-In the Woods-

As all adventures this one goes back a long time. the year was 1992 and the members of this strange and rather obscure band were determined to make it. starting out as a blackish kind of metalcombo, in the woods... was just one of many hopeful bands struggling to survive in an already flooded genre that was the extreme metalscene back in the early nineties. but whatever they did, something always separated them from the rest. be it the lyrics with the rather unusual (we´re talking metalbands here) paganish and non-satanic wrapping or the music, which was developing constantly; leaving the black metal origin further behind with every release. recorded in a house not far from where they lived, the "isle of men" demo created quite a stir upon the release back in 1994 and even if the extreme parts were without a question the main focus of the band, it was obvious the guys wanted to expand outside this rather limited way of musical expression.

The first trees in the woods consisted of anders kobro on drums, the twins christian and christopher botteri on guitar and bass respectively, oddvar a:m on second guitar and jan kenneth transeth on vocals. with this demo they obtained a record contract with the english underground label misantrophy. maybe most famous for housing the much talked about norwegian black metal band burzum, the label quickly saw the potential of their newly signed act and did a great job spreading the word and placing adds in different ´zines around the globe. the underground network and contacts was much due to jan kenneths long time activities with tapetrading and writing of letters. together these elements created a fundament for which the band could use as a springboard to get their music out to the masses."heart of the ages" (amazon 004 / misantrophy 1994), as the debut was baptized, rocked the underground and with its blend of black metal, beautiful melodies and harmonies, it received nothing but great reviews. the record was done in star studio in norway with producer trond are who also did the third album "strange in stereo".

Next step on the journey was to create a follow up and if possible take things further both musically and lyric wise. jailhouse studio is a studio run by the local metalhead hans eidskard and this cooperation would become a major part of what woods would sound like hereafter. "omnio" was to become the album, when looking back at it, which defined the overall feeling of the ultimate musical identity. in the woods was starting to gain a unique sound of their own. it was released in 1997 and housed such power anthems like "299 796km/s", "kairos" and the grandiose "i am your flesh". the clean vocal of jan kenneth sat new standards and took the band to new levels within the blend of genres that they chose to explore. a new guitarist in bjoern harstad also made this album into perhaps the finest woodsmomento. and yet again, we; the vinylfreaks, got it released on this lovely format. between the four albums released, three 7" appeared as some kind of appetizers, but i know many with me regard these items to be the bands finest musical effort.

The band was keen on showing the fans where they took parts of their inspirations from and first out was the great jefferson airplane tune "white rabbit" (ovl 69/misantrophy/1996) backed by a new version of the "heart of the ages" song "mourning the death of aase". next up was the pink floyd song "let there be more light" which was b-sided by "child of the universal tounge". (ovl 68/misantrophy/1998) adding the last chapter to the threesome was "epitaph", a magnificent opus by the 70´s progkings king crimson. the b-side was "karmakosmik", also a fine moment. (ovl 67/propechy production/2000). yet another change of guitarist saw christer join the ranks. now they were about to embark on maybe the most difficult part of this journey through the woods: to follow up the "omnio". in retrospective "strange in stereo" is by far a weak album, but i think they went too far away from the sound they had worked out and that made the earlier material so popular. but i range "strange in stereo" high and it has some killer moments in "closing in", dead man´s creek" and "titan transendence" (amazon 020/misantrophy/1999).

A change of recordcompanies also took place this year, from the english misantrophy to the german based propechy production. so far only the last album and 7" has been released under this label. "three times seven on a pilgrimage" was some sort of compilation for those already in possession of the 7"´s, but for the rest it was a chance to get to hear the singles plus some really strong new songs. the split came as a shock for many of the fans and seeing how the band had expanded over the years, one can only dare to imagine what could have been if they had continued. no hard feelings exist and they all rehearse and record material for various solo efforts; some of them already released. on the 29th of december 2000 the band held the farewell gig in their hometown of kristiansand. far too many missed out on this event, but a live album and a video shoot of the show will make this moment something everyone can be a part of.