Welsh metallers King Kraken are unleashing their upcoming second album, 'March Of The Gods,' on 18th April 2025. The eagerly awaited follow-up to 'MCLXXX' (2023). Ahead of the release, the band shared with us, a deep dive into all ten tracks featured on the new album to mark this mighty release. So read on to uncover the meaning behind the songs....
'March Of The Gods' Tracklisting:
1. Scream
2. El Giganto
3. Berserker
4. March Of The Gods
5. Hero
6. Vigilante
7. Preacher
8. Magnum Opus
9. Chainsaw Saviour
10. Under The Sun
Scream
The opener to the album is like a smack in the face with a wet towel when you've just dropped off to sleep. It's gonna wake you up and get the adrenaline going. It seems so long ago the riff came to me and started the ball rolling to the usual "put through the ringer" treatment of the Kraken. The end result is a megamix of riffs where we all had a part to play and it's an absolute bangar! This is only one of two songs on the album that has been influenced by real life. It comes from the struggles that poor mental health inflicts on a person and how that person overcame the odds and has since become a better version of themselves. It has been inspirational to see. The song reflects that struggle and the fight to scream out and leave your demons behind whilst remembering that you are never alone. A fairly simple song to write, although the vocal melody changed quite a bit as the song progressed. This was written early in 2024, the chorus was originally a guttural scream, however, this was eased up to fit in with the broader realm of the album, and we weren’t sure if this may end up as a single.
El Giganto
This song pays homage to the classic ‘man in a suit’ monster b-movies but with a darker tone. In particular, a not so subtle nod to what essentially is an evil Godzilla. The first line of songs says ‘over 50 storeys high’ which is a direct reference to the theme tune from the Godzilla cartoon of the 80’s which says ‘Up from the depths, 30 storeys high…’. So we knew that we wanted to make our monster bigger! In this song, our monster is relentless and causes constant carnage. As for the title, it was a conscious effort to detach it from the classic Japanese Godzilla as much as possible. However, did point out that there is a similarly named creature in the Resident Evil 4 video game called Gigante. Oh well! Ours is still bigger! The track was written musically without Mark or Adam present, and Richard remembers showing Adam the track and telling him how fast it was, and being surprised at how quickly the guitar solos were nailed over it. Sticking with the video game theme, Richard thinks the first solo sounds like the soundtrack to one!
Berserker
There's a funny story regarding this one. I bought a looper pedal when we were playing in Edinburgh last year, and tried it out at rehearsal, and stepped on it trying to get it to record a loop, and the main riff to the song was born and caught in this looper pedal that I couldn't turn off. Mark shouted over from the other side of the room, "record that riff now! Before it disappears for good, that's a song right there!". This led to the rest of the track being birthed right there and then! This is the first track on the album with a noticeable bit of light and shade in it - mellow at times, but the stomping beat of the verse sets everything up for the chorus. The first time we heard this in the studio with vocals recorded, we were all shocked at how well the dynamics had turned out here. This is one of those cases where the riff actually inspired the lyrics. When Pete came up with the riff it was a slow, stomping, pounding riff with a solid pace. It reminded Mark of the Vikings who would keep time to a drum being hit when rowing the long boat. The lyrics were written in about 30 minutes and focused on the tale of the Berserker. A Viking who fights in a violent and uncontrolled way, often in a trance-like fury. The words convey the strength and actions of a single person as opposed to the classic ‘armies in battle’.
March of the Gods
Richard, our drummer, wrote the verse and some of the chorus, on guitar (which he doesn’t play!) so we tried to interpret what he was playing. This is how March of the Gods was born! The more we spoke about that song and its title, the stronger it grew until it became the title track of the album! Directly inspired by Greek mythology, March Of The Gods tells the story of how Zeus felt when the mortals stopped worshipping the gods. Zeus then takes it upon himself to punish the mortals by first sacrificing Aphrodite and sending the Kraken to destroy the humans. Of course some artistic license has been taken here. The lyrics directly reflect Zeus’ frame of mind and his anger towards the mortals as opposed to telling the full story of what he did. Also taking inspiration from pop culture, movies and books, this is essentially part of the plot for Clash of the Titans.
