Interview

A Drink And A Chat With The Members of Alestorm Before Their Show in Scotland's Capital

I had the rare opportunity to chat with each of the current members of Alestorm at Studio 24 in Edinburgh, Scotland, recently, before a small show they played for the locals. Vocalist / keyboardist Christopher Bowes and guitarist Dani Evans were most eager to spin yarns of their voyages, but Ian Wilson and a gentleman that I believe was their drum technician also contributed to the highly amusing and irreverent discussion that follows.

Drum Tech: Marriage is for legalized prostitution.

Dani: Welcome to Alestorm!

Ahapaxlegomenon: *laughs* What do you think of Scottish metal? I ask that in particular because there’s just not that much…

Chris: Shite It’s all shite.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Fair.

Alestorm: *laughs*

Dani: Of I know, there’s only a couple of bands I actually listen to, like Sons of Slaughter.

Chris: Shite!

Drum tech: There’s very little Scottish metal.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I was very surprised coming here from the States and finding virtually no scene here.

Chris: Well, take a place like Ireland where it’s very similar culturally, and there’s literally thousands of bands doing this whole, “pot of gold, to be sure, to be sure, fiddles and metal”... but it doesn’t really happen up here.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I wanted to talk a bit about national pride because you include “Flower Of Scotland” on your album.

Chris: Aye.

Ahapaxlegomenon: So what are the political reasons for that?

Chris: Political reasons?

Dani: We were drunk and we thought it would be a good time-filler.

Chris: Pretty much. There’s nothing political about it; we just thought it was a good song to do on the album. It gets the Scottish thing into the whole Scottish pirate metal... thing.

[Interviewer’s cell phone starts ringing.]

Band: *groans*

Ahapaxlegomenon: Sorry! So...the folk influences in the band are overt, you have an upbeat Turisas theme and Korpiklaani style. But what’s the influence of power metal on Alestorm? Many people talk of you as power metal act; I don’t see it, myself.

Chris: Some folk will say we’re a folk metal band, some say we’re a power metal band, depending on what we’re doing. Sometimes we’ve got that whole fist-pumping, galloping shit with guitar solos up the ying-yang but other times it’s like polka...

Ahapaxlegomenon: I think it’s your voice that adds that element, because you have this raspy, guy-out-to-sea sound...

Chris: *rasps* Aye! Well, there are a few bands that do the rough vocals, like Gravedigger, who we toured with. That’s a lot of inspiration for what I belch out because their singer, he gets away with it, so why can’t we?

Ahapaxlegomenon: Themed metal is nothing new, especially with folk / Viking acts coming out of Scandinavia. But pirate metal isn’t common, in fact, the only other thing in my music library would be Swashbuckle.

Chris: Wow! It’s not Running Wild!

Dani: We know Swashbuckle.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I wanted to know where the inspiration for that stemmed from.

Dani: Much of it comes from this. *holds up a Red Stripe lager*

Chris: Mostly computer games, movies... There’s no historical kind of angle, like in my former life, I was a pirate, I am descended from blah blah blah...

Ahapaxlegomenon: That’s interesting, because I was wondering if there was a relationship between pirates and Scottish heritage...

Dani: None!

Chris: Captain Kidd, he was Scottish. That’s the only Scottish pirate as far as I know. In fact, I had to look it up because I didn’t know he existed, I was told about him in an interview. I pretended to know it already, of course.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Of course.

Chris: But I looked it up online. There’s your history of Scottish pirates.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Um. Not historians, you guys.

Chris: Silly fairy tales.

Drum Tech: A lot of people think Captain Morgan’s Revenge is all about that bottle of rum. It’s not.

Chris: People will ask if it’s about the historical Captain Morgan, and no, he’s just got a good name.

Ahapaxlegomenon: In listening to the song, you can tell it’s not.

Drum Tech: Yes, but Scottish people are very dull.

Chris: His name rolls off the tongue, it’s very piratical.

Ahapaxlegomenon: As you’re singing about pirates though, you have a great deal of history to draw upon.

Chris: Aye, and when we’ve run out of stupid shit to sing about, maybe we’ll do a concept album of some guy.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Some people think you sound a lot like Flogging Molly and such acts, how do you feel about this resemblance?

Dani: Yeah, in the feel of the music, not so much the actual content. Very similar act but very different content.

Chris: We’ve got a kind of punky atmosphere, I guess.

