I do love bands who tell you exactly who and what they are without any pithering about, and well, if Heathen Foray aren’t the one of the best examples I’ve come across in years. The first track of Oathbreaker, which is also the title track, tells you everything you need to know about this band and album in the first ten seconds, and it’s absolutely glorious. My next thought after “right, ok, I know what you lot are about” was “man, I bet this is fun live”, but I should probably hold off looking up gig listings until I’ve written this, right?
So, here goes. Heathen Foray are an Austrian Neopagan band who play melodic death metal, and claim to be known for “catchy melodies [and] skull splitting riffs”. They’ve toured with a good few of the usual folk metal suspects, such as Korpiklaani, Ensiferum, Eluveitie, and so on, and they’re keen that you know they’ve toured Europe four times. Doesn’t say what they were doing on those tours, but based on early impressions of Oathbreaker, it presumably involved a lot of riffs, fun, and possibly even intoxicating substances, who knows? According to the album notes, the suitably exuberant track five (Allvoll) is a “love letter to beer” (complete with toasts in half a dozen or so different languages, including – hilariously – “chin chin”), so one can only assume they got on superlatively well with Korpiklaani on their travels across Europe.
Speaking of which, I have to wonder if their bunkmates have rubbed off on them over the years and tours, because despite being allegedly melodic death metal, there’s an awful lot in this album that could surprisingly easily be classed as folk metal (not least the loving ode to beer, let’s be honest), musically as well as lyrically. Heimdall’s Spross in particular has some gorgeous riffing that a great many actual folk metal bands would be proud of. There’s traces of other influences in here as well – Raiments is basically full on cheesy power metal in places, and Covenant of Swords kicks off with what I can only describe as Children of Bodomesque power metal meets chiptune, only for the classic Cookie Monster vocals to kick in over the top. It even goes a bit Final Fantasy in places. It’s ridiculous, entirely over the top in a way that only metal can be, and it’s frankly amazing. I can only imagine what a creative mind could get a crowd doing while playing some of this – the possibilities here could put Evil Scarecrow to shame.
It’s not all fun and games and the potential for air guitar pits though, because there is a theme and a message to Oathbreaker, namely environmental concerns, anticapitalism, and a general theme of “we’ve doomed the planet and ourselves”. The Neopagan label earlier on isn’t just there to refer to the music either, as Heathen Foray seem to be taking it one step further than just singing about it and making a conscious effort to live as sustainably as possible. Which is pretty impressive as album theming goes, although I have to say that given how much of the lyrics are in German, it’s entirely possible that this aspect of Oathbreaker will pass non-German speakers by. Raiment is in English, and the theme does come through there, although without the wider context of the over-arching theme, it’s still not all that clear – metal lyrics have a tendency to be outlandishly grim anyway, so the bleakness of Raiment isn’t obviously part of bigger theme unless you’re looking pretty closely. If I didn’t have the lyrics and a comprehensive breakdown of each song’s message, lyrical content and intent in the press pack, I’m not confident I’d have picked up on very much of the above, especially given how rusty mein bißchen deutsch is these days.
That’s not to say that the environmental message and content here isn’t important (it is), but let’s be honest, the main appeal of this album isn’t in the eco credentials of the band and their music, the appeal is that this is fast, tight, catchy, sublimely ridiculous, and it’s impossible to listen to the bulk of this album without grinning like an idiot and moving your head. I suspect the environmental aspect here is far more prominent if you’re fluent enough to follow the lyrics, but even if you’re not, it’s still an enormously fun slice of boisterous folky death metal, that’s catchy, well put together, and despite the inherent absurdity, still has a salient point buried underneath the riffs, hooks and gratuitous guitar work.
(I’m off to look at gig listings.)
(9/10 Ellie)
Leave a Reply