Roadburn Festival – 013 and Various Venues, Tilburg

Posted on April 21, 2015 by News Team

From April 9^th to the 12^th it was time for the festival of Stoner, Doom, and all things Alternative: Roadburn. This was the twentieth edition of the festival, and it was, as always, a spectacle. Music lovers from all over the world congregate in Tilburg and fill the streets with black shirts and beards. One of the streets is even re-dubbed “Weirdo Canyon” in honour of all the lovely and strange people who gather here in between shows to eat and drink. This year saw the return of the Weirdo Canyon Dispatch, a daily leaflet detailing the previous day’s highlights, shows recommended by members of the organisation, and other interesting titbits of information.

While it is of course impossible to convey the Roadburn experience in mere words, I will share some of the highlights from the main stages of this year’s festival to explain what makes this festival so special. The pictures are by Susanne Maathuis, who managed to shoot a mindboggling 62 acts this year.

Thursday

Solstafir, by Susanne A. Maathuis

The first day of Roadburn, and what a day it was! Opening on the main stage was Solstafír, who celebrated the thirty year anniversary of cult-classic Viking movie Hrafninn Flýgur (When The Raven Flies). Solstafír played the instrumental film score while the film itself was projected onto the screen. Unfortunately the balance in the music was just a little off, as the bass was too soft. This show did make me really curious to watch the entire film, which was hard to follow here since the subtitles were at the bottom of the projection, and thus hidden behind the lovely musicians themselves.

Diagonally opposite the 013 sits restaurant Dudok with the club above it, Het Patronaat. This venue holds about 500 people and really brings people together – much in the same way as sardines are very close to each other. This is just another part of the Roadburn experience, as is either leaving another show early to catch a show in this venue, or waiting outside in an orderly queue in the hope that enough people leave so that you can experience the show. One of the bands that filled Het Patronaat to the brim on this first day was SubRosa, an experimental Sludge-Doom band from Salt Lake City. With three female vocalists and two electric violins, this band has a really distinctive sound which is truly delightful to witness live. Their overwhelming stage presence combined with the quality of the music made this show one of my favourites of the festival.

Subrosa, by Susanne A. Maathuis

What I love most about Roadburn is the amazing diversity in musical styles. It doesn’t matter what your favourite style is, you’re bound to encounter it somewhere. This was highlighted by the show that followed SubRosa in Het Patronaat: Spidergawd. This Norwegian Heavy Rock extravaganza encouraged us all to dance to our hearts’ delight with their ‘Post Boogie’ style, characterised by a rumbling saxophone, hard rock vocals, booming basslines, and especially the drumming. Oh gawd, the drumming. Kenneth Kapstad owns his space at the front and centre of the stage, and he gives those drums such a beating that they need to be tightened every few songs or they’ll fall apart.

Another spectacular and genre-bending band to wow the audience in the main stage was Wovenhand, who were as close to a headliner as you can get with a line-up like this Monday. This magnificent dark folk band fronted by David Eugene Edwards sounds as if someone managed to convert the American Gothic painting to music. After their stunning performance in 2011, we didn’t think they could do any better – we have never been quite so happy to be proven wrong. Playing mostly from their latest and heavier albums, the band performed with more energy than ever before, but with the same humility that brings them even closer to our hearts. Edwards may say that they “are out of [their] league,” but we know that there are few bands that can rival the show that Wovenhand gave us.

Wovenhand, by Susanne A. Maathuis

Friday, April 10^th

Every year Roadburn has a curator, one person who gets the chance to handpick the Green Room and Stage01 bands for a day, as well as headlining the main stage. The choice of curator is important, because this person always gives a unique flavour to the festival by highlighting a genre. Last year Mikael Åkerfeldt bought the keywords of Swedish and Prog to life, as well as headlining with Opeth, but this year saw a veritable Viking invasion with its double curators: Ivar Bjørnson of Enslaved and Wardruna‘s Einar ‘Kvitrafn’ Selvik. Together they programmed Houses of the Holistic, an incredibly diverse program of bands in wildly varying genres, they all had one thing in common: this was pure and unadulterated music. From the eccentric but oh-so-amazing blues from Pekko Käppi to the onslaught of sound from Black Metal Svartidauði, the intensity and passion burst forth from every single musician and made this day an unforgettable experience for the audience. And these weren’t even the headliners!

For the first time since 2007, Roadburn sold one-day tickets alongside the 3 and 4-day passes and afterburner tickets. And the first day to sell out was Friday. The reason for this is quite clear: headlining the Main Stage were not just Wardruna and Enslaved, but also the amazing combination of the two that is Skuggsjá.

