Amon Amarth return to the world of Odin with The Allfather Awakens, their 13th album and one of their most ambitious records yet, out October 2 via Metal Blade Records.. In our exclusive cover story, Johan Hegg and Olavi Mikkonen take us inside the mythology, sacrifice, and songwriting behind the new record—from the charging “Gjallarhorn” and heavy-metal grandeur of “We Rule the Waves” to “Upphaf,” the first fully acoustic song in Amon Amarth history.
Vocalist Johan Hegg says the band had touched Odin so often that the subject could easily have become exhausted. Instead, he found the opposite.
“Odin is so much more than that,” Hegg says. “I felt I wanted to explore him as a character in the mythology because he is a very interesting character.”
Hegg’s interest was not simply Odin’s appetite for conquest, but his pursuit of knowledge. A conversation with archaeologist Neil Price sharpened that idea. Hegg was struck that a notoriously violent age placed a god of the mind atop its pantheon.
“If you read about Odin, one thing stands out immediately, and that’s his relentless quest for wisdom and knowledge,” Hegg says.
Photo courtesy of Dearohwell photography
