INSOMNIUM - In The Halls Of Awaiting
June 3, 2002, 22 years ago
(Candlelight)
For those who lament the simplification of Sentenced, look no further than plucky Finnish upstarts Insomnium to save the day for frosty, gritty, fog-shrouded doom. Like Amorphis, Insomnium have taken inspiration from old Finnish poetry, which is fine by me, given the artful Maiden metal slam their gruff pronouncements are set to. Fact is, this is stirring groovy, riff-mad melodic metal like the very, very cream of the Sentenced experience, somewhat similar to In Flames but a little dirtier and even somewhat proggier. A welcome change of pace, in a genre where too many bands are playing too fast (The Crown), or just generally, re-exploring too deeply the hoary German roots of thrash.
