Anna von Hausswolff: Dead Magic

ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF: DEAD MAGIC (2018)

1) The Truth, The Glow, The Fall; 2) The Mysterious Vanishing Of Electra; 3) Ugly And Vengeful; 4) The Marble Eye; 5) Källans Ateruppståndelse.

General verdict: Your local "Ghosts, Inc." take on prog- and post-rock, also known as banshee-wagonjumping.

So, last we heard from Anna she was busy indulging in the kinkiest sexual fantasy of all time — making love to the hugest (pipe) organ in the world, which is probably as close as one can get to tentacle rape in real life. The process was certainly exciting but, as I mentioned in the previous review, once the novelty of approach wears off, the general sound waves of the album remain far more important than its specific musical themes. Whether or not this is a problem, the same approach not only remains valid for Dead Magic, but is made even more obvious. With only five tracks, two of them approaching epic prog-rock lengths, the artist very clearly states that a single static theme, very slowly evolving across time, is consistently preferable to arrays of hooks quickly tossing your mind from one emotional field to another. You know — some people live for the moment, others embrace eternity, that sort of thing.

I am not sure if the Acusticum was used again for the sessions (the liner notes just say «pipe organ»), but regardless, the big difference is that Dead Magic actually sounds less like a sound check and more like the actual performance. By not getting dissipated over multiple, equally atmospheric and equally not-too-memorable compositions, Anna succeeds in making these pieces sound like they actually matter. The main themes are fairly trivial: a repetitive waltz motif in ʽThe Truth, The Glow, The Fallʼ, an industrial-doomsday grind in ʽThe Mysterious Vanishing Of Elektraʼ, a New Age-style ambient chord sequence in ʽUgly And Vengefulʼ. But as time goes by and instead of fading away, they get further and further entangled in all sorts of psychedelic overdubs, a feeling of epicness and importance might come over you the same way it often takes a Grateful Dead psychedelic jam fifteen minutes or so to begin terraforming your conscience. And while this might speak of the benefits of technical craft and persistence more than it does of musical genius, it is also not true that any atmospheric 12-minute track by any artist works that way. This is a big risk she takes here, and it seems to pay off.

Anna's weakest spot seems to be confined to the lyrics now: the words she chooses for her sonic panoramas look especially pathetic on paper ("after the fall I'll find you", etc.), but by this time it should be perfectly clear that she only needs those words as an excuse to add her voice to the overall array of instruments. The only thing that matters is that the words do not stray from the chosen path. Like all her other records, this one, too, is also about loss, death, spirits, and wuthering heights, because this is what she wants to be: Stevie Nicks, (early) Kate Bush, and Lisa Gerrard all rolled in one and slightly updated for 2018 — for one thing, because 2018 can allow itself to be more tolerant towards a long, unhurried, even pretentious manner of unveiling one's story, by letting you clearly understand that music like this has no chance whatsoever of major commercial success and earning you a little extra freedom for that.

When I dropped that word «static» again, I was actually setting myself up, because, for instance, ʽThe Truth, The Glow, The Fallʼ is a three-part suite, moving from the Atmospheric Opening (ʽTruthʼ) to the Ghostly Waltz (ʽGlowʼ) to the Apocalyptic Coda (ʽFallʼ). (I think it's about a fair maiden who mourns for her loved one in the first part, follows his ghost in the second part, and transcends the chains of being in the coda; if you have a more logical interpretation, you are a better overthinker than I am). That build-up and tear-down, however, is so slow that there are no mental separators between the three parts — no big surprises, no epiphanies or revelations, more like a somewhat predictable ritual of solemn self-destruction on the part of the protagonist. No actual terror, either: perhaps some easily impressionable listeners might find the organ / voice combination here intimidating, but I sincerely hope that Anna's intention was never to «terrify» the listener as much as it was to try and simply push him over the threshold of the earthly realm into a different kind of reality. And why should life beyond the grave be terrifying, anyway?

ʽThe Mysterious Vanishing Of Elektraʼ (not sure if the reference is to the Greek tragedy or to the Frank Miller comic books or to both or to neither, but if I spend any more time researching Anna von Hausswolff-related trivia, I might end up having to propose to her or something) — anyway, ʽThe Mysterious Vanishingʼ, chosen as the album's single, is easily the most direct, attention-drawing number here: if the relentless battle-ramming, seismic-probing rhythm does not get through to you, then Anna's banshee-like whooooooos certainly will. It's a bit of a cheap trick, but it is also refreshing to see some sheer brutality in action: too many goth-rock performers believe that «going crazy» on record or on stage is not a dignified action on the part of the undead, and it is nice to realize that at least one undead performer has not yet forgotten about the simple power of histrionics. Not that she ever really abuses that power.

