By 1877 most firearms have progressed past the muzzle-loading stage that you mentioned. They were generally breech-loaded rifles, so reload speed had become significantly higher by this point, as well as range and accuracy.

Man this song used to be THE shit, now hardly anyone mentions it with all these new Sabaton songs picking up so much steam When the new meets the old it always ends the ancient way eh?

As you said at the beginning, Sparta and Shiroyama have similar stories as both are from album The Last Stand where all songs are about famous ...well... last stands.

So you're finally reacting to the unofficial theme for Ghost of Tsushima

Dave you do understand why most armies stopped wearing any armor at all once gunpowder became a thing? Regular armor can't hold up to gun fire, the amount of armor needed to stop gunfire would be too heavy and would make an army too immobile. Only certain cavalry units retained a breastplate. Samurai cutting down bullets is pure fiction. It would look more like the scene in Deadpool where he tries just that but ends up blocking little to none, "That's a lot of bullets."

Though it does say sword against the gun. That's not entirely true. It was yes, but it started off gun vs gun & artillery. Until the Samurai ran out of ammunition. Than, they gathered and made one last final push. The sad part of this story is that the two leaders were close friend and the whole army had great respect for the Samurai. After the battle had been won. There was no celebration. After all. They had just erased their own culture in favour of the new culture the Americans wanted to instill.

A front loading flintlock musket takes about 6~8 seconds to reload if you know what you¨re doing. Matchlocks were slower and you had to manage a burning piece of rope while handling black powder which was kinda dangerous. Then there were the wheellocks that had a spinning wheel grinding up against a flint for more sparks which meant the powder ignited more reliably. Bullets most certainly did not deflect off the armor unless it was at extreme ranges (beyond 40~50 meters i'd say). At 20~30 meters some muskets had enough kinetic energy in the musket ball to be compared to a 7,62mm rifle. True the accuracy was not great and the range was horrible, but the ability to pierce through even english full plate armor and shields is what put an end to armored knights and samurai alike.

I love how they potrayed that they prefered to die before handing their culture to the enemy. "Only 40 are left at the end" followed by "None survive Shiroyama", meaning that the 40 survivors commited harakiri before the were defeated.

This song is so amazing, I may be a weirdo here but alot of Sabaton songs bring me to tears and especially this one. Knowing this battle was the death of the samurai forever breaks my heart. But all the men held their honor to the very end and that makes me emotional. I love you man, keep up the amazing work!

Satsuma: "Surrender bruv" Saigō: "NUTS!"

Their leader commited suiced. In the end was a handfull samurai left and charged down the hilll to a surten death. So it wasnt evening but sometime med day. BUT the samurais first attack got the enemies to run. But of course, 500 sword vs 30 000 guns. But an honorable death for a samurai

When you said '40 survived', it meant there were only 40 Samurai left at the final charge/clash of forces at the end of the battle. The next line is 'none alive, none survive, Shiroyama'. They all died in battle. The Imperial forces on the other hand apparently only lost 30 men! (killed anyway, I dunno how many were wounded) and from what I've read the battle started in mid-afternoon and lasted through the night until dawn the next morning, so roughly 14 or 15 hours. and that last line was 'Culture UNDONE' m8, as in the culture of the Samurai had been destroyed.

I'm early! And I wasn't disappointed!! I really appreciate you taking the time, both before and during the video, to look into the subject of the song, since that is really what Sabaton are all about. Keep up the good work!

its about the Satsuma Rebellion in 1877 where there was a revolt of disaffected samurai against the new imperial government of japan. Saigō and his remaining samurai were pushed back to Kagoshima where, in a final battle, the Battle of Shiroyama, Imperial Army troops under the command of General Yamagata Aritomo and marines under the command of Admiral Kawamura Sumiyoshi outnumbered Saigō 60-to-1.

Dave you would make a great history/music teacher. Thanks for doing this one. Keep going.

Hi Dave, I like your Sabaton reaction videos a lot! You always get to the point. I can always hear Sabaton, but I especially love them live. By the way: It was only through Sabaton that I started to be interested in history.

The letter between the two friends, Saigo and the general, is heart touching and will make you cry. All 500 were killed but out of the 30,000 they managed to kill around 4,000 to 8,000 by having the imperial army come into a fatal funnel where they were cut down easily! Now! This said, many of them knew how to use firearms as well and were actually really good marksmen with them, including firearms such as a blunder bust that’s basically a shotgun filled with whatever you could put in there. This rebellion also started during the Meiji Era and the West began to influence the East. Of course this would change in the 1930’s leading into the 1940’s and Hirohito formed an alliance with Hitler and well we all know how that ended up. Also the Bushido code is a very tragic but beautiful code of which is still honored in modern day Japan. It is a code of respect for your enemy and that you would rather die than be degraded and disgraced by your enemy. If they lost a battle many would commit Hari Kari (I think I spelt it right) as it was. They would stab themselves with a tanto in the left side, pull the blade to the center of their body as you open their guts while a samurai of the opposing army would decapitate them then bow as a sign of respect to the dead and having the “honor” to preserving their opponent’s wishes to die in combat.

Bushido never dies, eventho the material disintegrates. Thats the beauty of a mind. You can just evolve.

Squeals! I have requested this on every Sabaton Video. Thank you. What will I request now?

I love this song so much. The best thing to watch for this is the move The Last Samurai. It's the exact same battle

My guys out here reacting to Calli AND Sabaton? I love it!

if you go by the battle shown in the last samurai there is a chance they might already had the hand crank machine gun. then again even if they had those a sound tactic can always win over a superior power. just look at how one canadian soldier single handedly saved an entire town in the netherlands, or how said soldier captured a german batalion just by shouting at their commander xd

The Boshin War, sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Imperial Court.

