Scandinavian metal band Leaves’ Eyes sing songs about Viking heroes and their epic voyages, deliver battle hymns in praise of ancient gods, and do so with such conviction and joy that despite it being pompously daft as a brush at times, one can easily become besotted by it all. They’ve been going 20 years. My own love affair with them came after Elina Siirala joined as lead vocalist. This is when they began veering away from their more obvious symphonic and power metal aspects and began adding real elements of classical and folk music while retaining their skewered take on gothic rock.
With new album Myths Of Fate, US soundtrack composer Jonah Weingarten is on-hand to deliver a full-on orchestral score. More in colloquial tradition, guest musicians Lea-Sophie Fischer plays fiddle and Thomas Roth a mediaeval Nyckelharpa. As constant as the wind is the siren-like Elina Siirala and main-man Alexander Krull on keyboards and what are termed “unclean vocals,”, alongside drummer Joris Nijenhuis, guitarists Luc Gebhardt and Micki Richter, and bass player Andre Nasso.
As its title suggests, Myths Of Fate offers songs about the gods and monsters of Northern legend, and so listeners might find interesting comparisons with last year’s Jethro Tull offering RökFlöte, previously reviewed at Midlands Rocks. As with that, there are detours from Snorri Sturluson’s historically preserved Eddas, but furthermore this time Leaves’ Eyes go beyond Scandinavian pantheon pageantry, and also sail into historical pathways a little more unfamiliar. Thus, as with their music, the thematic landscape continues to change for the band.
A fanfare is sounded, a choir act as proclamation, heralding the arrival of racing orchestration followed by great wades of distorted guitar, only for a female voice to begin sprinkling fairy dust in an operatic incantation – Picture the opening to Macbeth with the witches being played by Siouxsie Sioux, Toyah Wilcox and Kate Bush and you’re halfway there, and it suits the album’ cover where three hooded women are pictured. So far so spellbinding. A gruff male voice takes up the chant and from there the pair interchange amid raw guitars driving down for the main section where we’re suddenly thrown into an unworldly Stephen Poliakoff remake of John Boorman’s Excalbur with more CGI fire and damnation than your mind can take… But then, that’s how I think Leaves’ Eyes Alexander Krull tends to think when he’s putting most songs together. Dramatic comparisons aren’t too far afield either for ‘Forged By Fire’, this opening song, relates the Norse mythological tale of how dwarves created and then cursed the magic sword of Tyrfing.
‘Realm Of Dark Waves’ sees the band move into symphonic metal waters, the pace a little slower, with changes of arrangement both Wagner-like in orchestration and what we might deem a little Celtic as Siirala takes on the persona of Rán, the goddess of the sea – A sea-maiden often supplanted in folklore memory by the Vanir (a secondary race of gods worshipped), and as with all mermaids there is the siren-like beguiling (as heard in Siirala’s voice) along with the dread that this goddess is apt to cast her net and pull sailors to the ocean’s depths (as evidenced by the lyrics). Apparently, fans of the band will be able to note how this one corresponds to their previous deep-sea godly numbers.
An Emo styled piano plays out a bare, somewhat bleak, melody; tubular bells count time and guitars chug like dogs biting against a leash in the gothic ‘Who Wants To Live Forever’. This time round, Siirala takes a third person narration about the tale of Idun, bearer of the golden apples that kept gods eternally young. A number to attract midnight’s children, those post-Twilight fans. A real spellbinder of a number. Next eerie horns pre-empt ‘Hammer Of The Gods’, a number where Krull’s gruff death growl suitably leads proceedings in a battle hymn glorification of Mjolnir, the hammer in Thor’s possession that keeps frost giants at pray, for what’s a near-over-the-top melodramatic glorification performed as dirge rock.
Countering that profusely is ‘In Eternity’ a ballad as such, but at around one and half minutes in there’s this “Whoa-a-whoah” vocal dancing pop shanty that keeps feeding in over mild electronica and down-tuned guitars in a strangely erotic way, that possibly in a subliminal manner reflects some Freudian connections between sex, life and death, or just that I think too much. “It’s a tribute to our ancestors, a primal anthem to their lives and spirits,” were Siirala’s commented on the song, whilst also noting it’s one of the band’s most personal numbers, being dedicated to Krull’s late mother.
More earnest in its quest is the power rocking ‘Fear The Serpent’, as song about Jörmungandr, the Midgard serpent that would supplant Rán as the chief concern of those fearing being drowned at sea. Next, what’s presumably Fischer’s fiddle weaves a melody over a recounting arpeggio, a strummed acoustic then joining in this sweet laidback melody that evokes spring country meadow walks and the blossoming of life, but in fact is titled ‘Goddess Of The Night’, and so about Nótt, a figure of mystery and as such the song acts as respectful worship to her, rather than darker veiled horrors of characters like Hel.
It’s with ‘Sons Of Triglav’ that we start to detour thematically. Triglav was a chthonic three-headed god worshiped by Slavic tribes (You know, those people the Swedish Viking made into a nation called Russia, but for Christ’s sake don’t tell that to little boy Putin) and the song is a bracing declaration of a warrior tribe as sung primarily by Krull with Siirala interjecting here and there – The reality of Triglav being no more than a provincial deity remains probable but the thumping declaration of pride in this song cries out otherwise. Musically, it’s not unlike The Horslips in full Book Of Invasions mode with the guitars turned up to 11. Sung with conviction and pride, guitars solo melodiously in battle, serve their purpose and are gone.
You know how Vanilla Fudge slowed down The Supremes’ hit ‘You Keep Me Hanging On’? and in doing so influenced the likes of Purple, Heep and Spooky Tooth? Well, Leaves’ Eyes have taken slices of that to give us ‘Elder Spirit’ this musical tale that’s got pop and soul curiously mixed with stoner metal rock and is either about someone within Hel’s gates foretelling the future or another song in memory of Krull’s mother.
Death is also at the heart of the album’s closing tracks, but in an entirely different manner. ‘Einherjar’comes on like a Bavarian beer drinking song with an army of guitars rowing their right arms down hard, but with moments of genuine folk and melody too, and another too short a blistering guitar solo. The Einherjar being those who’ve died on battlefields, collected by the Valkyrie, ready to fight-as-one for old Wotan/Odin come a battle royal between good and evil at the end of the world. That’s echoed in ‘Sail With The Dead’, about Nagflar, a longboat made completely from the finger and toenails of the dead, to lead those warriors onto that final battle. It’s a song that rams hard while maintaining melody in a broadly power metal manner that owes some debt to Deep Purple Mark II, both in their 70s heyday and their initial return with the title track of their Perfect Stranger album.
Something tells me Leaves’ Eyes are docking here for but a while, and next time round they might just deliver us the tale of the end of the world that is Ragnarok in full. If the world doesn’t do that before they get to it”
There are also instrumental orchestra and choir versions of the tracks on this album available, and if you want the full experience I’d opt for those versions because they offer a different aural experience, and both proved worthwhile experiences for his listener.
- Myths of Fate is available now via AFM Records.
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- Reviewed by Paul H Birch.
Track List:
- Forged By Fire
- Realm Of Dark Waves
- Who Wants To Live Forever
- Hammer Of The Gods
- In Eternity
- Fear The Serpent
- Goddess Of The Night
- Sons Of Triglav
- Elder Spirit
- Einherjar
- Sail With The Dead
