Question by Tahuti: Pagans: What music do you find inspirational?
I like some “New Age” music during meditation, but I do have to say I’ve found Manowar “Gods of War” quite inspirational.
Best answer:
Answer by Black Wizard Lenin (Atheist)
Try New Wave. I’m Atheist but that stuff is almost spiritual.
New Wave as in Tears for Fears and Soft Cell.
Also Heavy Metal is quite inspirational…anything by Iron Maiden or Judas Priest inspires me.
Bathory’s good as well.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
Although I’m an atheist, I have pagan leanings, and am a musician.
I favour:
– Magma (Christian Vander et al) esp. ‘MDK’
– The Boredoms (esp. Vision Creaton New Sun)
– Can (esp. ‘Future Days’)
All of which are phenomenally inspiring and lift the spirit in different ways. Magma inspires me as real heathen music – chanting, repetition, earthy and almost ugly honesty struck through with enormous precision and expansive, diverse musical movements which run the gamut of emotion.
I find most ‘New Age’ music to be pithy and contrived ‘noodling’ tho’ 🙁
Sibelius strikes the right notes too.
Maybe you’d like ‘Pelican’ or ‘Isis’?
They do serve up good slabs of noise, it has to be said…
‘Opeth’ are very talented too…
(I’ll shut up now before I launch into all-night muso-mode…)
Anything by Mannheim Steamroller.
You like Manowar? Cool, if you like metal, you won’t starve for choice. There’s a whole genre called folk metal and it’s mostly about asatru and other pagan topics.
For really cool Asatru lyrics, get Amon Amarth. Their earlier albums are quite brutal death, but their later stuff is much more melodic. My fave is “With Oden on Our Side”.
If you like more epic, orchestral stuff, get Turisas: Battle metal. It’s so complex, so beautifully written, ful of different instruments and crazy huge choruses…
Similar stuff is Tyr, they’re from Faroe Islands and they sometimes sing in Faroese, which is very close to the old norse. They’re more progressive, though.
Vintersorg, Otyg and Storm (especially album Nordavind) are more folkish, not so very metal. They even have some acoustic songs, even just a drum and a guy singing in some crazy Norse language. Gives me shivers.
Wintersun are okay, Ensiferum are more of an “average” folk metal, then you have all the melodic death metal stuff like Insomnium and Eluveitie….
Isengard are black viking metal.
For something slightly funnier and more upbeat, get Fintroll (esp. Natfodd and Jaktens Tid) and Korpiklaani. Fintroll have an accordion in their music and they play some sort of a polka-death metal, it’s SO funny and upbeat and ideal for headbanging. Korpiklaani are just plain GOOD. They have a good upbeat feeling to their music, sometimes also slightly polka-ish, but in a good way.
Now, if you want some germanic, celtic metal, get:
Heol Telwen, Menhir, Odroerir, Wolgemut…
for slavic pagan stuff get:
Saltus, Skyforger, Temnozor, Volkolak, Pagan Reign (slavic bands are often nazi, so be careful with the lyrics).
A couple of very good kinda-folkish bands: In Extremo, they’re one of the first ones, they use old folk songs and play them with guitars and distorsion plus all the weird instruments,
Corvus Corax – purely acoustic band, lots of pipes, flutes, drums and weird old instruments,
Schandmaul – more melodic, almost pop at certain moments, but cool lyrics. you MUST get the song Walpurgischnaht.
Enough for now….? 😉
MANOWAR is awesome! I haven’t heard them in years. There’s a lot of classical stuff I like. HOLST is good, Musorgski (spelling?) Even Scott Joplin, Aaron Copeland, and Gershwin provoke emotional response in me. I’ve recently become a big fan of Tenacious D. They are absolutely inspiring!
I have asked here whether it was just a generalization or not, but most of us *do* really like Enya!
I also find Peter Gabriel inspiring — especially his African work. I love classical, too.
And Pink Floyd; goes without saying.
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Celtic or celtic sounding. I really like some of Loreena McKennitt’s stuff and Kate Price.
It depends on what I am trying to do.
There is a lot of meditation music out there that is good, but some classical and Celtic is good.
not necessarily inspirational but I loike to listen to Celtic Women, and Emerald Rose. I also love Saga’s version of Road to Valhalla:
There is a road and it leads to Valhalla
Where only the chosen are allowed
There is a boy, with a dream of Valhalla
A place in the land of the Gods
But in the heart, where the fire burns forever
Where life goes on, for those who fell in battle
The Gods are waiting, the moment he falls in a fight
And he will rise when the sun goes down
He raised high his sword as he cried out Valhalla
His dream had become reality
And tonight he will die on the road to Valhalla
Chosen to feast with the Gods
But in the heart, where the fires burn forever
Where life goes on, for the mighty
And my king
The journey has finally come to an end
For the boy
And he has risen as the greatest of them all
Same as other people, pagan and non pagan.
But for meditation I love Nigel Shaw and Carolyn Hillier.
It really depends on my mood. Sometimes New Age music does it for me and some times it doesn’t.
The Planets by Holst
Elemental by Loreena McKennit
Native American flute music
Edda by Sequentia
New World Symphony by Dvorak
I have used all of these at one time or another and they help.
Depends on my mood:
Alice Cooper
Celtic Women
Midnight Syndicate
Pasha and the Pagans
Wagner
Instrumental Jazz,Classical,Hardcore heavy metal. Ex.Naudo,Mozart,Slayer
It depends on what I’m doing really. For meditation I really like Native American flutes. I love metal. (I’ll have to look into some of that Norse metal that another poster listed, that sounds pretty cool, especially the stuff with the accordion.) For general inspiration, it depends on my mood, it can range anywhere from Celtic, to Pagan folk music, to Nox Arcana for a nice dark feel.
try listening to Metalica
I like Loreena McKennitt, her music almost wisk you away into another world.
Tahuti, The NEW Age Heavy Metal stuff gives me a headache. I much prefer the softer, more traditional music of Lisa Thiel, Elaine Silver, Blackmore’s Night, and Dagda. That music speaks to my spirit with such haunting melodies and lovely wording that I find it inspirational to the Max.
So, I’m an old fuddy duddy, but, the loud stuff just hurts my ears too much and with all that instrumentation, I find it hard to actually HEAR the words to become inspired by them.. LOL
Brightest Blessings,
Raji the Green Witch
I love to listen to Laura Powers, Celtic Woman, and the soundtracks to “Sister Act” and “Touched By an Angel.”
I generally do not listen to religious or “New Age” music. Most of the songs which I find inspirational are particular classic rock/oldies songs (some from Fleetwood Mac, Beatles, etc) and classical songs.
I believe all music is inspirational. But I know what you’re asking.
Pink Floyd, Enigma, Dirty Vegas, Carmen (the opera), :wumpscut:, Bond (the classical girl group), Nox Arcana, Clan of Xymox, U2, Fleetwood Mac, Inkubus Sukkubus, Strauss, both Fantasia soundtracks, Madonna’s Ray of Light album
I don’t practice Wicca anymore, but when I was into it, this is the music I would use to get into “the zone.”