Wintersun
Wintersun

THE REVIEW

I have read many reviews about Wintersun. All (or nearly all) Italian ones remain critical regarding this band and the work they have composed; all (or nearly all) foreign ones, on the other hand, praise them enthusiastically and celebrate them endlessly.
Probably, an objective judgment of this album can only be given by placing it between these two opposing opinions, but perhaps, as far as I'm concerned, it's not exactly like that. For those who don't know, Wintersun is the solo project of Jari Mäenpää, former singer and guitarist of Ensiferum, a band that, just by mentioning it among enthusiasts of the Folk/Epic/Viking genre, creates more chaos, in devastation, than a tsunami.
Ensiferum has been, and maybe still is, an institution in the "Swedish Metal" field, and with their debut self-titled album, they managed to set new rules and new standards for playing and narrating epic stories in full Scandinavian tradition.

With this premise, you can understand why many are critical towards Wintersun. Because the comparison with Ensiferum is inevitable, also because Mäenpää himself represented their backbone and was one of the main composers, but, in the opinion of this writer, it is incorrect. This album should be judged for what it is, not for what it "could be" if compared to its peers, even though this can be conceded. And indeed, the songs are deeply permeated with analogies and simply "similar" things to Ensiferum.
This does not take away from the expertise, the mastery, the exquisite compositional technique, the "emotion" that Wintersun puts into it being absolutely indispensable in any judgment or opinion one may wish to give.

Songs like the first one "Beyond the Dark Sun", although not striking for originality, and this is clear from the title, or like the second "Winter Madness", or like "Death and the Healing", are noteworthy episodes that compellingly show that talent, combined with a good dose of technique and taste, can give rise to albums that certainly will not be listed as masterpieces or epigones of a genre, but that, as we say in "our" slang, "rock on" and quite a lot too. Try it to believe it. It will be a pleasure to listen to almost sixty minutes of powerful, epic music, with an easy grip and always sharp and tense parts teetering between Power on one side, and Swedish Death on the other.
No periphrases, nothing that is not attributable to a precise scene that already includes many capable and well-structured bands, but for this reason, one should not turn away and run disgusted from such trodden grounds.
The drum parts, the work of a certain Kai Hahto, are decidedly beastly, well-balanced, robust, and without missing a beat. The guitars, the work of the same leader Jari Mäenpää, weave solos upon solos, hyper-technical scales on melodic frameworks filled with keyboards and synths, and his voice, moreover, is as raspy and evocative as possible (at times reminiscent of Jeff Walker from Carcass, a symbol of a certain Death Metal), and the overall compositions that emerge never bore, but always make you want to max them out on the stereo and thrash around.

If all this is not enough for you, then you would do well to go back to listening to Children of Bodom (to whom Wintersun, as if cursed by playing a similar genre, are often compared), or maybe, if you can't stand too much technique, to Eternal Tears of Sorrow, but it would be fair and appropriate to give this band a chance, if only for the composite and masterful atmospheres permeating a song like "Sleeping Stars", or for the steamrolling Power of "Starchild" which highlights Mäenpää's more epic and technical soul and stylizes it in a well-rounded seven minutes of sharp riffs and blistering drumming, truly remarkable, with, to top it off and complete the circle, many Folk references that will delight those who, at night, dream of snowy lands, dizzying mountains enveloped in mist, streams of cold water tearing through valleys, and endless auroras.