Enslaved
Roadburn Live

Enslaved has been around for a very long time, they celebrated 25 years in 2016 and now they are releasing their first ever live album. That has to be seen as a treat for all their fans, and a good thing to do that they are not flooding the record shelves with pointless live albums every other year like some bands do. And this live album has another first, it is the first time Enslaved has a cover on an official release – and for this first they have selected Immigrant Song that was made by Led Zeppelin once long ago and now made more Enslavic on this live album. And it is a good exciting and powerful live album we get, certainly one that is worth exploring.

It is a powerful album with strong songs, good variation, excellent production and great sound. We get eight songs that require about sixty-five minutes to play through, so the songs are rather long but they contain good drive and variation that makes the album seem quite a bit shorter than it actually is. It is an album that the fans will enjoy, and I actually think that Enslaved sounds better on this live album than they usually do on their studio releases. The vocals are great, the performances are great, I think that this is a live album that shows a band that is on their absolute best, and with songs from their newer and more progressive era they also have the best selection of songs on the album.

This is a great album, I think it is one that rivals the great live album by Vanden Plas that I reviewed just a few days ago, and it is one that I can clearly recommend not only for those who like Enslaved. It starts brilliantly with Building in Fire and than it continues down that same route all the way to the ending cover song. It turns out to be an album without weaknesses, an album that is as powerful as it is appealing. These Norwegians clearly knows what they are doing, now one can only hope that they don’t release any more of these live albums so that this gets to be this brilliant one off thing. I would have bought myself a nice vinyl edition of this album if I could afford it, but as I can’t afford it I will have to make due with the files I have been sent and I will keep listening to them even after I have finished this text.

It is great stuff, the opening track is the best one but none of the other tracks is far behind, and as I wrote I think that the album has no weaknesses. All I can do is tip my hat and confirm that you would be a monumental fool not to take a closer look at this album. Any fan of progressive extreme metal should have this one in their record collection, don’t miss it – that’s all I need to write.

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