I usually steer clear of so-called "mediaeval"-themed music but now and again I'm prepared to hear out something original. The Spanish Basque one-man ambient BM act Elffor might pose a challenge with this debut "Into the Dark Forest" from way back in 1998. From the outset this is grand-sounding epic instrumental music but the all-synth melodies and arrangements don't exactly scream freshness. Perhaps I'm just not the kind of person this music suits but I'll try to bear with it. 

As it turns out, all songs are performed on synth and all have a similar approach that yells "epic" and "majestic" in equal measures. The lyrics describe a frosty Tolkienesque landscape in which major battles have been fought with sword and battle-axe and where future major battles will be fought with much the same technology. Ghosts of warriors slain in past forgotten wars probably roam around and harass lone travellers. Misty air and the sounds of frost and ice forming from water vapour surround most tracks. Few songs have very memorable or distinct melodies or riffs and that strikes me as a bit odd for a work revolving around mediaeval history and culture. I thought maybe the guy behind Elffor had done some research - it doesn't have to be very deep research - into his country or culture's music traditions and come up with some old folk melodies or pre-Renaissance instruments that he could incorporate into his project's style.

The music is pleasant enough with a smooth (if bland) delivery, with all the emotion in the muffled vocals. Everything relies very heavily on the knowledge of past European history and culture that listeners might bring to this recording. Much of the drama seems quite forced and the pace of the music rarely slows down for listeners to be able to savour what they're hearing. The vocals have some aggression but even at their deepest and most ferocious they remind me of voices of villains in Japanese anime films.

When all is said and done (and fought to the death), this music really doesn't sound "mediaeval" ambient - it could just as well be labelled Tolkien BM or battle BM depending on the project's aims and nothing about it would need changing. A more folk-oriented album with some original Basque or pre-Renaissance Spanish melodies and/or instrumentation might have fit the bill better. Even on its own terms, the album lacks freshness and real emotion and drama. The subject matter of the lyrics is very vague and probably gives listeners nothing that they've not heard before.

The moment I listened to this album I was amazed and felt like I was entering a battle in the Dark Ages. I knew I was in for a journey.

Into the Dark Forest features nature-inspired music and lyrics. The songs consist of epic, battle-like and medieval-sounding ambiance with the vocals typical in depressive-suicidal black metal with the first track being an exception, being entirely epic ambiance. Each track is like a journey through winter landscapes. You feel hints (in a figurative sense) of the Dark Ages, Viking battles, and harsh winters. Highlight tracks for this album have got to be Frostfog and Entrance to the Fog. Frostfog starts off with very dark, ambient music, then collapses in with screaming black metal vocals. Throughout the song, 'Frostfog' is screamed. Since I love black metal, this track is perfect to me. 

Entrance to the Fog kicks off with "Entrance to the Fog" screamed, proceeding with action-filled, epic battle and medieval-like ambiance. It quiets down and becomes more dark and epic with piano/keyboard following. In the middle, clean vocals appear with screams ending and epic ambiance ending the track. This is sure to be an all-time favorite black ambient song of mine. 

Overall, this album deserves a 100%. The simple fact of epic and battle-like ambiance with screaming black metal vocals is genius to me. A lot of black ambient (ambient music with elements of black metal) I've heard is very dark and doesn't have epic ambiance like Elffor has. That makes this album so unique, and the ambiance is so action-filled and epic. 

I highly recommend this album for fans of black metal (especially atmospheric black metal), classical, and Medieval music. It is a masterpiece within the realm of black metal.

Elffor is the side project of Eöl, the keyboardist from Spanish black metal band Numen. In sharp contrast to the musical stylings of Numen, Eöl has chosen a darker, ambient route. Perhaps he doesn’t like getting drowned out by all that pesky guitar work and screeching. Whatever the motivation may be, Eöl has forged a rich symphony of cascading melodies with the power of his mighty keyboard.

