Who needs fictional television shows or movies about Vikings when the real-life tales and the characters that inhabit the annals of actual history are just as exciting, fascinating and sometimes blood curdling?
For European operatic metal masters Leaves’ Eyes, bringing the stories of Nordic and Germanic legends of yore to life are part of their modus operandi as a band, often combining the best of the myth sagas of the bards with documented history to compelling effect. For their latest album, and eighth overall, The Last Viking, the entirety of the album is focused on the heroic life and tragic ending of former Norwegian monarch King Harald III Hardrada, an iconic figure in Scandinavian history who lived a life worthy of tales told around longhouse hearths about the Asgardian gods.
The album is called The Last Viking because he was, in effect, the last of the travelling bands of Norse warriors to attempt to conquer foreign lands. His defeat at the highly significant Battle of Stamford Bridge not far from the English east coast in 1066 signaled the final hurrah of the Viking way of life, as their vaunted longboats would maraud the coastlines of the British Isles and northern Europe no more.
It was also a significant battle in English history as Harald Hardrada was one of three powerful warrior leaders claiming the English throne. The victor of Stamford Bridge, Harold Godwinson, was forced to quick march his army hundreds of miles south to take on the powerful William, Duke of Normandy (part of modern-day France). Near Hastings, Godwinson’s depleted forces were outmatched, and the so-called Norman Conquest now took place – a sea change in the fortunes of the British Isles as the Normans soon dominated the politics, culture and religious institutions of their new island lands, supplanting the Saxons.
Harald spent part of his early fighting days in Kievan Rus, part of what is now Russia, Poland and Ukraine, before moving on to become part of the elite Varangian Guard in service to the Byzantine Empire.
Hardrada died as he lived, in a search for the immortality that came with the glories and accolades of being a warrior prince, and the fact that he is still remembered in the annals of both British and Scandinavian history and in song by modern metal bards such as Leaves’ Eyes is proof that he succeeded, even if his final efforts were a lost cause.
“He truly was the last Viking. When he died, the Viking era was basically finished, and that’s already pretty significant on its own. And his life was pretty crazy. He went to so many places and had so many adventures and did so many amazing things; there were a lot of twists and turns in his real life, so he is a pretty cool character to write about,” said Elina Siirala, the Helsinki-born lead vocalist for Leaves’ Eyes, who joined the band in early 2016, replacing band co-founder Liv Kristine.
“And we were lucky that when all the lockdowns happened, we were already in the studio, so we were kind of locked down in the studio. That meant we were able to finish the album in March and April. Then we had to wait a little bit for the videos to see how we were going to work those, but lucky for us we are in a part of Germany [where she and the rest of the band live and where the album was recorded] that we can travel, although it’s changing all the time, but right at the moment it’s okay to be able to get together in small groups. It was good for me because I had a month or so to really work on my vocals and record everything and it was less stress because we didn’t have to keep going back and forth from home to the studio.”
Besides Siirala, Leaves’ Eyes is comprised of founding members and primary songwriters Alexander Krull [keyboards/backing vocals] and guitarist/bassist Thorsten Bauer, along with drummer Joris Nijenhuis and new guitarist Micki Richter.
“Alex is the Viking expert in the band, it’s not anyone else in the band, so it’s mainly his thing. He does a lot of reading and research because he is always interested in that stuff already in his daily life, so it’s not like it’s something new to him. And once he starts writing about it all, we have a chat and he explains the ideas and the history and the sagas behind the songs, and that’s the way I kind of get to know them. Sometimes he has the idea of how it’s going to be early on the process, but sometimes I have to wait until he is almost finished before you know what I wants to say, or what it’s about because he is always working on them, right up until the last moment, ” Siirala explained.
“Both Alex and Thorsten are responsible for the music and I think they both started pretty soon after we finished Sign of the Dragonhead which was our last album in 2018. Last year was the time when we got closer to getting everything finalized, the texts and everything and we went into the studio right at the start of this year. I know Alex believes it is important to tell these stories, although with the music you can’t always tell all the information. Even in the sagas there is always a little bit of exaggeration, but so many of the events that really happened and occurred are already pretty cool and you don’t have to add anything to it. For Alex and the band it’s more about how do you bring that into a song; it’s about how you can tell a huge story with few words, which is sometimes pretty tricky for him, but I think he did a really good job on this album. And then the music needs to fit with all of that as well, so it all kind of complements each other, and that’s really the theme of the band and how we operate.
“I think what people like about our music, and what I like about it, is that it does remind me a little bit of opera. I have a classical vocal degree and I think this music has the same power of opera, but in a different way. The power is in the music and also stage-wise too where it is very dramatic in the way we present it. It’s the power of the music that speaks to me, and maybe it’s the same for other people, it gives them a chance to escape from their normal lives.”
As she mentioned above, Siirala is classically trained, earning her bachelor’s degree from the University of Helsinki, before moving to London to study more contemporary forms of singing. While there, she began he foray into hard rock and metal music, and by 2011 was fronting her own bands.
“Through some friends I got into the metal scene in London and they introduced me to the whole underground scene there. I formed my own band, Angel Nation, which is still going because I wanted to write. I always wanted to write my own music, because I didn’t think my voice really suited metal so well, so I thought I should write music that did work for my voice, and that’s kind of how my career started,” she said.
“For my band and for Leaves’ Eyes, it was never about trying to copy another band, or specifically any other female fronted band. For me, it was always about trying to write original music that I would want to sing and be comfortable singing. You instrument is what it is, so you have to work to your strengths and not against them whether your voice is a guitar or your singing voice. I am writing a lot; I have almost a whole album written for Angel Nation and I also had some ideas for Leaves’ Eyes, but it’s always a case of what gets picked and what fits for the album and stuff like that. I tend to write a little bit different style than Leaves’ Eyes, but I still have input into the songs because I am the person singing them, and I like singing those songs too.”
Siirala said since joining Leaves’ Eyes, she has felt welcome both by her bandmates and by the band’s fans, as the band’s history goes back to 2003.
“We’ve recorded a lot of stuff together and done a lot of touring so I was really thrown into the mix right away and I felt accepted in the band and I never really had any problems with fans right from the first moment I joined the band. But it’s normal, I think, that people may have different opinions, and it’s a subjective thing. Sometimes people just like one voice over another and that’s okay,” she said.
“I am a different singer and a different type of performer, a different person with a different personality, so of course it’s going to be different for fans. But it’s been very easy for us all to work together in the studio and I have been all over the world with these guys and it’s gone very well. We have gelled so well on stage and the fans seem to love the show each night. And we have been to Canada and it’s always a super good audience in Canada, so we hope someday to get back there.
“Right now, we wouldn’t have been touring because it’s the promotion period for the new album, it’s more afterwards that we will have to see how it’s going to affect us and how much. Obviously, we won’t be able to tour much for the rest of the year. We were supposed to go to Mexico in June and then we had the big release show set for the Summer Breeze Festival in August and stuff like that, all of which was cancelled of course.”
For more information on The Last Viking, Leaves’ Eyes and any possible post-pandemic shows, visit www.leaveseyes.com.
- Jim Barber is a veteran award-winning journalist and author based in Napanee, ON, who has been writing about music and musicians for nearly 30 years. Besides his journalistic endeavours, he now works as a communications and marketing specialist. Contact him at jimbarberwritingservices@gmail.com.
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