In December 2019, we were publishing our first ever record, thus starting our musical journey. “Madness & Heroes” is a full-length album, with 44 minutes of music, that has been reviewed in many national and international media. Allowing Norwald to go on tour, it’s a symphonic power metal album with its own twist, as it is not just music, but it’s also literature and world-building.

The gates of the Norwald are now open.

Norwald is not just a power metal band. It’s a whole world, created from ground zero, from the most insignificant rock to the most important God, going through ecosystems, stories and mythology. The world itself tries to separate from everything we know, while keeping reference to traditional fantasy. This means that, while we can see, for instance, felines, they will never be taken from our regular forms of life. So, you can still relate to this land, while exploring absolutely new realms of epicness, fantasy, legends and myths.

“Madness & Heroes” is a conceptual album that, even if can be labeled as “symphonic power metal”, doesn’t have a lack of powerful death metal riffs or influences of other musical styles. The music serves the story, and not the other way around.

“Ruins of a Kingdom” represents the fall of Kajtar’s mad king, Thostar, who decided to fight lands way more powerful than his own to show dominance, but failed miserably. The song can be recognised for its fast and technic riffs, showing not just through the lyrics that sensation of tension. On the other hand, “Khelmet and Hakko”, tells how the hero of this story has to give his life in order to trap Nacta’s Ancient Rak, Hakko, freed by Thostar in an attempt to overcome the difficulties of the war he started, to the Netherwald (or the Nightmare Underworld). This song, about an epic fight between a hero and a monster, is epic and catchy, and was composed as a song that the people of the Norwald could sing to praise the champion that freed them from the mythical beast.

Overall, “Madness & Heroes” is a storytelling album that opens the musical path of the young band. Norwald is not afraid of experimenting with musical styles in order to serve the stories they have to tell.