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Their composition is anywhere from calm and tranquil to intense and blasphemic. The likes of Vintersorg, Mental Home, Otyg, Borknagar, Naglfar and even Children of Bodom all help explain the flavor of fruition that “Iron Way” puts forth. I personally would like to call their approach blackened dark pagan metal, but as many people have said before, labels don’t truly describe what a band sound, so to a certain extent it can become detrimental.
What Andras does well is their changing of pace. They have a knack for switching from something more forceful to something with less vigor without it feeling misplaced or making the listener feel awkward while they listen.
The main body of the music changes from an epic pagan metal sound to a chaotic black metal resonance. Andras can create quite an intense chaos at times with blast beats and violent blackened vocals and speeding guitars. As in most of the band’s composition that is from one extreme to another, the blackened vocals are balanced with clean vocals like Vintersorg. Galloping or epic riffs balance off the speed-driven riffs. Even the solos are from calm to extreme. Keys are used occasionally, mostly as a tone setter from what I noticed.
With ten tracks in total, with the first and last being an intro and an outro respectively, at about a minute apiece, there are 8 other tracks that push the length of this dark epic journey almost to 45 minutes. Fans of Vintersorg and Borknagar need to listen to “Iron Way” before it becomes part of pagan lore.
Rating: 82
Reviewed By: Jeffrey D. Adkins