Skyclad: Jonah’s Ark (1993)
Back when the very concept of “folk metal” was as novel, rare, and implausible as the notion of fairies flitting through the forests, England’s Skyclad sowed the seeds of it all (*) via influential albums like The Wayward Sons of Mother Earth and A Burnt Offering for the Bone Idol.
By the release of the English group’s third long-player, 1993’s Jonah’s Ark, new outfits as geographically and stylistically dispersed as Cruachan (Ireland), Amorphis (Finland), and Mägo de Oz (Spain), were taking up the folk metal torch, but Skyclad obviously had a comfortable head start.
And, looking back now, almost 20 years later, it’s apparent that Jonah’s Ark undertook a concerted thematic pivot: largely swapping escapism to mystical, pastoral lands populated by pagan idols and arcane superstitions, for modern-day issues afflicting the real world.
Politically-informed diatribes like “Cry of the Land,” “A Word to the Wise,” “It Wasn't Meant to End this Way” and the naked plea of “Tunnel Visionaries” all railed against predatory capitalism and its dire consequences upon the environment, making this LP something of an early artistic milestone in support of the Green Movement.
Simultaneously and perhaps consequentially, Martin Wakyer’s passion for puns reached new heights on album standouts like “Thinking Allowed,” “The Ilk of Human Blindness” and “Bewilderbeast,” even as song arrangements were shortened and simplified, with little sacrifice to either heaviness or thrashing.
Indeed, two of my favorite cuts on the LP, “The Wickedest Man In The World“ and “Earth Mother, the Sun and the Furious Host” (based on the classic folk tale of Dick Wittington and His Cat) are semi-perfect distillations of this new, more economic approach.
But fear not, me head-banging folkies, because progressive experiments were retained for dynamically varied tracks like “Schadenfreude” and “A Near Life Experience” (look for the surf rock guitar passage), along with Fritha Jenkins’ revolutionary (for metal) fiddle contributions, of course.
So even though many fans, myself included, saw Jonah’s Ark as a mild letdown, at the time, when compared to its two predecessors, and its immediate successor Prince of the Poverty Line, my views have softened over the years, given the quality of these songs and the fact that Skyclad were tilling such virgin soil.
Fact is, they did much to expand heavy metal’s horizons and compositional boundaries with these thought-provoking LPs, and for that they deserve our thanks.
* Unless you feel like reaching and want to credit Led Zeppelin III.
More Skyclad: The Wayward Sons of Mother Earth, A Burnt Offering for the Bone Idol, Tracks from the Wilderness EP, Prince of the Poverty Line.