Wardruna, by Susanne A. Maathuis

Wardruna’s unique modern take on old instruments and chants is mind-blowing no matter how you hear it, but there are few bands that can rival the intensity of their live performance. Although Gaahl has decided no longer to perform live, the vocals were not lacking in any way. And how could they, when there are up to 9 musicians singing at once! With such a range of percussion, vocals, and traditional instruments on stage, this was an almost otherworldly experience, and the audience, in so far as I was capable of observing it at that point, was completely entranced.

What a contrast, then, was formed by the black metal attack of Enslaved. This is a whole different brand of Viking, but it is no less effective. Despite their heaviness, there was a certain serenity about the music when performed live that I had not anticipated, but that I very much appreciated. During this show I did have a good vantage over the crowd, and the Main Stage was packed with happy music lovers, all the way up to the furthest reaches of the balcony.

Enslaved, by Susanne A. Maathuis

Then it was finally time for Skuggsjá, the collaboration of Enslaved and Wardruna, and in this they seem to have found an amazing combination. The balance of which band’s style has the overhand shifts with each song, but the sound always comes together in a meaningful way. The chanting just works so well with the metal. Written by Selvik and Bjørnson for the 200^th anniversary of the Norwegian Constitution, this truly is the best reflection of the diversity of Norwegian musical heritage. It was an absolute honour to witness this performed live at the 20^th edition of Roadburn.

Fans partying at Roadburn 2015, by Susanne A. Maathuis

WORDS BY LORRAINE LYSEN

PHOTOGRAPHY BY SUSANNE A. MAATHUIS

Einar Kvitrafn Selvik (Wardruna) Appearing On History Channel’s Vikings

Posted on February 15, 2015 by newsteam

Einar Kvitrafn Selvik of Wardruna will appear in History Channel’s Vikings series. Vikings is inspired by the sagas of Viking Ragnar Lothbrok, one of the best-known mythological Norse heroes and notorious as the scourge of England and France. It portrays Ragnar as a former farmer who rises to fame by successful raids into England with the support of his family and fellow warriors: his brother Rollo, his son Bjorn, and his wives-the shieldmaiden Lagertha and the princess Aslaug. WARDRUNA’s music has appeared widely in the series previously, and will also be found extensively in the series’ forthcoming season. Kvitrafn will appear in the third season, which is scheduled to air on February 19th, 2015.

“I really enjoy being a part of the musical artillery of the series and I was truly honored when production asked me if I was interested in making a small musical appearance in front of the camera as well,” Kvitrafn elaborates. “The production, director and actors was all very welcoming and so it was all in all a great experience for me! Before the first season was premiered,” he continues, “I was contacted by the production team because they wanted to license some songs. They were very pleased with how the music worked out and what it contributed to the show so they got in touch again for season two where they in addition to using WARDRUNA music asked if I would be interested in working together with the series’ award-winning composer, Trevor Morris. So we tried it and we all liked how it worked and we have continued our collaboration onto the score of the third season that premieres next week. It is great fun to be part of this and I’ve learn a lot from it. Even though the series, for several reasons, cannot create everything one-hundred-percent authentic they do have a genuine desire to do as much as they can to create a more nuanced and correct view on the Vikings and they constantly hunt for authentic details to include. It’s no secret that I am a Nordic-history nerd of giant proportions – therefore it is very pleasing when they ask me for such details from time to time.”

Wardruna on Facebook
Wardruna on Merchnow

Reinventing The Viking Steel – Johan Söderberg of Amon Amarth

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Steve Tovey

Swedish melodic Death Metal warriors Amon Amarth are just finishing off one final jaunt round Europe before settling down to the hard task of stirring the blood of a follow up to their beast of an album, ‘Deceiver of the Gods’ (Metal Blade). Ahead of their recent show at a packed-to-the-pulpit Colchester Arts Centre (a converted church), riff-monger Johan Söderberg took time to fill in Ghost Cult on all that is happening in their world.

“It’s fun to play a church. I played one church before in the US, so this is the second time. It should have good acoustics. Churches were built for acoustics” grins softly spoken Amon Amarth guitarist Johan Söderberg. Later on Söderberg’s head will be whirling (in synchronized fashion with his band mates) and he’ll be cranking out heavy, catchy Viking metal to a fervent crowd. But backstage before the show, the unobtrusive man is a far quieter proposition than the riff god he’ll portray from the stage.

