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Rating: I return after a few days to talk again about Borknagar. It's not an obsession of mine, or maybe it is; the fact is that these days I can't listen to anything else when I can, and therefore I feel it's my duty to share my impressions of a band that, in my opinion, deserves a lot of recognition, certainly for their content and extraordinary artistic talent.
Let's dispel any doubts: this "Epic" that I am reviewing (unworthily, I would say) is perhaps, for me, the best of the best of their already prestigious and multifaceted discography.
It is necessary to make distinctions regarding Borknagar: starting from a sound firmly rooted in symphonic Black Metal, with an eponymous album at the origins, they, thanks to the undeniable capabilities and intelligence of the guitarist Øystein G. Brun, in particular, revolutionized the concept of musical extremism, linking it indissolubly to what was then a branch of Black, namely Viking, derived from various influences, including those of Bathory.
The concept underlying Borknagar's artistic formula was simple but not easily foreseeable: the detachment of Viking properly said, establishing itself as a standalone genre, without giving up the necessary extreme origins that were still part of the band's songwriting.
Slowly but surely, thanks also to contributions from magnificent singers like Garm and I.C.S. Vortex, Borknagar gained a loyal and "elite" fan base in extreme domains, almost always resorting to stunning and astonishing blends of different genres. Black came first, then Viking was added, and it didn't stop there, as a faint but undeniable Progressive vein recalling the seventies was added, and finally, last but not least, an avant-garde music style emerged where one always risked breaking their neck searching for pleasing and fitting definitions, became distinctly clear.
And it's precisely this last period that still endures today, thanks also to the valuable contribution of an artist like Vintersorg, permanently in the band, and who has released "no less than" three albums with them: the much-celebrated "Empiricism," this "Epic" I'm writing about, and the last, totally acoustic "Origin."
Thanks to Vintersorg, Borknagar has acquired an eclectic and different taste, "universal" one might say, in music.
Here, the fierce "to the bayonet" parts filled with malevolent screams are certainly present, but they often give way to airy Progressive moments, highlighting Hammond organs, pianos, and keyboards (commendable work of a certain Lars A. Nedland, known as "Lazare," a member, for the few who didn’t know, of the equally indecipherable "Solefald"), all always and anyway seasoned with that overflowing and cyclopean aura of unmistakable and original epicness that the band itself inaugurated in unsuspecting times.
So, with this "Epic" and previously with the extraordinary "Empiricism," the band takes an indefinable but polished and fascinating direction that, for those who love "thoughtful" and never boring archetypes, certainly makes one think of the instrumental similarities Borknagar shares with another extreme Scandinavian pillar: Opeth.
Rest assured, I don't intend to blaspheme, nor would I ever want to be pointed out how different and varied, incomparable, the "distinguishing features" found in one band and the other are, but certainly, beyond all discussions about the entirely different "original" genres of the two components, it is undeniable that the same "pathos," the same sentiment, the same decadent and intricate atmosphere unites them, and all, naturally, without speaking of plagiarism or "mutual" directions, quite the opposite.
Borknagar are and will remain (at least so it is believed) an extreme band dedicated to a Black Metal, albeit denatured and structured differently compared to most bands of the same genre, and Opeth can certainly still be referred back to a deep, caustic, and dark Death Metal; the points of contact, however, exist and it would be hypocritical not to highlight them, precisely because these embellish and make "unique" the sound of one and the other.
Specifically, regarding Borknagar, I believe with good reason that episodes like "Origin" (the song, not the album), "Sealed Chambers of Electricity," the beautiful instrumental "The Weight of Wind," would not have been such without the serpentine "seventies" feeling in the background, a surplus of an artistic composition to be listened to calmly to assimilate its complex and sensitive structure little by little, without necessarily having to pay ten thousand attentions to the same song to convince oneself of its goodness.
None of that. If you are looking for "feeling" and subjectivism, you will find them in abundance here, and no singer like Vintersorg will know how to reveal it to you, with his always particular voice: atrocious in the scream passages and aching, almost broken, in the clear parts, managing thanks to his abilities to continuously interweave one with the other supported by forceful passages between keyboard works performed with mastery and excellent skills, varied and imaginative guitars that never indulge, as the minimal tradition of Black Metal would suggest, in indefinable and muddled orgies of sound. No! You won't be able to expect this from Borknagar, because it would be too simple, too predictable, and too foreseeable for a band that, no one can deny, has always elaborated its own canons and standards in a manner always ten thousand kilometers above every other extreme component.
