History Music / Alestorm

* AdaptationalHeroism: In ''Leviathan'' the pirates were presented as PunchClockHero Punch-Clock Heros who were only hunting the Leviathan because they were paid to do so. But then in the sequel ''Death-Throes of the Terror Squid'' its suddenly revealed that Leviathan was about to [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt destroy the world]] when the pirates managed to kill it.

* DarkerAndEdgier: Their second album is noticeably heavier and more aggressive than their first, and the third follows suit. Come the fourth, though, they started to lean more on sillier songs, to the point that their ''fifth'' album can more or less be considered [[ARarePhrase a piratical heavy metal comedy album]].

* DarkerAndEdgier: Their second album is noticeably heavier and more aggressive than their first, and the third follows suit.

* ALighterShadeOfBlack: Evil as the pirates are, they did dave the world. [[TheWorldIsAlwaysDoomed Twice.]]

** They also have midget doubles portray the band in their "Alestorm" official music video.

** The song "Back Through Time", concerning a ship of pirates that travel through time and wind up fighting and defeating a ship of vikings, is clearly mocking the many bands that sing about vikings and Myth/NorseMythology.

* AlienInvasion: "Surf Squid Warfare" is about a invasion of space squids, which the pirates have to travel to the future to battle.
* AnArmAndALeg: "Midget Saw" (which is about a group of pirates who saw a man's legs off after he kills a monkey) and "Wooden Leg" (about a man who loses his legs to a pair of Spanish broadsides, and then loses his arms to a {{Samurai}} in a BarBrawl).
* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: From "Keelhauled":

** And done again in "Rage of the Pentahook":

* CallBack: "Huntmaster" is about a famous man on a quest to "bring back beer to the lands of the free". In "That Famous Ol' Spiced", the titular drink is touted as "a beverage to rival the Huntmaster's draft".
** The entire second verse of "Drink" references several songs from previous albums.
* ClusterFBomb: "Fucked With an Anchor" is an entire song that consists of a pirate with HollywoodTourettes threatening to [[AssShove shove an anchor up the arse]] of the Witch Doctor that cursed him. The chorus of the song provides a good example, shown under LyricalDissonance.

* CombatPragmatist: "Back Through Time" features 17th century pirates deploying ''cannons'' against Vikings. CurbStompBattle ensues.

* CoverVersion: Many. "[[Series/SesameStreet P is for Pirate]]" is one with slightly modified lyrics (it is now pirate-themed instead of cookie-themed). "[[Series/LazyTown You Are a Pirate]]," "[[Music/StanRogers Barrett's Privateers]]," and "Wolves of the Sea" are the most famous of their covers. They also did a version of "[[Music/TheVillagePeople In the Navy]]." Suffice to say, if there's a nautical-themed song, a nautical-themed children's song, or a children's song that can be [[BuffySPeak piratified]], Alestorm stands a good chance of covering it, often hilariously. There is also their version of "I Am A Cider Drinker", originally by [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wurzels the Wurzels]] (which was itself a parody of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Baker_%28musician%29 George Baker's]] "Paloma Blanca").
** ''Sunset on the Golden Age'' features a cover of Taio Cruz's "Hangover".

** The first and only raid of the titular crew of "[[Music/StanRogers Barrett's Privateers]]" goes this route.
* DarkerAndEdgier: Their second album is noticeably heavier and more aggresive than their first, and the third follows suit.

* FaceDeathWithDignity: The pirate crew in "Captain Morgan's Revenge".

* {{Gorn}}: The lyrics to "Midget Saw":

* HeavyMithril: Lyrically, Alestorm are typically more grounded than the average PowerMetal band...but when they go for the mithril, they go ''hard'' for the mithril.
* HeelFaceTurn: Implied at the end of the music video for "Drink" where one of the pirates (Chirstopher Bowes) is shown wearing a suit and having dinner with the very family they'd terrorized earlier.
* HollywoodTourettes: The pirate in "Fucked with an Anchor" has been cursed to be incredibly foul-mouthed by a witch doctor.
* HookHand: The main zombie pirate on the cover of "Black Sails At Midnight" has a trident replacing one hand, He also has a sword but you can't see if he's holding it or if it's a BladeBelowTheShoulder.

