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Mortiis > Crypt of the Wizard > Reviews
Mortiis - Crypt of the Wizard

Blast From the Past Vol. 3 - Trolls. Lots of them. - 94%

Sigillum_Dei_Ameth, October 26th, 2009

When it comes to Scandinavian black metal, I often look at the characters in the scene and who was involved in making it some of the most exciting music of the late part of the 20th century; Quorthon, Fenriz, Varg, Euronymous...oh yeah the obvious are there but the one that seems to pop-up always when discussing black metal music with my friends, none other than the king of trolls himself, Mortiis, ALWAYS fucking seems to be the head cheese.

Mortiis is the kind of artist that you can easily write off because everything that he does just seems like total schtick. A guy walking around looking like Blix the troll from the movie "Legend"(He does goddamnit!), and playing cheap Casio keyboards that sound like a bad Italian rip-off version of "Conan The Barbarian"? I remember first hearing about "Crypt of The Wizard" in Metal Maniacs magazine when it was released and then seeing a picture of him and thinking "Is this motherfucker for real???" Yes and no. No, in the fact he doesn't walk around in total troll garb, but yes because it enhances the entire music and it offers you some of the best eye candy that fucking Pink Floyd couldn't have pulled-off even with "The Wall". And yes you can quote me on that one.

"Crypt Of The Wizard" is an album that holds a lot of memories for me as a fan. Simply being it was one of the first of a handful of albums that sealed the deal for me as a teenager wanting to find the end-all, be-all most extreme music of all time. I didn't get that, but what I got instead was music that not only exceeded my expectations, but made me feel more safe as a fan of ambient soundtrack-type music. When you're a teenager, you can't tell your friends that you like soundtrack music or anything else outside of metal music in general, that's just further alienation. Mortiis actually made me a bigger fan of such said music.

"Crypt of The Wizard" is also an interesting progression as far as Mortiis' music is concerned. We see him not only further evolving with the music, but the lengths and structures are way more constructed so that it's an entire alum and not one long 20-30 minute song. In a way Mortiis is able to paint a lot more in his own little world and we are able to walk outside of his tomb-like castle and are able to explore the caves, forests and lakes of the surrounding area that he reigns as king. Here Mortiis is able to expand on a lot of his earlier ideas and further detail the ancient Swedish countryside that he inhabits. This added with the absolutely stunning and beautiful artwork of John Bauer, a reknowned Swedish painter who's artwork was used in several children's books. His artwork used in the album depicts the other inhabitants of Mortiis' make-believe world such as giant mountian trolls, forest specters, child-like faries, dwarves, etc. Even the album cover depicts a child in some moldy cave sitting next to a mythological creature that looks like a cross between the head of an ant-eater and the body of a troll. All while at the same time the colors, tones, hues are perfectly used. The ironic thing is that when I first saw the artwork, I didn't see it as children's artwork. I saw it as best describing a typical fantasy land that you could easily read about in any adult non-fiction book for the most part. I mean...if you dress up as a troll, then goddamnit the theme should be about motherfucking trolls in caves doing trolly things with their trolly minds thinking of what trolls do with most of their trolly time!