Ahapaxlegomenon: You’re not nearly as angry as Flogging Molly, that’s for sure.

Chris: *Irish accent* They have songs about potatoes.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Your following developed really rapidly after your first release, so how did your EPs net a signing with Napalm Records?

Chris: Well, we recorded those in 2006, got bored of it and thought to do something else, but a year later we thought, “Let’s get this shit signed,” so we sent Napalm Records a link to our Myspace and they said, “Oh! Yes, we will sign you.”

Ahapaxlegomenon: Really??

Chris: Just as simple as that. “Here’s our band, do you like us?” Reply: “Yes, we want to sign you.” Aye, it’s not very hard.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Did they just think you fit in with the rest of their catalog or something?

Chris: Well, at the time, Korpiklaani was leaving the label so they were looking for...

Dani: ...some filler...

Chris: ...some shitty throwaway folk band to fill the gap. I’m not sure how true this is, but that’s the rumor I got told.

Dani: And we’ve kind of proved them wrong.

Ahapaxlegomenon: On the more technical side, what did you change in the production process between the EPs and the full-length?

Chris: We did it in a professional studio, as opposed to our guitarist’s bedroom. We used a drummer and a bassist as well, because on our demo it is a drum machine and computer-programmed bass.

Ahapaxlegomenon: And you changed your name from Battleheart after the signing. I heard some stories about Battlelore?

Dani: There are several stories...

Chris: But generally the record label didn’t like the name “Battleheart”. They didn’t think it was marketable. But in the end, I’m glad we changed it because Battleheart is seriously gay.

Dani: But some of the names they suggested were really bad.

Chris: They basically looked at a map of Scotland and all these Gaelic places in the Highlands and pointed and said, “Call yourselves that. Call yourselves that.” *makes up some Tolkien-esque names*

Dani: They came out with the best one though.

Chris: Yeah, they found this ship called “Wyda”, which already sounds bad if you can’t pronounce it. Then it came out that it was a slave ship. They wanted us to name ourselves after a slave ship.

Dani: So they were swiftly told to fuck off.

Dani: I was getting desperate. So I thought, “what’s good?” Beer. And... weather.

Group: *laughs*

Ahapaxlegomenon: And thus….So, calling you out a bit on the album artwork, you have this squid-faced pirate. Is this based on Pirates of the Caribbean?

Dani: We were sent the artwork and told this was going to be it.

Ahapaxlegomenon: No way!

Chris: We did not even get to see that until it came out.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Most bands have an artist friend who does that work for them.

Dani: For the first album, we got sent the concept for the backdrop, originally.

Chris: He sent us a first draft, and ugh, shocking! He asked us to make changes and then he ignored it. It wound up being exactly the same as the first draft. We wound up having zero say in the artistic side of it.

Dani: But then, for our upcoming EP, we all agree that it’s a phenomenal cover for it.

Ahapaxlegomenon: On your Myspace, it lists some of your influences as Primordial and Summoning, which are incredible bands, but being dark, pagan and ambient, you don’t sound anything like them.

Chris: That’s just the music I listen to. I don’t listen to gay power metal. I guess it influenced me on some level, I don’t know how. I love the atmosphere.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Chris, you’re a founding member and have been around since day one...

Chris: Actually I think it’s about day two. Some guys had a conversation in the pub and asked me to play keyboards. Then they all left. The band wasn’t my idea, I was drafted for keyboards and then started masterminding everything, writing songs...

Ahapaxlegomenon: The keytar puts you in the ranks of Sonata Arctica and the like. Why keytar? Increased theatricality?

Chris: It’s awesome! Standing behind a keyboard on a rack is dull. I hate standing on stage. I can’t cope even with staying behind a microphone. I couldn’t live without it.

Dani: You don’t often see a keyboardist who is also a lead singer, as well.

Chris: I’ve been accused by some of the sound guys that it has a real cheap and disgusting sound. But that’s what works! People love the fake brass sound and horrible accordion noises.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Would you ever go the Turisas route and add more instruments?

Dani: Turisas use a fuck-ton of backtrack and that takes away from the entire feel of everything. Playing live should be the band onstage playing live, not the band on a CD. We were just on tour with Hollenthon, and I can understand why bands like that use it because it’s a really heavy sound backed up by orchestras.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I heard that your first show was a few days after several of you met.

