Browsing Tag

Pagan Folk

Eolya Stirred Ancestral Silence with the Sacred Lament of ‘Qu’es Polida’

From the first reverently plucked, euphonically resonant string in Eolya’s release, Qu’es Polida, there’s an instantaneous transience into tranquillity as you’re swept to a serene sonic expanse where catharsis and meditation of mind come easily. Within the subtle harmonics and ambient stillness of Qu’es Polida, the modern bard Eolya resurrects forgotten constructs of sound that drift between breath, nature, and ancient reflection.

When his strident vocals enter, they bring with them wisdom that only a long lineage of history could conduit. Sung in Occitan, the track becomes more than an expression of folk tradition; it is a sacred invocation. With operatic stretches of tenor vocals, it’s so much more than your typical folk fare, it’s a cry from one soul to another, a river of emotion pooling from ancestral emotion and presence.

The narrative traces a man who wanders to a river in search of peace. There, he finds a muse, radiant and silent, cloaked in ethereal mystery. Fearing to disturb her, he watches and sings only for her. That silence becomes the breath of the track, carried on the wind, lingering in the shadows between longing and reverence.

Eolya, based in France, creates from the forest floor and composes with the wind. His musical language flows through Celtic, Norse, and pagan channels, yet it always sounds like it belongs exactly where it lands. In Qu’es Polida, stillness becomes a statement. Enchantment becomes an echo.

Qu’es Polida is now available to stream on all major platforms, including YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Ariana Saraha & Flight Behavior showed us the true tribal roots of folk in Grandmother’s Tears

Here to remind us of what folk music was before it was commercialised and dominated by The Lumineers is the world music album, From the Wild, from Ariana Saraha & Flight Behavior.

The opening single, Grandmother’s Tears, takes contemporary frustrative energy and stretches it back a millennia through a soundscape inspired by infinitely more than the grand sum of human construction and destruction. With each element of nature a potential muse for Ariana Saraha & Flight Behavior, it’s almost surreal that they’re of this era. After listening to the lyric “Grandmother’s tears, they have fallen. Four thousand years”, which will haunt my contemplation for quite some time, I scarcely seem rooted in 2022 myself.

Ariana Saraha & Flight Behavior’s album, From the Wild, is now available to stream on Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Kveda verse Pagan poetry in their latest Nordic folk single, ‘Thorkell Streep’

Kveda is a folk music project that digs far past the roots of contemporary music right into the arcane core of Viking folklore. Their pagan sound may be niche, but their latest release, ‘Thorkell Streep’, is steadily racking up the streams since the release on April 4th.

Their latest release proves that Kveda has exactly what it takes to reach the same heights as acts such as Heilung who have given music fans a taste for soundscapes that speak to you on a tribal level.

With lyrics taken from relic poems and manuscripts and their diverse instrumental arrangements that includes historic instruments  such as bouzoukis, mandolins, nyckelharpas, violas and lyres, Thorkell Streep would struggle to be more authentic. The release that comes with hauntingly mystic chants is as enlivening as it is hypnotizing, hit play and immerse yourself in the meditatively powerful release.

Thorkell Streep is now available to stream via YouTube.

Review by Amelia Vandergast