BrunuhVille
New Age, 2015

Now this is what I call getting back on track. After some lackluster generic-sounding music, BrunuhVille comes back with Northwind. Okay, there is still some generic-sounding vibes here, but this album has a lovely, soothing, and evocative ambiance that makes it just the right thing to play in the background when one needs some mental R&R. There are also some vocals here and there, giving a welcome human element to the otherwise electronic and rather cold production aesthetics.

The whole thing kicks off with the haunting, moody Winter’s Tale, which starts out soft and gentle only to slowly rise to a glorious crescendo, complete with feminine area and spoken bits. The Song of the North Wind is softer and the crescendo emerges only late in the track, but it’s a nice tune to unwind following the previous track.  The rest of the tracks all have a familiar “nature, elves, dreams and stuff” vibe that fans would recognize, and in many ways, this is BrunuhVille not breaking or changing the formula too much. But there is an energy, some kind of pulsing zest, here that seems to me to be absent in his more recent efforts, so that is great. After all, I need something to play in the background once I get tired of the same old tracks in my favorite fantasy RPG games.

So, yes, Northwind is recognizably and typically BrunuhVille, but this is a nice kind of familiar, and I like it.