Style: Viking metal, black metal, experimental
Primary Emotions/Themes: Washing up to a distant shore ready to plunder than lands before me, I ready my axe, my blade, and my saxophone
Thoughts: Solefald have always been a bit of an oddball project. From the opening notes of their debut album they have shown that they are not afraid to experiment. Sometimes the experiments work, sometimes they don't... but that never deterred the band.
When I heard that their new albums were going to focus on Viking mythology from a recent trip to Iceland was intrigued to say the least. Solefald has never struck me as a Viking metal type band, and it would be fascinating to see what they come up within the genre.
I wasn't really sure what I was expecting the first time I put on Red for Fire, but a saxophone was about the last instrument I could have ever imagined coming out of my speakers. It's paired with a guitar riff, but still... Viking metal with a saxophone... Solefald being Solefald I guess.
As crazy as it sounds it actually works quite well with the introduction of the album. It does not overstay its welcome, and is quickly overtaken by a violin - a much more traditional choice for Viking metal ancillary instrumentation.
Sun I Call is the track in question, and it is the perfect opener for such an ambitious album. It introduces the listener to Solefald's new sound in about a straight forward way as possible. The music is more aggressive, less progressive, and Cornelius has returned to a true black metal rasp. The band even uses blast beats on occasion. This mixed with the typical tomfoolery of the band you get one hell of an opener.
Not every song is as strong as the opener. Some are outright strange like the oddly acoustic and haunting White Frost Queen. Others just fall a little flat like Sea I Called. It has all the elements to make as great of a song as the opener, but the arrangements are a bit lacking.
Like any Solefald album there are hits and misses on the album, but unlike most of their albums the experimentation is more controlled here. More focused. The idea of making this a Viking focused album helped immensely, and it fleshes out the sound with a more epic and continuous feel than any of their earlier albums.
Songs like Crater of the Valkyries show that the band is capable of writing incredible black metal when pressed. This song in particular realizes the band's full potential. It's adventurous, it has that experimental edge, Lars and Cornelius dual vocals are used to an incredible degree, and the arrangements are top notch. Easily one of the best tracks they have written, and probably one of my fav black metal tracks from around the mid 2000's.
Red for Fire is a bit of an oddball album, both in execution and in terms of fitting in with the larger Solefald discography. It ranges from meh to mind-blowingly good with the mean being more towards the good than the bad. I only wish that the follow up was half the album that this one is.
Written March 21st 2024
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