Enslaved, in my humble opinion, is a Norwegian band, which somehow didn’t manage to get even a quarter of the respect and recognition, which they deserve. To me, they seem to have always been overshadowed by "bigger" brothers from their land. Enslaved has changed its style "A LOT" over the years. They were the ones who pioneered the Viking Metal sound ( I know many would like to argue that Bathory started Viking earlier…but lets not get into that). If you can listen to all their albums, you can appreciate the way their music / sound has progressed over the years. Their earlier albums had a hardcore epic / Viking feel which are unarguably brilliant. Blodhemn is an album that has a lot of "Black" feel , overpowering the Viking feel and hence, makes a marvellous introduction to the band (i.e. for people more used to "conventional" black metal). Unfortunately (for me, at least) their future albums progressed farther away from Black and more into the "Progressive" area with influences of death metal also coming in. While I myself didn’t like that approach in Mardraum (I am told the next one was a progression down the same line), many people also lapped that style. Coming to Blodhemn, Make no mistake-it is not "accessible" or commercial(do I hate that word) by any measure. Its pure aggression with healthy dose of majesticity. The album cover itself has a pure "Viking" feel with warriors and swords, medieval war clothes, etc. One thing I have always admired in Enslaved CDs are the lyrics being printed both in their native tongue as well as their interpretations in English. They don’t compromise on the Viking feel and you get to understand and appreciate them better as you know what they’re singing about. The black metal played here is not the grim / old-school kind but more of the straight-forward-in-your-face, fast, aggressive stuff with lots of blast beats and screaming vocals. The difference in this album is that the Viking feel is brought in primarily by the different vocal style at parts, while the music remains mainly Black, unlike the earlier albums wherein the complete structure had a Viking feel. A point to be noted is that while the vocals are mostly the high-pitch blackish, they are usually maintained low with the guitars being paid maximum attention. The album starts with a nice intro leading onto the blast of the second song, "In chains until Ragnarok"( am using English interpretation of title). This song, in many ways, captures the essence of the album-damn aggressive, starts in an epic fashion, has its Viking-esque moments in between and is a beautiful song. The third song "Urtical Gods" is an exception in that it’s sung in English. It’s a straightforward black metal song. Lot of songs have stories to tell, and often about soldiers, voyages, battles, etc. The alteration of the band from epic themes to blast-beat filled parts is unbelievably perfect. My favourite song in this album is "An eye for Mimir" which is a kind of dialogue between two characters and the vocals of the two are distinctly black and Viking / epic, respectively. The song has a "royal" feel to it which is best "experienced" than "described". Most of the songs are fast and aggressive, with few mid-tempo parts in certain songs. The pace just doesn’t go down at all. However, one listen to the last song (outro) will tell you exactly what’s the other extreme end of the spectrum which they have so successfully embodied onto the platform of black metal. The feel on this album is absolutely unique and inimitable. Rarely have I been impressed so much by an album. The pure intensity of the music, the perfectly timed "epic" portions, the "so-appropriate" vocals, pure bliss of black metal fused into a "regality" unknown to others. I am unable to think of anything negative to point out in this album. The only people who might be slightly disappointed would be the older fans of the band who have got accustomed to the pure Viking Metal they used to play and moved away from. Which is why I said this could be a great "introduction" to the band. Because if you listen to their older albums after this you’d still appreciate them (in all probability). But if you already eaten, drunk and slept every single riff and melody of Eld, you could be a little surprised with this album. A Must Listen, if not a Must Have !!!