Interview

Theigns & Thralls Founder Discusses Debut Album

Folk metal has come a long way since it was first recognised as a genre in the 1990s. While bands like Led Zeppelin were experimenting with folk music, it was the likes of Skyclad and Cruachan who established it as a true sub-genre and over the past ten years or so, its popularity has sky rocketed. As mentioned, Skyclad were arguably the first folk metal band and so it's unsurprising that one of the year's most excited albums in the genre would come from a member of its lineup, as frontman Kevin Ridley introduces the world to Theigns And Thralls.

It was only two weeks ago today that the band released their debut album, an eponymous trek which finds so many instances and events from history that the modern world has barely learned from, if at all. Joining Ridley on this journey are current and ex members of Irish legends Waylander and Cruachan, while an enormous amount of guest musicians from the likes of Korpiklaani, Ensiferum and Celtibeerian were also involved. To find out more about the record, Metal Underground spoke with Kevin Ridley himself, in an interview which you can watch in full below.

Diamond Oz: Obviously people know you from your work with Skyclad. What would you say it is about Theigns And Thralls that gives you more freedom of expression, if at all?

Kevin Ridley: Well, that's one of the things. Most of the songs that I write with Skyclad are co-written of course but obviously on the Theigns And Thralls album, I've written them all. Having said that, some of the songs are adaptations of poems and things like that from the past, which again is one of the things that Theigns And Thralls allows me to do because I have this penchant for history and historical fiction, so I can combine those things to create these new songs, so I'm not trying to fit in with what Skyclad's doing, I've got a free hand to do what I want. I've got to say, one of the things to remember is that when I started Theigns And Thralls, I didn't have a plan or anything, it was the kind of thing that just evolved because of the pandemic.

As you're well aware, we were will sitting with time on our hands in a lockdown situation and I had a few songs, because I'd done a solo album before and I wanted to do another one, because as a musician, you never really stop writing. Some things are suitable for Skyclad and some songs aren't so you end up with some stuff. It was a gradual thing where I said, "I've got this time on my hands, I've got a few songs, what can we do with this?" and kind of built it up from there. Once I got into it, it evolved quite quickly and I kind of found a little niche or a certain area that I thought was productive, so I followed it and got in touch with some friends who I felt could add things to it and then it built up to friends of friends and grew into this project, so I started taking it a bit more seriously once I realised it could turn into an album. We couldn't do anything with Skyclad anyway because I live in another country.

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Interview

Satan Guitarist On New Album, Skyclad & NWOBHM

Only yesterday, during the introduction to our interview with Tygers Of Pan Tang, we mentioned how important the North East of England was to the British metal scene of the 1980s. There's no need to go through another list, but the eagle eyed among you may have noticed that there was one very important band left out of the introduction when it comes to metal in Tyne and Wear and that would be Satan.

Having formed in 1979, Satan would go on to release one of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal's greatest albums, "Court In The Act" four years later, before laying the name to rest soon after and changing their moniker to Blind Fury. After another album as Satan, "Suspended Sentence," they would once again rechristen themselves, this time to Pariah, before going their separate ways. As always, Satan returned to Earth, first as a one off in 2004 and then again in 2011 and since then, the band with the devilish tag has been on something of a roll, releasing a further three albums.

Tomorrow, the fourth album since their return, "Earth Infernal," will be unleashed via Metal Blade Records and it seems to be the darkest and most gritty offering from the Geordie legends yet. To find out more about what went into this record, we caught up with guitarist Steve Ramsey, who divulged all the info about the themes, art, touring plans and more, as well as what's happening with Skyclad, the folk metal pioneers which he also co-founded. You can read the interview below or listen to it in full at the bottom of the screen.

Diamond Oz: The new album, "Earth Infernal" is out on April 1st. What can you tell me about the title of this record?

Steve Ramsey: The title is about the planet burning, basically. There's no title track but a couple of songs refer to the title. We've observed over the past couple of years, especially in this country, that people were becoming so obsessed with the pandemic and the politics, that they forgot that the planet is on fire, we just thought we'd remind them.

Oz: Yeah, it's not something to ignore. It's cool though, it's like an umbrella term when it comes to the actual songs on this album. Like you said, there's a few tracks that relate to the title.

Steve: Yeah, there's a couple of tracks that relate to it. "Earth We Bequeath" is kind of like a time capsule message for future generations, sort of apologising for what we've done. There's another one, "Twelve Infernal Lords," which is kind of like a horror story but the idea is like this supreme court made up of twelve demon judges, including the guy on our artwork. They're hellbent on destroying the environment by using laws, bending laws, to plant seeds of mistrust and chaos and fucking the planet up.

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