This came out in 1999 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
Medieval Swedish folk ballads performed with a modern-rock edge; sounds like some gawdawful, camped-up lederhosen act you’d have to endure at a hippie festival, right? Wrong. Way wrong.
If anything, this fiery Nordic techno-rock quintet would be right at home at Edgefest. Dig it: They take centuries-old Viking ballads about witches, murder and — of course — vengeance, and drag them up to the edge of the millennium, rendering the ancient melodies with smoky female vocals, spooky synths, distorted guitars and vaguely Celtic techno rhythms. If you could locate a midpoint between Björk, Nick Cave and Firewater, that’s where you’d find Garmarna. With nary a lederhosen in sight.
