Review by Michael on November 28, 2002.

Not having heard Taake before this listen, I was not sure what to expect. With the very Black Metal–esque band name and album title, I was fairly sure of what I was in for with this band.

"Bjoergvin" is basically your stock standard Black Metal album. The songs are well constructed, the guitar lines are fast paced, the drums are very quick and the vocals are straight out of the “Guide to Classic Black Metal” handbook. Not taking anything away from the band, they are very good at what they do, but like many new bands emerging at the moment…its nothing new. The band is obviously aware of this, and they have made some small advances on the standard sound. Clean vocals have been used sparingly on the album, and to good effect, but a more varied use of EQ on them would have gone a long way to really spacing the songs and giving the clean vocals a different and more effective dynamic to the screams and growls.

An interesting element to Taake are their use of quirky time signatures, not only sticking to the sea shanty like groove that Black Metal bands such as Emperor and Dimmu Borgir made so famous, they have experimented with many different rhythms, which at times go as far as to sound like a ramba or even a reggae beat! I’m not sure if I like these types of changes, but full credit goes to the guys for trying something new and being inventive.

Production wise this album is better than a lot of black metal but is still below the standard of many of the bigger bands in the scene. Too much mid range and not nearly enough bottom and top end creating a very bland all over sound containing basically no dynamics at all.

Bottom Line: I’m not sure what else to say about this band. They play black metal, and they do play black metal well, but when it comes down to it they are simply that, another black metal band.

Categorical Rating Breakdown

Musicianship: 7
Atmosphere: 6
Production: 5
Originality: 5
Overall: 7

Rating: 6 out of 10