The Norwegian black/folk/avant-garde metallers if anything prove with this ninth opus of theirs that they can come back strong after a period of mediocrities. By mediocre period I mean anything that followed the marvelous “Empiricism”.
There are no fillers in “Urd” and I really enjoyed Vintersorg’s shrieks here. At the same time ICS Vortex offers his clean vocals and I can’t recall a Borknagar record with so many clean vocals. As for the songs they are catchy with memorable melodic refrains. Of course the atmospheric folk parts are present as well. It could be because of the very good production but somehow it seems to me that the keyboards have an upgraded role in the album.
Many songs are worth mentioning. From the very beautiful instrumental “The Plains Of Memories” to faster black metal tunes such as “Routs”, “The Earthling”, “Frostrite” and “The Beauty Of Dead Cities” I can’t pick only track as the absolute highlight. To be more precise I rank “Urd” only one step below the insurmountable “The Olden Domain” and “Empiricism.
