Vengeful trickster fairies, a realm of impenetrable cold and boundless frost, a dragon gnawing away at the roots of the World Tree; Norse iconography is intense, and metal bands have known this at least since Led Zeppelin. Sweden’s Fejd, a folk metal group formed in 2001 from the folk duo Rimmerfors and the prog-thrash band Pathos,1 have been weaving Norse history and mythology into their acoustics-forward heavy metal for decades. They were last heard with 2016’s Trolldom, followed by a decade of inactivity as far as new music is concerned. But now, drummer Esko Sallow, keyboardist Lennart Specht, bassist Thomas Antonsson, vocalist/moraharpa player Niklas Rimmerfors, and multi-instrumentalist Patrik Rimmerfors2 have taken the Fejd banner to Nifelheim, the Norse realm of ice and an album steeped in mist-wrapped mystery. Fejd sing in Swedish and, being a Swiss-cheese-brained American, I can’t tell you if they capture their “Nordic melancholy” in lyricism. But can they musically?
“Folk metal” encompasses a lot of different sounds; the way Fejd do it, Nifelheim is folk, folk metal. Fejd’s approach immediately reminded me of The Hu’s early material, where amidst the great score of acoustic instrumentation, keyboards, and drums, not one distorted guitar appears. This is no issue. The lively, drone-noted strumming on “Edsvuren” and “Sköldborg”‘s Amon Amarthesque fighting riffs prove Fejd can bring the goods without them. Nifelheim’s acoustic soundscape—beautifully captured in a warm and dynamic mastering job—smells of sea salt on “Älvagrimmar” with its wind-swept majesty and “Strilja”‘s medieval jauntiness and Sgàile-like grandeur. On first listen, I was quickly and easily engrossed. Nifelheim doesn’t actually sound Nordic—like most Viking-y folk music these days, Fejd mostly play a hodgepodge of Asian and Eastern European instruments—but it nonetheless sounds like a dip into the primordial world.
Fejd use a lot of instruments on Nifelheim, and brother, you better believe they’re using them all in the same song. “Nidhögg” navigates between mouth harp,3 a plethora of strings, synthesizers, and group vocals while the title track opens to a cavalcade of drums, horns, and synchronized string riffs to bombastic effect. Nifelheim is just about always like this. But what’s crazy is that Nifelheim never sounds overly crowded. This owes partly to its aforementioned mix but also Fejd’s delicate songcraft, which sees pieces sliding in and out of the music in seamless, natural transitions. But what’s similarly baffling is that, though Fejd weave such big compositions together, Nifelheim still sounds kinda thin. This is in part due to a lack of low end, which is mostly handled by Salow kicking the dookie out of his drums, because Antonsson’s bass basically stands in the back of the mix sipping a beer mead. Regardless, in tying Nifelheim’s anachronistic musical identity together into a cohesive package, it’s safe to say these Swedes left no “Ø” uncrossed or “Ä” undotted.
But with how spirited Fejd’s musical identity is and how rich Nifelheim’s compositions can be, it’s a bit surprising how much steam the record loses by the end. Nifelheim keeps to a mid-pace throughout its runtime, and though Fejd can play briskly—Salow really lets loose on the kit when he wants to (“Edsvuren”)—the music nonetheless feels stuck in one speed. Similarly, I’d describe Rimmerfors’ vocals as workmanlike on Nifelheim, serving the music well but being too constrained to stand out or elevate it. Factored together, these two problems conspire to give Nifelheim a feeling of déjà vu. When closer “Svarta Tjärn” rolls out its big conclusion in hopes of a true Viking funeral, a track worthy of one in a vacuum, over-familiarity dims its flame to a serviceable campfire instead. Nifelheim is smooth sailing, but perhaps the trip would’ve been more memorable had Fejd challenged some choppier waters.
Nifelheim is a fun and expertly crafted album the whole way through, but a lack of exciting highs keeps me from giving a full-chested recommendation of it. Fans of folk metal will likely enjoy what Fejd offer on it, and genre diehards are likely to rate it more highly than I. I hear all the essence of a great album in Nifelheim, from Fejd’s expert chemistry to the record’s effortless fluidity. But I also hear the potential for something to really blow the roof off with Nifelheim gone unrealized. A few stronger hooks or up-tempo moments would’ve really gone a long way. But regardless, Nifelheim is a sound warship for Fejd to get back on the warpath with, and more than worthy of your consideration for listening. Skol!