At first listen, Elffor sounds simple. Listen a bit longer, and the many instruments (largely replicated on the keyboard) begin to seamlessly weave melodies which effortlessly flow in and around one another. Trumpets, flutes, violins, and piano (just to name a few) comprise the main force. Programmed drums and the occasional tremolo picked guitars from Jabo (also of Numen) will periodically contribute to the mix when things reach their peak. Eöl’s vocals range from raspy to controlled when invoked, which is hardly ever. But that’s ok, because there is more than enough going on to keep you interested.

And that brings us to another point. Most ambient music is either mired by repetitious mediocrity or too schizophrenic to do what it sets out to do effectively and efficiently. Elffor stands at a crossroads in that it is somber and subdued but also carries a certain fluidity to keep listeners engaged. Listening to Elffor is like listening to a chain of simple melodies and harmonies all stitched together to create a beautifully complicated sonic tapestry of medieval proportions. Tracks like ‘Ravensong’ and ‘The Nocturnal Moon’ evidence this point the most. 

The only minor complaint I would have with Son of the Shades is that there are a couple moments in certain tracks where things abruptly change. There is no slow transition, no expectant shift, only an awkward jerk into a new pitch and range of constructed melodies. It nearly ruins the feel of certain songs and detracts from the majesty of it all – like finding a door ding in your car.

But these moments are few and hardly put a dent in the grand scheme of things. The re-mastered version of Son of the Shades belongs to any fan of ambient music, metal or otherwise.

This album opens with a haunting and disturbing track which invokes a feeling of repression and dismay. The 2nd track (the title track) starts in with some really nice ethereal strings and piano which set the stage for the powerful transition in which the drum machine, guitars and vocals kick in (there is also a sound sample of a horse, which is pretty unusual in itself). The only complaint I have about this one particular track is that almost right after the song gets going, it fades out and that's the end of it. It's such an awesome song. Oh well, the next song kicks in with a similar tempo and is an instrumental except for some clean choir vocals. There are many transitions, with stormy soundscapes, lush pianos, and very dynamic tempo changes. One moment you will feel peaceful and at ease, then all of a sudden you are swept into a whirlwind of darkness and despair. The album as a whole has a very medieval and ambient feel to it, with many sound samples used throughout. Vocals are used very sparingly on this album (both growly black metal vocals and clean vocals are used). The music at first sounds very basic and simple, yet the way that so many different keyboard parts and sound effects (even bagpipes) are blended, along with the amazingly dynamic transitions (you can never predict what will happen next) make the album very deep and complex both musically and emotionally. As for comparisons, one might compare Elffor to Summoning. Although, in my opinion, this album totally blows away anything Summoning has ever released. "Son Of The Shades" is one of my absolute favorite albums. As of yet the band is not on a record label. If I had my own label, I'd sign them in a heartbeat. Hail the mighty Elffor!

I've only recently become familiar with Elffor, the one-man project from Basque, which I assume is a province in Spain. Overall I like what I've heard so far in Heriotz Sustraiak, Unblessed Woods and so on. A very strong Summoning element and strong conceptual direction exemplified greatly, or cheesily, in Elffor's cover art which exclusively and persistently features frontman Eol in black metal garb usually holding chains in the left hand and some sort of sickle or axe in the other propels this work and kept me interested. As with previous releases, the lyrics are primarily in Basque, an indigenous proto-European language native to this songwriters homeland. 

As another reviewer mentioned, Malkhedant is significantly more infused with traditional black metal elements than his previous work. However, I wouldn't agree that this takes away from the music all that much as those elements have been present, and even dominant before such as in Heriotz. A definite early highlight is the shift from this more traditional black metal sound into a medieval atmosphere during the song “Gerlarien Kondairak” where keyboards and clean vocals are first introduced as a major element that is more consistent in the following songs. In this two or three minute section screeching guitars and howling low end vocals fall away to reveal clean female vocals and a delicately patterned keyboard tone that transported me back to times of medieval splendor. This section likely influenced the cover artwork which again features Eol on horseback, this time a plague-ridden dark ages setting.

Eol is clearly a very skilled and talented producer of black metal at this point and should be regarded alongside the likes of Werwolf and Rob Darken in terms of sheer technical accomplishment. I doubt that he will though, since this style of epic/depressive music doesn't appeal to even a majority of black metal fans. Their loss is my gain, of course. 

