Born under an Eastern Moon, Newfoundland’s newest heavy hitting band brings the thunder on their debut album L’Anse aux Metals 

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Grab your horns and tankards! The Sons of an Eastern Moon are coming!

Made up of the hardest stuff, the heaviest of heavy with folk, melodic and pagan metal influences, the five piece outfit are the newest appointment viewing on our at times frigid isle in the Atlantic, storming venues with reckless abandon, soaring vocals and punishing riffs since their debut last November.

L’Anse aux Metals

Six months following their debut performance alongside the likes of Manacle and Lionsault, and with less than five performances in the bank (all rippers, by the way) the Sons of an Eastern Moon toast to Odin with their debut album, appropriately titled L’Anse aux Metals. 

Frontman Thor recalls the groups live debut at November Mayhem, alongside some of the best local and national rock and metal bands in the country. 

“It was scary because it was all my buddies and it was people that I didn’t know,” he recalls. “It was scary, but it helped at the same time having the bands from away be there. People that I didn’t know, and at one breath I didn’t care. But I’ve been going to shows ever since I moved back home in 2002 and you know screaming at everybody onstage, starting mosh pits and grabbing onto my friends and it just kind of happened.”

The wild frontman enlisted the services of the berserker guitar duo of John Roach and Last Soul Down’s Cory Fagan, with the rhythm section rounded out by bassist and vocalist Rob Peyton and drummer Benoit Roy. The epic war party was formed, and they’re not in the business of taking prisoners! 

The band name itself is rooted in near two decades of metal fandom. 

“I came up with that name 19 years ago in Toronto and I wrote that down in a little pocket book and I found that book a couple of weeks ago,” Thor recalls. “That was the name that I would scream to myself in a mirror singing along to other bands pretending I was them you know? Just tucked away in your bedroom pretending you’re a different singer or practicing vocals or just screaming for something to do.” 

Beautifully melodic

A classic play on Viking settlement L’Anse aux Meadows, Sons of an Eastern Moon’s debut effort combines the one-of-a-kind vocals of Thor with instrumentation both blisteringly brutal and at times beautifully melodic.

“If Odin smiles upon us we might even do a photo shoot up there sometime, or a music video,” jokes Fagan, expressing the groups desire to lay siege (metaphorically speaking of course) to the hallowed ground in the Great Northern Peninsula. 

Painstakingly crafted at Paradise Sound Studios with Bryan O’Reilly, the debut offering from Sons of an Eastern Moon brings the goods and then some. From large scale epics that delve head-on into Norse mythology, to tales of brotherhood, and the standard sacking and pillaging Viking mosher, L’Anse aux Metals is a statement piece that goes far beyond the cumulative age of the band. 

“It’s amazing, and we joke about it all the time, like we’ve only done four shows or five shows coming up,” says Roach. “And it feels like we’ve been doing it for years, It really does. Each one of us works really hard in our own respects. You get five motivated people together and now we’re releasing an album and we haven’t been a band for two years yet. We’ve played four shows.”

The band is set to release the album on April 27th at Distortion in St. John’s on a stacked bill that includes Winterhearth, Deadgaard, Devastator and up-and-comers Last Cigar. Tickets are $10 for the 19+ event. For more visit Sons of an Eastern Moon on Facebook