(This content originally appeared on Blistering.com)
Having hit the neo-Pagan folk metal wave at just the right time, Eluveitie have quickly become the most prolific band of this style. Their 2008 effort Slania is among the handful of albums from this realm worth dying for (the other being Moonsorrow’s V: Havietty), while last year’s all-acoustic Evocation 1: The Arcane Dominion turned many heads thanks to the band’s sterling songcraft. The new year brings another album in the form of Everything Remains (As It Never Was).
Very much in the vein of Slania, Everything… packs some melo-death muscle to this folk metal punch and when supplemented by a wide array of instrumentation (i.e. a hurdy gurdy), Eluveitie rightfully holds firm to the claim of being the best band of this totally-bloated style. Vocalist/primary songwriter/founder Chrigel Glanzmann phoned Blistering to merely confirm this notion, and to wax on the new album, the band’s tireless work ethic, and how all eight of ‘em can actually get along…
Blistering.com: You guys have put out three albums in three years. Where does this productivity/creativity come from?
Chrigel Glanzmann: [laughs] Oh man. It’s really just being in a band, playing music. That’s what we do with our lives right now. What else can I say? We just tour all the time, write new songs…it just happens. It’s not that we did it on purpose. It’s not like we decided to release one album…maybe next time it will take longer [laughs].
Blistering.com: Doing last year’s acoustic album was a risk, but turned out successful. How did it turn out in your eyes?
Glanzmann: Looking back, we can say it was really successful. Of course, before we did that album we were aware of the fact that it was strange to release such a totally different album especially Slania was our breakthrough album. We were aware of the fact that people will be confused. We just went for it. Of course there were many people that were surprised in a positive way that really liked it and there was exact opposite. Overall, we can be really happy and thankful the album was successful.
Blistering.com: I see the tag of “New Wave of Folk Metal” on your Myspace and promo material. Did you coin that?
Glanzmann: We don’t care about the labeling of music [laughs]. We think that’s your job and not ours. We just think it’s rock and roll. But a couple of years ago we originally came up with that term, the “New Wave of Folk Metal.” It was a bit bold and it was serious and the other hand, we just wanted to express everything that we did differently than the other folk and pagan bands, which I actually still think we are [different]. This kind of music is still kind of new. There are so many names for this kind of music and at some point, it became ridiculous. People were calling it folk metal and others were calling it Viking metal…all of that stuff and it became dumb. So we said we’ll come up with another description, but it was more like a joke to us.
Blistering.com: There are quite a few bands playing this style, definitely. What’s it going to take for a band like yours to remain visible?
Glanzmann: [pauses] I think in the end, we’re addicted to making music and playing music and we’re doing it in a way that is honest. We don’t care about that other stuff. We just want to play music. Regarding the growth and entire thing, it’s just the way you have to go and can go and that’s step-by-step. The way we experience this is quite natural.
If you look at it, things are happening fast, but for us, we’re working on the band every single day. You work hard to grow and hard to become a good band, so it doesn’t feel like things are going on to fast.