MIDNATTSOL — The Metamorphosis Melody (review)

MIDNATTSOL — The Metamorphosis Melody album cover

Album · 2011 · Folk Metal

4.5/5 · 2011-04-28
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The Metamorphosis Melody is the third album by Norwegian/German metal band Midnattsol. The album was released in 2011 and sees the band including more folk influences in their music than on their previous album, 2008’s Nordlys, which was mostly a gothic metal album. There’s still plenty of gothic metal to be had in The Metamorphosis Melody of course, and also some symphonic ideas, but all in all I have found that The Metamorphosis Melody can actually be fairly called Nordic folk metal, which is the tag that the band likes to use to describe their music.

Now I’m an established fan of Nordlys already, although it did gradually lose some of its initial appeal as I became more familiar with it. I still consider it a pretty solid album all things considered, but there were several things I knew I’d be looking for when Midnattsol releases a follow-up to it. Now that follow-up is here in the form of The Metamorphosis Melody and I’m pleased to report that what elements I found lacking in Nordlys have been improved on, which results in a much stronger album in all aspects.

The vocals of Carmen Elise Espenæs are one of the biggest improvements on The Metamorphosis Melody. While I enjoyed her voice on prior work there were a few moments where it seemed lacking in power or out of place with the music. A good example of that would be Nordlys first track Open Your Eyes. But with The Metamorphosis Melody Carmen’s vocals fit all the time and because her voice has a general folksy sound to it, the band’s renewed folk influences work all the better within the overall sound, and since I really missed the folk elements on Nordlys, having them appear on The Metamorphosis Melody in abundance is a big plus.

Speaking of those folk influences Midnattsol is one of those bands where they don’t come out in the form of traditional instruments, but by creating folk melodies on guitars or keyboards. There’s a mix of both on The Metamorphosis Melody such as the lead guitar lines in the title track and Kong Valemons Kamp and for keyboards there’s track such as Spellbound. Behind the melody however (no pun intended) the guitar riffs of Daniel Droste and Alex Kautz are more or less a gothic metal affair and at other times in the sound Daniel Fischer’s keyboards take on a more prominent role that gives parts of the album a more symphonic sound, which is heard early on in the intro track Alv, (which is one of the select few intro tracks I actually found myself enjoying) and later really prominently in Motets Makt. Going back to those folk influences for a moment there’s also an acoustic ballad, Goodbye, included in the album, which really brings them out in a completely new way.

The songs of The Metamorphosis Melody are also generally a lot more memorable and better crafted than the band’s earlier work. Tracks such as the title track, Spellbound, A Poet's Prayer, Kong Valemons Kamp & Goodbye all stand up as highlights from the very early listens of the album and as I become more familiar with it I find that there isn’t a bad track on it. While the band’s previous work was good, The Metamorphosis Melody tops it all in every way possible to become their best album to date. From a metal perspective Midnattsol aren’t the most aggressive or heavy band around, but they certainly have the technique and the writing skills to produce a great melodic folk metal album and if you enjoy folk metal then The Metamorphosis Melody is a highly recommended purchase!

As an additional note, like with Nordlys, there’s a limited edition of The Metamorphosis Melody that comes with a bonus track and again like Nordlys the band switches Carmen’s vocals for those of Daniel Droste (who some readers of this review may be more familiar with as the frontman of funeral doom metal band Ahab). The track is A Predator's Prey, and features Droste using his growl as well as cleans. On the Nordlys bonus track, Octobre, he just used cleans, so A Predator's Prey showcases a very different side to Midnattsol, which sadly may remain unexplored on future releases, as Droste parted ways with the band a little while before the release of this album. This is a good track and the limited edition also comes with a DVD which some live material, so it’s definitely worth a fan picking up, though as always, the score given to the album is based on the regular edition.

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven)