Stormwarrior – מפליגים לצפון

Germany's Stormwarrior may be the next heirs to the throne of Germany's mighty true metal band. With three albums under the band's bullet-studded belt, including the latest – Heading Northe, it seems the band, a direct descendant of such heroes as Running Wild and Gamma Ray, is heading for true metal greatness. Stormwarrior are true power / speed metal traditionalists, Trading any current fashion or fad with the real retro feel of good ol' 80's metal, double bass, high-pitched vocals – the epitome of true metal. We spoke with guitarist Alex Guth about the band, the new album, and the combination of metal, Germany, and Vikings too…

Hey guys, congrats on the new, and excellent new album, first – why is it called and why the intended misspell in the name "Heading Northe"?

Hey, thanks for the compliments! First of all, there is no "misspelling" in the title. We like to adapt old English writing to our song lyrics and titles, that’s why we sometimes write things a little bit different. It’s a trademark which accompanied Stormwarrior since the first demo back in 1998, and it’s a cool twist to the overall image of the band. We named the new album "Heading Northe" as homage to the northern lands being the home and refuge of the viking warriors and basically of ourselves too. Since we are from the northern part of Germany we relate our home very much to the image of a northern habitat. So when we are on tour fighting for the metal and the glory, our hearts are always yearning for the north where we come from… [Laughs]…

How does the cover of the album relate to its title?

The cover shows Viking ships away on a long voyage. Back in the day, the vikings often set out on long journeys across the seas. They were far away from their homes and families and were quarreling with an extrinsic and hostile world. As I said before, their greatest wish was returning to the shores in the north where their home is. It’s kind of viking romanticism, and I think the album cover is an excellent tribute to that allegory. Uwe Karczewski, who did our previous covers as well as the classic Helloween album artworks back in the Eighties, did another incredible job with the "Heading Northe" artwork. He just hit the nail right on the head.

Lyrically what do the songs in the album deal with?

We always had a lyrical concept dealing with northern mythology and scandinavian history. Stormwarrior has an image connected to viking themes and that’s a very powerful image which adds to our music, so we obviously kept this with "Heading Northe". The track "Revenge of Asa Lande" for instance is about the land of the Aesir, the house of gods Odin, Thor and Tyr are part of. Or take "Lion of the Northe" for example, where the lyrics are based on the life of the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus who interfered in the 30 Year’s War in the 17th century . We feel very connected to the North, Scandinavia and the history and myths emerging from there. It is an integral part of Stormwarrior and always will stay that way.

How different, or similar is it to your last album, Northern Rage?

"Heading Northe" is pretty different from "Northern Rage", as we have a more varied songwriting with the new album. The production is very transparent and you will hear every detail. Also, it’s s a strong effort concerning playing as I believe we progressed quite a lot when it comes to using our instruments. Of course you will immediately hear it’s Stormwarrior as it always were, but more to the point, more focused, and more metal.

It seems to me the album went an extra-mile with its speed and aggression, were you aiming for a fast and relentless album?

I wouldn’t say that "Heading Northe" is faster than its predecessor "Northern Rage". Of course there are real fast songs like "Remember the Oathe", which is one of the fastest one we ever did I think, but overall the material on the new album is very diverse. Slower and more epic songs just as "Revenge of Asa Lande" are something new which adds to Stormwarrior’s sound. Still, as you said it, the songs still are aggressive and relentless, as they are real metal songs and that’s just the way to play this kind of music.

Why did it take you sp long to do a new album?

Well, "Northern Rage" came out in mid 2004, so it's four years until the release of "Heading Northe" in march 2008. Besides, we did a live album entitled "At Foreign Shores – Live in Japan" which came out in Europe and Japan in 2006. Therefore, I wouldn’t call us a lazy bunch release-wise. Those were busy four years, we had some changes in the line-up and we lost our studio in 2005 since the building where we used to have it had been sold. We also did a lot of shows between 2005 and 2006, just as Earthshaker, Bloodstock in England, some shows together with Running Wild, a tour in Japan etc. It took some time to settle with a studio and start writing songs after quite a busy time. The band started recording in mid 2007 and now here we are with our new album.

Back to the roots now, can you tell us how did Stormwarrior start out?

Stormwarrior was founded in 1998 by Lars. By that time, the scene in Northern Germany was flooded with bands aping the by then popular death- and black metal bands. He wanted to do something different, which had more soul and expressed his love for real heavy metal. Influenced by the great Hamburgian bands like Running Wild and Helloween he hooked up with some other musicians, and did two demo tapes in 1999 and 2000, which were followed by two 7-inch singles. By then, the band already had a solid standing in the underground as an uncompromising band doing straight into-your-face heavy metal. All this led to record deal in 2002, with our debut "Stormwarrior" seing the ligtht of day soon after that. I think the rest of the story is already well documented.

To me, musically you are the combination of everything that's great in German heavy metal, what were your influences when you start out?