Amon Amarth are back doing what they do best – hitting it hard on the road, this time bringing their distinctive brand of Norse warfare to a whole host of smaller venues they’ve not visited before. “It’s been an old school traditional vibe, with the audience close to us. This is what we were aiming for, to have these intimate shows and also to get out in smaller markets we hadn’t played before.”

Normally when a band announces “An Evening with…” or “Back to basics” tour, it’s because their star is waning, and the “reconnecting with the audience” schtick is a way to mask a reduced demand. Yet Amon Amarth are still riding the crest of the ocean waves, and 2013’s Deceiver of the Gods their most critically and commercially successful album to date. But there seems to be a move from several bands, most notably Machine Head to bring their music to different, smaller venues, but to play more shows, actually pulling in bigger numbers across a tour than one marquee show would. “The down side is the perception, that maybe people think we’ve lost some crowd, or something, but that’s not why we’re doing this. This is just for something different because we’ve toured all the big markets already on this album, so this is for us. This is the last tour for the album, then it’s pretty much straight into writing because I never write on the road, I write at home.

“I started writing for the album before Christmas, when we had a break on this tour. I have some ideas that I’ll be working on when I get home. Then we have the rest of the year to come up with the songs. It’s always pressure in this band. Every album we make has always done better than the one before, so it’s always the pressure that you have to perform better, and do a better album next time.”

And there’s the crux, Amon Amarth have managed what so few can: continuous improvement and the art of tweaking and refining and step by step enhancing and perfecting a sound without straying from it. And Amon Amarth have managed to get bigger with each album, which is quite a rarity as these days a host of bands appear in a flash of glory before being dead and buried a couple of albums later, forced to reinvent themselves.

“It’s been a very slow on the rise!” Söderberg laughs. “With some bands they go straight up, and it’s easier to drop back down, if you have a slow progression, it’s easier to stay on the up.” Do you see it as a reward for a combination of improving professionally (technically and as a songwriter) and sticking to your guns (or, rather, hammers) in terms of what “Amon Amarth” is and does? “I think so, yes. We’ve always kept our style, and while we have changed, it’s not too much.

“Even when did the mini-CD the Under The Influence album, then we really tried to do something different and sound like a song in the style of other bands, but still some fans thought these we were regular Amon Amarth songs as well. Even when we tried hard to sound different, we still sound like Amon Amarth! When the five of us play together, it sounds this way. It doesn’t matter if we try to sound like something else, it sounds like us.”

To these ears, Deceiver of the Gods was peak Amon Amarth. They’d always had the catchy and the melodic, and their trademark Norse bounce, but on tracks like five-fister ‘As Loke Falls’ they opened the door and let out the Iron Maiden harmonies and licks that had bubbled beneath the surface, but never been allowed to flood into the sound.

“I like (to listen to) more traditional music when I’m at home, like Iron Maiden and other classic heavy metal. There’s so many bands these days, it’s impossible to keep up with every band, so I just stick to the old bands that I like.

“That (traditional metal) is what we always had as our influence, but these later albums, we now let that shine through compared to the previous albums. Of course, we still want to sound brutal -it’s also been the core of the band since the start, is that we have to keep that brutal sound (but) in the past we were (worried) ‘This sounds too much Iron Maiden, we can’t use that’ but on the last album, it changed and we were ‘Fuck it. Let’s use it’; if we like it lets go for it.”

Just as the Vikings hailed the Old Gods, so too their descendants, Amon Amarth, still worship the Gods of classic metal, and if that means they continue the path trodden so well from 1998’s Once Sent From The Golden Hall (Metal Blade) to the beast that is Deceiver of the Gods, with each step a stronger and bolder one than the last, then All Hail The New Gods!

Amon Amarth on Facebook

Words by STEVE TOVEY

Heavy Metal Movies – by Mike “Beardo” McPadden

Posted on August 6, 2014 by News Team

Heavy Metal Movies (Bazillion Points), written by Mike “Beardo” McPadden is a project the likes of which any metal geek-movie geek fusion would be proud to have accomplished in their lives; proof that they have indeed seen more movies than you, and can tell you how headbangingly awesome each is in their own way. Indeed, this titanic titanium tome does indeed show, rather than tell the sheer amount of neck-snapping cinematography observed by one man needed to even dare a book of this lethal thickness. From A to Z, it’s an outpouring of movie mayhem and magick from teenage stoner boners to Nordic loners; rockumentaries and mockumentaries; canon appearances by the metal gods on screen and on record; from swords to spaceships, and from monsters to Manson (Editor’s note: both Charles and Marilyn), this book packs it all in, dating from the silent era Nosferatu (1922) to the modern Hollywood bombast of The Hobbit (2012) and a whole hell of a lot of stuff in between that inspired distortion, patched denim, leather, and poor hygiene worldwide.

