Varde is the second effort of this Norwegian band named Gjenferdsel. Their debut, I, came out in 2006. Previously, this duo had a demo in 2004 called Det Komet Skiptil Bjφrgvin. Iudex is handling guitars, bass and vocals, while the drums and additional bass are the work of Invictus.
Varde is a ten track album of traditional black metal done the Norwegian way. There no extravagancy, keyboards or even acoustic instruments on this disc. "Vardoged" is the only instrumental piece on which some fire samplings are heard, so no other samplings in here. Gjenferdsel plays fast, powerful and tight black metal. The guitar tones are crushingly distorted. The vocals alternate between your typical rasps and deep growls. Their music is not only ferocious, but it is melodic all along too. A bit of clean guitar here, some folksy tremolo picking there and a bit of nostalgia are all helping the harmonies of this album. A couple tracks are quite pleasantly offering this folksy edge. The songs are called "Strid" and "Desember". On "Regin", you will hear a nice musical break where crushing guitar and arpeggios are ruling.
In short, Varde is a good all around traditional Norwegian black metal album.
Track listing:
1 Vardoger
2 Illverk
3 Vesaldom
4 Intet
5 Strid
6 Desember
7 Regin
8 Iaktatt
9 Nid
10 Manngard