Anna von Hausswolff
Dead Magic

I find it very difficult to talk about Anna von Hausswolff, a talented multi-instrumentalist (let's also say beautiful, which never hurts) who came from the cold Göteborg. This difficulty stems from the fact that the entire specialized music press has already set their eyes on her, with plenty of articles and reviews scattered across various print and digital pages. All of them mention the 1963 pipe organ of Marmorkirken (the Marble Church) in the Danish capital used for most of her songs, just as they all talk about the profound doom that has drawn hordes of metalheads, the drone music that has attracted shady figures in black attire, and the neoclassical that has even recruited followers among the ultra-fundamentalists of Wagner and Beethoven. There is nothing left to add to the historiography and technical sheet of "Dead Magic" that hasn't already been extensively and exhaustively described by everyone everywhere, which is why my writing will mainly focus on analyzing the relationship between the music of the beautiful and talented Nordic and the roots preserved in her compositions, the arcane influence that the Scandinavian lands exert on their populations and beyond. Norse culture is based on an essential concept: the existence of every living being runs in a circle where the starting point, sooner or later, is revisited repeatedly, a sort of Monopoly game where you cyclically pass Go. We don't know the input that started Von Hausswolff, but we can identify the previous work "The Miraculous" as a turning point in the aforementioned's artistic career, launched into an elite underground that granted her a cult following.

The initial arcadia with unusual (deceptive) liveliness addresses the theme of truth ("The Truth") walking along dreamy paths balanced on the crevices of existence, the treacherous Ginnungagap of the great north. A harrowing certainty "...From his heart and from his sadness, he sadly sang for me..." and a resigned hope "...After the fall I'll find you...", descend along the organ pipes and run along the mellotron keys to the swinging drumsticks of Ulrik Ording, who suddenly introduces the glow (The Glow), blinding and muffled, outlined in the forge of a white angel serving as a liaison between mankind and the divine; man reduces the distance from Odin, or vice versa, the Gods of Skaði substantially approach humans. This narrowing is clarified by a fundamental point of Norse mythology, namely the mortality of the Gods, just like it happens for humans (unlike in Greek and Roman culture). Here the glow dims, and the fall begins (The Fall). The tones lower, and that initial liveliness slowly begins to extinguish on the obsessed mantra "feel the fall..." that announces black clouds on the horizon. And punctually, they arrive. The martial and austere march in the evanescences of "The Mysterious Vanishing of Electra" guides us back to the cold, dark lands of Ginnungagap beaten by winds and rain, splendidly evoked in the video clip directed by her sister Maria von Hausswolff, who is also responsible for the album's artwork, depicting a sinister, eerie image, somewhat similar to "Parsifal" by Odilon Redon. "I wanna die...he wants to have my glorious..." Even "Ugly and Vengeful" lends itself to many interpretations, starting from the primordial connections, decodable in the importance the Vikings gave to the earthly departure. As a population of warriors, they considered dying in battle the only way to gain access to paradise. A subdued litany of disarming beauty retraces the paths beaten in their time by Dead Can Dance in Gregorian sound experimentation, in a Ravelian crescendo until the terminal implosion. The instrumental "The Marble Eye," a "liturgical horror" that makes your skin crawl, echoes in the naves, against apses and capitals, generated by the skilled hands of the multifaceted artist on the robust organ. The sound journey in "dead magic" culminates and is sealed by the concluding "Källans Återuppståndelse," and here there is no need to go back much, just a son of Odin named Walter Ljungquist and his 1961 story centered on the search for the fountain of eternal youth.

"Dead Magic" is a careful and brilliant exploration in the spirals of sound, the experimentation that brings a new wind to the universe of the fifth art in sync with elements of the past, and the Scandinavian with long golden hair is the notorious creator. Such talent has not gone unnoticed by the sharp and demanding gaze of a certain Gira who recruited her to open the live shows of his Swans.

From the misty, sulfurous shores of Sweden, a drakkar overflowing with untold legends, spells, and sonic nightmares has set sail and travels in the heart of the night at twenty knots in an unspecified direction, escorted by a devilish church organ announcing its proximity.

Keep your eyes open and stay alert.