History Music / Alestorm

* AdaptationalHeroism: In ''Leviathan'' the pirates were presented as [[PunchClockHero Punch-Clock Heroes]] 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.
** Similarly in ''Back Through Time'' the pirates are presented as unrepentant murderers and thieves engaging in RapePillageAndBurn on the defenseless Vikings. Come 'Surf Squid Warfare' and it's mentioned they 'saved the past from Vikings'. Considering that most of their songs are [[WrittenByTheWinners told from the POV of the pirates themselves]], [[FridgeBrilliance this makes a degree of sense.]]
* 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).

** ''Treasure Chest Party Quest'' contains this wonderful set of lines:

* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: From ''Keelhauled'':

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

* AsLongAsItSoundsForeign: ''Pegleg Potion'' is set in "the land of Sgriubh-á-dubh", a superficially Scottish Gaelic version of the nonsense word "scrubadub".

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

* BadassBoast: Many of them feature this, but perhaps the most memorable is ''Back Through Time'', specially the chorus:

** 'We're on a quest to kick your ass' (''Pirate Metal Drinking Crew'')

* BittersweetEnding: ''Man the Pumps'':

* BlackComedy: The pirate from ''Wooden Leg Part 2'' cuts off his head and replaces it with a wooden prosthetic to try to escape the spirits haunting him. He dies.

* 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.

** ''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 Music/TheWurzels (which was itself a parody of [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Baker_%28musician%29 George Baker's]] ''Paloma Blanca''). Many of the modern-genre songs the band covers have a suitably nautical twist to the instrumentation; for example, ''Bassline Junkie'' has a jaunty squeezebox line in place of the crunchy bass.
** ''Sunset on the Golden Age'' features a cover of Taio Cruz's ''Hangover''.

** ''Captain Morgan's Revenge'', Captain Morgan, forced to walk the plank, curses his mutinous crew to "death or worse".
** The curse on the treasure in ''Of Treasure'' as well. We're not told explicitly what it is, but apparently it's quite terrible.
** The pirate singing in ''Fucked With an Anchor'' has been cursed with HollywoodTourettes by a witch doctor.
** In ''Wooden Leg Part II'' we see how the protagonist's new limbs have been possessed:

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

** In ''Big Ship, Little Ship'', Christopher says that "living on a boat would float my boat".
** In ''Come to Brazil'': 'It's time for pirate party time!'
* {{Determinator}}: Some characters in songs, like the Huntmaster and the narrator in ''Chronicles of Vengeance''.
* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu: ''Leviathan'' sets up for this in its sequel, ''Death Throes of the Terrorsquid''.

* DownerEnding: A sizeable number of their songs talk about people who go on quests but end up dying brutally along the way. Such as: ''Death Before the Mast'', ''Magnetic North'', ''To The End Of Our Days'', ''Leviathan'' and so forth.
** ''Wooden Leg Part 2: The Woodening'' has this. The pirate manages to get revenge on the men who mutilated him then uses HollywoodVoodoo to [[BodyHorror attach their limbs to himself]]. But the magic he uses awakens a curse that causes the limbs to be possessed by the spirits of their original owners. The spirits drive him to insanity and [[DrivenToSuicide suicide]] by chopping off his own head.

* EpicRocking: A ''lot'' of Alestorm's songs go past the 6 minute mark. ''Captain Morgan's Revenge'' (6:49), ''To the End of Our Days'' (6:22), ''Chronicles of Vengeance'' (6:24), ''Death Throes of the Terrorsquid'' (7:45), ''1741 (The Battle of Cartagena)'' (7:18), ''Sunset on the Golden Age'' ('''11:26'''), ''To the End of the World'' (6:43), ''Treasure Island'' (7:48)... Essentially, it's at least [[OnceAnEpisode Once An Album]].

* ForcedTransformation: Happens to the female protagonist in the video to ''Magellan's Expedition''. After she takes on a giant rubber duck with twin swords and an assault rifle, it promptly blasts her with eye lasers that turn her into a duck.

