In 2009, five young men who share a passion for the mountains, the local traditions, folk music and heavy metal, meet over a beer to discuss this and that.
In a single evening, their destiny was clear: the province of Cuneo, the area between the Occitan culture and Piedmont, lacked a group that combines the great musical tradition of Southern Piedmont, love for the mountains and its people and, last but not least, the passion for the extreme sound of metal. In an environment dominated by traditional folk music groups, here that fateful night, “our five” decided to form a folk metal band: the Maladecia.
They began to experience the fusion of traditional songs and the sounds of metal, as in “Bela bergera “and “Sem Montanhol”, performing covers of groups already underway in this vein, such as “Rocce Nere” and “Trollhammaren” and, not least, to write their songs of their own, such as “Asi ‘d Ciocc” and “La Bataiolo”.
The band’s style is characterized by the abundant presence of accordion, flutes of the folk tradition, bagpipes and other wind instruments, to emphasize the attachment to traditional melodies, and an undercurrent composed of rhythmic guitar, bass and drums, so to give the necessary impact to get a sound that combines ancient and modern at the same time, soft and hard at the same time. As for the voice, chorusesare used, clean vocals and screaming vocals to be able to bridge here too the gap between the two genres.
The name of the band has a special meaning that binds even more “our five” to their land. Maladecia is a mountain that is located in Valle Stura and the origin of the name can be traced back to the Occitan language. And since the group is attached to the traditions of their land, just as a mountain is attached to the ground, and to the sounds as hard as the stone that forms the mountains themselves, the name of a mountain top so impressive is definitely appropriate.
In 2013 they released their first full-length: “Ames en peno” (Souls in pain) that includes all original tracks composed by Maladecia so far, plus some Occitan traditional songs and some covers of European folk metal, of which the group rethought the arrangements. The tracks “Olmo” was recorded with the participation of Lore Group Folkstone. The record also saw the participation in the folk/blues singer Erica Molineris and harpist Elizabeth Puppo.
Discography/Reviews
Ames en peno (2013))