Track Review: Metaspion’s Pyros

This one’s going to be very interesting. I am not new to folk music and other genres being blended together, since I like German folk-rockers Tanzwut, Knights Templar industrialists Heimataerde, and Celtic melodic death metal masters Eluveitie. Metaspion’s newest contribution to folk crossover is the single, “Pyros”.

Metaspion – also known as Morten Richter – combines electronic dance music with native Scandinavian folk music, wanting to “make people dance and to make younger people curious to check out more of the wonderful treasures that are to be found in Norwegian folk music and folk dance. The music is still relevant.” On “Pyros” and his 2018 album, Folktronika Schmolkfonika, Richter plays all instruments, and often includes guest vocalists. The single “Pyros” features rapper Skam R’ Tist.

Opening with a fiddle, and a very bass heavy, slow beat, R’ Tist takes no time to join in. There is a music video included, which features a roaring bonfire and Richter playing in the background. This gives the image of a Norwegian folk ceremony crosses with a rave. The vocals, beat, and fiddle are all interspersed, and even includes some vocoded vocals.

Though the song is short – two minutes and forty-seven seconds – it does get very repetitive. However, at 2:01 there is a folky stomping-beat bit that I like, which lasts for around 13 seconds.

Metaspion’s “Pyros” is a good introduction for people who have never heard folk music or folk’s crossover with other genres before, but personally I would have liked it to include more prominent folk sections. Interesting concept, and I would like to see Richter combine his folk sound with trance in the future, like Cymatics did with their remix of Yanni’s “Prelude”.