Yesterwynde

Yesterwynde is the tenth album on which NIGHTWISH drew the questions of time, memory and how humans receive the world as grand symphonic metal. Weighty guitar and orchestration, folk-music texture and delicate vocals overlay, raising a single narrative world like a feature film. Even after a long career, it is a record on which their creativity has not dimmed in the least. On “Yesterwynde,” “Perfume Of The Timeless” and “The Antikythera Mechanism,” the information is dense, but at the center there is always melody. Songs like “An Ocean Of Strange Islands,” “Spider Silk” and “Lanternlight” breathe the band’s full playing too. From the space of quiet scenes to scenes where chorus and orchestra spread widely, the songs give the listener time to imagine. A quiet emotion gazing at the finitude of life makes the album’s depth. It is a full work of their mature period that balanced grandeur and intimacy.