Hero
A deeply personal song and a change in pace for us as a band. This song is directly about the loss of Mark’s Dad. It is a tribute to him and goes some way towards the healing process by writing it. In Mark's words, ‘My father passed away in 2011 and still feels like yesterday. It is a difficult song to sing and I also include my brother in the song with the lyrics ‘and I’m not the only one’. While the song is centred around a part of my life, I hope that others will also be able to relate to it in the sense that the song deals with loss in general.’ From a musical point of view, Richard had wanted us to play something mellow and emotional for quite some time, and as we all thought it might be time to show a different side to the band, we relented. We’ve always gone to practice and messed around with blues/jazz (!) versions of our own songs, so now we’ve actually made it a proper thing! Karl came up with the initial chord progression to this, leading us to fill the bones with meat, so to say. This track was written for the purpose of firstly showing a different side to the band with emotion, feeling and dynamics. We also wanted to write something that would open up the interest to a bigger audience, which has actually gone just as we planned. We're very proud of this track.
Vigilante
Anyone who knows Mark will know that he’s an avid collector of comic books, movies, posters, statuettes and anything to do with the subject of this song. We were careful not to mention directly in the lyrics who this character is but it isn’t that difficult to work out. At the same time, because we’ve made a point of not mentioning the character, then hopefully this song will mean different things to different people. The lyrics focus on the retribution carried out against people who commit dark deeds. Hmmm…how to write a Batman song without saying it’s a Batman song! The chorus, vocally, was finished a week or so before we went into the studio! We had tried it lots of different ways, we finally settled on the way that it is now. When Pete came to the band with this idea, it threw everybody at first as it's not a straight forward track to play and is a bit of headwork with the way it's played at intervals. It's great when you get to the flow and is a great way to come out of Hero with a bang.
Preacher
Musically, an interesting one. Richard thinks it sounds like a System of a Down riff, with a Counting Crows verse. Adam thinks it sounds like a long lost track that Jethro Tull forgot to put on Aqualung. Karl probably thought he was writing Bay Area thrash! What we all agree on is that this track turned out surprisingly well. Lyrically, it’s literally the plot to the Clint Eastwood film ‘Pale Rider’ - A man comes to town under an assumed identity, cleans it up, gets rid of the bad guys and leaves. That is essentially the song with the added threat of what the Preacher will actually do.
Magnum Opus
Every band needs a song about a car and this is ours. The more ‘gaming obsessed’ out there will know instantly what this song is about. The Magnum Opus is actually the name given to your car in the Mad Max video game. Initially inspired by the pace of the riff, Mark wanted lyrics to reflect a relentless barrage of words but still make sense if you read them. Your classic…foot down and off you go type of thing! Apparently Mark only realised about half way through that he was writing about a post-apocalyptic setting for the car journey. Musically, we knew at this point in the album that we needed something with a driving verse, the vocal melody in the chorus was nailed, and all that is really left to do now is a Mad Max-inspired video to go with the song! This is Pete's driving track, full throttle, hold on tight, let's go!
Chainsaw saviour
Mark had to leave early at one practice, and we’d had the chorus for quite a while but hadn’t done anything with it. So, we actually wrote this song around the chorus, and it turned into a perfect single. In fact, Romesh, our producer for the album, chose this as the first single from the ten tracks. The chorus was actually born in 2019, Mark recently found the original recording of it. It pays homage and is a tribute to the Evil Dead movie, a classic in its own right. In our video, we switched to zombies as not to appear too direct. Aside from a word here and there, the chorus remains pretty much as it was originally written. Now fleshed (pun intended) into a fully fledged song, we were able to expand the story, and talk about finding the necronomicon book of the dead and the catastrophic results from reading aloud from it. This track was a real fun track to write and came across with a fun, tongue in cheek vibe. The video is complete chaos and was so much fun to film too. Loved everything about this. Great solid opening release for the album.
Under the Sun
Ultimately this is a dark horror fantasy story of what can only be described as biblical Armageddon. Now that the rapture has happened, God has a word with the Devil and asks him to ‘clean house’ on earth before God returns and starts over. The song is presented from the Devil's perspective as he talks to the people left behind and warns them of what is about to come. This is actually an old song, we originally recorded a version for an EP 7 years ago! However, we felt that it deserved a revisit, and now, with a proper production and a few tweaks, it’s the natural ending to the second side of March of the Gods.
BAND MEMBERS
Mark Donoghue - vocals
Adam Healey - guitars
Pete Rose - guitars
Karl Meyer - bass
Richard Lee Mears - drums
FOLLOW KING KRAKEN
Website || Facebook || X || Instagram || TikTok
Photo credit: Paul Hutchings
Comments
Post a Comment