Sellsword: The Monsters, Madness and Magic Interview
In the summer of 2013, Sellsword set forth on a journey to raid and conquer the whole of the United Kingdom. On December 1st, 2016, Sellsword would breach the walls, brandishing their own barbaric brand of power metal. Their first album …And Now We Ride besieged the scene and firmly established the arrival of the appropriately named new genre: Mercenary Metal.
Against the Wind, the Mercenaries of Metal would continue their march with the release of their second album …Unto the Breach in August of 2019. Equally as mighty as the first attempt and featuring tales of heroes, battles, and buccaneers, the band keeps their oath to the Sword. With songs such as Pendragon, Inquisitor, and The Courage to Die, Sellsword finds themselves galloping, shredding and serenading their way victory.
Monsters, Madness and Magic had the honor of speaking with Sellsword recently about their inception, reception, inspiration, and future.
J.R.: Formed in 2013, Sellsword would release their Saga of Siege ". . .And Now We Ride" three years later. Fully displaying the bands' ability to combine the cold steel forged by classic heavy metal with the thundering tear of power metal, its easy to see why the inaugural album has earned high marks from the metal community. Sellsword records and releases independently, can you speak on how you guys felt about the warm reception?
Sellsword: When we put "...Unto The Breach" up for pre-order via our band camp we expected a few orders to come in, but the reception was pretty overwhelming! It was crazy, I even recorded a short video for it expressing our gratitude for people putting in orders and believing in us after only hearing a few full tracks. Added onto that the album release had a great reception, I think everyone had an awesome, albeit sweaty, time! It's a great feeling to have people really enjoy your music, and Henry had put a lot of effort into writing and recording, I think it really shows.
J.R.: Sellsword summons songs that could send the listener into a berserker-like battle rage or take one on a historical excursion with the tale of Harald Hardrada. Are there any other influences, historical or fictional, the fans may have missed hidden within the album? We have our own suspicions here at Monsters, Madness and Magic about an original Transformers reference in "The Warrior".
Sellsword: In terms of lyrics that would be the realm of Stu, our previous singer. He is a massive nerd, like pretty much everyone else in the band, so it could very well be a transformers reference; however, I believe the original inspiration was the story of Druss from the David Gemmell books. Myself and Stu are massive fans of his work, we especially nerded out on the book Legend.
Other songs have other inspirations obviously, sometimes it was Stu just playing with fantasy tropes like Blackened Sky, other times it's historical like Pendragon, which has a very nerdy quote in the song and I only know of a few people who got it.
J.R.: The Mercenaries of Metal would return in August of 2019 with their second release
". . .unto the Breach". Picking up where it's predecessor left off, unto the Breach features stories of legendary figures such as Arthur Pendragon, blistering ballads dedicated to the Buccaneer, and offers infernal insights behind the ire of an Inquisitor. I believe Inquisitor is a song Sellsword has been performing live for some time, but can you speak on the differences in approach concerning songwriting, if any, for unto the Breach?
Sellsword: Songwriting for "...Unto the Breach" was mostly done by Henry and Stu. Henry is an amazing composer and Stu would put awesome lyrics to it. Some songs would have riffs by myself or James added which Henry would take on board and use to create epic songs, the most obvious being Sagaborne. Inquisitor was written by the whole band shortly after the release of the first album while jamming in rehearsal, hence why it has had so much live play.
J.R.: Recently, Sellsword celebrated the last ride of long-time Wordsmith and Captain, Stuart Perry. Fans are more than familiar with Lord Perrys' powerful and original voice as well as his crafting of Sellsword lyrics. Can you guys speak about the energy and emotion infused in that final performance with Perry at the helm? Also, was it established the unto the Breach would be the Last Hurrah of the battle bard?
Sellsword: The last gig with Stu was a very bittersweet night. He was the catalyst for starting the band after I heard him sing some Dio songs at an acoustic night, I think it's fair to say Sellsword would not exist without him. The last siege with Stu was awesome, two really great bands in Forlorn Hope and Dream Troll opened the night and then we got to play for 90 minutes with our original guitarist Jack flying in from Poland especially for the night to play on the last 3 songs.
We got to cover Hallowed Be Thy Name which was on Stu's bucket list for playing live, and we played in front lots of friends, family, and fans. Any we gig we do is always a blast, this night was special. The album was never meant to be Stu's last, but life, unfortunately, prevented him from continuing in the band. Everyone in Sellsword wishes him all the best, and we still see each other.
J.R: The Merchants of Menace are not abandoning the siege, however. Sellsword announced they are holding auditions for a new vocalist. With such huge shoes to fill, what would you all say to any vocalist out there pondering the position?
Sellsword: To anyone wanting to step up there are a few things I would look for: A great voice, we are not necessarily looking for a copy of Stu, but at the same time, the voice has to fit the music. A great stage presence, one thing we are always proud of is our live shows, we try to have fun on stage and that energy hopefully comes back to us from the audience. Mostly, of course, someone who will fit in with the personalities of the band.
Sellsword on Bandcamp: https://sellsword.bandcamp.com/
Sellsword on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mercenarymetal/
Official Sellsword website: http://www.sellsword.co.uk/
We look forward to supporting the future of the siege!