Album Review: Amon Amarth – The Allfather Awakens
Reviewed by Rich Oliver
When it comes to vikings and metal, generally there is one band that everyone thinks of and that is Amon Amarth. For nearly 35 years, Amon Amarth have risen from an underground death metal act to one of the leading figures in Swedish melodic death metal with anthems centred about norse mythology meaning that they now command large stages and headline festivals with ease. They are a band that have barely strayed from their tried and trusted formula and their sound is as easily recognisable now as it was back in 1998 when they released their debut album.
“The Allfather Awakens” is the band’s thirteenth album and is one that sees the band far more focused and energised with some of the best songs they have released in a decade. Amon Amarth have been guilty of playing it safe and going through the motions on recent albums but it seems that the band have had theirs fires stirred as “The Allfather Awakens” is what I have been hoping to hear from Amon Amarth in a good while – soul stirring, epic and anthemic anthems with plenty of death metal grit and rousing melodies. The album starts as it means to go on with two songs which are destined to be Amon Amarth classics.
Album opener ‘Gjallerhorn’ is a song born for the concert hall with its anthemic woah oh section guaranteed to be reciprocated by the crowd and ‘Eight Legs Of Thunder’ is another rousing anthem which is just pure Amon Amarth. ‘Kvasir’s Blood’ has a darker and heavier feel to it but also contains one of the best melodic sections on the album and ‘We Rule The Waves’ is a wonderfully corny song with its “We are, we are vikings” chorus. The leftfield moment on the album comes in the form of ‘Upphaf’ which is Amon Amarth’s first acoustic song but fear not, they have not gone the road of the ballad but have created an atmospheric song that sounds like it was recorded under the stars and around a campfire. ‘DIe WIth A War Cry’ is a chunkier and groovier piece of melodeath goodness, ‘Raven God’ and the title track are fist pumping anthems, ‘Oden’s Hunt’ dishes back out the heaviness with it’s relentless double kick drum attack and the album finishes in epic style with ‘Ascending Like An Eagle’.
“The Allfather Awakens” sees Amon Amarth in tremendous form. Having maintained the same line up since 2016, the band are a well oiled machine. The furious roar of frontman Johan Hegg shows no signs of wear, the guitar work from Olavi Mikkonen and Johan Söderberg is as great as ever with crunching riffs, soaring melodies and killer leads whilst the rhythm section of bassist Ted Lundström and drummer Jocke Wallgren are devastating. As I mentioned earlier, Amon Amarth have played it a bit too safe on recent albums but on “The Allfather Awakens” the band sound awakened themselves. It doesn’t quite reach the heights of classic Amon Amarth albums such as ‘Versus The World, ‘With Oden On Our Side’ or ‘Twilight Of The Thunder God’ but it is the best the band have sounded in a good while and this album is chock full of fun metal anthems for you to raise your fist and drinking horns to.
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