When we posted our review of the latest Metsatöll album this week, we joked on Facebook that it was an apt time to do so, what with the pagan festival of Easter taking place this week. But it got us thinking – rather than wheel out some lame, been-done-to-death LOL-zombie-Jesus Christianity-is-bad Sunday Slaylist, why not go full pagan? And what could be more pagan than Paganfest 2014?
Okay, so last week we gave you some advice about how to spruce up your shabby home – but what if you live in an absolute pit of squalor? What if your wretched hovel is so far gone that even the artwork of Valient Himself won’t sort it out? Well, if a Finnish TV production company gets their way, you might be lucky enough to get a local rock star to come round, smash your place up, then help rebuild it in an altogether snazzier and sharper style.
Well, well, well – for once, the most interesting band announced in a festival line-up announcement isn’t the biggest or best-known name. Damnation Festival have announced that leading Brit-thrashers Evile, Finnish battle metallers Turisas, djentish-types Xerath, and the curiously titled A Man Called Catten will all be performing at this year’s Damnation Festival in Leeds.
Turisas
Stand Up And Fight
Century Media
28 February 2011
by Tom Dare
It’s been four years and a rather famous cover since the warpainted, fur-clad horde Turisas last released a record. Their version of Boney M’s ‘Rasputin‘ is perhaps what the band are most well-known for, and being famous for a cover is not exactly a ringing endorsement of their original output. With Stand Up And Fight, they attempt to put the mad Russian monk to bed.
It’s time for another Thrash Hits festival splash page – and this time it’s for Sonisphere! All of our Sonisphere Festival 2010 coverage from the weekend will be linked to on this here post, so make sure you bookmark it as it’s all you’re going to need need. That means individual band coverage (interviews, photos, setlists and maybe even some reviews), all the dodgy rumours and salacious gossip we overhear, and every lewd photo of fit girls frolicking about at Knebworth we can rustle up will be here.
They don’t play Rasputin. On the plus side, the do play Battle Metal, so despite some sonic issues you either enjoy them or you’re sober/miserable as sin.
We’d be lying if we didn’t acknowledge that metal loves to follow trends – and we’re not just talking about the scene kids and their ridiculous hairstyles, this “nu-metal revival” that certain sectors of the metal media seem convinced is on the horizon, or the hipster pile-on that Mastodon unintentionally encourage. Even the tr00est of the tr00 catch a ride on a bandwagon from time to time.
Finnish folk metallers Turisas tore up the Barfly in Camden, London just after their appearance at Bloodstock Open Air Festival with mighty British metallers Ravens Creed in support for a Kerrang! Awards Show.
Charley Staniforth was there to take some photos.
Turisas & Ravens Creed @ London Camden Barfly photo gallery
