Behind The Tracks: Dreamslain - Burn The Boats (Single) (2023)

‘Burn the Boats’ is one of two sister songs on our upcoming album. Both songs are focused on stories from the Mediterranean Sea. ‘Burn the Boats’ started with research for the sister song, where we found that since 1983, the EU has been paying Greek fishermen to scrap their traditional vessels, the kaikia, in an attempt to reduce overfishing. The kaikia are built using techniques that are several thousand years old.

Greece is not the only place in Europe where the destruction of local fisheries and thus local livelihoods is given priority rather than reducing the activities of big trawlers that empty the seas. Also in our home, in Northern Norway, the situation is dire for the small traditional fishing vessels, the sjark. Here, it is not because the EU subsidises their destruction, but because of fishery politics allow boat owners to buy up and combine lifetime fishing quotas which drives up the prices and has resulted in rights to fish ending in fewer and fewer hands, making the way for bigger and bigger trawlers, and leaving less and less for the small boats.

With our song, we want to call attention to these challenges, in the hopes of more popular and political protests that will result in policy changes benefitting local fisheries rather than big companies that give little to nothing back to local communities.

Musically, the song was developed over a span of several years. Most of Anna’s piano parts were originally written for another song, but ended up being incorporated into ‘Burn the Boats’. Igor got the inspiration for the guitar intro at a concert, where we heard the doom/death metal band Mariana’s Rest. As usual when composing, once jamming took off naturally and easily based on the riff ideas, we knew that we had another song coming along! Daniel has ample opportunities to experiment with breaks and Porcaro-inspired playing, but at the same time, there is as always a lot of space for blast beats and double pedals, especially during his solo in the middle of the song. A fun fact is that the piano melody on the intro riff is inspired by the piano part of a violin piece composed by Antonín Dvořák. Furthermore, after Fall of the Elven Lord on our previous album, we continue the combination of melancholic piano melodies and slow, yet heavy evil organ parts. We look forward to sharing this song with you!