The longest piece on the record is ʽUgly And Vengefulʼ, essentially one huge, drawn-out cres­cendo notably reminiscent of the masterpieces by Godspeed You! Black Emperor — only with organ and vocals at the forefront rather than guitars, keyboards, and strings, which, of course, radically shifts the atmosphere. "I'm restless, I'm older, I'm heavy like a stone", she confesses here, making the entire composition look like some passing-of-age exorcism ceremony, with a lengthy ominous setup period and a polyphonic thunderstorm at the core. Not very original, perhaps, but at least the sixteen-minute length is justified — it's not as if you can really perform a proper exorcism in under three minutes. It does get pretty intense at the end, enough so that the last two tracks are completely given over to calmer moods (the organ instrumental ʽMarble Eyeʼ and the ultra-slow, ultra-New Agey ʽ Källans återuppståndelsʼ = ʽResurrection of the sourceʼ).

So, is there a reason why Dead Magic should be prioritized over dozens of similar goth-themed albums, apart from, you know, placing this particular emphasis on the organ and having a really powerful vocalist? As I compare it with, for instance, the latest Chelsea Wolfe albums, I think that the crucial difference is that, somehow, Anna makes it more about the music than about herself. She is engaging here in an original form of rock theater, rather than trying to make it all sound personal — and in that, she is an honorable disciple of Kate Bush (whom I love) rather than Tori Amos (whom I am cautious about). You can like this form of rock theater or you can be indifferent to it, but it is almost impossible to get offended by it, as it often happens with the mediocre «singer-songwriting» type. Of course, it also precludes the listener from empathy and catharsis, but no catharsis is always preferable to simulated catharsis. Truly, Dead Magic is high quality B-grade entertainment and should be taken as such — but it is also risky, uncommercial, and a few notches more challenging than anything in the same genre.

Anna von Hausswolff: The Miraculous

ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF: THE MIRACULOUS (2015)

1) Discovery; 2) The Hope Only Of Empty Men; 3) Pomperipossa; 4) Come Wander With Me / Deliverance; 5) En Ensam Vandrare; 6) An Oath; 7) Evocation; 8) The Miraculous; 9) Stranger.

Well, one thing is for certain: with her third album, Anna von Hausswolff no longer runs any risk of being called a «singer-songwriter», because what goes on here can hardly be called singing on what can hardly be called songs. Instead, she has settled into the role of a musical painter, focu­sing almost completely on long, drawn-out, multi-dimensional soundscapes — immensely aided by her new recording instrument, a 9000-pipe, 91-stop organ (called the Acusticum), installed in 2012 by the professional organ designer Gerard Woehl in a concert hall, located in the small Swedish town of Piteå. The multi-profile monster, capable of imitating a whole variety of classic and modern organs (and other instruments), seems to have been just the thing for Anna, who spends most of the time here exploring its capacity.

The bad news is that she almost seems enthralled by the terrifying majesty of the Acusticum so much that the concept of sound — as represented by one chord in all of its overtone glory — completely effaces here the concept of strings of sounds. In its essence, The Miraculous is an atmospheric ambient record, whose only dynamic aspect is the occasionally generated crescendo effect; otherwise, each composition makes its point early on and then gets busy sustaining it for whichever time length is deemed necessary by the artist.

The longest compositions (ʽDiscoveryʼ, ʽCome Wander With Meʼ) invite you to meld your conscience with the psychedelic waves generated by the organ and accompanying guitar and vocal parts (where available) in much the same fashion as you'd do it on a classic Dead Can Dance track, and are also reminiscent of symphonic post-rock efforts by the like of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, even if Anna's skills at generating subtle crescendos that command the listener's attention are significantly lower. And this is what gets me down: I was moved by her far more as a melodist than as a sonic explorer. The organ is a beast, for sure, but interminably long swoops of sustained organ notes, even when multi-tracked and further supported by loud percus­sion and various chaotic sound effects, do not seem to have much purpose behind them, other than the pure joy of exploration that, perhaps, her sound engineer would be only too happy to share with her — whether the outside listener will, though, is another matter.

