Martin Walkyier
| Martin Walkyier | |
|---|---|
| Birth name | Martin Walkyier |
| Born | 20 November 1967 |
| Genres |
Heavy metal Folk metal Thrash metal |
| Occupation(s) | Vocalist, Songwriter |
| Years active | 1985–present |
| Associated acts |
Skyclad Sabbat |
Martin Walkyier (born 20 November 1967) is an English singer known for his bands Sabbat and Skyclad and for his lyrics.Metal Hammer journalist Detlef Dengler called Walkyier a "great lyricist" known for his multitude of words and "brilliant puns"; yet Walkyier was never asked to write lyrics for other bands, "unfortunately", as he says.
Walkyier was born on 20 November 1967 as the only child of Roy and Eve Walkyier. At the age of eight he began to be interested in acting and poetry and started to play guitar. Fascinated by bands like Witchfynde, he formed Hydra with Fraser Craske and later Sabbat. Walkyier quit his job as a truck driver to invest more time in his music although he would have no secure income. He left Sabbat in 1990 and returned with Skyclad, a band that mixed heavy metal with folk music and pioneered folk metal. After the release of ten albums, Walkyier was broke; he later said that "[T]he insight that you can't live on dreaming came too late. Unfair contracts, incompetent advisers, wrong decisions and my naivety almost broke my neck. I ended up feeling like in a marriage not divorced because of the children." Skyclad were only a hobby for the other members. Walkyier left Skyclad and started working as a nightwatchman for a furniture store, gave occasional concerts under the name Return to the Sabbat and started the company Prick Tees, which designs and produces T-shirts.
Walkyier helped out Iscariah when the latter moved to England with his family: Walkyier got him a flat and a job for Iscariah's wife. It took two years to organise everything before they could seriously work on Walkyier's new band, The Clan Destined. Walkyier had to help his frail mother and his ill father while The Clan Destined got into the background. According to Walkyier, Iscariah left without telling him why and abandoned him. However, he finished In the Big Ending, but was disillusioned and announced it would be his last musical work, but had promise at his father's deathbed that he would continue. Roy Walkyier died in early 2007. Martin Walkyier structured and arranged the music composed by Iscariah. Andy Sneap wanted to produce the recordings but had to work with Nevermore; James Murphy, a friend of Sneap's, offered Walkyier his help. The final album features a DVD with a video to the song "A Beautiful Start to the End of the World", inspired by the novel Aimée und Jaguar. Although, according to Metal Hammer journalist Detlef Dengler, the video "is professional and looks very expensive", it cost "almost nothing" according to Walkyier, as The Clan Destined consist of Pagans with a common life philosophy: "artists, designers and film makers".
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