* GaiasVengeance: Suggested as the origin of the “dendrophagic horde” that ate the titular ship of ''Zombies Ate My Pirate Ship''. According to legend, grim and frostbitten druids invoked this trope—through a pact with roaming zombie hordes to eat stolen wood, the forest would reclaim its own.
* GargleBlaster: The titular ''Pegleg Potion'' is described as a "toxic punch" that "looks a bit like gravy, and tastes like Captain Crunch". Its recipe:

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

* GratuitousLatin: OminousLatinChanting is used for the outro of ''Magellan's Expedition'' as follows: "Spatium portibus fictus, venenum coetus unum, vox imperium capulus machina, nitidissimus de omnium algae, circumnavigandum infinita quest." Which isn't as impressive when fed through a Latin to English translation:

* GrimUpNorth: ''Magnetic North'' is about a Pirate crew questing to "Magnetic North" and subsequently facing a frozen sea, and probably dying along the way.

* 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.
* HollywoodVoodoo: The pirate in ''Wooden Leg Part II'' decides he's going to replace his inadequate wooden limbs by killing the people who are responsible for the loss of his originals, taking ''their'' arms and legs and sticking them back onto himself.

** ''Wolves of the Sea'' contains the lyrics "The hook of our Captain is looking at you"
** ''Rage of the Pentahook''. The Pentahook has five hooks. Just on his right hand.

* HorribleHistoryMetal: They ventured in this genre with ''1741 (The Battle of Cartagena)'', about the battle [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Cartagena_de_Indias of the same name]].
* InsaneAdmiral: Or Captain, but with the same purpose. In ''1741 (The Battle of Cartagena)'', the Captain sails against the Spanish despite overwhelming evidence that he's going to lose, and so he dooms himself and his crew to a LastStand.
* 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]].
** They also have midget doubles portray the band in their ''Alestorm'' official music video that have the band proper fight them.

** ''Tortuga'' tells the story of a pirate fleeing the Royal Navy, who doesn't help his case by stealing a ship (and murdering the crew) and heading for the titular legendary pirate stronghold.

** ''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)
* LyricalDissonance: ''Fucked With An Anchor'' opens with an very upbeat tune... and these lyrics:

* MoodWhiplash: Present in ''Black Sails At Midnight'', where from the blood-pumping and bombastic ''Keelhauled'' we go to the somber and depressive ''To The End Of Our Days''. Also in ''Sunset On The Golden Age'', after the silly and ridiculous cover of ''Hangover'' the album goes to the title track, which is ''eleven minutes long'' and one of the few grim and serious Alestorm songs.
* TheMutiny: Kicks off ''Captain Morgan's Revenge''. When the pirates make the captain walk the plank, he pronounces a dying {{curse}} upon them all.

* TheNeedForMead: ''Wenches and Mead''. Also ''Mead From Hell''.
* NeverSmileAtACrocodile: ''Chomp Chomp'' features a mob of alligators (along with other crocodilians) that devours a ship's crew in gruesome fashion, leaving the narrator the SoleSurvivor.

* 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''.

** When the titular monster awakens, ''Death Throes of the Terrorsquid'' abruptly becomes a Dimmu Borgir song.
** Their cover of ''Hangover'' features a brief rapping portion by the bassist of Lagerstein, tourmates with Alestorm.
** ''Tortuga'' features a rap section by Captain Yarrface of Rumahoy.
** Recent albums have songs featuring snatches of chiptune, notably ''1741'' and ''Mexico'', which both lead off with it. This is blown up macro-sized with the '16th Century' bonus CD of Crystal Coconut, where ''every song'' is redone in chip and the vocals bitcrushed. As an added bonus, the chiptune portion of the original ''Wooden Leg Part II'' is inverted and delivered with some quite nice acoustic guitar.
** The acoustic version of ''Come to Brazil'' on Seventh Rum features some Zappa-esque turbo saxophone, ''and it works''.
* 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.