Like Ceremony, I hesitate to call this music «Gothic» or «doomy-gloomy», or resort to compa­risons with Nico. Even when she is not singing, the right word is just «otherworldly» — she rarely resorts to combinations of sound that could be associated with anything apocalyptic in nature. The organ, as we all know, is the best instrument to create a snowy, winterish mood, but this here «winter» is not so much the end of life as simply a pause in its course, and even though she apparently produced a few visually gruesome videos to accompany these songs, my own video representation of this music largely consists of Sleeping Beauty-type images — mountains, winter, castles, and really, really big fur coats... okay, this is getting silly. In fact, the organ is the only thing that saves the whole enterprise from the impending cheese-storm: there is a certain freshness to Anna's approach that gives it more class than, say, Evanescence.

By the time we get around to the title track, the record has completed its pupation stage: ʽThe Miraculousʼ is a 10-minute piece of pure organ ambience, with absolutely minimal melody, and reactions to it will probably range from «quintessential beauty» to «quintessential boredom» with little in between. I have no problem with it existing and no desire to hear it ever again, because, unlike the best of the best ambient tracks, this one seems more like a professional test of an ins­trument's capacities to me — the work of an organ tuner rather than an inspired composer. Which does have its purpose, too, but perhaps organ tuners should speak up here, not me.

Overall, this seems to me to be a classic illustrative case of an artist totally swallowed up by his own instrument — she is the Jonah here, and the Acusticum is the whale, and until she atones for her sins and starts writing real songs again rather than purely atmospheric pieces, this approach is not going to get us far. There's a lot of potential here, but too much of it just sounds like a starry-eyed «wow, I'm all alone here with this big monster, and it's ALL MINE!» Bottomline: I hate to say it, but... gimme back the singer-songwriter shit. I could even settle for a breakup tune. An Adele cover on the Acusticum might not be too bad, actually.

Anna von Hausswolff: Ceremony

ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF: CEREMONY (2012)

1) Epitaph Of Theodor; 2) Deathbed; 3) Mountains Crave; 4) Goodbye; 5) Red Sun; 6) Epitaph Of Daniel; 7) No Body; 8) Liturgy Of Light; 9) Harmonica; 10) Ocean; 11) Sova; 12) Funeral For My Future Children; 13) Sun Rise.

Many, if not most, of the reviews of Ceremony use words like «dark», «Gothic», and «ice queen» — which is quite understandable for a record made by a Swedish femme fatale, with song titles such as ʽFuneral For My Future Childrenʼ and a grim, almost hellish photo of one part of a church organ on the front sleeve, the church organ being her primary instrument of choice for most of the songs. Now I do not know if this album is really «great» or just another minor varia­tion on the soul-seeking singer-songwriter saga, but I do know the most interesting thing about it — formally, it deserves all these epithets, and yet, at the same time, it feels totally light, lively, and, in some ways, even cheerfully optimistic to me.

It is no more «dark», in fact, than the average organ fugue or vocal cantata from J. S. Bach: just because the airwaves happen to be choked up by somber overtones from metal pipes, and the lyrics deal with issues of suffering and repentance, this does not imply glorification of the Dark on any rational level. And just because on her second album Anna von Hausswolff has expanded beyond the fiefdom of the personal into the realm of the universal does not imply that she inevitably has to sing and play about the upcoming end of the world. On the contrary, darkness is seen by her as something fairly casual, almost like an acceptable prerequisite of the light — and, as you may notice, for all the morbid imagery in the song titles ("epitaph", "deathbed", "funeral") there are a few important references to "light" and "sunrise" as well.

That this is a musical record first and foremost, and a theatrical one-woman show only in the second place, is immediately made clear by the first two tracks — ʽEpitaph Of Theodorʼ is com­pletely instrumental, and the epic ʽDeathbedʼ is only interrupted by a brief vocal interlude in the middle, so that for the first ten minutes you do not have any singing at all. According to Anna herself, she was more influenced by the drone metal scene (e. g. Earth) than her female peers in the singer-songwriting department, and it shows: ʽEpitaph Of Theodorʼ is slow, draggy, minima­listic, cherishing slowly congealing atmosphere over dynamic musical development — but if you are scared / bored shitless of drone metal for its colorless heavy guitar palette, have no fear: the church organ is a marvelous replacement, and, what's more, somehow she manages to find her own way for tuning and processing it, so the old instrument takes on a new life, reimagining itself as a synthesizer (note: sometimes she actually plays real synthesizers, and it is not always easy to distinguish one from another). Eventually, some guitars drop in, but they are not metal guitars: one of her session musicians plays a mean pedal steel that adds an element of serene, angelic beauty to the stern solemnity of the first part.

