It may just be my personal bias, but the "shamanic" vocalizations that come in at 5:57 into the first track are, well, grating to my ears. At first I thought, ok, a little sonic texture, sure ... but they go just on and on! I skipped ahead (could NOT listen!) and found out they end at 10:10. The part after the vocals is especially nice; too bad people turned off by the vocals will miss it.
Eventually I'm going to create a spliced version of that track for my own personal listening which removes the vocal section, because the rest of that track is fascinating.
The entire rest of the album is fascinating, as well. I'm so happy I found this.
When the guitar shredding of the last track came on, I had to look at my player and make sure it was the same album, because it had such a different character, but when the violin came in it tied it thematically to the rest of this album.
Good stuff!