Thanks for the kind words! Obviously we are influenced by the Hamburgian scene, as some of the best metal bands come from this area like Gamma Ray, Helloween and of course Running Wild. We are quite proud to continue their legacy and keep the traditions those bands initiated back in the Eighties. But we also draw influences from classic bands like Judas Priest, Manowar, WASP, Iron Maiden or even Bathory. No matter what, as long as it is real metal music!

How did you decide on going with the Viking theme in your lyrics and image?

Lars has always had strong feelings for the nordic way of life. He even studied scandinavian languages and archeology at university, so he even knows what he is talking about in his lyrics. As I said before, we all identify with this image. Yenz is danish, so he also added a lot of his knowledge and scandinavian lifestyle to the band. On stage, we don’t feel like a band just performing, but like warriors wielding swords in the middle of a bloody battle! We are drawing so much power from those themes, and it doesn’t get any more metal than that, does it!?!

You chose yourselves "stage-names" for the band, something more usually familiar in black metal, what was your intention in doing that?

It just sounded cool in the beginning I guess. Back in the 80s, many musicians took stage names – it’s not something exclusive to Black Metal or Folk Metal or whatever. We used pseudonyms that accommodated to the overall image of Stormwarrior being a band that is all about genuine heavy metal music and lifestyle. It worked perfectly in the beginning, but it wore out as the band evolved. By now I guess everyone knows what Stormwarrior is holding the flag up for and therefore you will read our real names in the booklet of "Heading Northe".

It's quite obvious that traditional true metal like yours won't make you rich in today's music scene, do you think that Europe's current metal scene can understand and accept such old-school metal such as yours?

Especially the European metal scene will understand our music and our statements, as most of the classic heavy metal which set the standards in the Eighties came from Europe! So you have a bedrock with the fans understanding what Heavy Metal should be about really. The scene itself, no matter where you are in fact, is pretty open-minded today which I appreciate, still everyone has the same fire burning inside when it comes to rendering homage to their favourite music style, and that’s metal full stop! It’s fun playing for those fans, it’s not about the money or getting rich, it’s for the glory of Heavy Metal…

Does that fact you hail from Hamburg, probably Germany's capital of metal, help the band in anyway?

Not necessarily, as you have quite a few established names here and it’s quite hard for a young band to find a place among them without being overshadowed by them. Also, when Stormwarrior started out in 1998 real heavy metal was quite unpopular and most people were into Death Metal or Black Metal. So we had to work hard proving we had something to give to the scene here, and I think we managed that quite well. Stormwarrior is becoming popular every day and we have the respect and friendship of fans and bands alike, it’s good to see we finally have our place here in the "capitol of metal" as you call it

I know you had some links with Gamma Ray and it's members, especially with Kai Hansen, what kind of work did you do with them, and how did the connection with him start out?

Lars met Kai Hansen back in the day he did the first demo cassette with Stormwarrior. They met at the Ballroom club here in Hamburg, and Lars gave him the cassette. Since Kai is virtually one of the godfathers of Heavy Metal coming from this area, we always kind of looked up to him and were influenced by the early Helloween where he was the driving force. We were overwhelmed that he actually liked the demo, and Lars and Kai stayed in contact. They consequently developed a friendship, so it became obvious that he would produce the first album "Stormwarrior" in 2002. The rest is history I guess, we did a tour in Japan together with Gamma Ray in 2005, and Kai joined us on stage a couple of times when we did special shows playing material from "Walls of Jericho", which in our opinion is still the best Helloween record ever. By now, both bands and their members are close friends and we did some great parties together, although sometimes they seem to be afraid of us youngsters partying a little too hard.

You also changed labels with this album, why, and what's your current label?

It was just time to move on for us I guess, and sometimes you have to change things in order to get growing as a band. Therefore we hooked up with our new label Dockyard 1 last year. They have some really cool bands in their roster, just as Savage Circus and Iron Saviour, and they have the experience and power to take us some steps further. Right now, Dockyard is doing very extensive promotion for "Heading Northe" and is spreading our name everywhere. Right now we are being snowed under requests for shows, festival as well as interviews, so we couldn’t be much happier right now! We knew those guys for some time now and we have a great working relationship. However, this does not mean that we have bad blood with our old label Remedy Records. In fact, they will be releasing a DVD featuring our complete show at Wacken 2007 sometime this year.

Summer is fast approaching, what kind of festival are you going to pillage?

We already did the Up the Hammers Festival in Greece as well as the Rock Hard Festival, and we just came back from this year’s edition of Sweden Rock, which was incredible! Right now we are preparing for our return to Manowar’s Magic Circle Festival as well as Masters of Rock in the Czech Republic and Hammer of the Gods in Spain. In August we are doing some smaller shows as well as a festival in Slovenia, so we are busy as hell right now.

Last message for the fans reading this?

We sincerely hope you will like our new album "Heading Northe". Maybe we will see each other at one of our shows and have a couple of beers together! Thanks for the cool interview! Horns up!