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Ashen Light > Песнь Велеса > Reviews
Ashen Light - Песнь Велеса

Good, but definitely not for everyone. - 78%

Kriegsminister, April 24th, 2004

"Pesn' Velesa" ("Song For Veles" or "Song Of Veles," if my admittedly limited understanding of Russian is correct) is Ashen Light's debut full-length and it is quite an introduction. Although I've heard some people dismiss them as a Nokturnal Mortum rip-off, that assertion is completely unfair. They differ from that band in a few areas, but from a strictly aesthetic standpoint, they seem to value the "folk" aspect of "folk black metal" moreso than their supposed Ukrainian inspiration. To this end, the album sounds much "happier" than something that you might expect from Nokturnal Mortum, but not quite as upbeat as, say, some of the work done by Temnozor'. For some, this 'happiness' might be a turn-off. They might see it as contradictory when compared to the rest of the black metal canon. But I can honestly tell you that it doesn't sound at all strange or out of place. In fact, I couldn't really visualize this album as sounding "grim" or "sad" or any other supposedly negative attribute.

Something that kind of gets on my nerves here is the fact that the production is very thin. The guitar really seems to have no weight behind it...sure, it's still pretty obvious, but when I hear it, I think "couldn't someone just turn that up a little more?" That's not to say that it's overpowered by the other instruments...on the contrary, they're all fairly thinly produced as well. But I've always been of the opinion that the keyboard ought to be a more or less incidental or at least an augmenting instrument, rather than a leading one (which is the role that it assumes fairly frequently here). But I digress on this issue for the simple fact that the work is enjoyable regardless of which instrument is in control.

To my recollection, there aren't really any clean vocals to speak of on this album. I think that's sort of strange, considering the preoccupation that many folk metal bands have with clean vocals. To me, however, this provides a blanket of consistency throughout the course of the album as opposed to the distracting role clean vocals played on "Tales From The Thousand Lakes" from Amorphis or even "Vedovstvom Krepka Chernaja Slava Rusi" by fellow Russians Temnozor'. Another fairly consistent element of this release is the background sounds of nature -- that is to say, birds chirping, water flowing, and other peaceful sonic images. This helps to hold things together and to serve in the establishment and perpetuation of an overall feeling of tranquillity while listening to the album.

While I think some people may be turned off by this album's happy and even somewhat optimistic sound, I'm certain there are many others who will appreciate it as the good piece of folk metal that it really is. I recommend this release to people who enjoy that style of music or to people looking for an introduction to it.