Universal: Comments (MODERATED!!)

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i love swedish/norwegian surnames because they often have beautiful meanings, connected with nature.
like hedlund, if i not wrong the translation is moor-grove :)

Mine is a clunky surname connected with nature...

'Linde'. Norwegian. (At least for us, my grandfather was from Vik.) Which means that I am named after the exotic and majestic linden tree :lol:
 
Mine is a clunky surname connected with nature...

'Linde'. Norwegian. (At least for us, my grandfather was from Vik.) Which means that I am named after the exotic and majestic linden tree :lol:

nice! :)
i've done some researches and it seems that my surname has germanic (but not scandinavian :) ) origins....
 
Mine is totally chilean, more precisely native. It means something like 'To Seize' or 'To take by force'. There was a warchief with that name (most likely my ancestor) and, like many other cultures, their names were born from their own qualities. In this case, this warchief was known for being 'the fiercest' warrior from the clan. On the spanish-mapuche war, he was one of the few warchiefs agreed to destroy Santiago (our capital) once and for all.

Back on topic: The box is really beautiful. It's really well done. I do miss the dragons printed on the cd, that was a nice tradition. Now with the booket, I can understand all lyrics. I love them. I like that Nature seems to be the main theme, it's a less 'cientific' approach that I truly appreciate (I don't dislike it, but I like more Borknagar talking about nature on a more 'organic/pagan' way). It's more like the old themes, specifically TAC came to my mind reading them.
 
After more than ten listening..i have changed my mind about my first listens of the album..it´s fucking great!!!!...the only thing i dislike is some clean vocals passages of vintersorg...i mean the " nasal" effect on his voice..

Apart from that the rest is just mind blowing..i did cancel my preorder,but right now i´m going to place another order...

It´s a fantastic cd...but it needs tons of listenings to get well into layers of music..
 
My last name simply means "son of Jacob" - it's Ibson, and apparently Ib was a Danish short form of Jacob. My mom's last name, Whelan, means "little wolf" and that's awesome.
 
My last name is an old way Norwegian way of writing Winter-house. The last name of my mothers family side is translated into Birch-hill.

On Topic: I still haven't' commented on Universal. I'm not sure what to say about it, like a couple of others I don't like the clean vocals, and I may be the only one to not like the keys on this album. I can't really put my finger on whats wrong, I just can't get into it. Maybe I only like the other Borknagar albums because of nostalgia and I have become unable to appreciate any new albums?
 
I'm really curious about this "Jester voice" thing. Maybe I'm not the right person to pass judgement since I'm naturally drawn way towards the "harsh" vocals over the clean ones, but I can't hear any real change in the way Vintersorg sings...?

The album as a whole, I thought it was a mess the first time I listened but then I thought that about most Borknagar albums on the first spins :D It definitely grows... this is some complicated shit... definitely not "accessible" until its penetrated your skin and eaten your brain... but then, wow.
 
Finally after weeks i fell in total love with universal!!!. it took me lots of repetitive listenings to really understand the cd.

i should eat my first words and opinions when i listened to the cd for first time..and i did not like it..

I become obssesive with "reason"!!!, the only song i dislike is " the stir of seasons" and some parts of " fleshflower", the rest is just mind blowing!!!.

i ordered now from

http://www.blahdvd.com/Music/Borknagar-Universal-Music-CD/INDIE014CD/product.htm
 
Haha I was celebrating my birthday last night and had a ton of people over then went out to a club, I was wearing that Ragnarok-logo-pendant that comes with the box set and people were so intrigued and asking about it all night haha. Made a nice accessory.

Perhaps the extra goodies are useful after all...
 
Haha I was celebrating my birthday last night and had a ton of people over then went out to a club, I was wearing that Ragnarok-logo-pendant that comes with the box set and people were so intrigued and asking about it all night haha. Made a nice accessory.

Perhaps the extra goodies are useful after all...

Did it get you someone to spend the night with?

'Ohhh what's that?'
'It's the logo from my band, Borknagar. It's called Ragnarok.'
'Oh so you're into vikings and stuff?'
'Why, yes!'
'Let's go to bed.'

