Review of Alestorm - Leviathan EP

So to coincide with the band’s current US Pagan Knights run with Suidakra and Tyr, Scotland’s purveyors of Pirate metal have given us a 4 song EP to tide us over until the next album, slated for a 2009 release.

The EP consists of 1 new song (the 6 minute title track), a reworked track from the Battleheart demo days (“Heavy Metal Pirates”), a German reworking of “Wenches and Mead”, and for me, the highlight of the EP, a cover of “Wolves of the Sea” from a Latvian pop band called Pirates of the Sea, which actually was entered as the Latvian entry into the Eurovision Song Contest (a staple of my childhood television viewing).

“Leviathan” is typical Alestorm; an epic, rollicking synth laden shanty with a glorious chorus. It shows Alestorm is still able to pen their ridiculously catchy style of metal and that the debut album was no one hit fluke. “Weiber und Wein” seems like filler track, but even with its German lyrics, it revisits my favorite track from Captain Morgan’s Revenge. The reworked “Heavy Metal Pirates” is a thrashier, traditional heavy metal number, but has a nice little jig between verses reminiscent of “What do You Do with a Drunken Sailor?”

However, “Wolves of the Sea” seems to have been made solely for the purpose of Alestorm to cover, and in fact it wasn’t till I did some research that I discovered the original song was a ridiculous pop song played by swarthy Eastern Europeans in pirate garb. Don’t believe me?  Check it out here is all its glory and have a righteous fucking laugh. The thing is, Alestorm’s version is so ridiculously catchy is will be in your head for days, and it has actually become my 8 year old daughter’s favorite new song-fuck you Hannah Montana.

A nice little stop gap, and I hope to hell they play “Wolves of the Sea” on their current US tour-I’ll see you thar mateys!