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Agalloch performs a progressive[1] and avant-garde[2] style of folk metal that encompasses an eclectic range of tendencies including neofolk, post-rock,[3]black metal and doom metal.[4]
Common themes in Agalloch's imagery and subject matter are natural beauty and allusions to ancestral Heathenry.
One of the non-traditional instruments Agalloch has been known to use is the skull of a deer. In the song "The Lodge" John Haughm strikes the deer skull in order to create an unusual clicking sound.[5].
In a 1999 interview done by Dan Tobin with Jason William Walton and John Haughm [2], the band members have cited other influences including Katatonia, Ulver, The 3rd and the Mortal, Swans, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor.
...And the Great Cold Death of the Earth by Agalloch
YouTube - Agalloch - ...And The Great Cold Death Of The Earth
Lyrics:
Life is a clay urn on the mantle
And I am shattered on the floor
Life is a clay urn on the mantle
And I am scattered on the floor
We are the wounds and the great cold death of the earth. . .
Earth is floating on the waters like an island,
Hanging from four rawhide ropes
Fastened at the top of the Sacred four directions.
The ropes are tied to the ceiling of the sky,
When the ropes break, this world will come
Tumbling down and all living things will fall with it and die. . ."
Life is a clay urn on the mantle
And I am the fragments on the floor
Life is a clay urn on the mantle
And I am the ashes on the floor
We are the wounds and the great cold death of the earth
Darkness and silence, the light shall flicker out. . .
Kneel to the Cross by Agalloch
YouTube - Agalloch - Kneel to the Cross
Lyrics:
Give us our bread and bury our dead
And kneel to the cross on the wall
Whether burnt at the stake or drunk at the wake
Just kneel to the cross on the wall
We've original sin, but we might just get in
If we beg to the cross on the wall
It's rattle your neighbours and rattle your sabre
But kneel to that cross on the wall.
See the roof fall, hear the bells crash
As flesh and bone turns to ash
Tried to conquer the sun with a Christian frost
The corpses' stench beneath the cross
Anf give them gold and they'll save your soul
And kneel to the cross on the wall
And hail to the boss of the great unwashed
And kneel to the cross on the wall
They wail and weep, the march of the sheep
As they go to the cross on the wall
And it's ever so wrong to dare to be strong
So kneel to the cross on the wall
See the roof fall, hear the bells crash
As flesh and bone turns to ash
Tried to conquer the sun, with a Christian frost
The corpses' stench beneath the cross.
And it's ever so wrong to dare, to be strong
And it's ever so wrong to dare, to be strong
But summer is a-coming and arise! Arise!
But summer is a-coming and arise! Arise!
Our Fortress is Burning II - Bloodbirds by Agalloch
YouTube - Agalloch - Our Fortress Is Burning II Bloodbirds
Lyrics:
The god of man is a failure
Our fortress is burning against the grain of the shattered sky
Charred birds escape from the ruins and return as cascading blood
Dying bloodbirds pooling, feeding the flood
The god of man is a failure
And all of our shadows are ashes against the grain
For a similar experience I would recommend Opeth
A Fair Judgement by Opeth
YouTube - Opeth - A Fair Judgement
Click the first comment at 3:37 and listen from then on. The whole song as a whole is amazing, but for a first time listener, this piece would be most impressive.
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