Skyclad - No Daylights Nor Heeltaps

Genre(s) - Folk metal
Origin - Newcastle-upon-Tyne, North North England
Year of release - 2002
Bitrate - 160 kbps

When it comes to folk metal, if Skyclad didn't write the book then at least they were its editors-in-chief. They were far ahead of most of their peers and in my humble opinion still one of the very few to ever do it right. They're a very likeable bunch too. The music is miraculously uplifting, and sublimely Anglosaxon, building from a NWOBHM-platform instead of the standard melodic death/black metal one, and adorning it with fiddle melodies audibly native to British soil. And of course they are rooted in that wonderful British class consciousness; their lyrics are left-wing without a doubt, but drenched not so much in politics as in a very astute and thoroughly sarcastic analysis of the world around us. Oh, and since precisely this release, Skyclad even have a good singer! So for No Daylights they retooled a few of their best tracks to suit his clear melodic voice and there you have an album and a half of great, really quite harmless metal that will pick up your mood and have you looking hard if you want to find any flaws at all. In fact, would it be sad if a bastard album like this (Martin's lyrics, Kevin's voice) was the band's best material to date? Because it seems a lot like it is.

Disk 1 - Load it down (42.70 MB)

1. Penny dreadful
2. Inequality street
3. Spinning Jenny
4. The cry of the land
5. Another fine mess
6. Sins of emission
7. The widdershins jig
8. History lessens
9. Land of the rising slum
10. Single phial

Disk 2 - Load it down (23.23 MB)

1. No deposit, no return
2. A great blow for a day job
3. No strings attached
4. Building a ruin
5. Loco-commotion