Stephanie Jewell recently got to chat with Simon from Wrath of Fenrir, one of the bands playing the upcoming Stormrider Heavy Metal Festival. Alora Bailey (vocals), Simon Holland (guitars), Michael Scurlock (guitars), Stu Halla (bass), Tom Langridge (keys) and Herb Bennetts (drums), come together as Wrath of Fenrir, a symphonic Viking metal band bringing you deep growls, thundering drums and galloping riffs.
Steph: Tell me about yourself and your band!
Simon: My name is Simon Holland, and I am from Wrath of Fenrir. We founded Wrath of Fenrir in about 2012. We have been going pretty solid, we have had a few line-up changes over the years, and it has always been an interesting side quest, but always been a lot of fun. We have had so many great people come through the band and so much music come from it, and great shows. It has just been a wonderful time.
Steph: What is the origin story behind Wrath of Fenrir?
Simon: Like a lot of bands in the Perth music scene, Western Front (Facebook page) was really the catalyst. A guy called Daz, he put that together and we met on there. We said we wanted to do this kind of fast Vikingy kind of thing, and then enough people responded so we met up at Soundworks Rehearsal Studio. We started on the same day as another band called Advent Sorrow. We were accidentally going into each other’s studios, we couldn’t figure out who was in which band because we’d never met in person before then. We’ve been going since then, we’ve had time off here and there, but it has been a really great side quest. Now we are getting serious and we have a really great line-up, we are having so much fun right now.
Steph: Having been together for so long, even with time off here and there, what would you say have been some of your highlights as a band?
Simon: It always has to be the international tours, when you do an international tour support and play somewhere like Amplifier or Magnet House. Just sitting in the green room and knowing that these guys that you have watched so many times and listened to their music so many times are sitting just in that room across from you. And so, any time that an international tour comes, we want to see fans come out in force. We love playing in a packed house with a great sound system with everything dialled in, that is absolutely it. So, for us, Eluveitie, that was a wonderful support. Enslaved at the Rosemount was great, and just all the things like that. Another highlight was playing Blazing Swan this year – we were the first band to play Blazing Swan in eight years!
Steph: What is coming up in the near future for Wrath of Fenrir?
Simon: We have our first full length coming out, everything is written, demos are written, everyone knows their bits. We have trialled some of them live, we are going to unleash some at this show as well and see how they go, because you are kind of reading the audience and seeing how they respond. Like maybe we need this bit to be faster, or this bit was too long, did we lose them? So, we are going to trial all of those out and then we have started the recording session actually this afternoon.
Steph: If you could pick any 5 musicians past or present that you could add to a line-up, who would be your picks?
Simon: You have got to start with Iron Maiden, I don’t think any of us or this gets anywhere without Iron Maiden… Black Sabbath, those guys. I think there are so many bands that heard guitar solos spinning around, dual guitars harmonies and the way they structure their songs, singing about historical lyrics… That was a real catalyst! You have got to have them as a head liner. Then I would probably go into some Scandinavian kind of stuff. But I went to a gig last year in America called Power Trip and saw Metallica and Tool back-to-back. Tool is probably the most incredible band that is getting around, are they this generation’s Led Zeppelin, you know? Probably. So, I would probably say Iron Maiden, Tool and then a bunch of Scandinavian stuff – Amon Amarth, Wintersun, something like that. That’s probably our dream line-up.
Steph: Having worked with so many incredible bands already, who has been the standout?
Simon: I think it has got to be Eluveitie because of the way that there are so many people in that band. And they are playing with tangle harpers and Viking instruments and coming out of Switzerland. They are just such professionals; they are super cool and we had a great time hanging out with them. We have also supported Fintroll as well, which you have got to shout out for those guys because they are a phenomenal band who started doing something really unique. Actually, some mates of ours from Advent Sorrow nearly drowned them at Penguin Island, because the tide came up when they were crossing the sandbar back so that was a bit of a shock! That was Tom Langridge who is in our band now, and Adam Thorne, who led them across just to show them Penguin Island and then the tide came up and nearly washed them away. Then they rocked up to the gig that night, so sun burnt. They were not prepared for Australia; those guys are from Finland!
