Here is an album that should appeal first and foremost to fans of Agalloch. Waldgeflüster is a rather recent creation. The one-man project was started by Winterherz in Germany in 2005 and released its second full length this past May. I can’t speak for his first album, but Femundsmarka definitely deserves more attention than it’s bound to get. A product of that marriage of black metal and ambient folk that has become rather common these days, it might not reach the very top but it certainly rises above the status quo.

Interlude II: Night

Unfortunately most of the folk and ambient tracks of the album aren’t available on youtube. This one, as much as I love it, is my least favorite of the four. Just consider that while the vibe this track offers is present throughout the album, the musical styles creating it vary. The intro and outro make use of acoustic guitar, and the first interlude is a beautiful ambient piano piece.

The concept of the album is pretty self explanatory, but requires a bit of German translation. Femundsmarka is a national park situated in the mountain range separating Norway from Sweden, and the album is a musical retelling of the artist’s travels there, translating literally as “Femundsmarka: A Journey in Three Chapters”. The track list, roughly, translates to:

Prologue: Departure
Chapter 1: Lakeland
Interlude: Rest
Chapter 2: Stony Deserts
Interlude: Night
Chapter 3: Spruce Grove
Epilogue: Homecoming

Generally speaking, the main chapters are black metal and the in-betweens are folk, but there is plenty of cross-over both ways.

Chapter 1: Lakeland

So if many of the metal portions of the album are as reminiscent of Drudkh as the folk bits are of Agalloch, it should come as no surprise that all three bands highlight nature as their main theme. I could go about comparing them all, but I don’t think it would be entirely fair. This isn’t some monumental standard-setting album like Swan Road or Pale Folklore, nor does it strive to be.

And any first impressions that Winterherz is just copying other artists’ styles should vanish around the 2:30 mark anyway. It commences the most descriptive movement of the album, as you can hear the traveler begin to comprehend the beauty that surrounds him, exploding in a final triumphal realization around 4:20.

The work certainly isn’t perfect. I struggled at times in Chapters 2 and 3 to remember that Winterherz was trying to show me something and not just writing another metal album. But its high points are pretty great, and the only standard you might say it falls short of at times is its own–it’s consistently good, just not consistently visual. The introduction, interludes, and outro are my favorite moments, and give the album a higher degree of stylistic variance than most metal of its kind. The more subdued entries aren’t sparse, either, filling up nearly half of the album.

In the absence of a full track list on youtube, someone took the effort to compile an eight minute sample of the album that covers a lot of ground without revealing too much. I’ll leave you with this. If you have to buy it to hear the rest, well, your money will be well spent. Not an album of the year contender, but a pleasant surprise from an artist you’ve probably never heard of.