Biography from Last.fm
The project was formed by Gregor Mackintosh (Paradise Lost) with the help of his colleagues from At the Gates and My Dying Bride. Their music combines elements of death and doom metal which resulted in the single ‘Desecration’, released by Imperium Productions in 2011 as a seven-inch vinyl limited to 500 copies. Their debut album is titled ‘A Fragile King’ and was released worldwide in 31 October 2011 by Century Media Records. Their second album, ‘Splinters’ was released in 2014. Read more on Last.fm
We promise (really promise!) that this will be the last lookback-at-2014 thing we post. Except maybe a podcast (and that’s a big maybe). Whatever. We’re launching yet another of our splendid genre columns today, this time with one of our long-time death metal aficionados, Rob McAuslan, taking a quick look back at the biggest things that happened (or in one case, learned about what’s coming) in the wonderfully fluffy world of death metal.
Vallenfyre
Splinters
Century Media
12 May 2014
by Pete Long
A psychologist could probably draw all sorts of conclusions from the fact that when Gregor Mackintosh, one of Britain’s most prominent doom mongers, looked for a way to channel his grief at his father’s passing, he chose raw and brutal death metal. Three years on from the somewhat sad inception of Vallenfyre, Mackintosh and his group of hyper-talented friends are back once again to explore both loss and grief, via Mackintosh’s own musical heritage from the 80s.
It’s just a few short weeks away now – Damnation Festival 2013 is (once again) going to be the heavy music event of the Winter here in the UK. We’re going to be heading up to Leeds University in force come 02 November, but until then, we’ve put together a Sunday Spotify Slaylist to hype us up for what’s (once again) one of the best one-dayer metal fest line-ups the UK has ever seen.
Damnation Festival have announced five more bands for their 2013 line-up: Vallenfyre, Crippled Black Phoenix, Negura Bunget, Moss, and The Sontaran experiment.
We reckon we’re pretty good at finding new bands. Over the past few years we’ve championed Turbowolf, Bastions, Wolves Like Us and loads more before the rest cottoned on. That’s why you probably want to know what new bands we liked the most in 2011.
Maybe some of them will go on to become your favourite band of 2012. Maybe you already love them and this just reinforces the fact that you’re awesome. (If so, come and join us.) Just give the bands a listen. They’re worth it.
Vallenfyre
A Fragile King
Century Media Records
31 October 2011
by Vincent Danger
This is the album from the latest metal supergroup. It’s the project of Paradise Lost’s Gregor Mackintosh but with My Dying Bride and At The Gates members also in tow it’s extra exciting. They’ve become one of metal’s most talked about bands. What everyone really wants to know, however, is whether A Fragile King is any good.
Last week, one of the many, many press releases that was emailed over to us here at Thrash Hits was an announcement from Century Media that they’d signed a death metal band called Vallenfyre. “So far, so what?”, right? We clicked on the link they gave us to the band’s website, cast a cursory glance at the band’s moody’n’shadowy promo pic, before nodding in appreciation at Vallenfyre’s dirty, crusty rumble. And then we moved on to the next of the 2463 unread emails currently filling up our inbox.
Then last night, Century Media – who’d clearly been bouncing up and down for the last week, biting down on their knuckles, silently humming “I know something you don’t know!” – blurted out the truth they’d been sitting on since their first announcement: “HEY GUYS, IT’S REALLY A SUPERGROUP MADE UP OF GUYS FROM PARADISE LOST, AT THE GATES, AND MY DYING BRIDE? HOW’D YOU LIKE THEM NOW, HUH?”