* HookersAndBlow: "Wenches and Mead"
* HorribleHistoryMetal: They ventured in this genre with "1741 (The Battle of Cartagenea)", about the battle [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cartagena_de_Indias of the same name]].

* IntercourseWithYou: "Questing Upon The Poop Deck" is most [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial certainly not about]] a type of sexual activity.

* LittlePeopleAreSurreal: A midget shows up in "Shipwrecked", [[spoiler: in a hallucination]].

** ''Back Through Time'' ends with "Death Throes of the Terrorsquid". (7:45)
** ''Sunset on the Golden Age'' ends with "Sunset on the Golden Age". (11:26)
** ''No Grave But The Sea'' ends with "Treasure Island". (7:48)

* MemeAcknowledgment: The Limited Edition version of Back Through Time includes a cover of [[Series/LazyTown You Are a Pirate]].

* TheMutiny: Kicks off "Captain Morgan's Revenge". When the pirates make the captain walk the plank, he pronounces a dying {{curse}} upon them all.

* OdeToIntoxication: "Rum", and the cover song "I Am A Cider Drinker", ''Drink''.

* OnceUponATime: "In a time men knew the meaning of fear!" the opening lines of "Huntmaster".

* APirate400YearsTooLate: A few of their songs are sung from a modern perspective, like "The Sunk'n Norwegian," about how hard it is to find any place good enough to be a modern pirate.

* ProgressiveInstrumentation: "Buckfast Powersmash" has the sequence guitar > drums > keyboards > bass > voice.

* SequelSong: "Death Throes of the Terrorsquid" is a sequel to "Leviathan", as both songs feature a beast called "Leviathan" and follow some sort of chronology. "Leviathan" has the pirate crew hunt down an ancient beast of yore to battle it, but lose the battle and the beast escapes after slaughtering most of the crew. "Death Throes of the Terrorsquid" concerns the Crew's RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the beast, and the second round of the battle.
** "Surf Squid Warfare" is a sequel to "Back Through Time", where the pirates travel into the future to fight [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot undead squids from space]].

** They also reference Music/RunningWild in "Scraping the Barrel".

* SkyPirates: "Heavy Metal Pirates" seems to be about them ("We're the Heavy Metal Pirates, we sail across the sky!")

-->You put your faith in Odin and Thor
-->We put ours in cannons and whores
-->Your viking gods won't save you now
-->When pirates strike from the starboard bow
** The 7-second long "Rumpelkombo" is this. Once, Alestorm was touring with Music/GraveDigger, and they were basically the opposite of Alestorm: old, cranky, and hated drinking and partying, so the entire tour pretty much consisted of Music/GraveDigger hating Alestorm. During an interview, the lead singer, Chris Boltendahl described Alestorm as a "rumpelkombo," which basically means "group of rowdy idiots." Well, Christopher Bowes then decided to write the really quick song where the only word is "rumpelkombo," but then credited the lyrics to Boltendahl, thus giving him a royalty check every month that's a couple of cents from Alestorm, reminding him of them every month.

* TookALevelInBadass: "Leviathan" and "Death Throes of the Terrorsquid" concern the same crew. In the first the monster slaughters them with impunity, but in the second [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu the crew takes revenge]]. The chorus makes it clear: The chorus in the first song is about the beast's fearsome slaughter, the chorus in the second is the crew's BadassBoast.