The music being ambient incorporates everything from cheesiness to doom, to hints of actual seriousness. "Ferden og Kallet" sets the tone in welcoming you back to Mortiis' world. An epic medievil opening that quickly turns into a calm and then back that sounds like the iron gates opening to his kingdom. "Davi Bygde Tårnet" invokes images of a troll blacksmith hammering away in some underground kingdom making armor for some army about to go into battle. That same army is summoned in "Under Tårnet's Skygge" with introduction of tamborines to a slow marching beat keeping the general mood going and never letting up. "En Sirkel av Kosmisk Kaos" is a bit of a throwback to Mortiis' Casio keyboard days but then comes in whispered distorted vocals obvious used through a vocoder. Thie vocals cut in and out during the Casio keyboards and this is probably where the cheesy factor kicks in due to the fact that Mortiis wants it to seem dark. Sorry buddy, you're not Ohgr from Skinny Puppy...only he can get away with dark distorted vocals. There is also a Middle-Eastern sound which then morphs into Goblin-esque Moog synth sounds. It ends up sounding like music you hear on an old 70's science documentary about space. "Vandreren's Sang" takes that cheesy Casio sound and makes it sound even cheesier and throws in flutes that are more Native American sounding. Can I ask a question here? Just what continant are we in? Europe or North America? Anyway "Den Bortdrevne Regnbuen" has a more symphonic aristocratic Casio sound. Not much of a difference but at least I know it's somewhere in Europe! "Trollmannens Krypt" is "Davi Bygde Tårnet" prt. II. "Stjernefødt" is a better version of "Den Bortdrevne Regnbuen" that shows muffled/distorted CLEAN vocals from Mortiis. "I Mørket Drømmende" is total Native American flute sounds mixed with an obvious Tangerine Dream worship ala "Legend" soundtrack. "Fanget i Krystal" is completely different. Next to the previous song, it's the lightest and kookiest song that is probably Mortiis' way of saying "Don't take this serious folks. I DO have a sense of humor y'know!"

When all is said and done this was really the end of what is know as Mortiis' first half of his career which is called Era I. The next album "The Stargate" was more elaborate in the fact that he actually used lyrics for the first time and as well using more vocals not just by him but also Sarah Deva thus further taking away from the original concept of just total instrumental music with extremely little to no vocals or lyrics. That and when you compare "Crypt Of The Wizard" to "The Stargate", there is no comparison because COTW is simply a lot better and in my opinion his absolute best. Last thing I want to add is if you are going to purchase COTW, try to find the latest re-issued version that has the amazing fucking artwork to it. Earache re-issued "Crypt Of The Wizard" right after Mortiis switched from Cold Meat Industries to Dig's label and completely fucked their issue of the album up. Which was frustrating to me being such a big fan of the album, after years of trying to track down the original, and mind you this was before Ebay and the internet so trying to find Cold Meat Industries and getting a reply from them in snail mail in the late 90's was a goddamn endurance trial. Thankfully the newly re-issued version with the CORRECT John Bauer artwork is available to Joe public and hopefully Joe public will be smart enough to not pass up on such an amazing album.

Goofy, but a hell of a lot of fun. - 85%

ForNaught, May 20th, 2009

Crypt of the Wizard is something of an oddity in the Era 1 portion of Mortiis’ work. Gone are the long, involved tracks of the first three full-lengths. Gone is the ponderous, weighty, gloomy solemnity of Født til å Herske. Gone are the long, multi-staged, multi-faceted journeys of Ånden Som Gjorde Opprør and Keiser av en Dimension Ukjent. The wonderfully rich, complex, inspirational splendour of The Stargate had yet to be revealed. There are two major characteristics that set Crypt of the Wizard apart from all of these works. First, it does not form a cohesive whole like all of the others. Second, at times, it is very, very silly.

As far as artists go, Mortiis has always been tough to take seriously. Between the mask and outfit, ridiculous covers (especially the second release of the album being discussed) and the whole Casio-medieval-esque music shtick it’s often pretty tough not to view the whole thing as a big elaborate piss-take. On the other hand, the very serious compositions, particularly the majestic Stargate, confirm without a doubt that the man’s music is no joke. Still, if the quality of his work were not so high then I suspect that our little Norwegian troll would be nothing so much as a laughing-stock. However, this release is very definitely a break from the seriousness. Crypt of the Wizard, although very enjoyable, was the only album in which Mortiis’ sillier side was allowed to come to the fore in the music itself.

As mentioned previously, the songs on this album (ten of them, many of them fairly short by his standards of the time) do not form one continuous whole. This is due to the fact that they were released as a series of five two-song EPs. Indeed, the pairs of songs do generally fit together far more neatly than the album as a whole does. It must be pointed out that although the album doesn’t flow quite as nicely as most Mortiis albums do, this isn’t a huge detraction from the listening experience. It’s just a slight inadequacy when Crypt of the Wizard is held against the rest of the catalogue, since Mortiis has shown himself time and again to be very careful about this aspect, even on releases later than Era 1.