As far as downsides to the album go, all I can say is that I'm not the hugest fan of the shrieking vocals and I feel like they sort of take away from what feel like Eol's best assets vocally, there being his low-end rasp and that haunting sort of Bathory-viking chant that pops up towards the end of the record. That's just my personal preference in extreme metal vocals though, and I also feel like the last song “Eldhr” might be a little redundant until it's fadeout and wall of male-choir vocals make me again reflect if not long for a buried past of battles and triumph.

Elffor’s evolution during its career has been remarkable. Eöl’s personal project began as a pure ambient project in the vein of other interesting bands like Vinterriket, for example. But Elffor focused more on adding an especially intense medieval touch to its compositions, being able to create an excellent soundtrack of the Dark Ages. Contrary to other ambient based bands, Elffor has constantly evolved and with the following albums Eöl started to add more metal elements, which enriched the band´s sound and shaped its own style. With “From the Throne of Hate” Elffor became a darker version of Summoning, playing a slow paced black metal with great keys and the recognizable high pitched screams of Eöl. Those vocals were clearly influenced by Burzum. With the following albums the sound became heavier, tough efforts like the masterful “Unblessed Woods” showed how well work the most atmospheric parts with the heavier ones. Since “Frostbitten Pain” the black metal side became more predominant with longer and faster sections. Fortunately, the magnificent atmosphere achieved by the keys was still there. Even with this faster sound Elffor continued to maintain two essential elements of the bands style, the atmospheric keys and Eöl’s screams. 

Sadly the situation seems to have changed with his new opus called “Malkhedant”. My expectations were remarkably high after the interesting “Heriotz Sustraiak”. Moreover, those expectations were reinforced by the astonishingly good bonus tracks appeared on the reeditions of the last albums. Those tracks were long, intensely atmospheric and full of amazing keys, I couldn’t be more satisfied with them. However “Malkhedant” marks a rupture in Elffor’s traditional style. The album begins with a long track called “Gaizkiaren hats iluna” which gives you a clear impression of how the album is going to be. The first 6-7 minutes are a furious attack of straightforward black metal with almost no keys and a true fest of blast-beats. Until the second half of the song the keys don’t appear, but thankfully when they do, they continue to be quite good. Anyway and old fan like me expects to enjoy those keys through all the song, not as an occasional addition. With the second track the structure is more or less the same, though I would say that this track is better. The main role is again for the drums and guitars until it appears another change of tempo in the second half the song. A fantastic medieval/atmospheric section is introduced, this part is so good that I undoubtedly consider it as the best and most beautiful one of this album. Another relevant characteristic of these tracks is that Eöl continues the trend of the last albums, where he has performed vocals without the high pitched tone of the classic works. In this case the use of this tone has been reduced even more. I personally miss it because I think that those vocals fitted the music very well.

“Solis in antris“, the third track, could be the best song of the album but it’s still far from being as good as the best compositions made by Eöl. It’s a Summoning-esque track with a slower pace and a greater presence of the keys through the song, which is something closer to what Elffor should do. The keys should fill the music and create an enveloping atmosphere, not only appearing sparsely. The problem with this track is that Eöl almost no sings and that he lets the main role on vocals to Hildr Valkyrie. Once again on this album, a track lacks one of the two trademarks elements of Elffor’s music. This problem appears once again in the last track where Hildr becomes again the main voice with Eöl appearing only sporadically. In addition to this, the last composition lacks, once again, a greater presence of the keys which should lead the song. They appear on a very little amount and not playing a major role as they used to do in the past albums. This is not by any means the best ending for an Elffor album. 

In conclusion, the major problem of “Malkhedant” is that this album gives you an impression of being a project where Eöl is the guest member and not the other musicians, when it should the opposite. From the very beginning of the bands career the atmospheric keys have played a main role alongside with Eöl’s shrieks. Sadly “Malkheldant” have little of those two, which is weird, and after some listens, finally disappointing. It’s a quite good black metal album because Jabo´s riffs are consistent and Ametsgaizto’s drums are brutal. Nevertheless as an Elffor album, which is something more than the average black metal album, “Malkhedant” is not something we could have expected and desired.