:Of The Wand & The Moon: ‎– The Lone Descent

It takes more or less one hundred albums to get something like “The lone descent”, one hundred albums full of imitations and clihés, wandering inside predictable notes and strolls and finally the whole sum from this annihilates the entire genre making it boring and unbearable and then among all that coal, a jewel like this appears. This kind of episode has happened during the last 10 years with this incredible amount of guitar strollers that call their selves Neofolkers and “invent” something that has been done by others yet they claim the merit once again. This never ending bunch of bands with no other merit than to be attached to a genre by copying formulas and identities where only a few (Most of them veterans by now) can be called as true representatives.

But this album is different and it saves the night for all. And it shows OTWATM in quite another facet invariably linked anyway to the genre that allowed him to express in the very beginning. By definition it should be a Neofolk album and it is, because it has this melancholic uproar, this solitude linked with obscurity, because its sound it’s pristine like a cold lake and its mood is like a forest under snow, but above all it’s a love album, utterly desolated and hopeless and that’s somehow different from what we were accustomed to.

The previous albums efforts are enriched here with beautiful accompaniments and intrepid guitar chords, the atmospheres, the guitar exploration that mix the elemental note with the bucolic delicacy of a conservative stroll now classic. The explorations made with the sideproject Solanaceae are also perceived here with this halo of 60s sound, groovy bass lines coinciding with solid guitar arrangements in the vein of psych folk, shocking choruses and subdued atmospherics both organic and synthetic that grants the album this particular depth so close to a final testament or a suicidal note.

Its a dangerous and radical album from this perspective as the melancholy denoted its intense and desperate and one cannot escape easily to its grip, besides the compositions are so touching and easy to be remembered, its a shocking album who dares the listener to survive the hit that goes directly into his heart as it certainly points that direction. The melancholy and lyrical scepticism expressed characterize a beautiful darkness, this spleen on mankind and its future, this distrust, this solitude of the spirit, loveless and lost, well managed to integrate into pure beauty all these sentiments for the listener to enjoy.

The eleven songs comprised are simply outstanding both compositionally and sentimentally and an album of such dimension can only be named as a classic almost immediately after listening as it surpasses not just owns band merit and previous creations but somehow becomes a benchmark for veterans and newcomers altogether, showing them the way, not to follow but to understand what its required to create something not just authentic and beautiful but just unique.

http://heathenharvest.org/2011/10/01/of-the-wand-the-moon-the-lone-descent/