ANGL

Ihsahn attempts to recapture that fire (and demise) and gifts us all with another three quarters of an hour's vamp-groove in the gothic, self-conscious fashion that fits him so well.

It's dull, though. Ihsahn must have dominated the writing process while in Emperor and Peccatum because his solo music is a neat continuation of those bands all stirred in with considerable Opeth influence (and vice-versa, since metal is often such a spiral towards copyism), and like that band, although the songs are dressed up in intellectualism and experiment they each remain predictable, particularly as they are SO CLOSELY ROOTED in songs the man has already written.

There exist very proggy sections which will suit this generation of musos - bouts of fretless bass and guitar interplay here, descending pseudorandom riffs there. The songs average five minutes of length, so alternate sections are swapped in to keep the music from stagnating, which I appreciate. angL is not so extreme as anything by Emperor because Opeth syndrome has crept in, so instead of having a heavy song you have a heavy, repetitive part of one which then returns to more gothic climes - a very acceptable and safe way of diluting an extreme genre, one that's expected of mellowing musicians. All in all, the album is comfortably aimed at coffee-table metalheads. This may describe you, in which case, you might want to buy Ihsahn's album instead of Opeth's this year.

For the rest of us, who aren't so taken in by this false dichotomy between light and shade nor this cynical attempt at bring extreme to the mature (music in this reviewer's view can be either one or the other, which isn't to say that extreme music is bad but simply that it should not be tempered) this album is safely ignorable, or at least, be sure to have heard Peccatum's Lost in Reverie first, since that album is far more charming and Ihsahn does better work, there.

'Angl' - Ihsahn (8/10)

Once the front man of Emperor, guitarist and vocalist Ihsahn has come a long way from the primal times of early black metal. Now a respected individual in both the black and progressive metal circles, he is certainly one to impress with this; his second release. While 'Angl' can feel a bit pressured at times, a good performance and great songwriting takes Ihsahn's blackened roots and projects it to a whole new level of creative spirit.

One of the first things that the typical metal fan will notice with this album is appearance of Opeth vocalist Mikael Akerfeldt on the third track; entitled 'Unhealer.' As one of my personal favourite vocalists, Akerfeldt does a great job of using a warm, clean voice to counterpoint Ihsahn's screams. While I wasn't a fan of Emperor before getting 'Angl' (I am now,) hearing that Akerfeldt was on this album was a great way to convince me to buy the album, and the performance works out to be much more than just a sales pitch.

The songwriting is kept under pretty average song lengths and structures, although there are instances- such as in the song Elevator- where the music trails into something soft and different. There are amazing riffs aplenty here, which makes the fact that there isn't a whole lot of technical experimentation work with the album instead of against it. That said, this is not the most ground-breaking piece of metal in the world. Instead, it takes existing black metal conventions, and transforms it into something fresh and layered. While the majority of the vocals are 'extreme' in nature, it's a nice change for him to go clean for a bit, which adds another dimension of melody.

Ihsahn has done something here that is just short of being a masterpiece. Had it been for a little more detail to album flow and continuity and one or two more highlight tracks (there are already plenty to mention) 'Angl' would have surely become a landmark in the history of metal. While the mark might have been hit here, I have no doubt that in the future, Ihsahn has the potential not only to hit, but absolutely demolish the barriers of what black metal can do. A great, rocking progressive metal album.

"angL" is the 2nd full-length studio album by Norwegian progressive/extreme metal act Ihsahn and is the successor to "The Adversary (2006)". The album was released through Mnemosyne Productions in May 2008. After Emperor originally disbanded in 2001, Ihsahn (real name Vegard Sverre Tveitan) first collaborated with his wife Ihriel (Real name Heidi Solberg Tveitan) on the avant-garde metal act Peccatum, but in 2006 he opted for a solo career, and thus Ihsahn was born. As the case was on "The Adversary (2006)", Ihsahn handles all guitars and keyboards, and most of the singing on "angL". Asgeir Mickelson (Borknagar, Spiral Architect...among others) again handles the drums, and bass and fretless bass are played by Lars K. Norberg (Spiral Architect). Mikael Åkerfeldt from Opeth makes a lead vocal guest appearance on "Unhealer".

The music on the album continues down the progressive/extreme metal path of "The Adversary (2006)", just better produced, better written, and better performed. Stylistically Ihsahn is still in the same genre as Opeth, and "Unhealer" could almost have been a track by Opeth if I didn´t know better. Ihsahn is not a clone act though and Tveitan still manages to create an original sounding style (despite the obvious references to Opeth). The balance between light and dark, acoustic/distorted guitars, clean/raw snarling vocals, and atmospheric and heavy moods, is something Tveitan masters to perfection. His past in Emperor is not heard often in the music, but the way he uses the swirling neo-classical oriented keyboards, and the occasional blast beat section do lead my thoughts in that direction.

The material on the 9 track (10 tracks on the Japanese edition), 47:22 minutes long album is of a very high quality throughout. Every track is intriguing and memorable, and the quality of the material only drops very few times during the listening experience. Highlights could be "Scarab", "Emancipation", "Unhealer", and "Monolith", but it´s a consistently high quality album which deserves to be listened to from beginning to end.

As mentioned above "angL" is also a very well produced album, performed by very skilled musicians. It´s hard not to praise the inventive drumming by Asgeir Mickelson, but everything on the album is skillfully played. For instance check out the many well played guitar solos and harmony themes. To my ears Tveitan is a bit of a compositional genius too (his classical/symphonic arrangements are also quite clever) and taking all features into consideration "angL" comes of as quite the brilliant release and a 4.5 star (90%) rating is deserved.