Review by Adam M on September 14, 2014.

Solstafir has created an album with an even more relaxing atmosphere than its previous entry Svartir Sandar. The wondrous ocean in the background on the album cover nicely represents the movements of music that are gone through here.

Songs typically feature softer moments that built up into a climax of more powerful moments. A great example of this is the title track, which has beautiful strings that are the background of the song and an increase in intensity that is wondrous to behold. “Midaftann” features beautiful piano and stands out as the most subtle piece here. One can also be overwhelmed by the last couple of minutes of “Lagnetti” and its use of piano. Overall, the tracks need time to get stuck in the listener’s mind and once they do the album can become more addictive.

This is also an album that is good for relaxing, despite partially belonging to the heavy metal genre. The mood or atmosphere is an important part of music and the amount that is created on Otta is overwhelming. The folk element of the music that is contained here is masked in a larger degree of atmospherics. The tag atmospheric metal might actually thus be largely appropriate for the music here. Instrumentally, a very sparse sound is accompanied by several instruments, much like Agalloch, but I think Solstafir has the advantage over that band this year.

Check out this new work and the band’s previous album while you’re at it and become enraptured by what is turning out to be one of the better bands in music these days. Otta is compelling from one song to the next.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Review by JD on May 4, 2014.

I have heard only a few bands from Colombia and have to say: not been impressed to any degree. They have fire but seem to be following rather than leading. Guerra Total (Spanish for Total War) are another hopeful from this historically rich area of the globe.

Hailing from Bogotá, Colombia, Guerra Total comes out of nowhere with some very interesting music to say the least. Speeding on like a killer car, Guerra Total combines speed metal with horror tinged black metal – the results are somewhat intriguing. Wild old school riffs, evil vocals and lo-fi recordings make Guerra Total’s album feel and sounds exactly like when the massive glut of speed metal flooded the marked in the mid 80’s.

Songs like 'Nuklear Zombie Division' and 'Black Speed Rock and Roll' are humorous, and yet never once comes through. Unoriginal and boring, the whole album seems to have been done many times before to the point that I had to stop the CD a few times to get through it. Bland, comic book like lyrics backed by flat sounding riffs that neither inspired nor moved clearly were then order of the day. Sounding like all of the one-album-then-disappear speed metal bands that had popped up through the 80’s before thrash took over, made this a forgettable experience.

If this band had even attempted to redefine their music a little, there would be something to hang on to. As it stands now, Guerra Total simply is not a band that has much to offer, and needs a total reworking just to get to average. I had hopes when reading the bios to start the review process, they were quickly burned and tossed away. Not a album to be bought.

Rating: 3 out of 10