CRUACHAN — Folk-Lore (review)

Album · 2002 · Folk Metal

5/5 · 2010-12-07
adg211288

Cruachan is an Irish folk metal band and Folk-Lore is their third album, released in 2002. While some of the band’s music touches on black metal, Folk-Lore is almost entirely a folk metal album, with only a hint of the band’s black metal influences in the final track, Exiles, where male vocalist Keith Fay uses a growled style of vocals, the only time he uses his growl on the album (in contrast it features much more heavily on other albums), at other times vocals are usually handled by female vocalist Karan Gilligan or by Fay using a cleaner style. Fay also has a more middle of the road style between his over two vocal types, more extreme than his clean vocals but not really a growl either. He uses this to best effect on Ride On. Shane MacGowan of The Pogues fame also provides guest vocals on the album on the tracks Spancil Hill and Ride On (he also produced the album). This means that Folk-Lore is a very varied album in terms of vocal delivery and on first listen you really won’t know what style is coming next.

The songs on Folk-Lore fall into two categories – Cruachan originals and metal covers of traditional Irish folk songs. There are more originals than covers. Ride On is also a cover but it is not traditional. Interestingly the two covers of traditional songs, The Rocky Road to Dublin and Spancil Hill, have no known lyricist. MacGowan provides lead vocals on the latter of these. If I’m honest if there is a weak moment on Folk-Lore it is Spancil Hill, although it works very well in the context of the whole album, on its own not so much. In contrast The Rocky Road to Dublin is just a very fun song in the way that folk music can only be.

However it is their original songs that make Folk-Lore a truly great album, starting with opener Bloody Sunday (which leads straight into instrumental The Victory Reel like some sort of epic double act) right through to closer Exiles. Each track is as solid as the last and they flow together really well. Each track is able to stand on its own figurative feet, originals and covers alike. This is folk metal done at its very best and unlike some folk metal bands I’ve encountered Cruachan has produced an album that sounds very authentic. Maybe it is because they are Irish and have used their country’s folk roots with their metal influences to create their music, and this approach to folk metal just sounds so much better to me than for example a band from a country that has their own language but sings in English anyway. While these bands can be good in their own right I can’t say that I’m aware of many that have that authentic folk feel like Cruachan do, and Folk-lore is probably the best Cruachan album to introduce people to their music. Highly recommended.

(Review originally written for Heavy Metal Haven)

more than 2 years ago
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adg211288 wrote:

more than 2 years ago

I've always found that most of their albums have a very unique feel so there aren't any completely like this one. The Middle Kingdom has the same kind of base sound without much black metal influence but I've never found it to have as many memorable songs. Pagan is brilliant but suffers a little on production values, but is probably the next best step for exploring their music. My personal second favourite though is Blood for the Blood God which has Keith Fay on lead vocals instead of Karen Gilligan, who left after The Morrigan's Call.