A black metal nerd’s love for their country’s natural history is one of the purest loves in metal. Andy Marshall, now best known for Saor, is one of the world’s premier folk/black metal artists and writes music that harks to Scotland’s immense beauty and folkloric culture. Album six, entitled Amidst the Ruins, is now primed for unveiling and once more returns to the desolate highlands, glossy lochs, and misty glens that characterize the best of Scottish nature. With five full-length releases under Marshall’s belt between 2013 and 2022, and having written reviews for four of these, I was starting to find the impact of his work dulled, if only through sheer familiarity. Can Saor find something fresh amidst the ruins?
The album features a pivot back to the lengthier, grander compositions from earlier in Saor’s career after the comparative brevity and directness of Origins. The opening leads of the album exemplify how Saor straddle the fine line between potently heavy but also satisfyingly melodic, with the track extending for nearly 13 minutes. Emotionally, it finds that goldilocks zone of music – that’s somehow mournful, hopeful but also epic – in which the band excels. By contrast to the energetic opening minutes, the closing minutes of the record lean heavily into emotive impact. “Rebirth” forges a massive guitar and string harmonization, with layers of cleanly sung vocals, into an auditory demonstration of Scottish pride and heroism. These strains of black metal and stirring melodies are packaged in production that sounds appropriately heavy with robust bass, but which enables the piercing effect of the tremolo-picked guitars. It’s hard to imagine that a fan of folksy, melodic and/or atmospheric black metal wouldn’t appreciate something in the core Saor sound.
Despite the retreat towards lengthier songs, there’s a sophisticated, progressive edge to Amidst the Ruins that distinguishes it from earlier releases. “Echoes of the Ancient Land” immediately adopts a spikier song-writing approach, shuffling predictably fast riffs and unpredictably technical riffs across its opening 90 seconds. The guitars are more technical than you might expect from folksy black metal that ordinarily prioritizes emotive above cerebral impact. As the song develops, it becomes more intricate and dynamic, levering a variety of harmonies (between layers of guitars, guitars, vocals, guitars, and strings, etc) and a variety of instrumentation (uillean pipes, various whistles and strings). Although the core Saor sound remains comfortably familiar, it’s presented with more bells and whistles this time around. Similarly, Andy Marshall’s compositional prowess in integrating classical and folksy instrumentation has developed. On the title track, the abating heaviness around the mid-point exposes just a quiet guitar and a whistle that gradually layers with dancing strings and chugging guitars. The swelling composition, especially as it explodes into a memorable vocal refrain with the strings remaining behind, makes for an entrancing experience through the beautiful melodies and subtle instrumental details.
It all coalesces into the type of hypnotic effect you feel across the best atmo-black records, where the songs don’t feel quite as long as they are; contrasted by the worst atmo-black records that feel interminable. But perhaps Origins spoiled me given that it saw Saor playing with shorter songs that were a mite sharper. My principal complaint about the otherwise strong title track is that it continues for a further three minutes after the dramatic climax described above. The material remains enjoyable but it disrupts the song’s flow. Likewise, “The Sylvan Embrace” has an initial impact but is ultimately too long and repetitive. It’s intended as an acoustic interlude – and folksy metal can do this type of thing well – but the core guitar melody loops for seven minutes. The songs are scarcely longer than those at the pinnacle of the Saor discography but those overcame their ponderous length through consistent emotional intensity and immense payoffs. Amidst the Ruins also bears these qualities but to a slightly-lesser extent.
Although plainly produced by the same band producing a similar sound to other records in their discography, Amidst the Ruins stretches Saor in new and interesting ways. It may not be quite as emotionally arresting as the first few records – although this may well be the result of diminished novelty more than anything – but the songwriting and melodies remain highly engaging. Saor are perversely comforting to me, even on a release that would be intolerably heavy for 99% of the world’s music-loving population. Anyone with a mere passing interest in folksy black metal will undoubtedly glean much from Amidst the Ruins.
Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps MP3
Label: Season of Mist
Websites: facebook.com/saor | saor.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: February 7th, 2025