But anyone that comes to Australia, we want to show them a good time because for them it’s a long way, they are playing in the heat. We have seen bands playing in body paint and furs on 40-degree days at Soundwave and things like that. So we just want to be a good host and put on a good show. But learning from those guys and learning how to be professional and trying to get into international waters for music representation – that is something that I think is really important.
Steph: Tell me about your writing style?
Simon: I play guitar and the way I love to do it – I grew up with punk in the 90s, so skate punk, Tony Hawk kind of stuff. The surf scene in Freo was kind of a go, so we just would go into a room, drink a bunch of beers, and then write music. And I still love that way. But the modern way that its going is that you sit at your computer, you just put down a click track, and you lay down some licks. You send that to this guy, he sends it to this guy, and sends it around. And I just cannot write like that, which is kind of why it took so long to get the music out. But I just thought ‘this is it’ and embraced the learning curve and deep dived. And it started to get there, and I’ve started to actually enjoy it too, getting excited about plug ins and different tech and bits and pieces.
I think that’s where the momentum is coming from, like that. And Aidan, our old guitarist, taught us all that kind of stuff too. Now though, we all just sit down and write our individual parts but then we bring them into a jam room, and we think this will go with this, or this will go with that. But I have got a very good relationship with our drummer, Herb, who is a phenomenal drummer, you will get to see him at Stormrider. Most of our new album got written in a room during Covid when you could only have 2 people together playing music. For us, Covid was really the time off of our intense daily lives. We got a chance to just sit back and play a whole bunch of stuff. That was really wonderful, it was the side quest that has just sort of become the main event.
Steph: If there was any other instrument you could choose to play, instead of guitars, what would you choose?
Simon: I always liked the French horn, I just think that is so epic! I saw Hans Zimmer play at the Perth Arena and the dude who was sitting on that giant French horn with that big sound, I was like that looks pretty fun. I think that would be up my alley.
Steph: How did you guys become involved with the Stormrider Festival?
Simon: We actually come from fairly similar DNA with Silent Knight because we had a real epiphany moment at an Iron Maiden show and they got everyone up on stage and we could all sing in chorus together, Stu was in that too. I grew up reading fantasy books and playing Magic cards and Warhammer, I always loved dragons, mages and wizards and all that kind of stuff. Stu went down the route of doing power metal and shredding. I couldn’t shred because I came from a punk background, so I went into riffs, chugging and triplets and then got into bands like Wintersun which is the blend, and the heavy vocals. I think that is one difference, but we actually come from a very similar place. We have got a lot of admiration for Stu and Silent Knight, he works tirelessly with that band and Stormrider as an outreach of that, plus Merch Raven and things that he has got going on. When he contacted us, we knew that he would put on a really intense show, intense marketing campaign, its going to have an awesome line-up, bands from over east. He is just such a machine that we couldn’t not be a part of that, and we just love Silent Knight, we love what they do, we love every part of that band. They are all our friends, we are so proud to be part of it and included in the Stormrider family.
Steph: Is there any band that you are looking forward to seeing on the Stormrider stage?
Simon: Yes – Black Majesty! They are on after us so we are going to have to ditch our instruments and go but Black Majesty was a power metal band from over east and they got started around the early 2000’s. So, when we were in high school we were listening to Black Majesty while playing Magic cards and so now we get to actually share a stage with them which is absolutely bananas and a childhood dream!
A big thank you to Simon from Wrath of Fenrir and Stu from Stormrider Touring. Be sure to get along to Stormrider Heavy Metal Festival, happening Friday 23rd and Saturday 24th August 2024 at Amplifier over both nights, celebrating Stormrider’s 10 year anniversary. You can catch Wrath of Fenrir playing the Stormrider stage on the Friday night. Tickets available here.
You can follow Wrath of Fenrir: Spotify | Twitch | YouTube | Facebook | Bandcamp
Photos: Supplied by band
