(written by Islander)
Ill winds usually blow no one any good, or so the old saying goes, though in its earliest expression (before the meaning morphed) the writer John Heywood actually suggested that a wind unlucky for one person would bring good fortune to another. In the case of the Peruvian band Illwind, they have brought good fortune indeed through their debut album The Unfolding at the End of Light, which will be released on July 3rd by Personal Records.
Almost anyone who has come across the circulating press materials for the album is bound to be intrigued. For one thing, they disclose that the Illwind quartet includes members of such bands as Reino Ermitaño, Cobra, Arcada, and Argul. For another thing, the music is described as having an “idiosyncratic personality”, one steeped in aspects of traditional doom but also branching out in unexpected directions — such as closing the record with a cover of The Stooges’ “I Wanna Be Your Dog”.
And then there’s this:
[A] more specific reading of Illwind’s influences puts into perspective this particular personality: from Neurosis and Swans to Black Sabbath and ’70s hard rock to Yob, Windhand, Monolord, Bell Witch, and Warning to Sonic Youth, Depeche Mode, or the aforementioned Stooges.
This mélange of musical mapwork, distilling the four members’ very musical beings, has truly given The Unfolding at the End of Light a relatively singular sound – equally ambient and extremely heavy, ominously moving yet dreamlike, and all of it with a surprisingly kaleidoscopic tint of melancholy.
Your conclusions about how this collage of disparate influences works out in the music may depend on which song you’re hearing. The one we’re now revealing is “Lucifer’s Mule“.
The length of the song is daunting (and the music often is too), but the duration is necessary because of how many turns Illwind take before they reach the end, and the end is a spectacle that’s very unlike the beginning.
In the beginning, the song combines immense ominous drones and light acoustic picking whose melody creates a mysterious and melancholy impression. Menacing spoken words and fiendish cackling intrude, and then the song begins again — with soaring singing, crashing chords cloaked in abrasion, and enormous stomping beats.
The music malignantly heaves but the lead guitar also sizzles and simmers. Woozy, ethereal arpeggios (reminiscent of a sax) also drift through the amalgam of crushing heaviness and broiling sonic acid, and the reverberating singing continues reaching for the skies. The bass throbs; the drums lock into a primitive ritual cadence; the music seems to miserably moan; and choral vocals climb to spine-tingling heights.
More changes come. Illwind inflict brutal slugging blows and repeatedly charge listeners with compulsive head-moving grooves, while continuing to unfurl a mesmerizing array of witchy guitar melodies across the channels. A pair of fantastic guitar solos also spin up in exhilarating (and equally witchy) fashion.
The soloing really is astonishingly good, and for older heads it might revive rapturous memories of rock guitar gods from the ’70s, and propel clawed hands to ascend, grasping invisible oranges.
The song as a whole is like a spell of seduction, a sinister spell to be sure, but one that’s very difficult to resist and very hard to forget.
Personal Records will release The Unfolding at the End of Light in CD and digital formats, and you can order it now. Below the following links you can also listen to the album’s first single, “Crimson Skies“. Like the one we’ve just premiered, it’s also brilliant.
PRE-ORDER:
https://www.personal-records.com/product/pre-order-illwind-the-unfolding-at-the-end-of-light-cd/
https://personal-records.bandcamp.com/album/the-unfolding-at-the-end-of-light