description
Hail Of Bullets: Perfect Music When Playing War Plan Pacific
Posted February 13th, 2011 at 08:22 PM by S.R. Krol
Tons of high explosives
Plastering the reefs
Amtracs approaching
Offloading LST's
Establishing the beachheads
Perimeter secured
Distant laying battleships
Roaring while harbored
Barbed wire and minefields
Concrete obstacles
Cautiously proceeding
Behind armored vehicles
Say farewell to their comrades
Left in blood red waves
A sudden hail of metal
From camouflaged caves
--"On Coral Shores" from On Divine Winds
Haydn, Wagner, the Carmina Burana, movie soundtracks...all make great backdrops for wargaming. Recently I just discovered a fantastic Dutch death metal band, Hail of Bullets.
Made of of members with extensive backgrounds in the death metal scene, Hail of Bullets' latest release is "On Divine Winds", a concept album of the Pacific War.
Opening with "The Eve Of Battle", a short but epic sounding introduction that ends with a screaming aircraft signaling the start of "Operation Z", Hail of Bullets immediately impresses. Sounding somewhat like Unleashed, Jungle Rot, or Dismember, this is pretty much pure death metal. They're not striving to be a technical band, nor progressive metal, which is fine because sometimes you just want something that gets the blood flowing and your pulse pounding.
Lyrics are all awesome, touching on everything from the Tokyo fire raids to the War in China to the Bataan death march. For a wargamer this is of course perfect subject matter.
Hail of Bullet's first album, "...Of Frost and War" is another killer piece, focusing on the Eastern Front. Considering they hail from the Netherlands maybe their next release could be on Market Garden.
Plastering the reefs
Amtracs approaching
Offloading LST's
Establishing the beachheads
Perimeter secured
Distant laying battleships
Roaring while harbored
Barbed wire and minefields
Concrete obstacles
Cautiously proceeding
Behind armored vehicles
Say farewell to their comrades
Left in blood red waves
A sudden hail of metal
From camouflaged caves
--"On Coral Shores" from On Divine Winds
Haydn, Wagner, the Carmina Burana, movie soundtracks...all make great backdrops for wargaming. Recently I just discovered a fantastic Dutch death metal band, Hail of Bullets.
Made of of members with extensive backgrounds in the death metal scene, Hail of Bullets' latest release is "On Divine Winds", a concept album of the Pacific War.
Opening with "The Eve Of Battle", a short but epic sounding introduction that ends with a screaming aircraft signaling the start of "Operation Z", Hail of Bullets immediately impresses. Sounding somewhat like Unleashed, Jungle Rot, or Dismember, this is pretty much pure death metal. They're not striving to be a technical band, nor progressive metal, which is fine because sometimes you just want something that gets the blood flowing and your pulse pounding.
Lyrics are all awesome, touching on everything from the Tokyo fire raids to the War in China to the Bataan death march. For a wargamer this is of course perfect subject matter.
Hail of Bullet's first album, "...Of Frost and War" is another killer piece, focusing on the Eastern Front. Considering they hail from the Netherlands maybe their next release could be on Market Garden.
Total Comments 5
Comments
|
Yeah, that's exactly what I would have suggested if you'd suggested something different. Hail of Bullets is simply the best metal soundtrack to any WW2 strategy game! I saw them live last year on the Summer Breeze Festival here in Bavaria, Germany. They simply rule. I'm also a big fan of the other band of some of their members (including singer and one guitarist), Asphyx. Check them out, too, if you can. They've also done some WW2-lyrics, also on their newest album Death... The Brutal Way(they runited a few years ago). Their material is partly similar to Hail of Bullets, but Hail of Bullets have the better songwriting. But check them out anyway, saw them three times live (in a period of roughly one year, on three different festivals) and it was a blast each time.
|
Posted February 16th, 2011 at 05:22 AM by spillblood
|
|
|
Hehe, I have a few videos online of the Hail of Bullets Summer Breeze concert (but with bad sound quality).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q21FGSp5Rkg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTsHoinGTpM |
|
Posted February 16th, 2011 at 05:24 AM by spillblood
|
|
|
If you like Black Metal, I'd also suggest Eastern Front, although that fits more to for example WinSPWW2, I guess. That's a british band with purely WW2 lyrics, also pretty epic stuff. They've got one album out called Blood on Snow. Hehe, martial industrial also fits perfectly to WW2 wargames, for example Arditi (although they have some pretty nazi-like samples, but I don't know if they're really political), March of Heroes (Eastern Front WW2, russian perspective), Toroidh (all of WW2, especially European theater).
|
|
Posted February 16th, 2011 at 05:39 AM by spillblood
|
|
|
Hey, thanks for the recommendations. Can't say I've ever heard of Arditi, March of Heroes, or Toroidh. Will be checking them out. Stay brutal!
|
|
Posted February 27th, 2011 at 05:23 PM by S.R. Krol
|
|
|
Martial industrial isn't Metal, but some kind of electronic music with military drumming and often neoclassic keyboard arrangements. Very epic stuff.
|
|
Posted March 3rd, 2011 at 06:24 AM by spillblood
|
Recent Blog Entries by S.R. Krol
- Rod Humble's Eastern Front Game (June 22nd, 2011)
- The Bloodiest Game Ever: John Hill's Battle for Stalingrad (SPI) (April 10th, 2011)
- Michigan Toy Soldier Company: Of Crime And Punishment (February 14th, 2011)
- Hail Of Bullets: Perfect Music When Playing War Plan Pacific (February 13th, 2011)
- The Slippery Slope Of Game Pricing (January 9th, 2011)