Glory in life honor in death.

I like that they didn't add Japanese instruments because at the end of the day they were soldiers all the same. Best example of this is in sabaton song hellfighters referencing the Harlem hellfighters they never once mentioned the men's race because that's not what made them heroes it was a fact that they held out for 6 weeks and hell on Earth with no support is what made them heroes

That is the way to go, on your feet fighting for your honor and principles

One of my favorite Sabaton songs along with Christmas Truce (a new addition) The Last Stand and Uprising. Also, Samurai didn't use ONLY the swords, they used firearms and used the swords when the guns became useless.

Nearly all their songs were covered on the history channel, new album set to come out in march. (according to amazon)

Fun fact: the samurai practically abandoned their swords when they got a hold of guns only using there swords to commit suicide.

There's an amazing movie called the last samurai, which sort of tells the story of this final samurai showdown. Incredible movie, highly recommend it.

I believe the movie "The Last Samurai," while it presumably had a ton of historical inaccuracies, covers the subject and would give you a chance to see what this would look like in practice.

Btw this battle was depicted in movie The Last Samurai... a romantized version ofc ;)

The movie Last Samurai is based on this scenario. Obviously it’s been Hollywood-ified, but still not bad.

Sabaton - Carolus Rex. An old but gold song

You should do carolus Rex. It’s one of the most evil sounding songs and is really powerful sounding.

If you want infusion then check out the bagpipes in Blood of Bannockburn lmao

And all 500 samurais laid their life for their religion and emperor. Honorable death!

FINALLY!

Some Historians (left winged) try to explain, that these last samurai just fought for their privileges in the administration. I truly think, that it’s very short thinking. Of course they had a lot of power and influence but they faced their fate very clearly and decided to choose the way of the warrior to set a strong statement for their old values. In my opinion, they knew their time has come and it commands me great respect, that they stand the post until the end. What a great culture.

As far as I know samurai run out of ammo, so they forse to go close combat. Battle last all night after it.

Awesome! Hit Far From the Fame next!

The survivors committed seppuku at the end.

Ayyyyyyye I come back from a small hiatus from KZfaq to this???? Nice!

The samurai during this time didn’t just use swords they also used guns because samurai mastered many different weapons

The samurais killed 30 soldiers before they where are gone

Despite the line "Sword Vs Gun" Samurai had been using Guns since around 1550

“Caroleans prayer” is a must

New way commes in sin is reference to that modernization is preceded by war (often civil war/revolution e.g. French revolution, US civil war, .... ).

New age comes in sin means that in order for new age to come old ways must be extreminated and killed. In this case samurais were becoming outdated in a sense.

During this battle (not entirely sure) but the imperial army used some American made Gatlin guns (old school minigun)

Interesting fact is that it wasn't clear western winning, there's multitude of reasonings of this "war" for example europeans agreed on certain terms of trade and then said "nah".. there was a reason for the samurai to attack the west.. secondly, often overlooked, samurai did also have guns.. but truth is that that was the last fight for bushido and sortition in japan.. those changed soon after west forced trade & westernation

The most ipressing is some of them was still alive in the evening.

Shiroyama's cover by Jonathan Young It's Very good

Now we need To Hell and Back. Unless you've already done that one and I need to go back and look lol

the movie " the last samurai" with tom cruse is based off this.

you should watch the sabaton history channel about this song Shiroyama also in bushido code there is no retreat if they do its bring shame to yourself. its just like the other saying DEATH BEFORE DISHONOR .

I love watching your sabaton reactions and don't think you should ever feel that you are wrong when trying to interpret lyrics or what to expect from sabaton and their songs. I've been a fan of sabaton for six years and they completely rise above expectations every single year constantly refining what sabaton's sound is. They sound like a tank in the form of music

another against all odds song that is incredible would be Counterstrike. very fast and metal song

it just rhymes...that's it. Saigo had riffles and shit and quite western stuff but in last moments of battle they went for katanas and shit like that. and he commited seppuku..

For some reason, this song always makes me think of 40:1.

Some cool Battle between the bands (Sabaton style) Sabaton - 82nd all the way Amaranthe - 82nd all the way Sabaton - Carolus Rex Follow the Cipher - Carolus Rex Manowar - Kingdom Come Sabaton - Kingdom Come Amon Amarth - Twighlight of the thundergod Sabaton - Twighlight of the tundergod

Culture undone

This song reminded me of a Power Rangers theme...

Just watch The Last Samurai movie, it's wonderful =)

Bushido Dignified

The japanese troops where poorly trained and of Low Moral. You can watch the movie the Last Samurai with tom Cruise. It is based loosly on this event. Of course with some additions made

Bushido= Bushi(Warrior) Do(the Way) The Samurai armor was mostly made from wood, not metal. That being said the armor could withstand several shots before failure. The greatest sin was that it brought to a close a culture of Honor. AS was said in the old west, "All men were created equal. Samuel Colt(or another gun manufacturer) made them that way."

When u get a chance u should react to sabaton 40:1 its another last stand song like this song and sparta

samurai arrmour was made out of wood...

Tbh it is true that winged hussars proved that they are more greater than Spartans

🤘 React to Mats & Morgan - paltsug feat Henrik Linder

Could you react to sabaton wehrmacht?

this battle apparently took 7 months to complete, which is much more than I'd have expected, but I may have found the wrong info

Please watch the Pokemon Rival rap cypher By cam steady

There's a awesome movie with Tom Cruise about the event called 'The Last Samurai' If you haven't seen it i would definitely recommend it 👍