There are many types of Chelsea Wolfe; the doom folk poet, the goth overlord, the master of all things hypnogogic. Wolfe’s covered a vast landscape of mystery and occultism over the past two decades, distorting genre lines into uniquely amorphous collections of songs. ‘The Dark’ is her newest and 9th of these. It’s not her loudest, heaviest or most rustic. It is however one of her boldest. With ‘The Dark’, Wolfe becomes the unashamed songwriter that her previous albums have always hinted towards. By minimising the historically all-consuming components of her music – like the layers of distortion on ‘Abyss’ and the lo-fi scuzz of ‘The Grime and the Glow’ – Wolfe’s voice sounds bullishly stark. ‘The Dark’ is thus the closest there’s ever been to Wolfe the singer-songwriter. It’s also a high watermark for Wolfe the storyteller.
The Californian has described the album as a love letter to the dark. This may sound grim but it’s strangely charming too. Yes, the darkness can be a metaphor for the emotional nadirs of life, but it is also where resilience lies. This is best explained by Wolfe herself via the title track’s gentle defiance. Keen to imbue the darkness with a sense of renaissance, Wolf has developed a newfound positivity. “Seeds grow in the darkness/our love glows in the darkness”, she sings. It’s a striking viewpoint – newfound fortitude is obtained only when at our weakest. Wolfe’s vocals support this further, with her sounding both weathered and imperious.
Her voice is a focal point throughout ‘The Dark’. In near-conversational speak, opener ‘Cold’ has Wolfe conversing with someone (or something) that she fears, but from whose grasp she escapes. She’s not running away though, but rather “running back home” in an endeavour to discover “who I am without you”. The subject of Wolfe’s address is ambiguous but never impersonal. Rather, it’s surprisingly relatable, making ‘Cold’ one of Wolfe’s most accessible songs to date.
This goes for the rest of ‘The Dark’ too. While lacking the spooky crunch of Wolfe’s most revered albums, ‘The Dark’ may become a future entry point for the unconverted.
There nonetheless remains enough of an eerie allure to keep Wolfe loosely tethered to her musical roots. ‘Turn the Key’ opens with grandly strummed guitars, sounding like the strings are hanging by a thread, as if precariously perched upon the instrument. Wolfe’s tendency towards the ghostly is also present, evidenced through her Kate Bush-esque head voice that anchors the chorus to ‘Seethe’ with a crisp breathiness. The song’s final moments dissolve structure, making way instead for atmosphere. While emotionally warm, much of the album feels instrumentally cold as a result of this penchant for ambience, as gales of sound amplify the music’s intensity.
‘The Dark’ is Wolfe at her most accessible but she remains capricious. ‘Death Is Not the End’ is a tale of two Wolfe’s. The acoustic whisperer conducts the first half before the distorted warrior battles through the second, the yin and the yang of Wolfe’s musical palette. The muscular grandeur of the song is potent. It also carries an inherent finality. So much so that when ‘Dancer in the Sky’ follows – with its watery pianos and icicles of pizzicato strings – it feels less of a finale and more the end credits. Its group-sung chorus instils the song with something of a Broadway feel too. The result is less of a sprint and more of a stumble to the finish line, but Wolfes make it out of ‘The Dark’ in anthemic style all the same.
The album is nonetheless Wolfe, yet again at her most conceptually consummate. Her paean to the darkness is captivating, but it’s the enchantment of Wolfe herself that ensures an ember of light has us drifting through ‘The Dark’.
As Motionless In White hit 20, we find out how they’ve evolved from metalcore wannabes to an arena band who are headlining Bloodstock next year – and it’s partly down to the determination of their only original member, frontman Chris Motionless.
In our emotional interview, Chris reveals the highs and lows of their journey so far, why making new album Decades took four years, and how it was the closest he’s ever come to walking away from the band.
“I ground myself to the bone for this record,” he says. “I was going into these toxic cycles of workaholism and just burnt myself out. It took a little bit of my passion away, because it felt like a job for the first time, so I definitely wanted to walk away and come back to it. That’s part of why it took so long.”
We also go inside Ghost’s massive new concert movie, 2 Big To Rig. Tobias Forge tells us about how they captured the epic Skeletour stage show, the unfortunate incident that nearly derailed it, and his “extracurricular” future plans.