Continue reading →

Grand Magus – Triumph and Power

Posted on February 4, 2014 by News Team

MMXIII was a year with a dearth of proper Heavy Metal releases. Death and post-metal dominated, but a horns in the air, involuntary neck-moving, fist-pumping classic metal was nary to be found. The year turns and Grand Magus remind us all what we’ve been missing. Triumph And Power (Nuclear Blast) is as metal as they come.

It’s worth saying this may not be Grand Magus best album, that honour still belongs to Iron Will, but that is more testament to the high-quality outputs of a band that are criminally still the bridesmaid despite some excellent albums in their canon than any fault of this offering.

Pre-Turbo Judas Priest, Manowar (Ross The Boss-era) and Sabbath (all eras) are the predominant influences in an album and when your main sources of (Triumph and) Power are Vikings and classic metal it’s pretty difficult not to rule the waves, the land or the wind. ‘On Hooves Of Gold’ evokes the Valkyrie-epic of Manowar’s ‘Blood of My Enemies’, ‘Steel Versus Steel’ and ‘Fight’ stir the blood, simple galloping riffs over a driving drum beat and choruses that are crying to Asgaard to be belted out live after a few ales.

There is no let-up either, as the title-track a Battle Hymn of the highest order, swaggers in over a thunderous bass line ripped out by Fox, the guitars stab in before we’re swept into a rousing call-to-arms chorus that segues into a true metal solo via a Holy Diver middle eight. Exhausted yet? This is then followed by the Priest worshipping ‘Dominator’, a song that will bang the head that doesn’t bang. JB Christofferson owns this album, distinctive strong and gruffly velvet over the doomier ‘Holmgang’, dominant and rousing on the air-guitar inducing ‘The Naked And The Dead’, owner of a great chorus before things are brought to a fitting close by the epic ‘The Hammer Will Bite’, a summation of all that has gone before.

Triumph And Power is a statement of vibrant classic metal intent, hosting a series of anthems strong and pure that if Viking justice be done will propel its’ creators to lead the great battle in the sky.

8.5/10

Grand Magus on Facebook

Steve Tovey

Wardruna – From the Bogs of Aughiska: Live At Queen Elizabeth Hall, London UK

Posted on November 7, 2013 by News Team

The Norse gods are watching over London as ambient folk metal band Wardruna arrive to perform on UK soil for the first time. With the unfortunate departure of Steindór Andersen and Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson from the support slot on the bill, the challenge was left to From The Bogs Of Aughiska. Having described themselves as the musical equivalent of standing atop the majestic Cliffs Of Moher with a gale force wind in your face, it was certainly music with impact. The low droning rumble concealed vast soundscapes that struggled and blossomed into audibility before melting back down into the murk. Their choice to wear black face masks while performing diminished any chance of a connection with the performers, forcing the audience to fully engage with the music. This was not about personality but truly focused on sonically documenting the power of nature and Irish folklore. My only criticism would be the volume of the performance was too low to appreciate the full majesty of their sound.

Right from the first beat, the hairs on the back of my neck are on edge and shivers are running the course of my spine as Wardruna begin to play. For a short time the dark theatre, leather seats, and audience transform into vast forests, crystal lakes and imposing mountain edges. The soundscapes created by this band using old and traditional instrumentation alongside the sounds of nature are positively tribal, a reminder of old spirituality more in connection with the trees and the land. Starting off with songs of their first album, Gap Var Ginnunga they work from older to newer pieces building up from the calmer tracks to the more dramatically performed songs off Yggdrasil. Again, a choice by the band to perform in all black costumes allowed for the music to be the real focus of the piece, although splashes of drama were added through lighting for the more climatic moments. Wardruna is a truly unique experience live, leaving me emotionally exhausted through the sheer power of their performance. As the final noise fades, the voice of the gods recedes and we are left as we began, back in the darkened theatre and our leather seats.

Wardruna on Facebook

From The Bogs of Aughiska on Facebook

Wardruna and From the Bogs of Aughiska

Queens Elizabeth Hall

London UK

October 24^th, 2013

Words: Caitlin Smith

Photos: Susanne Maathius

Ghost Cult Magazine

Music News, Interviews and Reviews that matter.

Tag Archives: Vikings