After the free for all Avant-Jazz meets 70's existentialist sci-fi soundtrack flurry of their previous album "In The Kingdom Of Kitsch You Will Be A Monster", (again released on the Rune Grammofon label) Norwegian quartet Shining seem to have gone all-out for operatic Metal and ridiculous, near non-sequitur instrumental tangents of the highest order here on their new one. Initially, it all sounds incredibly, preposterously theatrical, but by the end of the album one finds they've taken a rare convincing trek through the uncharted realms of the genuinely mentally unhinged.

I'm going to make an attempt at detailing this jaunt down mentalist lane: Stand out track "Wintereisse" is what Slayer would sound like if they got Rick Wakeman and Hungarian composer György Ligeti in to jam for a session. Other highlights include "Stalemate Longan Runner" which is clearly inspired by the Doomier end of the Southern Lord Metal spectrum until its coda sees the piece transformed into a kind of far-out baroque chamber music, which leads nicely into the delicate fairy tale music box interlude on the following track "To Be Proud Of Crystal Colors Is To Live Again"... and these couple tracks only begin to represent the bad-vibes kaleidoscope of the album.

By the time you get to the end of "Grindstone" you might be unsure as to what exactly just happened to your ears, much less in your mind. Penultimate track, "1:4:9" sums this up perfectly with its weird melding of Grindcore abrasion and ponderous fairytale melodies played out on flute, dulcimer and folksy percussion. It's near impossible to describe the kind of genre-hopping flights of fancy involved with this stuff, other than to say its absolutely nuts, confoundingly unpredictable and quite brilliant.