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Heavy Metal Thunder Anatolian Folk Metal

Genres Heavy Metal Folk Metal Anatolian Folk Metal

Anatolian Folk Metal

Turkish folk modes and the saz woven into metal. A tiny genre, perhaps half a dozen bands, and it sounds like nowhere else.

Active years
1997 – present
Origin
Turkey
Family
Folk / Viking / Pagan
Bands here
5

Start here

Two records in order of how easy they are to get into — which is not the same as best first.

  1. Anatolia Mezarkabul, 1997 The landmark

    The founding record, by the band who spent their early years as Pentagram before the American Pentagram made that impossible abroad. Turkish modes and saz lines written into heavy metal rather than laid over it.

    Listen to Anatolia

  2. Kalihora’s Song Almora, 2003

    The other pillar of a very small scene — symphonic, keyboard-led and considerably more romantic than Mezarkabul. There is not a great deal of Anatolian folk metal, and this is half of what there is.

    Listen to Kalihora’s Song

What it sounds like

Turkish modes and the saz, played straight. Anatolian folk melodies use intervals and ornaments that sit awkwardly against Western harmony, and the bands lean into that rather than smoothing it out, with the bağlama and zurna carrying lines a guitar could not. The metal underneath is fairly conventional heavy or thrash. Compared with Nordic folk metal there is no drinking-song jollity here at all; the mood is closer to something ceremonial. It is a genuinely tiny genre — five or six bands have recorded in it, and Mezarkabul account for most of what anyone outside Turkey has heard — which makes any account of it provisional.

  • Heaviness 3 out of 5
  • Speed 3 out of 5
  • Aggression 3 out of 5
  • Technicality 3 out of 5
  • Darkness 3 out of 5
  • Melody 4 out of 5

Where the name came from

Named for Anatolia, the Asian landmass of Turkey. The style follows the earlier Anatolian rock movement of the 1970s, which had already fused Turkish folk with Western rock. Pentagram (known abroad as Mezarkabul) bridged the two.

The bands

Hear these first

  • Mezarkabul Turkey
  • Almora Turkey
  • Orient Turkey

And 2 more

  • Jakuza Turkey
  • Bosporus Wolves Turkey

Where it happened

Counting this genre and everything descended from it.

  • Turkey Turkish Metal & Anatolian Heavy Music 4 bands

If you liked this

Closest in sound outside this family, leaning towards the similar or the gentler rather than straight into the deep end.