Amorphis - The Beginning Of Times (Vinyl)

Pretty much from the very start, Amorphis' career has been about constant reinvention (hence the name, hello!), and so the Finnish group's albums have traversed the realms of death, folk, progressive, electronic, and psychedelic rock and metal over the past 20 years -- never looking back along the way. Until now. The Beginning of Times isn't entirely correct in its billing because it doesn't quite bring Amorphis full circle to their brutal death metal debut of 1992, The Karelian Isthmus, but rather to its highly influential sophomore successor, 1994's Tales from the Thousand Lakes, which first proved they had something original to say -- something heavily indebted to their country's folk music traditions and tales, yes, but original nonetheless for taking such daring license in blending those exotic, elegant melodies with "vile" extreme metal hallmarks to fascinatingly contrasting effect. So Amorphis obviously sacrifice the element of surprise by going back to the well on this, their t