Vengeance

It begins with an eerie backwards fiddle, then the beats kick in, banging for dear life, and the cool, authoritative voice of Emma H¤rdelin floats over the top. It's the third Garmarna album, fulfilling every promise they'd made on their first two records. The ancient and modern achieve an almost perfect balance here, the original material sounding as if it should be centuries old. Blood, guts, violence, love, they're all here, every aspect of the human condition. While the band conjures up musical magic, it's H¤rdelin who emerges as the sorceress, the true star, with a voice that just seems to bewitch. Put it all together, and you have something that's more than the sum of its impressive parts. This is the record you always knew Garmarna could make. --Chris Nickson