;)
 
At first 2 listens I was dissappointed. Maybe I was not in the mood for this kind of music. The only song I loved was My domain. Many of the songs sounded fuzzy and not too catchy. The Bonus songs were quite good. Vintersorg is a bit too nasal at times in the clean vocals and I longed for more ethereal stuff like the clean bits in Genuine pulse.
But now I'm listening to For a Thousand years...and Fleshflower and it sounds good... Albums can lurk and grow on you.. so I'm giving it several spins to form an opinion.
 
Okay. I've listened to the whole album three times and I can honestly say that it's a masterpiece. Maybe not as good as "Olden Domain" or "Empiricism" but, like Oystein said, it's sort of a best of both worlds. It's got the old, epic naturesque feel of the older material but has the advanced feeling of the newer era. Though all the songs are awesome, a few that really stood out to me are "Abrasion Tide," "Worldwide," and "For a Thousand Years to Come" as I feel they best represent the current sound they aimed for this time around. "Stir of seasons" I find rather interesting; it's almost like a ballad for the most part. Same thing with "Fleshflower," it kinda sounds like it should be a Solefald song, but maybe it's just me. Even the two bonus tracks (if you're lucky enough to get the limited edition) are great tracks. In conclusion, this album has definately lived up to the hype in my book. Awesome job gentlemen.
 
Now playing:

Borknagar: Havoc

I just keep getting more and more into the album, amazing after more than ten listens! There're some pretty sick bass lines in this song :kickass: .



Hav•oc:|ˈhavək| noun
widespread destruction : the hurricane ripped through Florida, causing havoc.
• great confusion or disorder : schoolchildren wreaking havoc in the classroom.
verb ( havocked, havocking) [trans.] archaic
lay waste to; devastate.

PHRASES
play havoc with completely disrupt; cause serious damage to : shift work plays havoc with the body clock

ORIGIN Late Middle English: from Anglo-Norman French havok,

ORIGIN late Middle English : from Anglo-Norman French havok, alteration of Old French havot, of unknown origin. The word was originally used in the phrase cry havoc ( Old French crier havot), to give an army the order havoc', which was the signal for plundering.



Very Viking haha :p .

It's interesting to see that Lars composed in it's entirety 'Fleshflower' and that he wrote the lyrics for 'Reason'. Aaaaaand, now that I read said lyrics I understand the meaning of the title. Great lyrics to be honest!

The lyrics of 'Abrasion Tide' were written by Mr V. Wait, let me correct that. Were brillaintly written by Mr V :) . I like how he sings in tune with the main riff, simply great.

Now that I've taken some time to read various lyrics of the album, I can see how well they're written and how they really go with and complement the music.

And until now I haven't seen any of the grammatical mistakes a reviewer mentioned :p .

Cheers!
 
I love the album. A great return to form after the (to me) disappointing Origin and Solens Rötter (only applicable to V, I know).

I'm completely loving it, and any worries I had about it turning into a Vintersorg pt 2, were laid to rest.

You did a great job guys. I especially like "For a Thousand Years to Come". Awesome singing by V, right there.
 
Rivfadír;8964238 said:
disappointing Solens Rötter
.
Sorry, if I'm not on the track of the thread, but SR in my opinion slays!
Anyway, you can't exspect your favorite artists to hit your jackpot 100% all the time. I've yet to see Mr. V fail even the slightest as Vintersorg. The last 2 Bork albums have some meh.. parts, but they're alright.
 
I'm new here in this forum. I find that the album is great! I have just listened to it, reading the lyrics with the booklet and everything. Till now I had only had time to listen to it in the car and walking in the street. I'm discovering new details each time.

I see an evolution with this album, it's not the same as other past albums. There's more diversity, from my point of view. Now my favourite song is For a Thousand Years to Come. The vocal lines are amazing there, and so they are in the whole album. I like the keyboards of Lars fullfilling everything. Good compositions, very good, indeed. Well, I like everything. I have to listen more to it, though.

I hope that Borknagar will include so many songs of this album when they do some gigs in the future.
 
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