WAN – Wolves of the North (2010)

All the way from Sweden today we get WAN, a band that features a sound that will take you back to the ‘early’ days of Black Metal with their Bathory/Hellhammer influenced music. With a lo-fi production that will make some sound snobs cry, and fans of the ‘poor’ sounding music cheer. We think that there is a fine line between sounding ‘old-school’ and just ‘plain shitty’, and for “Wolves of the North” we have to lean on the ‘plain shitty’ category.

The band takes us in a 13 tracks and 35 minutes long ride of dull sounding old-school Black Metal. After a few songs you will start wondering why they are signed and releasing such an unimaginative album. There are some ‘ok’ moments, but they quickly get dulled by the monotonous drum machine, random riffs, and reverbed vocals. There is not much to be rescued from this album besides a few riffs and some decent songs like “Ulvhall”, but the drumming makes them less than bearable.

In case you are wondering, the production sounds like this album was recorded on a shed in a rehearsal, we have even heard better sounding rehearsals of grindcore bands than this album. The guitars sound higher on one side, and the drums on the other side, making this album albums unbearable to listen with headphones.

Overall, there are very few things that would make this release worthy of your time. If you want old-school stuff get the stuff on Hell’s Headbangers instead, since their albums sound raw, but not terrible. The chainsaw guitar sound is probably the most ‘respectable’ thing about this release.

Release: March 22nd, 2010

Country: Sweden