Alestorm: Scottish pirate metal and the sound familiar from “Sunset on the Golden Age”

Alestorm’s approach to subjects treated with deadly seriousness in metal is illustrated by their arguments with their label over the names of the band’s mascots. Napalm Records representatives insist that the zombie-pirate/octopus hybrid is Captain Morgan and the rat is Scurvy Steve. The band maintain that they are Jimmy McFucknugget and Barry Shitpeas. They began in 2004, playing what they describe as intimate sets for farm animals in eastern Scotland. Fame came with “Heavy Metal Pirates”, a power-metal smash that secured them a record deal and led to their 2008 debut, “Captain Morgan’s Revenge”.

A year later came “Black Sails at Midnight”, just as wild as the debut but more subtly arranged. It was promoted by “Keelhauled”, for which the band made its first-ever video. Subsequent Alestorm albums were equally unpretentious. “Back Through Time”, released in 2011, included an excellent cover of Stan Rogers’s famous shanty “Barrett’s Privateers”. The 2014 release “Sunset on the Golden Age” climbed to number one on the UK Rock & Metal Albums Chart, ahead of Foo Fighters and Linkin Park among others. The band’s latest, hit-filled album, “No Grave But The Sea”, released in May 2017, proudly held the top spot on the Billboard Top Heatseekers Albums chart and also performed extremely well on the independent album charts.

The Scots avoid forced experimentation, playing classic power metal with folk-metal and heavy-metal elements and enjoying themselves immensely. Yet they are far from metal cabaret: they do not mock their genuinely devoted audience, giving everything live. They occasionally enter the charts without particularly trying. Piracy means more than humour: it also means complete musical independence.

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