Customer Reviews

Nightshade Forest

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Summoning - Nightshade Forests

Nightshade Forests is the fourth album release from this Austrian duo and their third work in the traditional sound. It is a MCD, but for Summoning that means clocking in at 33:42, so you're definitely getting a fair amount of music at MCD price.

Yes, Summoning is my favorite band, so of course I love this CD. Three out of four of these songs were left over from the great Dol Guldur, which you think would make them sub-par but they are not at all. In fact, if they had managed to pull off a full length of songs of this caliber it might easily have been their greatest release.

Emotions and themes run the gamut of Tolkein-esque situations: dark and dreamy sad soundscapes; ambient, melancholic wanderings (this is easily Summoning's most depressive and melancholic work); the crushing might of steel in medieval epic battles; and triumphant, majestic, yet staid and controlled revelry in the beauties of mythic forgotten realms. "Habannan Beneath the Stars" is one of the most amazing songs I have ever heard, capturing PERFECTLY the sense of something beautiful, harmonious, pure and triumphant hidden in a golden yet starlit realm, lost long long ago. It coincides perfectly with the lyrics, a lost poem penned, of course, by probably the only christian to catch the admiration of the black metal scene.

The formula on this album is the same as usual: slow drum beats (though more rhythmically complex, more syncopation and breakbeats even on this release) with black metal-toned guitars placed very low in the mix while medieval keyboards carry the melodies and Protector's and Silenius's great bm vocals either plod through dirges or ride on the waves of hymns. This
MCD has a very unique sound, though, a very dreamlike quality to it. It is easily the most pastoral of Summoning's releases so far, not having the sharp drops and heavier elements found in previous and subsequent releases, opting instead for an ambient pace with a muted and feathery (by our standards) tone and sound. It works marvelously though, as everything melds together in a beautiful lush soup of sound, percussion, and melody.

For Summoning fans, I command you in the name of Sauron to go buy this immediately if you don't have it already. As I said, it is easily one of their strongest release by far (shorter running time = less room for inconsistency).

For those of you that don't know, Summoning, have crafted an ENTIRELY unique genre within not only metal but music as a whole. They are NOT, despite what they claim, a black metal band. Most of the time they are hardly a metal band. They are best described as Tolkein metal, there is no other word for it. If you are looking for something VERY original that is also very
emotional, I would of course recommend this band, and this a wonderful little gem to start with. Despite the prevalence of keyboards, Summoning have NOTHING to do with all the gothic cheeze and pathetic...weak vampires and their keyboards that plague metal today. Summoning are pure *MEDIEVAL*/Tolkein slow epic-dirge and they are the best at what they do. Nightshade Forests is a must for the discerning music fan; beautiful, stirring, melancholic, and, of course, dramatic.

"Nightshade Forests", the fourth Summoning release, is most definity not a cd single. Containing only four songs, it clocks near 35 minutes, almost making it a full album. "Mirkwood" is a great fantasy song that paints a picture of The Shire in my mind. "Flesh and Blood", is about The Great Battle against Mordor in the First Age, a fast but almost calm song with samples of sword fighting near the end of the song. I HIGHLY suggest you (the reader) get "Dol Guldor" along with this "single" and everything will make sense!

I got over 400 cd's and lp's in my home. This 4-songs-EP in my top 3.

Couldn't get a chance to hear anything that is nearly like it. The only thing that can come close to this definition - Is "Dol Guldur" - the sire of this EP. This release just perfected the darkened middle-earth dream-like style from it.

Any description hurt this flawless piece. it have achieved an astound athmosphere that i never heared before.
It's quite hard to accept the fact that 2 humans played and recorded this pastoral cd, becouse it sounds like it's coming from whole other world.

One of a million piece of plastic.