Music elitists and humorless arseholes may as well stop reading now. Those of you who have been blessed with grand observational skills may have guessed from the album title and the cover art that this piece of work is about pirates. Let’s face, it’s a pretty amusing subject to dedicate an entire album to, and a fair few people believe that humour has no place in music, these people are to be ignored. Bands like Crotch Duster, Strapping Young Lad and Frankenstein Drag Queens have proven that comedy is always welcome within heavy music. But any way, back to the only noticeable music export Scotland have given us since The Proclaimers.

It’s easy enough to pin Alestorm’s current popularity on the boom of folk metal bands like Korpiklaani and Turisas, but Alestorm set themselves aside from their face painted and big bearded European counterparts with a delightful helping of cheese. Captain Morgan’s Revenge is a concept album; the story involves betrayal, cursed treasure and rum. Does this remind you of a specific Disney film series that got so consistently worse that eye gouging seemed like the grandest idea of all while watching part three? But thankfully Captain Morgan’s Revenge doesn’t get stupidly unbelievable. No 60ft, New Orleans Goddesses are sung of, nor is there a keyboard solo to symbolize her dissolving into an army of crabs. As the album moves along, suicide isn’t a constant thought, thus ending the similarities with Pirates of the Caribbean.

Now for the cheese course. There is enough talk of steel to build a city skyline, but not enough to make a Manowar album. And the sheer volume of verses regarding rum and mead is enough to make the population of Glasgow sober up and join the rest of civilization. When the band play live the level of cheese is quadrupled, every word out of the singer’s mouth is either ‘Yarr!’ or ‘Arrg!’. But if you don’t mind this high dose of audio dairy, then you can really enjoy this album. Rapid and heavy drums and rather excellent guitar solos keep the metal alive, and the keytar (keyboard held like a guitar) solos promote a grand level of jigging, thus keeping some folk credibility despite not using traditional instruments (the Finntroll method).

Fair enough, the songs drag you in with catchy choruses and their amusing content, similar to a lot of not so credible pop songs. But when you are swinging your arms to a song about cheap whores and fine booze (Wenches and Mead), you won’t care.

Stand out tracks: Over the Seas, Captain Morgan’s Revenge, Wenches and Mead and Set Sail and Conquer.