I think I like ʽEpitaph Of Danielʼ even better, though — no idea who the Theodor and the Daniel in question are here, but Daniel gets the luckier deal, with an even prettier pedal steel part: the guitarist may be a big fan of David Gilmour or it may just be a coincidence, but he has a true talent of squeezing emotion out of a limited number of notes. And in both cases, the «epitaphs» are done in excellent taste: stern, but light sorrow overridden with musical hints at The Light Eternal. There is probably not much going on here in terms of active musical innovation, but the sonic palette mixed up by Anna and her associates is fresh, and certainly among the most inspiring ones to come from the 2010s.

The obvious downside is that more or less the same palette is used throughout the entire album, and the entire album goes on for about an hour — not too surprising, considering how long some of the themes have to take in order to unwrap their whole potential. But this I can live with. For one thing, there are a few helpful diversions along the way — for instance, ʽNo Bodyʼ is two and a half minutes of sonically impressive experimentation, an industrial/avantgarde track where Anna is busy farting into the leftmost organ pipe and then catching the exhaust on the rightmost one. Or if she is not, at least it's something from that area; amusing rather than properly terrifying, but an intrigue all the same. And ʽHarmonicaʼ, with its handclap and conga rhythms accompanied by dense synth patterns, is an intrusion onto New Age / World Music turf that does not work as well as the organ-based tracks, but is competent and compatible with the rest.

For another thing, she still has a knack for occasional vocal hooks, although now they are less in the shape of catchy choruses and more in the shape of particularly sharp and beautiful phrasing, like on ʽOceanʼ, whose toppling "I take it ba-a-a-a-a-a-ack, my honor..." lines are head-spinning; or the tense, admonishing "it's written all around" resolution of the verses on ʽLithurgy Of Lightʼ; or the whoah-whoah-ing on ʽFuneral For My Future Childrenʼ, an odd hybrid between her church style and country music, with waltz tempos, a small pinch of yodeling, and a pretty happy into­nation as the lady declares her intention to "bury all my children" — actually, the song is not so much about death inevitable as it is about life eternal, hence all the subtle happiness. She's a strange one, but I admire how she manages to get through all this pretense without becoming truly annoying on the ears or offensive to the mind.

And as for the monotonousness, well, she said it herself that the whole album was to be some­what conceptual and «soundtrackish», with a common thread running through all the songs, and she was pretty right about it, too. I am not sure what kind of movie should have hosted this sound­track — something by Terrence Malick, perhaps? probably would be unwatchable — but since the entire thing has a ghostly atmosphere, let's assume that, in the end, it should be a movie about ghosts. Friendly ones, you know, those who come to you in your dreams and teach you that earthly life is only the beginning of true existence. For what it's worth, by the way, Ceremony gives the impression of being a very Christian album without a single explicit shred of Christi­anity — something that always commands my respect. Even better, I simply like it without putting too much thought in it, meaning a thumbs up from all sides of consciousness. And championing a moderately new kind of sound in 2012 ain't no slouch, either.

Anna von Hausswolff: Singing From The Grave

ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF: SINGING FROM THE GRAVE (2010)

1) Move On; 2) Track Of Time; 3) Pills; 4) Above All; 5) Singing From The Grave; 6) Lost At Sea; 7) Old Beauty / Du Kan Nu Dö; 8) The Book; 9) I Am Leaving.

It is not difficult, I presume, to guess the first impression recorded by an eye that happens to fall upon an album called Singing From The Grave and credited to an artist by the name of Anna von Hausswolff. Dark, metallic, doom-laden Gothic chants, right? Like a modern day Nico or something, and probably with all sorts of occult and witchy references, too, what with "Hauss­wolff" sitting so close to "werewolf" and all. I have no doubt that the lady in question nurtured these connotations, even if the album sleeve, with its quasi-Pollockian sketchings, adds no direct evidence. Therefore, it is the first and foremost duty of any honorable reviewer to begin with the obvious: nope, not a single zombie was harmed during the recording and production of this album. Furthermore, von Hausswolff is Anna's real name (none of that «Lana Del Rey» crap in this story of artistic growth), and she is not even German, but Swedish. Though she does claim to be a fan of Burzum, but then again, who doesn't?

Although the lady's ambitions were clearly set on the international market from the start, given that she sings everything (with the exception of one short snippet) in English rather than Swedish, her debut album never got an international release — in 2010, it was too early, and later on, as she changed her style significantly, it was much too late. It did, however, make her a star in her native country, which was up to that time running rather low on talented singer-songwriters of the female persuasion that also happened to be aspiring for something more substantial than shallow pop glitz (although this is more of an assumption than factual knowledge on my part). The lady could compose, play (piano and organ mostly), sing, and even produce the artwork for her album (admittedly, the latter endeavor did not require too much talent), so here was a Swedish Kate Bush / Tori Amos / Fiona Apple / Joanna Newsom all rolled in one, and with an advantage, too, because neither of those four ever thought about singing from the grave. Well, except Kate in her ʽWuthering Heightsʼ incarnation, but that was way back when.

