photo by Matt Chains
(Comrade Aleks has brought us a truly excellent interview with members of Chicago-based Fer de Lance, whose enthusiasm for metal and their own music-making is highly infectious. Their latest album, which is an exception to the not-entirely-serious rule in our site’s title, is also an excellent one, and worth checking out before, during, or after this very engaging discussion.)
Around 2019, MP Popeye (vocals, guitar) and Pat Glockle aka Rüsty (bass) left the Chicago heavy doom band Professor Emeritus, so it took their friend Lee Smith another six years to find a new lineup and record a second, and by the way, very cool, album. But it was all part of a cunning plan, as MP and Rüsty quickly found collaborators (Scud on drums and J. Geist on guitars) and formed their own band, Fer De Lance, and in 2020 recorded the EP Colossus, followed by their full-length debut, The Hyperborean, in 2022.
To Fer de Lance‘s credit, they didn’t waste any time and are already thundering along with a second, more powerful album. Fires on the Mountainside combines a number of musical concepts, among which are doom metal, classic heavy metal, even some elements of Mediterranean folk, and the epic nature of Viking-era Bathory. Continue reading »
