Iceland's DYNFARI plays Black Metal-influenced, heavily Atmospheric music. Formed in 2012, the band had released two previous albums. "Vegferd Timans" is the band's third full-length release, and contains eight tracks.

The opening track "Ljoi" is a short instrumental, save for a few spoke words which are largely unintelligible. The mood imparted is dark and somber. The first track with vocals is the five minute song "Arei - a". Violin, bass and guitar work together in a slow, Gaelic kind of opening. Soon enough it picks up speed into more traditional Black Metal with that "wall of sound" and long, extended vocal passages that are more like bloody wails than singing in the customary sense. The atmospheric passages come into play later, and a quiet chanting is plucked from the earth, like the very voice of Satan himself.

"Sandkorn" begins in a similar fashion, with what I swear sounds like a mandolin, strumming slow, minor chords until the instrumentation kicks in full bore. For the remainder of the track the back and forth between full sound and quiet passages trade places here and there. "Hafsjor" is an eight minute song that starts off with a bomb followed by a despondent sound, as if all hope just left your body forever. Several meter changes accentuate the ambient nature of the song as a whole. The one minute "Fall hinna XCII og 2" is more of a segue than anything. Like whispers in the dark, it is gone faster than you had the time to comprehend.

Now, we come to the final three tracks which share the same title, but are separated into three movements if you will. The first is the longest, "Vegferd I Ab Terra," which clocks in at twelve minutes. There is a little more substance to this track in terms of the amount of instrumentation and slightly more traditional riffing style. Still, there are connecting atmospheric and acoustic passages, which in this song really do breathe in some beauty and hope the desolate landscape. The second act, "Vegferd II Ad Terra," is nearly as long but opens more unassuming, like taking in the calm of a gentle sea. At the five minute mark more instruments pick up the sound and the chord progressions are almost regal sounding, if only for a short while. Another completely different arrangement comes in at the seven minute mark and it closes on a strong, heavy note. The final movement, "Vegferd III Myrkird" is the nine-minute album closer. The dichotomy of hope and despair is perhaps best characterized in this track.

I found the album to be as close to their description as it could possibly beM an amalgam of traditional Black Metal with extended Atmosphere and little variation from track to track. They are very good at setting the mood of loss, hopelessness, sorry and death, and at producing a sound that is both tangible and ethereal at the same time. It's a pure sound that fans of the genre will enjoy in my opinion.