Varg fjerne a tornet

Branikald is a Russian black metal band that was part of the infamous Blazebirth Hall group. I've previously covered Kaldrad's other project Forest, so I figured it's only fair that I also check out some of his work in this band. And to start things off, we're gonna be checking out their first studio album "Varg fjerne a tornet". Coming from the ashes of the early demos, this album is suppose to showcase the band's sound at its full potential. But how well has it aged?

To find that out, we will need to check out the first track "Рассекая в кровь, разбивая в прах". Compared to the earlier demos, the production on this album is noticeably cleaner and polished than on Stormheit or To Kampf. Despite this, the composition is still very basic and bare-boned. The guitars plays a droning riff that repeats throughout the track with little variation, and the drums play the same blastbeat over and over with only the occasional crash. But like most other Blazebirth works, the main attraction is the atmosphere, as the emphasis on melody and atmosphere works best on this track and the last track "Varg fjerne a tornet". The last track in particular being reminiscent of the early demos with its raw production, but still atmospheric in the middle. As for the other two tracks? Not so much. They lean more towards a rawer and darker style in the vain of Darkthrone, but this style has been done better in the demos, and there's not really a whole lot done with those two tracks. But even with the weaker tracks, this album still has some great instrumentals that showcase a strong atmosphere, despite simple technical skills.

The vocals are also really good. Kaldrad's vocals have been great most of the time, and this album is no exception. His shrieks sound very painful and agonized, and are very fitting to the nature of the instrumentals. On the first track, he adds in melancholy within the atmosphere, and includes a more sorrow tone in the riffs. And even with the second and third track, one positive thing I can say about them is that Kaldrad flows extremely well with the darker riffs, especially on the third track where his vocals have more reverb in them. Even at the start of Branikald's career, Kaldrad's vocals still maintain a strong delivery that would only continue on as the albums progress.

In some ways, this debut album expands on the atmosphere of the demos by including a more melodic sound and taking more influences on Burzum. However, with the second and third track only being leftovers of the demos, it's clear that they still haven't exactly found their sound yet, and are still in their experimental stage. But if you're looking for a simple atmosphere black metal album with some emphasis on the melodic moments, then I'd say give the first and fourth tracks a spin.

Branikald's debut Stormheit, and to a slightly lesser extent, their sophomore demo To Kampf, are astonishing relics of glorious black metal purity. Varg fjerne a tornet is not even close. And that's weird, because if you compare the individual building blocks, there are some things done better on Varg. The vocals are a bit more up front in the mix and less lost-in-the-storm; the guitars are given a heavier, stronger recording quality; and the drums are also enhanced. I find the drums stick out a little too much, but that's certainly not enough to derail the whole project.

So where did this album go so wrong? On paper it looks like Kaldrad and Blazebirth drumming stalwart Wizard have everything in place to make another classic. Yes, the throaty, classic Darkthrone influenced howls are more audible this time. (And at this point, you still want to hear these lyrics, as they haven't transitioned from that perfectly Russian, nature-inspired national-isolationist bleakness to full on nazism yet.) Yes, the guitars are stronger, while still maintaining the windblown rawness inherent to this infamous little scene. However, they forgot that somewhat better presentation doesn't make crappy songs less crappy.

There's just not nearly enough here that is in any way memorable. The atmosphere of morbid Russian fatalism is ever-present, but the great individual tunes of the demos, like "A Stormride" and "By the Breath of the Murder" are sorely missing. Only the opener "Cleaving to Blood, Crushing to Dust" do I catch myself whistling from time to time. It's like a much rawer take on Immortal's long wintry epics such as "A Perfect Vision of the Rising Northland". The closer "Varg fjerne a tornet" is almost there, but kind of feels like a leftover passage from "Cleaving" that didn't quite cut it. In between, this album is an utterly forgettable cloud. A properly dark atmospheric cloud, but unfortunately, while hypnotic repetition within distinct songs is a great hallmark of Branikald, indistinguishable sameness throughout is not.

