Sol Invictus
In Europa

And here he finally makes it to the longed-for shores of Debaser: ladies and gentlemen, Tony Wakeford, the most badass of the apocalyptic folk musicians, the one who played bass in Crisis and then in Death in June, the one who told Douglas Pearce to fuck off, then picked up a bass, threw it in the toilet, grabbed a guitar, and founded Sol Invictus.

Proud, fierce, him alone against all odds. A legend.

Tony is a universal pessimist; he knows the End is inevitable (what kind of apocalyptic folk musician would he be otherwise??), he knows, as a man, that he is defeated from the start. Tony doesn't lull himself with illusions; in fact, he doesn't give a damn: against the odds, he doesn't abandon himself to whining; he forges straight ahead on his path and remains unwaveringly exposed to the opposing slaps of fate, unbending, unyielding, and standing. Nothing moves him (and who, after all, could succeed?, he must weigh about two hundred kilos!).
Tony has only one problem (besides his figure): the modern world. And against it, he carries on his crusade with consistency and determination, with the anger of someone truly pissed off, feeling the indignation and the piercing pain that arises from humiliation and despair at the prevailing arrogance and stupidity rising to his throat.

Proud, as we said, but also with a tear running down his cheek, like the brave warrior who rides stubbornly against the wind (not that there is any risk of getting disheveled with the few hairs he has left), knowing he is heading towards certain death. Something tragic in itself and by no means painless, but accepted as necessary, because it is the Cause that matters.

Winter, a quiet battlefield, the wind's whistling, the bloodstained weapons strewn in disorder, the dead lying on the snow. On the hill above stands Tony with his guitar, minstrel of the End, bard, troubadour, poet of the Apocalypse, incurable nostalgic, perhaps just a foolish passionate soul, see him as you wish.
He stands laconically watching the horrible scene of desolation but with his feet firmly planted on the ground, as the connection with this world is still strong, the cold scrapes the skin and the stench of the dead assaults the senses.

Contempt for this modern world, which erases all value and spirit, despoetizes existence, and devours everything in the name of calculation, profit, and material interests. A world full of futility, crying and bellowing like a spoiled child or, worse, like an idiot. A world that incites particularism, leading to massification and cultural and spiritual flattening. But also bitterness, bitterness for what was, for what has been lost. And above all, fury, the fury that arises from contemplating one's ravaged land, the old and glorious Europe, forge of barbarism and nobility, beauty and destruction, art and war, today reduced to a trivial shopping mall.

Tony is to the right, so far to the right that he surpasses those as far right as possible, ending up transcending the right altogether and landing on a kind of pre-capitalist and medieval right, so much so that it doesn't even seem right anymore. A right that doesn't get stuck in the usual cliches and doesn't lower itself to the veneration of usual bugbears, a right that paradoxically ends up merging with certain instances of the most radical left (let's not forget, after all, the left-wing and anti-system origins of Crisis), with which it shares a common aversion to the Capital establishment and a strong distaste for the American way of life.

Tony's interpretation of history cannot be anything but disillusioned, cynical, and alien to any sort of progressive hypocrisy ("Nature is based on killing, on a hierarchy of Killers, and so are we. Our Institutions, however sanctified; our Churches; our Monarchies; our Dictatorships; and our Democracies, are based on Killing - are built on Murder... History' Sea has a Killing Tide" reads the booklet of "The Killing Tide"). A vision that becomes awareness and direct consequence of human nature, divinity, and at the same time beast, to which virtues must be recognized and limits accepted.

A tough character, who must be approached correctly, not always agreeable in his choices or beliefs but damnably pure, genuine, with the significant flaw, as an artist, of having written only one song in his entire life, a song he has repeated for nearly two decades. But what a song, guys!, a song that will always exude a damn charm because the story it tells cannot help but captivate us as it touches us deeply and for this reason, it will probably never tire us.