* RedemptionEqualsDeath: The protagonists of ''Magnetic North'' mention to be seeking redemption in the titular location, but the song frequently notes they'll most certainly die along the way.
* RedemptionQuest: ''Magnetic North'' is a minor example. The singer wants to go "far beyond the ice and snow" for redemption.

* RhymingWithItself: Subverted. The initial lyrics from ''Shit Boat (No Fans)'' were "You'd better give us all the money in your treasure chest / Or Kristoff's gonna take a shit on your fucking chest" before the band was advised to tone down the song.
** Played straight in ''Mexico'', where one part has two lines both ending with "the alcohol is free".
** ''Big Ship Little Ship'' has one section where "boat" is rhymed with "boat".

* RockBeatsLaser: 17th Century pirates halt an alien invasion of space squids in ''Surf Squid Warfare''.

* 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]].
** ''Wooden Leg Part 2: The Woodening''.

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

** Chris has [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Alestorm/comments/dd8nzk/stupid_question_about_pegleg_potion/ admitted]] that parts to the lyrics of Pegleg Potion (specifically "I sail the seas of Scrub-a-Dub Island" and "always [on the] search [for] treasure") are stolen from the description on a bottle of ''Matey'' bubble bath. [[NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer Yes, really.]]

** ''Curse of the Crystal Coconut'' contains several to Franchise/DonkeyKong. The track ''Pirate's Scorn'' is a cover of a song from the ''WesternAnimation/DonkeyKongCountry'' TV series, the title of the album is almost directly the name of an episode from the same show (replacing "Legend" with "Curse"), and the album artwork features a Crystal Coconut from ''VideoGame/DonkeyKong64'', a gorilla skeleton wearing a tie, a few Kremlings, a TNT barrel, and a DK Coin.

* SilverFox: The eponymous ''Nancy The Tavern Wench'', "A lovely bar-maiden/She may be old/But her beauty ain't fadin'."

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

* SongOfSongTitles: ''Drink'' name-drops several past Alestorm songs.
* StepUpToTheMicrophone: For the last chorus of ''Rum'', Elliot Vernon sings the lead vocals as well as handling the main keyboards while Bowes crowdsurfs (and usually tells the audience to "take him to the bar").

** ''Swashbuckled'' is a playful repartee at Alestorm's friends, fellow pirate band Swashbuckle, in response to the latter's ''We Are The Storm''.
*** ''Scraping the Barrel'', off of Back Through Time, is a response to some of the band's criticism as being a "gimmicky band" that will eventually become dry. Their response? "If you don't like it, go start your own band."

** 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, [[{{Troll}} 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 the band.
** The song ''Treasure Chest, Party Quest'' is a deliberate example, with LeaningOnTheFourthWall humor about selling out and a trashy music video intended to scare off fans that take the band too seriously.

* TitledAfterTheSong: Inverted with ''Alestorm'', a song titled after the band.
* 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.

* UnreliableNarrator: Interestingly enough, we're never told exactly why the perpetrator is being keelhauled in ''Keelhauled.'' We pretty much just have the narrator's word for it that he did something bad.

* VerbedTitle: ''Keelhauled'', ''Shipwrecked''.
* 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".

** ''Bar Und Imbiss'' is a first-person account of the ransacking of a bar and kidnapping of the bartender's ugly wife somewhere in dark Thuringia.

* 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''.
* WouldHurtAChild: One of the verses of ''Pirate's Song'' is "I've killed and I've shot, and reddened the cold tears of children with blood!", driving home just how much of a RetiredMonster our protagonist is.
** The subject of ''Rage of the Pentahook'' will "eat your kids". The narrator also notes that "one time he shot a baby - with a gun!"
* WretchedHive: A lot of these tend to show up in the songs, such as the cafe in ''Nancy the Tavern Wench'' and the inn where ''That Famous Ol' Spiced'' is apparently served, not to mention the titular tavern known as ''The Sunken Norwegian.''
* WordSaladLyrics: The pre-choruses of ''Pegleg Potion''. Probably as a result of ''drinking'' said [[GargleBlaster pegleg potion]]....

