CARDINALS FOLLY: Live By The Sword
Release year: 2023
Label: Soulseller Records
A good name is a good name, right? And Live By The Sword is a good name. When Count Karnstein, band leader, vocalist and bass player of Finnish true doom act Cardinals Folly told me their next album is going to be called Live By The Sword, my first question was if he’d heard the awesome band of the same name. Apparently, he’d heard of it, but hadn’t heard the band. Anyhow, despite being superficially very different acts, when one goes deeper, some odd similarities start to become apparent, making it oddly appropriate that these two bands share this link.
We’ll return to that in a bit. In the name of full disclosure, I’m not pretending to be entirely unbiased when it comes to Cardinals Folly. As alluded to above, I know the primus motor of the band. And not only that, I’ve been listening to and liked the band since even before they existed, from the days of a precursor band called The Coven. In my not-too-humble opinion, Cardinals Folly are one of the best true metal bands out there today, in Finland or elsewhere. I’d be of this opinion even if I wasn’t friends with one of the guys in the band.
But: high expectations mean that there’s the potential of falling down from high.
OK, returning to the subtle similarities between the US/Dutch oi! group and these Finnish doomsters is a great way to start describing Cardinals Folly’s music. Usually pinned down as doom metal, for years already the Finns have reached beyond the boundaries of that box, to the point of no longer fitting into it. Where Live By The Sword combine black metal and epic heavy metal into their street punk, Cardinals Folly combine black metal, Bathory style epic atmospheres and more than a whiff of punk into their metal. And the track Ludovico shows a significant overlap with all things boots & braces: A Clockwork Orange has after all had a crucial influence on oi!. Add to that a certain antimodern streak both share, and I think I’m justified in finding a certain kinship of spirit.
So, to reiterate, Cardinals Folly’s starting point is true doom metal without a doubt, but at this point, it’s really doing nobody a service to rigidly define them as that. Call this true metal. The tempos are way too fast and the riffing way too aggressive for the most stubborn of doom purists to not find something to nitpick about. You’ll find as much Cirith Ungol and Manilla Road here as Candlemass or Witchfinder General or Pentagram.
In a way, Live By The Sword reminds me of my first steps into heavy metal beyond the obvious names such as Metallica and Iron Maiden. Discovering acts such as Manowar and Saxon, who were not “household names” in the mid-90’s, truly was exciting: I didn’t know there could be music that epic and exhilarating. Cardinals Folly capture that spirit of real heavy metal aptly on this album. Hard hitting riffs, pounding drumming, catchy choruses, cool lyrics about Hammer Horror and H.P. Lovecraft (and more)… this truly captures the beat of the heavy metal heart. This is the kind of music that makes you go “Fuck yeah! Heavy metal!” and not be one bit ashamed of your childlike excitement.
The band’s previous album Defying The Righteous Way (2020) felt to me like a coming of age album, where the band cashed in all chips and finally saw all promise come to fruitition. Live By The Sword isn’t monumental in the same way, but it nonetheless sees the band improve. The sound and expression feels more unified and seamless: the different strands in the band’s music, from traditional doom to classic heavy metal to black metal to punk, mesh into one better than ever. The riffing is tighter. The vocals, whilst still certainly rough around the edges and all the way down to the middle, sound tighter than ever. And the songs works as well as ever.
Don’t believe me? Check out the advance singles Last Bastion Of Doom and Luciferian. These two belong to the speedier tracks on the album, and are perfect examples of how Cardinals Folly anno 2023 are all about metal, with little point in splitting hairs about what prefix to add to it. Priesthood Of Darkness, on the other hand, is a slower track which proudly displays the group’s roots in traditional doom.
To circle back to the beginning of this text, I admit to having some bias. I like Cardinals Folly. But even without this bias, I would laud Live By The Sword highly. And as a long-time fan, I feel my words must have some weight when I say that, without a doubt, this is their best album to date. The previous one was in some ways more ambitious, but Live By The Sword consolidates the evolution of that album, resulting in an even tighter, more powerful package.
So there’s another parallell between Live By The Sword and Cardinals Folly: both belong to the absolute forefront of their respective genres.
Only Death Is Real 