Let's talk Bagpipes
Believe it or not but bagpipes are my favorite instruments. I'm not kidding. I love 'em and everything that involves them. One of my life-plans is to buy myself a motor (the plan splits in 2 here: if I make a lot of money: a ducati, if I don't: a honda, who cares) and just take the ferry to Scotland. To just drive where the highlands take me. First pub I come across that has bagpipe music is gonna be happy because the first round is on me.
I only have one problem... Bagpipe without any other instruments or vocals tend to bore after a while... Not many bands use the bagpipes in their music, no wonder since it is a very hard instrument to play.
You might get into the right mood when you listen to this little piece of music: from the movie Braveheart.
I'm going to list some bands that I know who use bagpipes in their music! You do the same
Let's start with the most obvious band of them all: The DropKick Murphy's.
They are American and play Celtic punk. And by playing Celtic punk they are highly influenced by old Scottish folklore and their typical instruments.
I'm not really into the Dropkick Murphy's so I can't really tell you anything more then: it's punk.
I'd rather talk about more music-orientated bands such as Blind guardian..
The Piper's Calling is a song by this world famous metalband (although on this forum they probably aren't well known), and it's a great song, but yet again it only consists of bagpipe and no other instrument or vocals... Weird as it is, I'll have to find some other famous band with pipes in it... Such as ... koRn... (it was inevitable, I'm sorry) the song "my gift to you" has some in it, but I don't like that song, so here's "dead" :
Though I like the effort, I'm not convinced... Never really liked korn anyway
Next in line: Graveworm, never let's you down. At least not when you are looking for screamo death metal covers of Iron Maiden with bagpipes in it...
Ow wait... Graveworm DOES let me down, because bagpipes don't fit the death metal scene at all in my eyes (and ears). And as for the dropkick vs Graveworm screaming contest: graveworm wins. (they should be proud.)
The Scorpions, a German heavy metal group, used bagpipes to open their song Wild Child on their album Pure Instinct. Good for them. Less interesting for us. Metal again.
Let's see, maybe the rock scene:
Paul McCartney's song "Mull of Kintyre" (1977) with the band Wings, made strong use of bagpipes for a characteristically Scottish sound.
And Peter Gabriel's "Come Talk to Me," from his 1992 album Us, features an opening passage played by bagpipes. He also incorporates bagpipe-like synthesizer effects on his track "Biko" from his third self-titled album.
That's about all I could think off within the rock scene. And none of them are more then one-time bagpipes.
Within the jazz scene there are plenty of musicians who use the pipes.
U.S. musician Rufus Harley (1936-2006) was the first jazz performer to use the Great Highland Bagpipes as his primary instrument, and I love him because of it.
Malika by Rufus Harley
Ow and Wuthering Heights (not the book, not the play, the band!) has an album starting out with a pipe-solo. But they are metal again.
But the only band unavoidable to me is IN EXTREMO.
Again they are a metal band (it is obvious: only metal bands dare to use instruments not known by the wide public. other examples: Kerry King uses them sometimes (see pic down below..) or the metal band Corvus Corax)
But in the contrary of the former bands or persons I mentioned (apart from Rufus) I really like what IN EXTREMO does with the pipes! They use flutes and bagpipes in many of their songs and they really do it well.
OMNIA SOL TEMPERAT - IN EXTREMO
as you are reading this you haven't reached the part where they sing, so I might as well prepare you: rammstein-alike singing is coming up.
But as long as that hasn't happened yet you are still listening to a great pipes song.
If you like metal they are a truly great band to know and listen to.
That's about everything I could come up with... I didn't mention Enya, but they play the braveheart song so I haven't forgotten about them..
Believe it or not but bagpipes are my favorite instruments. I'm not kidding. I love 'em and everything that involves them. One of my life-plans is to buy myself a motor (the plan splits in 2 here: if I make a lot of money: a ducati, if I don't: a honda, who cares) and just take the ferry to Scotland. To just drive where the highlands take me. First pub I come across that has bagpipe music is gonna be happy because the first round is on me.