Elsewhere, Mastodon open up about the death of guitarist Brent Hinds, just months after he split from the band. They explain why they’re moving forwards with new album Marrow Deep, and a brand new outlook.
Zoltan Bathory gets The Hammer Interview treatment, explaining how he arrived in the US with little more than a Hungarian-English dictionary, braving cockroaches and judo throws to steer Five Finger Death Punch to the top.
Meanwhile, seven years on from his throat cancer diagnosis, Dave Mustaine revisits his journey in an exclusive interview and an extract from his new book, In My Darkest Hour.
Green Lung take us on a tour of London’s graveyards and occult hotspots, Halestorm power couple Lzzy Hale and Joe Hottinger tackle your questions about love, keytars and… killer farts?! And Snot explain why they’re back in the studio, almost 30 years after the tragic death of frontman Lynn Strait.
Sleep Theory’s Cullen Moore shares his soulful playlist, Mudvayne/Hellyeah veteran Chad Grey delivers the lessons he learned from hanging out with a young Slipknot and meeting James Hetfield, and Godsmack give us the inside story of their blockbuster anthem, I Stand Alone. Plus, we meet Decessus, the Chilean death metal band led by a beauty queen.
All this, along with Eddfest, Metallica, Bring Me The Horizon, Sigh, Rory, System Of A Down, Acid Bath, Duff McKagan and much, much more.
Twin Atlantic have shared a new track called ‘Supersweetness’, written with vocalist Sam McTrusty’s family firmly in mind.
Musically, it is classic Twin. Urgent, vibrant and bristling with heart and soul from beginning to end. And dig a little deeper and you will find that it is another piece of heartfelt honesty that is coming to define the band’s new record, but this time with a sweeter edge. Written about how much he loves his daughters, with them even providing backing vocals, it is Sam pushing the ante: even though life can throw shit your way, it can also deliver pure diamonds.
As Sam beautifully puts it,“Every song is a love song really, but this one is about the bittersweet feeling of adoring my children until the point where it makes me feel ill.”
The song is set to appear on the band’s upcoming full-length ‘Separation From The Animals’, which will be released on October 02 via Dance To The Radio.
Sam had this to say about what has inspired much of the honesty that defines the album:
“I’m from a family that’s fairly divided, so I’ve always been passed about from when I was six-months-old. It’s all I’ve ever known. As you grow up, you start to view life through a different lens – especially the whole struggle of going from boy to man. My experience of that is particularly painful, emotional and confusing. But because it seemed normal at the time, it didn’t really hit me until I found my tribe, my people, my band. My entire adult life is meant to have been looking ahead but my personal life is always looking back. That baggage is basically what the whole band is about.”
It will also feature ‘In Your Eyes’, which is utterly beautiful and sounds like this:
The band is heading out on tour this Autumn, with support from The Xcerts.
Review: Warren Haynes – Dreams & Songs: A Symphonic Journey Provogue Records – September 18th, 2026 Reviewer – Chris O’Connor There are musicians who seem to spend their careers perpetually busy, and then there is Warren Haynes. Guitarist and vocalist extraordinaire, songwriter, producer and seemingly tireless musical workaholic, Haynes has spent decades carving out a career […]
Who here likes folk metal like me? Well, if you do, you might want to check out this interview with the fantastic Kupfergold, from Germany!
Benedetta
I’m here with Bonnie Banks from Kupfergold. How are you doing today?
Bonnie Banks
Good, thank you.
Benedetta
How does it feel to play in the anniversary year for Wacken?
Bonnie Banks
It was a great feeling. I feel honored to play at the anniversary of Wacken. We played here two years before. And it was great playing at the anniversary. It’s another thing, I think, yeah. Especially for us, Wacken is always special.
Benedetta
Do you think that the life of the artist is a lonely life?
Bonnie Banks
I don’t think so. I think the life of an artist is a whole life with many people. I have all my friends with me. My band is also my friends. Everyone that’s working for us is my friend. And I feel welcomed every time. I can stay with them and have a good time with them. And it’s combined with earning money, earning fans, earning everything in this life. I feel honored to be an artist. Not everyone in this world has the honor to do this. Being an artist is everything I want in my life. Band and crew is like a chosen family for us. It’s not just people that we work with. It’s family. And they are people we really love to spend time with. And we’re very grateful for that. And this is our choice. We know not everyone has it like that. But we do it because we want this. We want our crew to be our family.
Benedetta
Has it ever happened to you that someone treated you differently than the guys just because you’re a woman?