The actual musical content of the songs, although not entirely serious, is actually rather good. It’s nearly all the product of fairly bog-standard keyboard patches, which will certainly turn many listeners off. In this respect, it is about the same as all of his prior releases, but inferior to The Stargate which used far more pleasing instrumentation. Still, as keyboard-generated work goes, this sounds relatively good. The songs are built around various themes and melodies that are generally slightly repetitive within each iteration, but vary within the songs. Most of the music is unlikely to get boring at any stage for this reason, with a couple of exceptions— Vandreren's Sang is very long and not particularly varied, and Stjernefødt, although more concise, only has one real melody that never goes anywhere of interest.

The structure of the songs is further enhanced by contrasting darker, moodier sections with upbeat, light-hearted Renaissance Fayre fodder. This is achieved in one of two ways. First there is the half-and-half method, which is exhibited best in the songs Trollmannens Krypt and I Mørket Drømmende. Here the first half of the song will be very gloomy and down-beat, but the atmosphere thus generated is then thoroughly turned around by a sharp transition into something very bright and cheerful. Although this sounds like it might be a slightly suspect technique, in each of these pieces reprisals and links with the original theme maintain consistency, and prevent the song from feeling like a pair of shorter pieces clumsily squashed together. The other contrast structure is a simple back-and-forth between dark and light sections. This is best exhibited by En Sirkel av Kosmisk Kaos, which contrasts very threatening, timpani-heavy sections, laden with atonal effects and distorted vocal samples, with very summery-sounding, gentle, calm portions. It’s really quite effective, although the vocals are slightly too goofy and faux-evil to take seriously, and were a mistake in this piece.

A number of different instrumental sounds are used to create the music. Leads are usually provided by flutes or other woodwind, or brass. These are then fleshed out using strings and further woodwind, brass, and keyboard-type instruments. Many of the sounds seem to have been created by using instrumental patches played outside of the instrument’s natural range, providing some interesting tonal qualities. Heavy use of vibrato is prominent also. These two factors in combination create a very unusual sound that is highly distinctive, and also makes it tough to positively identify some of the sounds used. A tuned-percussive drive is added to the music using timpani as the primary instrument, but a heavy use of pizzicato cello and double bass is also used very distinctively. Occasionally other percussive effects are used; for example, Davi Bygde Tarnet employs a sample or effect which sounds reminiscent of hammers on stone, and Trollmannens Krypt uses something more akin to hammering on metal. These are both rather novel instances of percussion, but unfortunately are mixed rather loudly, and turn out to be more annoying than anything. The album is instrumental, apart from the previously-mentioned, distorted, sneering-sounding vocals on En Sirkel av Kosmisk Kaos, and some unintelligible treated vocals on Stjernefødt. These are both used for mood and texture only, and are not hugely notable or beneficial to the sound.

Despite the previous references to the music being silly and upbeat, this does not apply to all of the album’s contents, by any means. Several songs are far more solemn and serious-sounding. For instance, Davi Bygde Tårnet has a sort of epic battle feel to it. This song is actually thematically similar to much of the material on The Stargate, but presented with simpler music and a less rich texture. Other pieces are more gloomy than bouncy; for instance Den Bortdrevne Regnbuen and Under Tårnet's Skygge, or the previously-mentioned first half of I Mørket Drømmende. The second portion of this piece, however, is utterly manic. It’s an endearingly bizarre contrast.

Overall, despite the silliness, and the disjointed nature of this album, I still consider it to be very good. The songs are interesting and with some exceptions, well-written. The melodies are usually good and the sound textures rich. Several of the songs build up a very convincing atmosphere and the album is rarely a boring listen. Still, by the standards set by Mortiis himself, this one isn’t entirely up to par. I would recommend it to fans of his other albums who want something more or something lighter—it’s actually quite a refreshing change to hear him try something more light-hearted. It’s not a great place to start with his music, but if you’re a fan already, then consider it as an essential addition to your collection.