I only have one problem... Bagpipe without any other instruments or vocals tend to bore after a while... Not many bands use the bagpipes in their music, no wonder since it is a very hard instrument to play.
You might get into the right mood when you listen to this little piece of music: from the movie Braveheart.
I'm going to list some bands that I know who use bagpipes in their music! You do the same
Let's start with the most obvious band of them all: The DropKick Murphy's.
They are American and play Celtic punk. And by playing Celtic punk they are highly influenced by old Scottish folklore and their typical instruments.
I'm not really into the Dropkick Murphy's so I can't really tell you anything more then: it's punk.
I'd rather talk about more music-orientated bands such as Blind guardian..
The Piper's Calling is a song by this world famous metalband (although on this forum they probably aren't well known), and it's a great song, but yet again it only consists of bagpipe and no other instrument or vocals... Weird as it is, I'll have to find some other famous band with pipes in it... Such as ... koRn... (it was inevitable, I'm sorry) the song "my gift to you" has some in it, but I don't like that song, so here's "dead" :
Though I like the effort, I'm not convinced... Never really liked korn anyway
Next in line: Graveworm, never let's you down. At least not when you are looking for screamo death metal covers of Iron Maiden with bagpipes in it...
Ow wait... Graveworm DOES let me down, because bagpipes don't fit the death metal scene at all in my eyes (and ears). And as for the dropkick vs Graveworm screaming contest: graveworm wins. (they should be proud.)
The Scorpions, a German heavy metal group, used bagpipes to open their song Wild Child on their album Pure Instinct. Good for them. Less interesting for us. Metal again.
Let's see, maybe the rock scene:
Paul McCartney's song "Mull of Kintyre" (1977) with the band Wings, made strong use of bagpipes for a characteristically Scottish sound.
And Peter Gabriel's "Come Talk to Me," from his 1992 album Us, features an opening passage played by bagpipes. He also incorporates bagpipe-like synthesizer effects on his track "Biko" from his third self-titled album.
That's about all I could think off within the rock scene. And none of them are more then one-time bagpipes.
Within the jazz scene there are plenty of musicians who use the pipes.
U.S. musician Rufus Harley (1936-2006) was the first jazz performer to use the Great Highland Bagpipes as his primary instrument, and I love him because of it.
Malika by Rufus Harley
Ow and Wuthering Heights (not the book, not the play, the band!) has an album starting out with a pipe-solo. But they are metal again.
But the only band unavoidable to me is IN EXTREMO.
Again they are a metal band (it is obvious: only metal bands dare to use instruments not known by the wide public. other examples: Kerry King uses them sometimes (see pic down below..) or the metal band Corvus Corax)
But in the contrary of the former bands or persons I mentioned (apart from Rufus) I really like what IN EXTREMO does with the pipes! They use flutes and bagpipes in many of their songs and they really do it well.
OMNIA SOL TEMPERAT - IN EXTREMO
as you are reading this you haven't reached the part where they sing, so I might as well prepare you: rammstein-alike singing is coming up.
But as long as that hasn't happened yet you are still listening to a great pipes song.
If you like metal they are a truly great band to know and listen to.
You might click the play button again after the first run of Omnia Sol Temperat just to listen to the beginning again... And now that you are a little more used to the singing, you'll find that it all fits...The band's musical style combines metal with medieval traditional songs, blending the sound of the standard rock/metal instruments with historical instruments (such as the bagpipes, harp, hurdy-gurdy and shawm). Versions of well-known traditional/medieval ballads make up the main part of their repertoire, but the band has written an increasing share of original material in recent years. Their own material is written in German, whilst the traditional songs are in a variety of languages, including (but not limited to) Spanish, English, Norwegian, Swedish, Icelandic, French, Estonian, Hebrew, Gothic, Latin, Old High German, and Middle German.
That's about everything I could come up with... I didn't mention Enya, but they play the braveheart song so I haven't forgotten about them..