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Heavy Metal Thunder Pirate Metal

Genres Heavy Metal Folk Metal Pirate Metal

Pirate Metal

Precisely what it sounds like: sea shanties, accordions and rum, played loud and entirely for the joke.

Active years
2004 – present
Origin
UK (Scotland) / Germany
Family
Folk / Viking / Pagan
Bands here
9

Before you press play

Explicit content

The filth here is comedy filth — Alestorm swear like a stag do, not like a war crime. Different thing entirely from the rest of this list.

Start here

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

  1. Captain Morgan’s Revenge Alestorm, 2008 The landmark

    The record that made this a genre rather than a joke one band was telling. Keyboard accordion, power metal riffs and songs about drinking, and it is played entirely straight, which is what makes it funny.

    Listen to Captain Morgan’s Revenge

  2. Sunset on the Golden Age Alestorm, 2014

    The band at their best and their silliest at once — genuinely good power metal songwriting underneath, and a twelve-minute closer about a wreck. This is the one to hear if the first made you laugh.

    Listen to Sunset on the Golden Age

  3. Back to the Noose Swashbuckle, 2009

    The thrash version. Faster, nastier and much shorter — closer to Municipal Waste with a cutlass than to Alestorm with an accordion.

    Listen to Back to the Noose

What it sounds like

A folk metal band who have committed entirely to a joke. Accordion and fiddle over fast major-key riffs, sea-shanty rhythms, gang choruses about rum, and keyboard sounds chosen for comedy. The playing is better than the concept suggests and the tunes are genuinely catchy. Nothing about it is dark and nothing is meant to be taken seriously. Compared with folk metal generally it is narrower — one theme, pursued relentlessly — and compared with pagan metal it is the exact opposite in spirit. Under a dozen bands build an identity on it, and Alestorm are most of the audience, so it lives or dies on whether the joke keeps working.

  • Heaviness 3 out of 5
  • Speed 4 out of 5
  • Aggression 2 out of 5
  • Technicality 3 out of 5
  • Darkness 1 out of 5
  • Melody 5 out of 5

Where the name came from

Running Wild's Under Jolly Roger (1987) established the imagery decades before the label existed; Alestorm, formed in Perth in 2004, made it a genre in its own right and cheerfully adopted the tag.

The bands

Hear these first

  • Alestorm UK
  • Running Wild Germany
  • Swashbuckle USA
  • Rumahoy UK
  • Ye Banished Privateers Sweden

And 4 more

  • Lagerstein Australia
  • Storm Seeker Germany
  • Verbal Deception Austria
  • Dread Crew of Oddwood USA

If you liked this

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