Sol Invictus
Necropolis

Four years after Once Upon A Time, the new album by the great Sol Invictus of bardo Tony Wakeford is released, titled Necropolis. It is almost a concept album dedicated to London and the Thames, viewed as a sort of serpent winding through the city. His is a very decadent "vision" of the British metropolis, emphasizing the lost grandeur of what was once the capital of a glorious empire. On a personal level, while listening to Necropolis, I was reminded of a book by Welsh writer Arthur Machen, namely The London Adventure or the Art of Wandering: in it, I found the same nostalgia for a lost time and the discovery of hidden corners of London. Moreover, the title Necropolis refers to an underground railway that connected London with Brookwood Cemetery between 1854 and 1941. In any case, the term should also be read metaphorically as the dark "vision" Wakeford has of the city itself. As in the previous, inconsistent work, this time we also find Don Anderson on guitars, former member of Agalloch—an influential American black-metal band—who contributes, at times, to give a hard and electric touch to the sound as in the splendid "Nine Elms," a typical Sol Invictus style track, and in the frantic "Turn, Turn, Turn." Wakeford also employs the voices of the Green Army Choir while, as usual, his voice stands out. Unfortunately, Andrew King is absent, whose contribution was significant in the past production of Sol Invictus. However, compared to Once Upon A Time, the ideas seem more focused: we are not so far, in some tracks, from the atmosphere of masterpieces like "In The Rain" and "The Blade". Notable tracks also include "Serpentine," "The Last Man," and "Kill Burn" but, overall, Necropolis is a good work that returns Sol Invictus to us in all their splendor. Let's hope that it is not, as rumored, their farewell album. Highly recommended to all followers of the Cult of the Unconquered Sun.