--> I will not say what he has done
--> His sins are far too great to tell
--> It's not my place to judge a man
--> But for them he will burn in Hell

* VictoriasSecretCompartment: In the video for "Shipwrecked", several of the wenches are shown secreting coins in their cleavage.
* ViewersAreGeniuses: "The Huntmaster" ends by quoting the English translation of the poem inscribed on bottles of Jägermeister, which itself is the German word for "Huntmaster".
* VillainProtagonist: The songs are aware they are talking about a bunch of selfish, petty and murderous thieves. The clearest example is "Pirate's Song", which describes a RetiredMonster of a pirate elaborating on his numerous crimes and how he doesn't feel an ounce of remorse.
* WalkThePlank: In ''Captain Morgan's Revenge'' and ''Keelhauled'', in the latter case as a pretext to something [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keelhauling far worse]]. In ''Sunset On The Golden Age'' they now have a track ''named'' "Walk the Plank".

* WordSaladLyrics: The pre-choruses of ''Pegleg Potion''

* AssShove: What the singer in ''Fucked With An Anchor'' is planning to do to the witch doctor who cursed him. [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin With an anchor]].

* NoodleIncident: During the Live At Summer Breeze 2015 CD for the 10th Anniversary Edition of ''Captain Morgan's Revenge'' before the segue into "Drink", Christopher mentions that the group isn't there to "stick potatoes inside the bottoms of the concert goers sexy girlfriends", stating it's happened before. Elliot then quips "yup", leading to Christopher to say "Jesus Elliot".

Formed in 2004 under the name Battleheart, they released a bunch of [=EPs=] (The first of which, ''Battleheart'', gave rise to the term 'True Scottish Pirate Metal, parodying the term 'True Norwegian BlackMetal') before signing themselves to Napalm Records and rechristening themselves Alestorm.

* TheMutiny: Kicks off "Captain Morgan's Revenge." When the pirates make the captain walk the plank, he pronounces a dying {{curse}} upon them all.

* APirate400YearsTooLate
* PirateSong: A pirate-themed PowerMetal band that patterns its songs after these, with sea shanty beats and lyrics about [[https://youtube.com/watch?v=GTyMhv7MCCs the golden age of piracy]] and [[https://youtube.com/watch?v=Od7I54LHTTU warfare]]. And sometimes sillier things like [[https://youtube.com/watch?v=f55CqLc6IR0 stealing beer]]. They have also made {{Cover Version}}s of other famous pirate songs, like "[[Series/LazyTown We Are a Pirate]]", "[[Music/StanRogers Barrett's Privateers]]" and "Wolves of the Sea".

** The 7-second long "Rumpelkombo" is this. Once, Alestorm was touring with GraveDigger, and they were basically the opposite of Alestorm: old, cranky, and hated drinking and partying, so the entire tour pretty much consisted of GraveDigger hating Alestorm. During an interview, the lead singer, Chris Boltendahl described Alestorm as a "rumpelkombo," which basically means "group of rowdy idiots." Well, Christopher Bowes then decided to write the really quick song where the only word is "rumpelkombo," but then credited the lyrics to Boltendahl, thus giving him a royalty check every month that's a couple of cents from Alestorm, reminding him of them every month.

** The first and only raid of the titular crew of "[[StanRogers Barrett's Privateers]]" goes this route.

* [[ViewersAreGeniuses Listeners Are Geniuses]]: "The Huntmaster" ends by quoting the English translation of the poem inscribed on bottles of Jägermeister, which itself is the German word for "Huntmaster".

* BadassGrandpa: TheCaptain on the videoclip of ''Death Throes of the Terrorsquid'' [[spoiler: In fact, he is the [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu slayer]] of the aforementioned squid]]

* RedemptionEqualsDeath: The protagonists of ''Magnetic North'' mention to be seeking redemption in the titular location, but the song frequently note they'll most certainly die along the way.

* {{Deconstruction}}: While they do sing about the joys and adventures of piracy, Pirate's Song is a rather brutal deconstruction of the whole romantic pirate, showing the singing protagonist as a ruthless monster who lost all his glory in his old age.