Uploaded August 2024 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
With band and label "Punishment 18 Records" permissions taken from the "Spread Your Wings" album (August 30th, 2024).
Buy the album: orcd.co/xr7kp9l
FB: facebook.com/drakkarmetal
BC: drakkarofficial.bandcamp.com/album/spread-your-wings
Label FB: facebook.com/punishment18records
Label info about album: media.punishment18records.com/drakkar-spread-your-wings/?fbclid=IwY2xjawE_qdZleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHYX8linFqPZohIh86UHqWFeJjHRbVhqC4RXCYcmf80aYHy9TC5xKjKC74A_aem_cuqRMwnqOkObHWhlVZkpSw
Line-up:
Davide Dell’Orto: Vocals
Dario Beretta: Guitar
Marco Rusconi: Guitar
Simone Pesenti Gritti: Bass
Guests musicians:
Daniele Ferru (Drums), Johannes Frykholm (Keyboards), Michael Stavrakakis (Lead Vocals on “Ancestral River”)
Band statement:
True Veterans of the Italian Power Metal scene, Drakkar are about to reach the amazing milestone of publishing their 7th studio album! 3 years after the critically acclaimed “Chaos Lord”, the band is back with “Spread Your Wings”: a new conceptual record, based on a novel called “Claire Voyant: Helliger Quest” which is set for release – In Italian language – at the same time as the album.
Written by the Italian author Diego Delpiano and based on an original idea he conceived many years prior together with Drakkar’s guitarist and mastermind, Dario Beretta, it’s a science fiction tale about a futuristic metal band coming from an 1980s-stylized Earth colony in space, whose members end up tangled in a huge power struggle among forces they can barely comprehend. Musically, the album explores an even more 80s-based sound and feel, to the point of including an instrumental track and a typical ‘80s Sunset Strip ballad to go with the concept. This doesn’t mean, though that it comes across as dated or fully nostalgic: Mattia Stancioiu’s powerful and very much modern production solidifies this as an album that pays homage to the history of metal while still being current.
Dario Beretta said: “Doing a concept album is always as challenging as it is rewarding. Gemini was a whole story, start to finish, in the same setting; When Lightning Strikes was a collection of tales from different eras and places, woven together into a single, cohesive narrative; this one is totally different from both. In the novel from my friend, Diego Delpiano, the first incarnation of the futuristic ‘80s power metal band called Claire Voyant is killed before they can finish their most important record to date, called – as you probably already guessed – Spread Your Wings. So, what we set out to achieve here was the creation of an album which is the real-world version of the one which is part of the narrative… Morphing, so to speak, Drakkar into Claire Voyant: a futuristic ‘80s band with an epic and tragic destiny to fulfill. It has been a very interesting process – especially writing all the lyrics from the point of view of one of the characters in the novel was, like I said, challenging and rewarding at the same time. We had a lot of fun with this record and we recommend you get the physical version to really enjoy all the little touches we put in the booklet. And, of course, read the novel, if you can read Italian!”.
On top of a fascinating chance to travel into another world, “Spread Your Wings” offers the usual trademarks of Drakkar: catchy melodies with singalong choruses, powerful riffs and epic atmospheres, with an approach that is 100% classic power metal. In an age where the label of “Power Metal” is often associated with bands that have foregone the genre’s complexities and nuance in favor of an all-out pop sensibility, Drakkar stay very much true to the roots by refusing to dumb down their compositions and oversimplify their riffs, and instead take the road of true heavy metal once more, walking with their feet in the dirt while gazing at the stars.
With band and label "Punishment 18 Records" permissions taken from the "Spread Your Wings" album (August 30th, 2024).
Buy the album: orcd.co/xr7kp9l
FB: facebook.com/drakkarmetal
BC: drakkarofficial.bandcamp.com/album/spread-your-wings
Label FB: facebook.com/punishment18records
Label info about album: media.punishment18records.com/drakkar-spread-your-wings/?fbclid=IwY2xjawE_qdZleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHYX8linFqPZohIh86UHqWFeJjHRbVhqC4RXCYcmf80aYHy9TC5xKjKC74A_aem_cuqRMwnqOkObHWhlVZkpSw
Line-up:
Davide Dell’Orto: Vocals
Dario Beretta: Guitar
Marco Rusconi: Guitar
Simone Pesenti Gritti: Bass
Guests musicians:
Daniele Ferru (Drums), Johannes Frykholm (Keyboards), Michael Stavrakakis (Lead Vocals on “Ancestral River”)
Band statement:
True Veterans of the Italian Power Metal scene, Drakkar are about to reach the amazing milestone of publishing their 7th studio album! 3 years after the critically acclaimed “Chaos Lord”, the band is back with “Spread Your Wings”: a new conceptual record, based on a novel called “Claire Voyant: Helliger Quest” which is set for release – In Italian language – at the same time as the album.
Written by the Italian author Diego Delpiano and based on an original idea he conceived many years prior together with Drakkar’s guitarist and mastermind, Dario Beretta, it’s a science fiction tale about a futuristic metal band coming from an 1980s-stylized Earth colony in space, whose members end up tangled in a huge power struggle among forces they can barely comprehend. Musically, the album explores an even more 80s-based sound and feel, to the point of including an instrumental track and a typical ‘80s Sunset Strip ballad to go with the concept. This doesn’t mean, though that it comes across as dated or fully nostalgic: Mattia Stancioiu’s powerful and very much modern production solidifies this as an album that pays homage to the history of metal while still being current.
Dario Beretta said: “Doing a concept album is always as challenging as it is rewarding. Gemini was a whole story, start to finish, in the same setting; When Lightning Strikes was a collection of tales from different eras and places, woven together into a single, cohesive narrative; this one is totally different from both. In the novel from my friend, Diego Delpiano, the first incarnation of the futuristic ‘80s power metal band called Claire Voyant is killed before they can finish their most important record to date, called – as you probably already guessed – Spread Your Wings. So, what we set out to achieve here was the creation of an album which is the real-world version of the one which is part of the narrative… Morphing, so to speak, Drakkar into Claire Voyant: a futuristic ‘80s band with an epic and tragic destiny to fulfill. It has been a very interesting process – especially writing all the lyrics from the point of view of one of the characters in the novel was, like I said, challenging and rewarding at the same time. We had a lot of fun with this record and we recommend you get the physical version to really enjoy all the little touches we put in the booklet. And, of course, read the novel, if you can read Italian!”.
On top of a fascinating chance to travel into another world, “Spread Your Wings” offers the usual trademarks of Drakkar: catchy melodies with singalong choruses, powerful riffs and epic atmospheres, with an approach that is 100% classic power metal. In an age where the label of “Power Metal” is often associated with bands that have foregone the genre’s complexities and nuance in favor of an all-out pop sensibility, Drakkar stay very much true to the roots by refusing to dumb down their compositions and oversimplify their riffs, and instead take the road of true heavy metal once more, walking with their feet in the dirt while gazing at the stars.