** ''Treasure Chest Party Quest'' contains the wonderful line, 'In my Lamborghini, flintlock by my side'

* BalefulPolymorph: Happens to the female protagonist in the video to ''Magellan's Expedition''. After she takes on a giant rubber duck with twin swords and an assault rifle, it promptly blasts her with eye lasers that turn her into a duck.

* AnimatedMusicVideo: Shit Boat (No Fans), is a shorter music video that is entirely animated, featuring animated versions of Christopher and the rest of the band.

* AnimatedMusicVideo:
** Shit Boat (No Fans), is a shorter music video that is entirely animated, featuring animated versions of Christopher and the rest of the band.
** P.A.R.T.Y. is a music video featuring skeletal pirates performing the song.
*** That video was actually made by a fan, Alex Henderson, who also [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5-X58Tw6RQ&t=5s&ab_channel=AlexHendersonAnimation made a video for Pirate's Scorn.]] The band liked it so much [[AscendedFanboy they hired him to make their next video.]]

* 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''). Many of the modern-genre songs the band covers have a suitably nautical twist to the instrumentation; for example, ''Bassline Junkie'' has a jaunty squeezebox line in place of the crunchy bass.

** Seventh Rum of a Seventh Rum's subtitles feature a twofer: an embedded recipe for what appears to be Baked Alaska, and the lyrics to a completely different song, complete with '-- oh shit wrong song'.

** In The Battle of Cape Fear River: one of the ways Blackbeard might die is projected to be a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHUofC27NwY 'shotgun in the bum']]. asdfgfa is one of Chris Bowes' many side projects.

** In "Big Ship, Little Ship", Christopher says that "living on a boat would float my boat".

** A combination CallBack and ShoutOut in The Battle of Cape Fear River: one of the ways Blackbeard might die is projected to be a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHUofC27NwY 'shotgun in the bum']]. asdfgfa is one of Chris Bowes' many side projects.

** ''Stick a cannonball up your cunt // Put your dick in a blender''

* StylisticSuck: Their music videos started displaying this in 2020, due to the COVID pandemic making it harder to produce proper music videos using a larger film crew.

As Alestorm, they have released one [=EP=] and five studio albums:

* BilingualBonus: After the protagonist of the Wooden Leg saga gets his vengeance on the people who cut off his arms and legs and claims the limbs as his own, evil spirits visit to detail how his Japanese arms and Spanish legs are now cursed. The arm curse is outlined in Japanese and the leg one is delivered in Spanish.

* RetiredMonster: The narrator of ''Pirate Song''.

* FiveManBand:
** TheLeader: Christopher
** TheLancer: Gazz
** TheSmartGuy: Elliot
** TheBigGuy: Pete
** [[SixthRanger Fifth Ranger]]: Mate

* MohsScaleOfRockAndMetalHardness: Generally 7 or 8, with "Death Throes of the Terrorsquid" ratcheting up to a 9 during a particular portion past the second chorus which sounds more akin to BlackMetal.

** Similarly in ''Back Through Time'' the pirates are presented as unrepentant murderers and thieves engaging in RapePillageAndBurn on the defenseless Vikings. Come 'Surf Squid Warfare' and it's mentioned they 'saved the past from Vikings'.

* 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''). Many of the modern-genre songs the band covers have a suitably nautical twist to the instrumentation; for example, ''Bassline Junkie'' has a jaunty squeezebox line in place of the crunchy bass.

* BadassBeard: [[http://www.spirit-of-metal.com/membre_groupe/photo/Dani_Evans-14620.jpg Dani Evans]], Christopher Bowes, the zombie pirate that appears on all of their CD covers all have one.