Band: ICS Vortex
Title: Storm Seeker
Label: Century Media Records
Distribution: Suburban
Release date: August 22nd 2011
Review: CD

Simen Hestnæs is a very well-known musician within the Extreme Metal scene, known under his artistic moniker ICS Vortex. For ages he has been active in notorious acts like Dimmu Borgir, Lamented Souls, Borknagar, Goatlord (the Norwegian, of course) or Arcturus. As session and live musician, he joined different other combos too, both as (clean) vocalist or instrumentalist (like the bass; when it comes to the bass, he did sign for promotional activities to the famous B.C. Rich producing company, a trade of bass guitars used enormously intensive all over the world within Rock- and Metal-milieus).
For years he played with ideas in his head, stuff he couldn’t really ‘translate’ in the bands he was active with, so he decided to concretise all of it into a solo-project. However, he couldn’t do it all alone (or at least he wouldn’t do it), so he contacted a few friend and / or colleagues he worked with before to finalise his creations on master tape. Simen takes care of the lead vocals and bass parts, and the instrumental performances on his solo-debut Storm Seeker (duration: forty five minutes) have been done by Asgeir Mickelson on drums (think: Spiral Architect, Borknagar, Testament, Ihsahn, Sarke, Vintersorg and tens of others) and guitar player Terje ‘Cyrus’ Andersen (Susperia, Dimmu Borgir, Satyricon, Crownfall, Old Man’s Child and many others)!
In mean time, guitar player Jens F. Ryland (formerly also in Borknagar) and bassist Steinar ‘Azarak’ Gundersen (e.g. Sarke, Spiral Architect, Lunaris, Satyricon or King’s Quest) joined to complete the (live) line-up.
The recording sessions took place over quite a long period at the rather famous Toproom Studio (think: Solefald, Mayhem, Winds, Borknagar, Asmegin etc.) with engineer Børge Finstad, and the result was mixed by Børge, Asgeir and Simen himself, and finally mastered in Sweden by Peter in de Betou at the very well-known Tailor Maid Studio (with Norwegian acts like Susperia, Zyklon, Chrome Division, Enslaved or Khold on its historical roster).
Storm Seeker is, and I guess nobody will be completely surprised, strongly inspired by many of Simen’s former bands, at least instrumentally. When it comes to the vocals, ICS Vortex as musical project comes with clean vocals only – no grunts, no screams, no growls (except for just some additional ones). The vocal approach reminds me to, especially, the Power / Heavy / Speed Metal-scene from, well, from always, and even though I do not like this that very much, even I need to say it is all more than acceptable. Main reason: it does fit to the instrumental interpretation of Storm Seeker.
Instrumentally, ICS Vortex combines elements from several extremer genres, like, of course, Black (and Death) Metal, as well as from dark-edged Pagan / Folk / Viking-alike traditions. The album sounds pretty epic and heroic, Nordic (and more specifically: undeniable Norwegian) and majestic, with an energetic speed (yet not just necessarily ‘fast’ to the core) and a colossal sound.

85/100

Ivan Tibos.