to genius and avant-garde music, sipping a bergamot tea, and anticipating the pleasure of a good cigar. However, every so often, even I find it's time to descend a few steps and explore rougher and more aggressive sounds, only to detach from them with disdainful superiority. That's how I approached Amon Amarth: a band of true Vikings, the kind who go to the sea with an inflatable drakkar and eat raw polar bear meat. Only these Swedes don't unleash their natural Scandinavian rage by sailing the seas for raids, but by churning out violent metal pearls. And when it came time to create "Versus The World" (2002), they must have been pretty pissed.

The same singer Johan Hegg, a bearded lad raised on beer and steaks, has defined his band's fourth work as "the heaviest, most melancholic, and darkest we've ever made," and indeed, you can hear a semblance of tragicness (most notably in "Across The Rainbow Bridge") slithering through the nine tracks of the album. For heaven's sake, it's still an album labeled "Amon Amarth," therefore full of references to mythology, the genre's classic anti-Christianity, and a melody that, to a keen ear, will offer subtle and admirable variations. Hegg's growling is powerful and intense, like the most frantic phase of Ragnarök, the guitars thunder as if they were lightning invoked by Thor, and the excellent Fredrik Andresson's drumming is reminiscent of his relentless hammer striking thunderously upon the Midgard serpent. Yet, even our five Vikings, coming off three stormy albums, have finally understood what gloom is. Thus, we transition from the epic drama of the title track and "Where Silent Gods Stand Guard" to the pessimism of "...And Soon The World Will Cease To Be".

In conclusion, "Versus The World" is an album that stands on the fusion so dear to Amon Amarth of violence and melody, and it still manages to be very powerful, even though the band has decided to loosen the reins compared to the first three works. Unfortunately, however, it's an album that has been and will be labeled by many as "repetitive": in fact, it must be admitted that, despite the small changes mentioned above, the musical offering of this album is too little diversified. In short, there's a risk of listening to it obsessively for a few days and then abandoning it to dust. However, if you are a fan of the genre, it's a work that cannot be missing from your collection, as true as Odin!

And now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for my tea.