Biography
Amorphis is a Finnish
group that began life playing primal death metal with superficial
Finnish folk influences scattered throughout their early albums;
a self titled 7" and two full lengths, The Karelian Isthmus
and Privilege of Evil. The mid-90's saw a sort
of creative renaissance in extreme metal, and Amorphis' intensely
forward-thinking 1994 album, Tales from the Thousand Lakes
was arguably one of the catalysts for this movement.
The wake of this album saw increased experimentation and acceptance
for other brilliant works from bands like Moonspell, Tiamat,
In Flames, Opeth and Arcturus. The album had a significant
progressive influence, utilizing vintage keyboards and "clean"
vocals along with harsh death metal growls, an idea which was
quite novel at the time. However, the best was yet to
come, as Amorphis' creative developement came to full fruition
on their 1996 masterpiece, Elegy, a definitive step forward.
The album clearly illustrated a love on the part of the band
for progressive rock and folk music, further incorporating stellar
keyboards, better clean vocals and an incredible sense of melodic
inventiveness. The album is a perfect mixture of utterly
primal heavy metal and darkly beautiful "proggy" elements, a
paramount work that capitalizes on contrasts and tension between
these two forces. Both albums have an underlying concept,
as they are based on traditional folk tales from two important
collections that are definitive Finnish cultural documents,
The Kalevala and The Kanteletar.
Unfortunately,
the band's continual forward progress would see them dump the
death metal elements altogether on subsequent albums, opting
instead for a more traditional progressive approach. A
stop-gap EP, My Kantele hinted at a new direction, but
albums like 1999's Tuonela and their newest Am Universum
lack that primal edge that made earlier albums so great.
While Tales... and Elegy saw the ambitious songwriters
empassioned with a need to stretch the definitions of extreme
metal, the last two albums find an Amorphis that is quite comfortable
outside the bounds of genre definitions. Though the albums
are certainly competent, and might even hold more appeal to
a progressive rock fan, their truly visionary days are probably
behind them. Tales from the Thousand Lakes and
especially Elegy are both essential for those looking
to explore some truly progressive and original heavy metal opuses.
- Greg
Northrup [February
2001]
Tales
from the Thousand Lakes (1994)
Tales from the Thousand Lakes was
actually a fairly revolutionary album when it first came out.
Amorphis took the quickly stagnating basic death metal structure
and injected it with huge folky and progressive melodic ideas,
including keyboards and a stand-in "clean" vocalist to contrast
Tomi Koivusaari's earth shattering warbles. In retrospect,
the keyboards and new vocals don't really add much to the songs,
they were just kind of there as a statement, and they would not
see full and proper integration until the band's next opus, Elegy.
Still,
the songs here simply kill, displaying an ambitious naiveté
that is positively endearing. "Into Hiding" and "Castaway"
open the album with a solid one-two punch of great riffs and
killer melodic hooks. "Black Winter Day" is the song that
everyone points to as being a highlight, and indeed it lights
the way for the even more ambitious direction the band was about
to take. Phenomenal. Amorphis incorporates death
metal, folk music, prog as well as some doomy and gothic overtones
that are eventually discarded on all the later albums.
An excellent companion piece to Elegy.
-
Greg Northrup [February 2001]
Click
Here for Tracklist and Lineup Info
Elegy
(1996)
Elegy
is without a doubt one
of the most important albums in my life, and definitely a sentimental
favorite. I remember when this came out, I was pretty much
listening to mediocre alterna-metal like Helmet or Stone Temple
Pilots along with my Priest and Maiden albums. I was utterly
flabbergasted. I had no idea that people still made music
like this. This album got me into fringe extreme metal acts
that were so much better than anything remotely "mainstream",
and from there got me into progressive rock. In listening
to this album for the first time in a couple years for this review,
I can hear that this music still sounds fresh and certainly trumps
the vast majority of the current "prog-metal" pack as far as creativity,
originality, complexity and vision. Elegy is truly an important
album.
The musical
adornments that the band toyed with on their last album, Tales
from the Thousand Lakes, such as keyboards and clean vocals,
are fully integrated into the band's sound, thanks for full-time
professionals stepping in for those roles. The arrangements
as a whole are intensely more progressive, featuring extremely
diverse instrumentation, vintage keys, attacking guitar parts
as well as a swirling and dynamic metallic base. Much
of this album is simply beautiful, paying respectful homage
to 70s progressive, especially on tracks like "Orphan", "Weeper
on the Shore" and "Elegy". Meanwhile, "Against Widows"
and "On Rich and Poor" are total tour-de-forces, with Tomi Koivusaari's
primal roar exploding out of the speakers in front of a complex
and melodic guitar attack. The album is based on a book
of traditional Finnish literature entitled The Kanteletar,
and the band incorporates a huge amount of ethnic influences
into their music, such as on the bridge of "Cares". An
excellent progressive metal album that blows away all the Dream
Theater clones out there. Without a doubt one of the finest
ever. I have to recommend this to anyone looking for truly
complex and original metal with a fully integrated "prog" feel
to it.
- Greg Northrup [February 2001]
Click
Here for Tracklist and Lineup Info
My
Kantele (1997)
My
Kantele was a cool stop-gap EP that was intended to whet
the by now rabid fanbase's appetite between full-length albums.
My Kantele is a mix of original and cover material.
The first track is an acoustic reprise of "My Kantele" from
the Elegy album, which was already on my version of
the album. The two original compositions on here are
very good, but show Amorphis slowly leaving any connection
to death metal behind them. There is a significant Pink
Floyd type atmosphere in both the songs, and Koivusaari's
"death" vocals are completely absent. The last two songs
are covers, the first of Hawkwind's "Levitation" and the other
a song by Finnish hard-rock/prog legends Kingston Wall, unequivocally
exposing a few of the band's prog influences. Overall
this is a worthwhile pick up for the price, and though a slight
letdown from Elegy, it's after all only an EP.
- Greg Northrup
[February 2001]
Tuonela
(1999)
Meh... Tuonela was a pretty big disappointment coming
from what was then one of my favorite bands. I guess
it would have been impossible for Amorphis to keep writing
within the same style as Elegy, and this album sees
Amorphis adopting a more traditional progressive approach,
albeit retaining much of their significant folk and ethnic
influences. However, the heavier edge and brilliant
tension of Elegy is gone. One of the main problems
with this album is the vocals, Pasi Koskinen steps in as full
time vocalist and is, unfortunately, painfully inadequate.
Though he sounded great on Elegy, he seems to function
best merely as a counterpoint or background vocalist.
His mediocre and sometimes seemingly out-of-tune lead vocals
definitely put a damper on the album as a whole. The
songs just aren't very memorable anymore.
Musically, this is pretty good. Again, more of a progressive
rock vibe as opposed to a metallic one, but still complex
and often beautiful. Nonetheless, Amorphis can no longer
be considered at the forefront of extreme metallic art.
They've toned down their sound and decided to pursue other
avenues. For me, this is a huge let down after the metallic
supernova that was Elegy, although it may be unfair
to incessantly compare a band's new albums to their past achievements.
I guess I wouldn't mind so much if the vocals were better
and the songs were more memorable. Overall, mundane,
to say the least.
- Greg Northrup [February 2001]