Bonnie Banks
Yeah. Every gig. At this one gig, there was a man shouting at me. I told him that something wasn’t fine. And after all he shouted at me, he decided to excuse on him instead of me. Even if he shouted at me. And he went to him. He said, “Yeah, sorry, but… That felt wrong. Very wrong.” Because I’m a strong woman fighting for everything. I’m a feminist. It was a difficult situation. The festival was a very small festival. And they really didn’t bring all the stuff and get the stage cleared and prepared as it was written in our contract with them. At some point, you’re not able to play a show anymore if certain things are not done rightly. So we commented on that and we wanted to talk to him. He was not ready to talk. And he made it like a thing. He didn’t take the matter very seriously. There was no roof over the stage and it was a 40°C day. You can’t do a 60-minute show with very light skin. You’re just gonna burn. You’re gonna get cancer. They were always like, “You’re a diva”. Because I was heading for the basics. That’s been the case very often. Everyone could speak to me in a proper way. But they don’t. We’re all humans.
Benedetta
Thank you so much for taking the time to do this interview with me. Is there anything else that you want to add to our readers of FemMetal?
Bonnie Banks
When I was here yesterday, I thought, many festivals don’t display too many bands with female artists. The scene is very male-dominated. But here in Wacken, even in a year where they don’t have Jinjer or Halestorm, they’re not here. Yesterday only I saw many bands that were female-fronted. Compared to other festivals, other big festivals, it’s a lot better in Wacken than somewhere else. I didn’t realize before when looking at the posters, but yesterday just running over the campground, running over the infield, I was really impressed by that. So we’re happy to be invited over and over again here. The whole crew of Wacken seems to be like feminists. They are pushing it and that’s all love. I feel honored to play here. In a safe space for women, where people take me as I am. As a woman wanting to be seen.
A Hawkwind without space rock? A Hawkwind without Dave Brock? Amazingly, such things were genuine prospects at one point in the revered band’s history. In 2016 Brock talked Prog through some of their lowest lows and highest highs (literally).
When did music stop being a hobby and become a vocation for you?
I was busking for a living for quite a while back then. Some of the subways were fantastic for creating echo, especially the one in South Kensington that used to connect the museums [it’s still there! – Sub Ed]. It was a huge long tunnel and I used to practice lots of songs down there, then I’d do them at home with my echo unit. And I used to daydream, as one does, about how nice it would be to get a band together.
So what was the impetus for Hawkwind?
I used to practice at home in Putney, with my friend John Harrison, who I’d met when I was out busking and who used to play bass with Joe Loss’ band. Another friend, lead guitar player Mick Slattery, joined us and we’d rehearse in our front room and annoy the neighbours. Then we put an advert in the Melody Maker for a drummer, which is how we got Terry Ollis.
On a few occasions I didn’t bother turning up at the early Hawkwind gigs, because I earned more money busking at cinema queues in the West End. Eventually, our manager Doug Smith gave me this long lecture: “Look, you’ve got to make up your mind: Are you going to play in a band or be a busker all your life?”
Given your blues background, how come Hawkwind took a totally different direction to most of your peers?
I worked in a cartoon studio for a while, where we did lots of TV commercials and soundtracks for musique concrète. We used to make huge tape loops on Revoxes and around door handles. It was interesting work and I was able to experiment with a lot of weird sounds. So it was a combination of that and John and I mucking around with a Revox in our back room. We’d get Sonny Terry’s harmonica going backwards on a big loop, then play guitar over it and really get the echo going.
On stage as Hawkwind we could play 10- or 15-minute numbers, because that was the age where you could be as avant-garde as you liked. We had Dik Mik doing his oscillators, John would just hold the bassline forever and we’d chug away. We’d get slagged off for only using three chords. Or even being one-chord wonders. But you could experiment with one chord for half an hour and still make it interesting. Can, who actually toured with us in the early 70s, used to do the same sort of thing.
What’s your enduring memory of Hawkwind’s first gig in August 1969, when you were billed as Group X at All Saints Hall in Notting Hill?
I can vaguely remember it at all! We just had this one huge strobe light that flashed on and off. Most everybody down there was on LSD anyway. In those days you used to drop acid, freak out and run around the place.
What was your first acid experience like?
