Best Of... Ultima Thule on 'Olifant Records'

ULTIMA THULE - "THE BEST OF..." ("Olifant Records"; CD):

Okay, decide for yourself if you really need a(nother) Best of record of ULTIMA THULE (beside the anniversary stuff and so on...), but here's a more or less new Best of CD of the swedish Vikings released by the label "Olifant Records" based across the border in Poland. And so this is the special Poland edition or polish edition of this Best of. I don't really know what's so exclusive 'polish' about it at all, maybe the three (as usual good) Bonus tracks "SVERIGE, SVERIGE FOSTERLAND", "DU GAMLA, DU FRIA", and "BROTT OCH STRAFF", but don't ask me anything more. I can't tell ya if the (just great) artwork is exclusively here to see, but how-ever. Now to this record here: We do get around 23 songs in nearly 80 minutes of playing time, and that's what you can call 'value for money', or at least I guess so. A lot of hits are here settled together, first and foremost the legendary two great tracks "SKINHEAD" (damn, I wouldn't have thought that the lyrics would so precise be describing me some day... and I tell ya this song really brings lovely memories to my mind) and "STOLT OCH STARK" (it also really brings a lot of good memories to my mind), beside that we do also get "RAGNAROK", "VARSANG", "BLONDA SEVNSKA VIKINGAR", "SVEA ARV SVEALAND", "WITCH HUNT", "EN FOR ALLA", and "BALDERS HIRD", just to name you my personal favorites. I think you can always question the song compilation of a Best of record of a band like ULTIMA THULE, but I do also think that who ever done this compilation here had done a pretty good job at all. So decide for yourself if you feel the need to get this Best of or not, but it could be a good completion of your ULTIMA THULE collection or a nice and well-profund starting point if you finally want to get something to know about ULTIMA THULE (but if that's the case it would mean that you missed them right to this very day, and damn it, how could you do this, how could it happen...). We get also a pure beauty of an 'the Vikings are comming' artwork (looks great, fantastic job!!!), linernotes, a big bunch of photos, and all songs are coming to you dressed in a very good production sound. Ah, what music do we get to hear here?!? Vikingrock!!! (Oh come on, it's ULTIMA THULE, what did ya expect?!?) Very melodic and majestic-hymnal guitar leads and melody lines, clever guitar solos, meldoic and clear vocals, a very well-present bass and tight and pushing drumming, all very melodic, yet powerful, folky, nordish, and pretty unique, so like I've said: Vikingrock!!! Good stuff, and truly of course really justified, even if maybe not that necessary at all... (8 of 10 points)

(http://www.myspace.com/officialultimathule)