Recently, Nordic dark folk collective, Heilung, premiered a new song to a star-studded audience at The Game Awards in downtown Los Angeles. This song, including the soundtrack, was written in collaboration with Ninja Theory for the video game Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II, due out next year. Watch the live performance video from the event below.
Since its inception in 2015, the enigmatic ritual collective Heilung has been paving melodic paths to the past with their unique and mystifying sound. Evading all conventional genre tags and the confines of any specific labels, the group aptly self-describes their sound as “amplified history,” emphasizing their ability to connect modern society with the rudiments of humanity’s beginnings through music.
While Heilung features authentic and archaic instrumentation that ranges from rattles and ritual bells to human bones and throat singing, their captivating brand of music is far from primitive. Producer and founding member Christopher Juul implements subtle electronic elements that elevates the musical atmosphere and provides a more in-depth and layered soundscape.
Check out our previous interview with Heilung!
More from Heilung:
By 2019, HEILUNG launched their second full-length record, Futha,which contrasted the masculine and battle-heavy themes of their debut with a feminine counterpart that celebrated fertility and female energy. Upon the first week of the record’s release, it graced the Billboard charts with coveted numbers, debuting at #3 on the Heatseekers Charts and #4 on the Billboard World Music Chart, placing on a total of seven Billboard charts while meeting critical-acclaim from the press on a global scale.
Having already made its way around Europe, Heilung announced its first ever North American tour for the start of 2020, which sold out entirely within 72 hours of ticket on-sale. The band later returned to the United States and performed their live ritual for a sold out audience of 10,000 people at the historic Red Rocks Amphitheater in Denver, CO (USA), further solidifying their early legacy status.
By this time, the band’s music started to appear in places outside the confines of music venues, videos, and vinyl. From hit television series like Game of Thrones and Vikings to video game giants like Conqueror’s Blade VII: Wolves of Ragnarök and Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II to the blockbuster Robert Eggers film The Northman, Heilung’s music has risen far above the underground and has transcended into a greater world. Even a global pandemic couldn’t slow down Heilung’s success; it only strengthened them and gave them the gift of time to complete work on album number three, Drif.
Make no mistake, Heilung still does not represent any modern political or religious ideology, but rather delivers a humbling reminder of where we came from. “Remember, we are all brothers. All people, beasts, tree and stone and wind, we all descend from the one great being that was always there, before people lived and named it, before the first seed sprouted.”
Lineup:
Kai Uwe Faust
Christopher Juul
Maria Franz
Follow Heilung:
www.facebook.com/amplifiedhistory
https://heilung-usa.travelling-merchant.com/