It was all right, actually. Me and Mick Slattery were at the flat of Pete Meaden, who used to be The Who’s manager, somewhere near Willesden. Pete had a really good record collection, with 60s stuff like Sopwith Camel, and it was nice music to drop acid to. He also had some really good books on art, which I remember going through. When you looked at Turner’s paintings on LSD, it was a revelation. They were all moving. You could see spirits in the winds coming up with the ghost ship in the estuary.
When Hawkwind began performing at full volume with light shows and effects, was it a purely confrontational idea?
On the sleeve of our first album [1970’s Hawkwind] it basically said that our aim was to freak people out without them needing to take acid. But after a while, corruption sets in. At the beginning, taking LSD and organic mescaline was like a religious experience, because it was something really important and you had to be careful what you were doing. Then, as people got more blasé, they became drunk on acid and would take speed with it, or get stoned and so on. People just pushed themselves to see how far they could go on different drugs. Sometimes people took these things and went mad.
Were there times when you were close to madness yourself?
Yeah, absolutely. You can only do these things for so long. Eventually you think, “Fuck, I’ve got to be really careful here.” We were lucky in that we were around in an era where you could get pure LSD. Loads of people took it and lots of artistic things happened in this country as a probable result.
Did you feel as though you were Hawkwind’s captain from the get-go?
The others wanted to go more into the funk side of things, whereas I was still into the spacey stuff. My confidence suffered as a result
In the early days there were a lot of captains in Hawkwind. It was really a band of eccentric individuals. Bob Calvert was a great writer and poet. I know he was up and down, but when he was on form he was fantastic. Hawkwind had a really good rhythm section in Simon King and Lemmy, then we had [Nik] Turner’s antics of jumping around. And having Del Dettmar and Dik Mik meant that we were really quite revolutionary in the electronics field. You could freak people out just with the volume of deep, throbbing EMS synthesizers, with Dik Mik going through his oscillators and the light show pulsating away, courtesy of John Smeeton [aka Liquid Len].
1975 seemed to be a watershed of sorts for Hawkwind: Lemmy was fired, Bob Calvert rejoined and you had a change of record company and management…
After Lemmy was sacked we brought in Paul Rudolph on bass, who we’d known from when we played gigs with the Pink Fairies. Paul was a really nice guy and we got on well, but I suddenly became really insecure in my guitar playing. The others wanted to go more into the funk side of things, whereas I was still into the spacey stuff. And my confidence suffered as a result. Tony Howard, who was also Marc Bolan’s manager, started looking after us and they sacked me from the band.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Bob Calvert phoned me up: “Look, we’ve just had a meeting in London and they’ve sacked you. I don’t agree with this, so I think we’ve got to have another meeting.” I went up to London and we all met in Tony’s office. Basically it was Turner – I mean, Turner had got rid of Lemmy and it was me next – Alan Powell, Paul Rudolph and Simon King, I believe, who wanted to go into funkier music. Bob didn’t want to do that and said he wanted to carry on doing space rock.
So how did you get your own way?
Simon House [keyboards/violin] was on my side as well and that’s when we decided to get rid of the others instead. We’d signed with Charisma and they all got paid off, though I don’t know how much. But they were out of the picture.
Three years later though, you decided to jack it all in after a miserable Hawkwind tour of America. What exactly happened?
That was when Bob Calvert was suffering. He was really depressed and was going to have to go into a sanitorium when he got back home. It was a low for us all and I’d already sold my guitar by then. I remember watching [bassist] Adrian Shaw from my hotel room in San Francisco, walking down through Chinatown, just looking totally despondent. I didn’t see him for years after that. Touring really does wear you down. But once I got back home, back to sanctuary as it were, I started thinking about getting things together again and was a bit more positive. We got Tim Blake in the band, plus Simon King and all that lot, and did Live Seventy Nine, which was quite a successful record.
The studio follow-up, which was 1980’s Levitation, suggested that you were on a creative roll…
Ginger Baker had been owed so much money by so many people over the years that it was enough to make anybody really pissed off
We’d signed up with Bronze Records by then, with our old manager, Doug Smith. Doug had Motörhead, Girlschool and us. When it came to do Levitation our drummer wasn’t very well, which is when Marion Lloyd-Langton, [guitarist] Huw’s wife, suggested we bring in Ginger Baker. She worked in Ginger’s management company and phoned him up. We were all really nervous, to say the least, when he came down to the studio. But off he went and he ended up being in the band for a year and a half.
And how was Ginger?
