Warthur Ah, Enslaved. Are they purveyors of progressive black metal, or blackened progressive metal? They've wavered back and forth across that line over the years, but In Times to my ears sounds like it's sat on the progressive metal side of that line, largely consolidating the embellishments and improvements they'd made to their sound on albums like RIITIIR. The more aggressive and recognisably black metal-oriented compositions tend to be front-loaded to the start of the album, so as the runtime progresses you get less snarly blast beats and more progressive shoegaze-y sort of stuff.

It's unfailingly pleasant to listen to, but it doesn't do anything we haven't heard Enslaved already extensively dabble in. If you just want more Enslaved - and I can't fault your taste if you do - it's no disappointment, but it's not where I'd point people as a first port of call to explore their music.

UMUR "In Times" is the 13th full-length studio album by Norwegian progressive extreme metal act Enslaved. The album was released through Nuclear Blast Records in March 2015. Enslaved has for the last many albums had a steady touring/recording cycle of two years between studio albums, but "RIITIIR (2012)" was quite the successful release for the band, and they have toured heavily in suppport of the album, so the recording break was a bit longer this time around.

It hasn´t resulted in a rushed album written under pressure though as "In Times" comes off exactly as well written and detailed as any other album released by Enslaved. Compared to it´s predecessor "In Times" features a few more black metal oriented sections (though not a dominant part of the album), but other than that it´s pretty much a natural sounding successor to "RIITIIR (2012)". So the music style is still epic sounding progressive oriented black metal with norse mythology/viking themed lyrics. The songwriting is generally of a very high quality with relatively harsh black metal sections (especially the opening track "Thurisaz Dreaming" features some pretty raw and fast-paced black metal sections) seamlessly intertwined with progressive rock/metal parts, and mid-paced epic metal sections. Keyboards, synths, mellotron, heavy riffs, tremolo picking, melodic guitar solos, clean/harsh vocals (and a few viking chants), and good rhythmic variation are some of the elements which make up the music. The tracks feature natural progressions, which never sound forced or calculated, and that´s a great strength when writing and playing music as progressive inclined as this. By now Enslaved masters this art to perfection.

"In Times" features 6 tracks and a full playing time of 53:05 minutes. All 6 tracks are around 8-9 minutes long and in the case of the title track nearly 11 minutes long, so all tracks are given room to breathe and time to develop. Again this doesn´t sound calculated but sounds more like it´s a question of where the compositions led the band while they were writing them. The adventurous and playful approach to writing material is also reflected in the obvious passion behind the delivery. It´s hard to single out any particular tracks as highlights, as they are all great in their own right, but I´d still like to give a special mention to "Building with Fire", which is an unusually melodic track, with a soaring and easily memorable melody line in the clean sung vers. The melodic vers is complimented perfectly by the relatively brutal chorus featuring growling vocals, which provide the music with a death metal touch. The epic title track deserves a mention too as a highlight.

"In Times" features an organic, powerful, and overall very well sounding production. A perfect match for the music, and upon conclusion "In Times" is a high quality release on just about every measurable parameter. Despite the progressive nature of the music, it´s an album which feels slightly more predictable than it´s predecessor though and in the end I´m not left as surprised as I was when I first listened to "RIITIIR (2012)". That doesn´t make "In Times" an inferior release to "RIITIIR (2012)", but the surprise element, which often means an artist has developed their sound a bit more than usual between albums, and which sometimes elevates an album from being brilliant to being a masterpiece creation, isn´t present on "In Times". Quality wise it´s just as great as "RIITIIR (2012)" though and fans of the sound on that album will probably greatly appreciate the sound and music style on "In Times". A 4.5 star (90%) rating is fully deserved.

bartosso Two steps forward, one step backwards

Enslaved is a Norwegian extreme metal band that managed to carve out an admirably big niche for their bipolar "melodic/harsh" black metal, in a similar way Opeth did in the death metal milieu. Every time I try to explain how I feel about this progressive black metal sound, I find myself in an unenviable position of being for the ideas but against the way they're executed. I've listened attentively to several of their albums so far (Vertebrae, AEO, RIITIIR and just a little bit of Isa) and the only one that actually (literally?) grabbed me by the ears, chopped them off and poured ten gallons of pure bliss into the bleeding orifices, was RITIIR... well, shit got graphic much sooner than I planned.

