But all of those are basically black metal or prog metal bands with folk influence. They aren't folk metal in its modern form pioneered by the likes of Korpiklaani, which is basically folk music set to a metal rhythm. Yes you have Alestorm and the like but they aren't folk metal, they're pirate metal. Plus there's a visible strand of Satanism and similar unpleasantness in the likes of Skyclad and their progeny. I realise not all black metal is like that, but I think folk metal, especially live, is first and foremost about having fun and feeling good, or at least telling some kind of story about your culture. Black metal is not fun nor can you discern anything from it, it's very negative and not very articulate. In short, as you can tell, I'm not much of a fan of it. Tbh I don't think the likes of Eluveitie are particularly influenced by Skyclad, they take after the British and German folk and folk rock bands of the 70s and 80s.
My favourite subgenre of folk metal though is Slavic Pagan metal, by Skyforger, Arkona and Leshak et al. There's also a less well known band called Lutaverje from Belarus who do very soft, but very musical stuff.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2LodJjSLIY. Also Chur from Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fn4XbKvILM8A lot of folk metal bands have songs in English, but you have to be EXTREMELY fluent in English to write good lyrics for folk metal, which most folk metal artists are not. Tbh most native English song writers would and do struggle to write folk metal that sounds sufficiently old and majestic but not too faux 'olde Englishe'.
Anyway I fear we are derailing this thread a little, we need a dedicated thread for Folk Metal tbh
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