Field of Sorrow - Inspiration

[Negru_Voda]

I recently got and absolutely love the newest Falconer CD. I can't stop listening to it, all the songs are fantastic, the melodies are great, and progressive elements or the interplay between all the instruments is great. I really likI recently got and absolutely love the newest Falconer CD. I can't stop listening to it, all the songs are fantastic, the melodies are great, and progressive elements or the interplay between all the instruments is great. I really like the song Field of Sorrow and find it very sad and moving, almost bittersweet, especially the lyrics; the chorus in this song is great. I'm just wondering though, what's the historical inspiration behind this song? I did some digging for Man of the Hour for example and found out about the sinking of the Kronar, but is Field of Sorrow also based on a historical event?

I guess the concept of the poor dying in the name of the wealthy and powerful is something that can be generalized, and is relevant even in modern times.

Thanks! And if any Stefan Weinerhall or any Falconer musicians are reading this, your music is some of the best in all of metal! You truly go above and beyond.

[Bebbanburg]

http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=20855488&blogId=421792825

A fast opener with alot of galopping and double bass drums reminding a bit of the first album.
Lyrically it is based upon the Danish king Valdemar IV holding the Swedish port town Visby of ransom in 1361.

Linked from the myspace site which is kindly run by another forummer I believe.  I too like to know about songs and really like songs that reference events and acutal histories instead of being about "chicks n' yeah baby" or "railling against the system, man, despite being on MTV"... Hence I 've always a Maiden/Ritchie Blackmore fan as opposed to numetal/pop rock. That said, "Highway Star", despite the great keyboard/guitar solos, does have the worst lyrics of any song ever.

[Negru_Voda]

That's awesome, thanks so much! These lyrical concepts are awesome and interesting, I'll have to do more reading into them.

The way the lyrics fit the mood of the music as opposed to just being slapped on top carelessly like in most metal bands is awesome. The "wolf's call" in Vargaskall and that really dire sounding folky melody at the beginning of Carnival of Disgust for example work great. I seriously can't stop listening to this album, I love it!

[RedFox742]

I rather like how Stefan picks events from Swedish history that are essentially unknown to the rest of the world. I've never heard about any of the people or events on ABAT, but now I've looked up a bunch of them... and it's really hard to find information in English! Especially about the witch-hunt that inspired Dreams and Pyres!

It'd be almost like there was an American power metal band that wrote all about the minute details of our own wars. They could be called, I dunno, Cold Planet. Or... Freezing World. No...

[Stefan W]

Here you have some english info about the story behind "Dreams and pyres":
http://www.vasa.gavle.se/projekt/Witch/Text/Witchesgefle.htm

[cuauhtle]

Here you have some english info about the story behind "Dreams and pyres":
http://www.vasa.gavle.se/projekt/Witch/Text/Witchesgefle.htm

Wow..
Very interesting story indeed. Also, I had not known boys could be executed due to being witch.

[RedFox742]

Hey, thanks a lot, Stefan, I never would have found that.

But now I get to call poetic license on you: the boy Grijs was hanged, not burnt! As were all but one of the witches, apparantly.

Suppose it's a crime for a power-metal band to avoid a rhyme with "flame", though!  (and poetic license is allowed in a perfect song.)

[AngelOfMusic]

Men did occasionally get tried as witches, but it wasn't common.  I know here in the US there were a few men hanged during the Salem witch trials, but it was primarily women.

So yes, men could, and did, get tried and hanged as witches.

Nasty business, that.



RedFox:  It's an unwritten law.  Power metal MUST rhyme fire in some way, shape, or form.  Most common is rhyming "Fire" and "Desire." lol

[Bebbanburg]

It'd be almost like there was an American power metal band that wrote all about the minute details of our own wars. They could be called, I dunno, Cold Planet. Or... Freezing World. No...

Wasn't Loverboy's "Hot Girls in Love" about the Gettysburg address?....... Um....perhaps not...

Interesting to read about the witch trials - very similar to the Pendle Witch trials of the area I come from - one old lady gets accused, then another, then it just becomes a fashionable craze. You'd like to think we aren't like that anymore, but just transpose our mob reaciton to certain religious/political events and you can see how even in these supposedly enlightened times, we are not that much different, and I think it's for this very reason why history and thus songs with historical lyrics are still so relevant now.

[RedFox742]

Men did occasionally get tried as witches, but it wasn't common.  I know here in the US there were a few men hanged during the Salem witch trials, but it was primarily women.

...

RedFox:  It's an unwritten law.  Power metal MUST rhyme fire in some way, shape, or form.  Most common is rhyming "Fire" and "Desire." lol

One man. Giles Corey. Wasn't hanged; was crushed to death for refusing to confess. In Salem, at least. (*is from Massachusetts and ergo knows way too much about the Salem trials; many of the victims were from my hometown*)

The first power-metal song I ever heard went, in an epic a capella: "In a land of desire, your heart filled with fire, you live for the right to be free." So, yeah. :p

[AngelOfMusic]

LOL!  The first power metal song you heard was by Van Canto?  I like them, but if they had been the first power metal I'd heard, I might have been turned off.  Or not, the first power metal I ever heard was HammerFall's "The Champion." :D

[RedFox742]

LOL!  The first power metal song you heard was by Van Canto?

Nah, it was just that one moment that was a cappella in an otherwise insanely cacaphonous song. It was--brace yourself--"Evening Star" by DragonForce, way back before they broke out. (Bash them all you want, I don't care. They're fun and cheesy and became popular in a scene that favors pretentious harshness over silly melody, without ever changing their style. Still love 'em, and I never would have heard of Falconer without 'em. And I've been using them as a gateway to hook friends on power metal as well. So there. :p)

Van Canto is also awesome. And HammerFall. ("Hearts on fire, hearts on fire, burning, burning with desire!" There's another one, anyone got any more? :p)

[Bebbanburg]

Not sure if it counts, but 16th Century Greensleeves

"Flames are getting higher
Make it leap unto the spire
Draw bridge down
Cut it to the ground
We shall dance around the fire"

I think because he than just adlibs fire, higher, spire, brighter and all other words he can get to rhyme on the outro.

And you can bet Ronnie was dancing around a fire when he sang that.

[RedFox742]

Ooh, thought of one more

"Raging fury in the sky, burning with desire/self-determination rising from the fire!" - Edguy, "Mysteria"