Tales of winter - A review of Finnr's Cane's Wanderlust

If you've ever been to Sudbury, you know why Finnr's Cane sound so elegiac, gloomy and lethargic because the whole city is like this. It's basically an unpleasant mining town without any noteworthy attractions and stands out as one of the least beautiful places to visit in an otherwise gorgeous province and country. It doesn't come as a surprise that the natural landscapes around the town seem to be the band's main inspirations.

Finnr's Cane's music barely qualifies as metal because of a few monotonous riffs with minor black and doom metal inspiration. Wanderlust is essentially numbing ambient music with a few harmonious neofolk spots here and there. The drum play is mostly appeasing and smooth, the guitar play slow and fragile and cello and keyboard sounds are used scarcely as they invite to dream yourself far away. Only few songs feature vocals that are drowned in the production and sound like vague blurs or fading choirs complementing the domineering instrumental work. The album develops a hypnotizing mood that works coherently from start to finish. The slow but playful and somewhat diversified ''The Lost Traveller'' is probably the most interesting song on an album where the sum is greater than its parts.

As references, I might cite Agalloch, Dornenreich and Empyrium and it doesn't come as a surprise that the mysterious Canadian trio signed with Prophecy Productions which have quite a few interesting ambient and neofolk bands in their roster. If you are looking for gloomy music inspired by natural landscapes, this authentic soundtrack of winter will evoke numerous images on your mind. Finnr's Cane might not be spectacular instrumentally but the band's cohesive atmosphere makes the trio stand out very positively.

Final rating: 75%