The Wave Gothic Treffen in Leipzig 2003 was my first encounter with Neun Welten. This German group made a promising impression on the neo-folk stage in Haus Leipzig. The members, who seemed to be rather young, played an enthousiastic mixture of folk and classical music. This demo was recorded in 2001 and contains 4 songs. The titles and artwork are clearly inspired by nature, by the woods, the seas and the mountains. Instruments used are acoustic guitar, drums, flute, violin and cello.
All songs are instrumental (except for a short spoken intro), which is a daring thing to do. At the concert they played about two songs with vocals, which gives a welcome variation, though in their best songs you don’t really miss the vocals. The best track without doubt is the title track ‘Neun Welten’ a very energetic piece, with a nice melody, where the strings, guitar and drumming really enforce each other. The violin, cello and flute give the music a romantic, melancholic character, while the drummer contributes a dynamic element. By the way, nice to see the drummer use a full drumkit, usually in neo-folk music only 1 or 2 monotonous drums are used. The next song ‘Jötunnheimen’ is also uptempo and rather cheerful. ‘Svartalfheim’ and and ‘Folkvangr’ are more tranquil and introspective.
All in all a nice demo, of which especially the first two tracks are good. I hope that we can expect an album soon of this new group, I would not be surprised if they have developed further since this demo.