Branikald has done much better before and after this album. For that matter, the slightly stronger sound quality Kaldrad went for this time around, was better served by the debut from his other project, Forest. Varg fjerne, on the other hand, barely deserves to float above the "for completists only" tag.

Ahh... Branikald... our favorite oxymoronic "slavnazi" friend hailing (or should I say heil-ing) from the glorious frost lands of mother Rus'. Despite having a ridiculous ideological background, Branikald (and the other Blazebirth bands) manage[d]s to churn out multiple borderline excellent if not full blown excellent black metal albums (including the awesome that is Rdjandalir). This album, Varg Fjerne a Tornet, while not on par with his next album, is still fairly decent black metal. Nothing really innovative or new to the genre, but this was produced in the early days of 2nd wave black metal, so it's understandable.

The main highlight of the album has to be the first song "Рассекая В Кровь, Разбивая В Прах", it definitely reminds me of something from Transilvanian Hunger, and it's main riff very epic and melodic. The rest of the album is just your standard mid-90's black metal with blast beats, atrocious production, etc. The vocals, aren't the high pitched screeches you find in other black metal, these have more of a yelling, gargling at some points, kind of sound to them. Better yet, it's all in Russian.

These songs are incredibly repetitive, but it's not like you didn't expect that from a Branikald album. Not to say that repetition is a bad thing. That said, Kaldrad really does know how to create a good melody, so it's not a bad thing that he tends to repeat things. Speaking of repetition, the final 7 minute long track consists solely of a set of guitar melodies.

The bottom line is, if you like repetitive Darkthrone-esque mid-90's black metal, this is right up your alley. This is also a must have if you're a fan of Branikald and the Blazebirth Hall.

Branikald is undoubtedly the most productive of the Blazebirth Hall bands and probably the most varied throughout its career. Started as what was basically Kaldrad Branislav's solo project, the band evolved from raw black metal, closely inspired by Darkthrone almost to the point of being Darkthrone worship, to more ambient black metal around the Blikk Av Kald period and ended up as RAC-influenced and ideologically very pronounced NSBM on the band's newest music. Varg Fjerne A Tornet, being the band's first full-length (third if we count the two demos as albums since that’s what they basically are), is stylistically very close to Darkthrone and the Norwegian Second Wave of black metal.

Varg Fjerne A Tornet is a four song album released in 1996 which clocks in at around 32 minutes, a pretty normal thing for a black metal record. Musically this is one of Branikald's rawest, noisiest and hardest to get into albums I've heard. This is almost nothing but Darkthrone worship with a slight atmospheric edge reminiscent of the band's mid-era albums but still basically raw repetitive black metal. None of the songs stand out from each other in any meaningful way save perhaps their length. The album consists of an endlessly repeated series of black metal riffs similar to the Transilvanian Hunger era of Darkthrone but with less melody and more rawness. The vocals are a little deeper than Darkthrone's, Kaldrad's rasps being quite competent, evoking pain and suffering wherever they are heard, which pretty much means throughout the album. The drumming is also repetitive to the bone and continues the same way almost ad infinitum, which can be expected from such an album.

The production is, as mentioned before, raw as hell, probably more so than anything to ever come out of Norway in the 90's, with the guitar sound being fuzzy as hell, much like it is on several Forest albums. The lyrics deal with the usual black metal subjects of desolation, cold, solitude and the generally evil stuff which inspires people to write this sort of music.

Varg Fjerne A Tornet is yet another blackened gem in the massive amount of albums spewed forth from the Blazebirth Hall. It's one of the rawest albums these guys created, on par with some stuff by Raven Dark and Forest but stylistically even closer to Darkthrone. Don't let the fact that this is so heavily dependent on Second Wave black metal discourage you from getting this because while it most undoubtedly is Darkthrone worship, it does an excellent job at that.