People always used to say what a miserable old cunt he was, but I always got on all right with him. So did Kris [Tait, Brock’s wife], though their dogs used to fight each other. She actually hit Ginger over the head with a pool cue one time. Kris has quite a temper on her and she’d had some kind of confrontation with Ginger. Looking back at it, he’d been owed so much money by so many people over the years that it was enough to make anybody really pissed off. He was very embittered and grumpy.
I was still busking when Eric Clapton was playing with Ginger and Jack Bruce in Cream. Eric had a flat just off Notting Hill Gate and I used to pop round and see him for a cup of tea when I’d finished for the day. I’d seen Ginger play at Eel Pie Island a few times, then I’d gone to Middle Earth and seen him in Graham Bond’s band. So I couldn’t help thinking how strange it was that Ginger ended up playing with us.
Post-Ginger, Stonehenge became synonymous with Hawkwind for a while. Did it feel like the band’s spiritual home?
It was the magical place, which it still is of course. We used to play there as regularly as we could, for free, when we weren’t touring. When we did the big number there in 1984 I remember the sun coming up in the distance on this lovely golden dawn and all the druids coming down in their robes. Ken Barlow [actor William Roache] was among them and we were all going, “Ken Barlooow!” using this drone, like a meditation. Harvey [Bainbridge] was just playing this one note on his keyboard and the druids could obviously hear us.
What happened with the all-star Hawkwind project that was proposed fairly recently?
There was this supergroup thing that came up two and a half years ago, which I refused to do. And it’s cost us dearly. It’s an American company – the guy who runs it is a millionaire and he wanted me to do all these recordings. His idea was to use Hawkwind to get people like Paul Kantner involved. The line-up would’ve been spectacular. He wanted some of the old psychedelic giants in the States to come together to do an album with me and the band. Then I found out he wasn’t going to use any of the band and was going to basically manipulate the Hawkwind name and use session musicians. And I said no, because these were my mates.
Do I have any regrets? Not really. Hawkwind have had loads of ups and downs, but generally it’s been fun
Lemmy was asked too, but refused to do it. It’s a hard story to tell you, because it’s ongoing as we speak, but our American tour was cancelled because of it all and there’s a certain ex-member that he utilises. This is who’s behind it all, this stupid old cunt who I wish would just die.
I’m guessing you’re talking about Nik Turner here. This is probably a stupid question, but can you foresee a time when you two will make up?
Never, ever. He has done untold damage to this band. He’s an absolute idiot with what he’s done. When he went over to America he was playing in pubs and using the Hawkwind name. It’s all linked to our webpage and people assume it’s us. It’s actually really ruined the band’s credibility in America.
In light of the recent demise of people like Lemmy, David Bowie and Keith Emerson, do you become more conscious of your own mortality?
It does actually make you think. I remember my mum and dad, years ago, having a telephone book and there were lots of crossings-out where their friends had died. It’s the same with me now – there are only two of my really old mates who are still alive. But you don’t dwell on it.
Aside from that legal business, what’s it like being the keeper of Hawkwind’s flame in 2016?
It’s quite fun at the moment. We’re enjoying ourselves and we’ve got a happy band. This line-up has been together for nearly 10 years now and it’s exciting, musically. Do I have regrets about any of it? Not really. Hawkwind have had loads of ups and downs, but generally it’s been fun. I’m lucky in that I’ve ended up doing something that I really like doing, which is what most people want from their lives. What more do I need?
Vengeful trickster fairies, a realm of impenetrable cold and boundless frost, a dragon gnawing away at the roots of the World Tree; Norse iconography is intense, and metal bands have known this at least since Led Zeppelin. Sweden’s Fejd, a folk metal group formed in 2001 from the folk duo Rimmerfors and the prog-thrash band Pathos,1 have been weaving Norse history and mythology into their acoustics-forward heavy metal for decades. They were last heard with 2016’s Trolldom, followed by a decade of inactivity as far as new music is concerned. But now, drummer Esko Sallow, keyboardist Lennart Specht, bassist Thomas Antonsson, vocalist/moraharpa player Niklas Rimmerfors, and multi-instrumentalist Patrik Rimmerfors2 have taken the Fejd banner to Nifelheim, the Norse realm of ice and an album steeped in mist-wrapped mystery. Fejd sing in Swedish and, being a Swiss-cheese-brained American, I can’t tell you if they capture their “Nordic melancholy” in lyricism. But can they musically?
