Amon Amarth - Once Sent From The Golden Hall

Wednesday you say? Death metal you say? Sure. Those things go together like peanut butter and jelly. I think... Anyways, follower janis! knows her metal, and she asked that I take a peek at Amon Amarth. Turns out they are a Swedish death metal band that started making tunes in 1992. Apparently the name is translated to English to mean 'Mount Doom' which is a reference from JRR Tolkien's book 'Middle Earth'. The band worked on an album in 1993 called 'Thor Arise' - but it was never released because of the poor sound quality and unevenness of the audio. Even though it was never done in a studio - the band started to get a little bit of a following. 1998 saw the signing with Metal Blade Records, and the debut release of this album. Looking back, it was praised for being this raw fusion of dark rhythms and then the lead singers growling vocals making for intriguing metal. The band does a lot of their writing based on mythology and Pre-Christianity themes. I guess there is a genre called "viking metal" - who knew? These guys would fit that sort of label though. While I suppose I can see the reason why music like this exists - it definitely isn't for me. I never did enjoy the shouty type of metal, and this is nothing but shouting things I can't understand and using words that aren't in anyone's vocabulary under the age of 2,000. I wouldn't recommend popping this in today unless you're really in the mood for a headache.

TRACK LISTING:
1. Ride for Vengeance
2. Dragons' Flight Across the Waves, The
3. Without Fear
4. Victorious March
5. Friends of the Suncross
6. Abandoned
7. Amon Amarth
8. Once Sent from the Golden Hall

Listen To Samples

Top 3 Tracks:
1. Ride For Vengeance
2. Without Fear
3. Abandoned

FINAL RATING:
1.5 out of 5 stars