The North Brigade

Bleh.

I see this labeled as Viking metal, yet it is clearly not. It is a mixture of black and death metal with symphonics - and damn is it artificial.

This band sounds a lot like Dimmu Borgir, minus the sugarcoated production, plus some comical attempts at sounding like Arcturus or Vintersorg, and an extra helping of fake sounding drums. Bleh.

The drummer hammers away almost relentlessly at horrendously produced drums, with toms that crackle through the speakers, hushing everything else in the music, a poppy snare, and cymbals that are shrill and strangely don't ring out. Oh, and the drummer just plain can't play.
The guitar is buried in the mix, being trampled upon by the much too loud synths, which sound like they belong in a carnival. Obscenely generic vocals top off the finished product. A singer who can't sing, harsh vocals that are distorted. It renders dejection in the heart of a avid Viking metal fan, such as myself, to see that this band attempts to be or play Viking metal. It is awkward to listen to, and sad to know that such bands exist, especially when they're thrown into a genre I once thought to be virtually free of such frivolous musicianship and song writing.

There are frequent breaks in the song, (which prove the band can't write a song on top of everything else) with tones of droning noises, white noise, and distorted ... everything. It's more like this band is trying to sound like one of those generic satanic black metal bands, rather than a pagan one. Viking metal is more than just a lyrical theme, and obviously whoever labels this band as Viking metal, has not been exposed to enough Viking metal. If it wasn't for the lyrics, this would not at all be Viking metal. No melody, no folk essence whatsoever, just some plagiarized corny synths . Not to mention no ability to write a song, no ability to play, and horribly unbalanced and inconsistent production (the production actually sounds different on many tracks).

This band sucks, badly. Odin is displeased. And so am I. Avoid!