In the light of Anna's subsequent output, Singing From The Grave is the quintessential «teenage first effort», even though she was 24 when it came out. Her chief instrument is the grand piano, which she does not play with a lot of invention or dexterity, largely restricting herself to repetitive fugue-style chord runs that she probably had all figured out while practicing her classical pieces on the black and white. Her instrumental melodies are difficult to tell from one another and also tend to go on much longer than necessary even after you get that they are difficult to tell from another. Her lyrics, although not as ridden with clichés as your average romance/loss/redemption cycle, are not particularly insightful for those who want a fresh, 2010-worthy take on these mat­ters for their crash course in «Breakup 2.0». And her singing... well, it would not be totally inac­curate to call her a slightly lower-pitched equivalent of Joanna Newsom, at least at this early stage in her career.

This is, however, just the right point to roll the tape in the opposite direction: I like her singing more than that of Joanna Newsom. What Newsom does as a gratuitously irritating artistic mannerism, von Hauss­wolff does naturally — her voice is not particularly powerful, but she has a solid range, an infal­lible technique, and plenty of versatility: it is clear that her influences are much wider than Kate Bush-inspired art-pop, and also include country (watch out for the chorus of ʽAbove Allʼ), blues, and gospel (not that Kate Bush did not have some of these influences herself, but we are talking stereotypes here, people). At the same time, she strives to keep things reasonably simple, not considering herself above and beyond the concept of a vocal hook in the chorus; and largely (though not always) avoids direct manipulation, singing with just the right amount of detachment to not lose herself to the listener and not to overwhelm him. It does not usually take me much time to shoot down a pompously operatic or manneristic singer, but she does not count. At the end of the day, she is merely carrying on the tradition of grand old ladies like Sandy Denny or Annie Haslam, rather than doing this «I am going to sound very weird and mysterious because publicity» schtick.

As for the songs themselves, after a short while you might realize that, while not much of a pianist or an organist, she has a good instinct for seductive vocal modulation — already on the second song, ʽTrack Of Timeʼ, she is able to develop one single line ("you lose it all the time") into something epic. In ʽPillsʼ, she goes into a trance admitting that "I made love with the devil", and it is almost believable — the trance, I mean, not the devil part which is a very obvious hyper­bole. ʽAbove Allʼ, as I already said, makes me envision a collaboration with The Dixie Chicks or somebody like that, but the country waltz element is given a tragic sheen, as she seemingly recounts the last moments in the life of her grandmother. The most hysterical performance is in ʽLost At Seaʼ — the song that is most dependent on her higher range and, therefore, the most re­miniscent of Kate Bush, but also the most openly rocking number on here, and with awesome production that does indeed create a (slightly vaudevillian) illusion of a raging sea storm in which the protagonist's lover is supposed to be getting lost.

The culmination of all these broodings is the 10-minute epic ʽThe Bookʼ, which takes all that time to tell us that "I'm happy for what I found", that "I'm understanding more of me", and that "I will never turn back now". After a few listens, I finally got what it reminded me of — some of the piano chords sound almost directly lifted from The Smiths' ʽNever Had No One Everʼ, and even if that is just a coincidence, the brooding, broken-hearted atmosphere is still the same for both, except that von Hausswolff is willing to be more optimistic about the perspectives of going on (well, it's pretty hard to beat Morrissey in the pessimism department anyway). In any case, her performance is stellar — going from whisper to scream back to whisper back to scream, she gives a first-rate theatrical delivery. A small problem is that not a single ounce of the music really gives credence to the line about finding "a book about the happy way of living life", but let us count this as a small — and surmountable — problem indeed. I could also live without the atmospheric five-minute piano jam at the end (her little team does not have the means yet to create a suitably grand wall of sound), but that, too, is nitpicking.

I suppose that the record should be penalized for being monotonous and musically lazy (just how many of these two-chord piano runs is it possible to tolerate in one go?), yet I still give it a thumbs up — for what, I don't even properly understand myself. Some hooks, some first-rate singing, perhaps, and above all, this strange atmosphere of believability and a complete lack of superficial gimmickry. It just sounds like an honest record, that's all.