Sol Invictus is the AC/DC of apocalyptic folk, no, even better, the Motorhead of apocalyptic folk, and Tony is a decadent Lemmy ("Born to lose, live to win", isn't that strangely fitting as a motto?), only instead of bikes, beers, and gals, we find runes, blood, and princesses.

Singles, EPs, albums, live recordings, compilations, splits, collaborations, parallel projects, and so on, the concept remains the same: whether one has the first, the latest work, or the entire discography, one will have understood everything about Sol Invictus. For this reason, I am not here to recommend any particular work (also because in my opinion, Wakeford hasn't produced any true masterpieces, or looking at it another way, he has produced only masterpieces, but in either case, it remains difficult to recommend one over another... one could mention "Trees in Winter", which should be the first official album, or the following "Lex Talionis," and "In the Rain," but the latest "The Devil's Steed" could also work, up to you).

What better initial approach, then, than an overview of his entire career? This "In Europa" is not a live recording in the strict sense nor a compilation with Best of aspirations (as demonstrated by the absence of unmissable classics like "The Killing Tide", "Black Easter", "Angels Fall", or "Amongst the Ruins").

"In Europa" is instead a strange collection featuring both studio and live recordings, both unreleased material and revisited classics, a work that sees the light only because at a certain point Tony realized he had good material to offer his fans (sure, all these neofolk characters don't seem to find peace unless they release something every week!).

The first and most substantial section consists of tracks recorded in March '96 in Amsterdam for a local radio broadcast, featuring, among classics, a beautiful version of "In Europa", a song from the debut of L'Orchestre Noir, the symphonic music project where Wakeford plays the role of a classical composer. "Time to Meet the King" is instead an unreleased track from the sessions for the album "The Blade", while the last part is an excerpt from a live performance held in France at Nevers in '95 as Tony Wakeford & L'Orchestre Noir, totaling nearly seventy truly exciting minutes. It’s noteworthy that it all sounds eerily homogeneous, both in terms of production and songwriting, as if it were a standalone work (which says a lot about the variety of the band's proposal throughout their entire discographic journey).

From the initial invocation, it will be a succession of epic and poignant tracks in typical Sol Invictus style, between Shakespearian tragedy and "Viking" saga. Wakeford's sparse strumming is enriched here with a respectable folk background, where Matt Hodwen's always inspired violin shines, the doleful trumpet of the indispensable Eric Roger, and the providential ethereal warbles of Sally Doherty, adding variety where Wakeford's strangled turkey voice cannot reach. Only sporadically is the acoustic idyll disrupted by the mighty strumming of Karl Blake’s distorted bass (the only one who, over the years and amidst line-up changes, had the saintly patience to endure alongside the corpulent leader’s overwhelming ego), contributing to invigorating the whole and heightening the epic pathos of the tracks.

Sure, Wakeford is a terrible singer, and the songs are very much alike (listen to the openings one after another, jumping from track to track, and you'll be appalled), and it is surprising how historic songs like "Media", "Believe Me", "A Ship is Burning", "Sheath & Knife", or "Against the Modern World" (from the very first EP and strongly reminiscent of "The Death of the West" by Death in June) coexist peacefully with the leftovers from a minor album like "The Blade". But then again, what else could we expect when everything stems from the immediacy and spontaneity of heart’s motions, and each gesture follows only one logic, that of blood? And the blood animating these songs is the same coursing through the veins of this small-great artist, who despite all his compositional and performance limitations, has known (and still knows) how to bring us great joys.

And showing us this is the formidable quartet of final pieces, a true Bignami of our hero’s entire career and eternal anthems of the genre: "English Murder" (perhaps the pinnacle of the band’s production), "Abattoirs of Love", "Summer Ends", and "Come the Horsemen", revitalized by the magical touch of L'Orchestre Noir, are offered once again for the umpteenth time, but for us, it feels like the first, as always happens with things beautiful and simple.

The truly spartan recording of this little live parenthesis and the hand clapping of the four (perhaps five) people present at the event remind us that this artist is here neither for money nor fame. Today as it was twenty years ago. Thank you, Tony.