The examples of all that’s been said so far, with regard to "Epic," are inherent in all the tracks, many of which, such as "Resonance," "Cyclus," and "Future Reminiscence," are authentic stabs of cruelty and nihilism on notes, while others, like "Quintessence," "The Inner Ocean Hypothesis," and "The Wonder," instead, highlight the more seminal, intimate, almost "shamanic" approach to Borknagar's music and, if you really want advice from someone who generally frowns when giving it, get the album, it's certainly worth it. Of course, for those who naturally love certain refinements, certain paroxysms, certain paradigms and would always want to make them their own.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Future Reminiscence (05:26)
The mysteries of a hidden past. Precession of the planetary relations. Restitution of a genuine consciousness. Return to the haven of the first and the last. The everlasting zero, a glimpse of a million. The forever million, yet a ubiquitous presence. Coronate the path of the Gods, the Elder. Beware, stare towards the horizon new. Sear, tear the sensation of distant propinquity. Through the secret moments I flew. As one among the very few. The everlasting zero, a glimpse of a million. The forever million, yet a ubiquitous presence. Coronate the path of the Gods, the Elder. Coronate the path of the Gods. Beware, stare towards the horizon new. Sear, tear the sensation of distant propinquity I am a remnant of the forever origin. I am the soul of every phantom fallen. I am rising as I am falling, silent as calling. "The precise prelude of the catalysm". silent as calling. Apocalyptic visions of the future fall. The aberrant taste of the conceiving past. As a slave of the next moment of presence. The ones among the very few. Restitution - summons the sight. Emancipation - circles in presence. Renunciation - for a new era to enlighten.
04 Sealed Chambers of Electricity (04:13)
["The human brain is a tyrannical despot" - Louis-Ferdinan Céline (1894-1961).]
From the lonely, grey bricks of inaccessible places to the
massive stones of a shared foundation.
From a Mental clarity of inverted liberation to the
intricate web
forming ever-changing mazes.
Numerically understanding east to west,
only to snap in a single contraction.
Failing to grasp what all should know best as a perfect
circle of interaction.
An electrical chamber of vast capacity,
storing the pieces gathered by senses,
pushing through filters to see if it cleanses anything
leaning on intricacy.
A matter of movements in a cul-de-sac.
A set of sealed chambers - no compromising.
Collecting raw data - defeat or attack.
Remembering, storing and schematising.
An electrical chamber of vast capacity,
storing the pieces gathered by senses,
forcing trough filters to see if it cleanses anything
leaning on vivacity.
The mind's electricity clearing the vanity,
grasping the world through keyholes of sanity.
Anything leaning on vivacity.
Numbness in speech - not in visualisation - forms
intricacy's silent coronation.
An electrical chamber of vast capacity,
storing the pieces gathered by senses,
opening filters so that nothing cleanses all that is leaning
on complexity.
08 Cyclus (05:26)
I am soon to reach the pith.
My spherical vile so sacred.
Engendering the divine fusion.
Visions of emerging stars.
I am about to stake my stance.
Fly above the precluding fence.
The cosmic feast I am to gasp.
To honour the divine cast.
Cyclus - frames the core of the causes.
Circle - the way of the forces.
Gods, I am here to prevail.
End the subsequent existence.
The resound of thousand tales.
Hear the call, stirring the fall.
Reinstate the lurid, lunar existence.
The renaissance of primal founders.
Stamina, the retrace of revival.
Synergy of entire universal courses.
Energy of the stellar host.
Cyclus - frames the core of the causes.
Circle - the way of the forces.
Gods, I am here to prevail.
End the subsequent existence.
The resound of thousand tales.
Hear the call, stirring the fall.
Gods, I am here to be and become.
Combine the rotating sequence.
Trig the fall of the presence.
Here the call, stirring the fall.
I am about to stake my stance.
Fly above the precluding fence.
The cosmic feast I am to gasp.
The honour the divine cast.
Gods, I am here to prevail.
End the subsequent existence.
The resound of thousand tales.
Hear the call, stirring the fall.
Gods, I am here to be and become.
Combine the rotating sequence.
Trig the fall of the presence.
Here the call, stirring the fall.
12 The Wonder (04:15)
Celebration of life in all its forms.
The visionary scope of wonders.
Confluent and figural scenery.
The resilient existence of the past.
As a drone of the inevitable progress.
The carrier that breach the horizon.
I see the winter all summer through.
Moments inducing the way and sight.
Dark is the astray, as the olden domain.
Illumine the wonder new.
Spiritual moraine, a phantom brew.
The wonder - of the solar/lunar peak.
Through the glimpse of the moments.
Query presence of celestial wisdom.
Mirrors summoning fires igniting.
Fires inducing the day and light.
I see the winter all summer through.
Moments inducing the way and sight.
The path I have chosen is the spring of you.
A wonder ignites, ahead, towards infinity.
Welcome!
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