One of the more infamous interviews in metal history is an interview from Rock Guerilla TV with Fenriz in 2005. It featured a very obviously drunk Fenriz and a very obviously drunk interviewer with the worst hair on record, hanging out in his dingy studio apartment, surrounded by heaps of dirty laundry, making incredibly awkward conversation, all while Fenriz drops hilarious drunken nuggets of weirdness every few minutes. "BIG sunglasses, not Emperor sunglasses, always big sunglasses, cool band", "You know Elvis on his belt bucket said T-C-B", "HOW MUCH PRIMITIVE CAN YOU GET??", the entire "Rock and Roll Gas Station" sequence, it's a fucking riot and I recommend everybody watch it twice.
But I bring it up because the very first question asked of him produces a very weird answer. The interviewer asks what he's been listening to lately, and Fenriz answers "Boring thrash with really great vocals." If you swapped out "thrash" with "trad metal", you'd have Iron Griffin to a T.
Iron Griffin is a two person operation, with Oskari Rasanen (drummer of Mausoleum Gate) doing a terrible job of playing every instrument, and Maija Tiljander absolutely kicking ass as the vocalist. The gulf between the two members' talent is obvious from the second she first opens her mouth. At first I just thought Curse of the Sky would be simply boring and weak trad revival of the Cruz del Sur variety (so very Slough Feg-ish with a lot of bounce in the gallops), because that's exactly how "Reign of Thunder" starts out. It begins with incredibly toothless guitars, dully puttering out beginner-level power chords with absolutely no fire or gusto behind them. But once the verse begins and Maija hits the second line and first showcases her masterful wailing vibrato, all of the sudden the music itself becomes insulting. I can't stress enough how little actually happens during the thirty minute runtime of this debut. It's astounding to me that somebody who so clearly has so little vision or ambition could want to take on what is essentially a solo project purely for the ability to have total control, because that's the only conceivable reason he'd be doing this. He clearly isn't a very skilled guitarist, there is nothing interesting or aggressive or moody or atmospheric or anything that makes a bog standard riff anything other than bog standard. Stale ass rhythms, unexciting chord progressions, weak tone, no cool leads, just not one god damned thing happens with the instruments on here and it blows me away that somebody could produce so little on instruments he's clearly not particularly skilled at playing and decide "Yeah this is ready to go to press." It's all mid/slow paced gallops and dreary minor melodies that evoke little more than a disinterested yawn. Even his backing vocals sound like he's barely trying, it's shameful.
And yet, Curse of the Sky isn't completely worthless, because god dammit I am in love with these vocals. She reminds me a lot of Witch Mountain's original vocalist with how fucking clean and smooth her delivery is while still packing more power and bravado into each and every line than Manowar has managed across their last six albums in total. She does a lot of wailing and oversinging but man I just don't care, she sounds like a Valkyrie with lungs six times the size of her whole body. Check out the out-chorus on the title track, for as restrained and uninteresting the riffs are, she almost singlehandedly makes up for it with the wails of an extraordinarily desperate siren. This is everything I didn't know I wanted and I can't praise it enough. For every dumbass riff with no bite, there is at least one absolutely stunning vocal acrobatic to keep me from the stop button.
So just like how Fenriz can find Detente a worthwhile band based entirely on great vocals alone, I can almost say the same with Iron Griffin. Unfortunately, the end result is me basically just wishing she was in a much better band, because this is duller than the back end of a spoon. Curse of the Sky is very neutered and unexciting, with basically zero musical moments that stir my insides whatsoever, and as great as Maija's stentorian vibrancy is, she alone can't save this dishwater-bland nothing-album. Believe me when I say this would easily score thirty points lower without her.
RATING: 39%
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