The problem I have with Enslaved has already struck me when I listened to AEO for the first time. A good album for sure. Its bold mixture of prog rock and quite atypical nordic black metal is intriguing, but it somehow lacks identity - quite a feat given the sheer originality of the concept - that would make it something more than just a blend of stylistic ingredients. Technically well-written as it may be, music on Vertebrea or Axioma Ethica Odini doesn't feel focused on giving any meaningful artistic impact. Black metal passages tend to drag aimlessly and mellow parts seem oddly misplaced. Now listen, if not for RIITIIR, I'd be tempted to say it's just me, a member of the mentally challenged minority for whom this stuff simply doesn't work as intended. RITTIIR, however, is a testimony to the fact that Enslaved are indeed capable of turning their ideas into an inspired, evocative, well-rounded creation, yet for some unfathomable reason they tend to keep falling short of their potential.

Now, time for In Times. To cut a long story short, In Times is a blend of the semi-classic prog rock sound of Vertebrae with the atmosphere and black metal edge of Axioma Ethica Odini plus a - regrettably - tiny spatter of RIITTIIR's spacious and adventurous eclecticism. Oh, and vanilla prog metal in the vein of Dream Theater's also here, especially in the later stages of the album, and the role it plays is sadly a leading one. Due to this fact, In Times is even more structurally complex than the previous album but that's exactly where the rub is. When form takes precedence over essence, you know something went south, amirite? I mean, some of the more "spontaneous" experiments certainly add to the experience in a good way (e.g. chants and theme progression in "Thurisaz Dreaming" and the fantastic "One Thousand Years of Rain" and "Nauthir Bleeding"), but some of the rhythmic variations seem redundant. And these irregular meters ("Building with Fire")... I mean, come on guys, even Meshuggah usually uses 4/4. It's almost like the band was afraid of being judged by a jury of prog metal elitists that would otherwise deem the album "not progressive enough, 3/10". I mean, give me a break, you made RIITIIR for fuck's sake! And it all worked just fine.

Even though some people seem to be more and more weary of the sound Enslaved keep exploring, In Times does not sound stale to me. For the most part, it is a very enjoyable progressive black metal album with a decent amount of fresh ideas and it certainly will make most die-hard fans headbang in ecstasy or at least nod their bearded (prog)heads in admiration. Sadly, while it's varied and very well written - with more clean vocals than ever - it lacks the human touch that made its fantastic predecessor so good and, well, timeless.

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Nightfly Not being much of a fan of Black Metal I didn’t pay a lot of attention to Enslaved’s earlier albums, the earliest one in my collection being 2004’s Isa. As good an album as that is, to my ears they have got better and better on each subsequent release as the prog quotient has increased to the highpoint of 2012’s Riitiir. In Times has a similar lush production to Riitiir but with just 6 tracks they have upped the prog elements even more.

Despite the prog elements Enslaved have still managed to not lose sight of their black metal roots as opener Thurisaz Dreaming certainly demonstrates coming straight in with frantic blastbeats and bassist Grutle Kjellson rasping black metal vocal style. Like the entire album the vocals alternate between Kjellson and keyboard player Herbrand Larsen’s cleaner vocal style which has improved greatly over recent releases.

While there are lighter moments extreme metal fans will be pleased to know that In Times contains some of the most brutal music I’ve heard from Enslaved, the dynamics of the songs giving the heavier sections even greater impact. The rich production does the music justice, so much better than the thin weedy sound of much black metal, the brutal riffing complimented by the lush keyboard textures. The songs twist and turn through numerous inventive changes keeping it all fresh and captivating, the eleven minute title track being particularly effective.

Fans of extreme prog metal are going to snap this one up and the bar has been set for prog metal album of the year. In Times is a stunning album that will reward with repeated listens, quite possibly their best yet. Perhaps it’s now time for me to start investigating those earlier Enslaved albums.