Heavy metal cosplay, mild déjà vu, and the slow erosion of my will to live.
275 days till W:O:A 2023.
At this point, working through the line-up feels less like preparation and more like a particularly niche endurance sport.
There’s no backing out now, though.
W:O:A 2023 is stacking up a suspicious number of all-female metal bands, so here I am—weakly raising my fist, mumbling a half-hearted #WomenOfMetal, and soldiering on.
Next up: Burning Witches.
Excitement level: tentatively optimistic. (Spoiler: it will not last.)
Meet the Burning Witches: Imitation, Flattery, and Mild Identity Crisis
Burning Witches are a Swiss heavy metal band, founded in 2016 by guitarist Romana Kalkuhl (who also plays in Atlas & Axis, if you're the sort of person who keeps a spreadsheet of obscure side projects).
The concept?
An all-female band paying heavy homage to the gods of metal: Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Dio.
The execution?
Less "bold new voice" and more "extremely enthusiastic cover band with original material tacked on."
Speaking of covers, every album features one:
- 2017 - Burning Witches - Jawbreaker / Judas Priest cover
- 2018 - Hexenhammer - Holy Diver / Dio cover
- 2020 - Dance with the Devil - Battle Hymn / Manowar cover featuring Ross The Boss
- 2021 - The Witch of the North - Hall of the Mountain King / Savatage cover featuring Chris Caffery
Points for consistency, I guess.
The Witch of the North: Predictable but Loud
Their fourth album, The Witch of the North, dropped in May 2021—produced, as always, by Marcel Schirmer aka Schmier from Destruction. (Presumably because at this point, he knows exactly how this is supposed to sound.)
The album itself?
Straightforward heavy metal: heavy riffs, twin guitars, Norse mythology themes.
A lot of effort. A lot of noise.
Absolutely no danger of startling the horses.
The Circle of Five makes it almost impossible not to think of Rob Halford — from the leather-drenched outfits to the vocals, which land somewhere between heartfelt homage and accidental karaoke night.
It’s not bad.
It’s just aggressively—fine.
The Crushing Weight of Polite Endurance
There weren’t really favourites here—just a growing sense of mild confusion as I realised I had nearly 50 minutes of musical déjà vu ahead of me.
The Witch of the North isn’t an album you listen to so much as one you politely sit through, nodding occasionally, like a distant relative's slideshow from their hiking trip.
It’s there. It makes noise. It keeps the clock ticking.
And then, mercifully, it ends—leaving you to dust yourself off, crack a joke about it, and carry on with your day slightly more heroic than before.