Dani: I heard Battleheart from the Dragonforce forums and e-mailed Gavin to say I’d be interested in playing bass. The four of us original members met six days before our first gig to practice. And so that was a good laugh.

Chris: It’s still that way, we never rehearse, we’ve gone on tours with zero rehearsals. We’ve had maybe five rehearsals ever.

Dani: Two before the Dundee shows, two before Turisas, one before we went to Graspop, one in Germany. So, six ever. Seriously, we played a small festival and played “Wolves of the Sea” to rehearse it. We know we should practice more but we don’t. It works. We’re all very spread out.

Chris: Rehearsals are very expensive and rare.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Ian, I’m glad to see you’re back on drums. Could you tell us a bit about your difficulties touring this summer?

Ian: Well, I had work commitments over the summer and don’t know what actually happened...

Dani: Pussied out.

Ian: It was a case of quitting my job to get time to tour all summer, which in retrospect I should have done but I didn’t have any money. But I left and I was on MSN and Gavin asked me back to the band. I thought about it and I missed boozing and the guys… it’s all a big gay-fest.

Dani: He quit his job to come back. We get to do things that not many people do.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Tim, you’re the newest acquisition on guitars, since September 2008. How is that working out for you?

Tim: I was looking for work, Gavin quit and I saw an opportunity to... leave the house, have some money, see the world. It was a real dramatic step but I don’t regret it. I had been in a tongue-in-cheek death metal band, but that was it. No experience with the business and touring side.

Chris: Money? Wrong band for that.

Ahapaxlegomenon: As a young band, what are you doing to accommodate newer members?

Dani: Well as a fairly young band, it is very difficult to find members who are willing to commit to it 100%. Everyone is going to Uni or trying to find work and they’ve not got a steady thing.

Chris: Still, a lot of changes but ¾ original members is not bad. There’s a list as long as my arm of people who were in the band before we did anything.

Ahapaxlegomenon: How was your reception at Bloodstock and Wacken Open Air?

Dani: Fucking insane! We absolutely loved that.

Chris: I think Bloodstock was the best gig.

Dani: I disagree, I would say Graspop still.

Ahapaxlegomenon: That’s right, you were at Graspop.

Dani: I’d say Bloodstock was definitely one of the most insane crowds we’ve had.

Chris: Biggest!

Ahapaxlegomenon: I’d imagine that the crowd there was much more familiar with your music.

Dani: I’d say that quite a few of them were, but there were still a couple thousand who were saying, “Ooo, there’s a Scottish band here,” and the reception we got there, from the second we ‘Bel-Aired’ them, the crowd were just into it and had a great time. We came off the stage and stood there for a half hour, just buzzing.

Chris: Wacken sucked ass. Napalm Records, They wanted to release that show as a DVD and the footage of it makes you want to cry. There are bits of Gavin looking at the drummer like “dude, you’re doing the wrong thing” and it’s going to come across as a laugh, but...

Dani: We were so bad at that show.

Chris: The crowd loved it! The sound was so bad at that show you couldn’t hear a thing; we saw a bunch of guys at that show jumping at the stage, covered in sweat.

Ahapaxlegomenon: You’re slated for pretty extensive touring in 2009...

Dani: You have no idea.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I was wondering where the best shows have been to date...

Group: Holland.

Dani: Because of the crowd participation. The last day of the tour was in Holland and it was packed to the rafters and we sold out on merch. We were so overwhelmed by that day. They’re definitely the best so far.

Ahapaxlegomenon: And what are you most anticipating for 2009?

Chris: Salt Lake City. I want to shout at Mormons!

Dani: The opening day on the tour is a big festival in Atlanta so I’m looking forward to seeing who’s there.

Ahapaxlegomenon: Who are you playing with?

Dani: We’re the main support for Tyr and Suidakra and Kivimetsan Druidi. We’re touring extensively with them at the moment.

Ahapaxlegomenon: I thought Leviathan was quite a bit heavier, new direction?

Chris: Not entirely, we just recorded it very recently. I hate to say it, but it’s more of the same, in a good way. I sometimes run out of things to say about pirates. I ask people, “What can I say about pirates?”

Ahapaxlegomenon: *laughs* Why an EP instead of a full-length, is that on the horizon?

Chris: Yes the full-length is for April / May.

Dani: Leviathan is just a precursor to remind everyone we still exist!

As if it would be hard to forget. Thanks for your time and sincerity, Alestorm!