If you like the “idealism” behind Amon Amarth but you wish they played a more straight up death metal, almost to a point that would resemble the brutality of a band like Vader but without loosing all those great melodies the Swedes are so famous for, then Unleashed is the band for you.
One of the best death metal releases of the year, “Midvinterblot” has every ingredient to attract all death metal fans, gore, Satanism, history, social consciousness, mythology, aggression and of course heavy as fuck riffs and nice guitar solos, ah yeah and a panzer of a drummer.
At first the album felt too long, and that was because the 15 track list creates an illusion of longevity, right after the second spin, it felt way too short; every song has something to offer, either a great chorus line, or an amazing riff, or both, there are no filler songs in here. Norse mythology is everywhere but not in everything, these guys know what they like but are not afraid of trying something different with their vocal and lyric approach, songs like “Midvinterblot” mention Thor, Frey and Odin, their approach is more of a celebration than of a pagan worship cult, really nice, it brings depth to an amazing line of pure death metal, another Norse influenced track is “The Avenger” a song about the prayer of a warrior to his god for strength in battle.
A single song provides the Satanism for the album, with extremely strong lyrics and a great chorus line that will make a nun explode, “Salvation of Mankind” gives you a great solid fast death metal song “Yeah, resurrect so I can vomit on the The body of Christ” just awesome. “Triumph or Genocide” is a song about the Rwandan Genocide where an estimated 800,000 to 1,071,000 persons were murdered; the lyrics are great, and the song is a bit rawer high speed death metal, than many others, perhaps because of the importance of the topic, and the reality presented in it “FUCK THE UN, USELESS BUROCRATS!!!”
One track may be a little off topic on the album, a little Lord of the Rings in here, the song is for me the best one written by a metal band about J.R.R Tolkien’s book (sorry Battlelore!) “We Must Join with Him” one of the best tracks on the album, a bombastic, rapid attack, great chorus line and nice timed interactions between the guitars and drums, a couple of tempo changes that include a slow void that provides room for some guitar solos, a nice escalation guitar display.
The album is full of great songs, headbang classics, some anthems; this band and this album are solid, straight up Swedish’s death metal, played, performed and presented with the right attitude and the right amount of ingredients to make “Midvinterblot” unforgettable.
