It’s been 8 years since Writ On Water has released anything new, their last release being 2000’s Pelléas EP. But even back then, their music was stuck even further in the past, specifically in the halcyon days of 4AD Records, and artists such as Cocteau Twins and This Mortal Coil. Therefore, it should come as no shock that A Wingless King, the group’s newest full-length, sounds somewhat like a musical artifact unstuck in time.

A gloomily atmospheric post-punk/4AD tone permeates the entire disc, even on the more “relaxed” numbers such as album opener “Angie Swirls In Pastel Summer” and “Wondertime”. And on songs like “Dead Give Away” and the dreamy closing track “Things Only Heaven Knows”, it coalesces into something quite spell-binding. All of which was something I was more or less prepared for.

However, what I wasn’t necessarily prepared for was how experimental and left-of-center A Wingless King would be. Their previous releases, specifically 1992’s Sylph, revealed that the group wasn’t content with simply being clones, but rather, would venture out into left field from time to time. But that’s even truer on A Wingless King.

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If you’re one of the uninitiated, I’ll admit it: there’s really no easy entrance into Cold, Lycia’s fourth full-length (fifth, if you count 1989’s Wake). At first blush, it’s overwrought and pretentious, rife with any and every goth cliché you can think of, from Mike VanPortfleet’s sinister vocals to lyrics such as “All the aching signs we miss/To live in purple scarlet bliss/And swim with jeweled golden fish/And breathe the autumn air so crisp” (“Snowdrop”) to morose, shadowy atmospherics guaranteed to cause pale folks in long, black robes to start swaying and swirling en masse.

The thing is, Lycia never attempt to deny any of this. They do nothing to deny the clichés inherent in their music. On the contrary, they dive headlong into them with wild abandon, inhabiting them fully, and never once shirking from the stylistic and aesthetic ramifications. As such, the music certainly never transcends its clichés and tropes. Rather, the band’s intensity and integrity transforms those clichés into something that feels wholly original, lively, and perhaps most importantly, convincing.

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Black Happy Day describes their music on In The Garden Of Ghostflowers as “ambient roots music”.  As with all ambient music, Black Happy Day’s amorphous, drifting sound often leaves the listener with very little point of reference.  But unlike the typical ambient approach, which leaves the listener within a somewhat blissful place, Black Happy Day leaves the listener smack dab in the middle of a foreboding, constantly shifting environment.

The duo’s vocals are layered and shifted slightly out of phase with normality thanks to generous portions of reverb and echo.  Adding to the harrowing, dreamlike tone are exotic drones, amorphous metallic tones, and shuddering walls of dripping sound that ooze, reverberate, and shimmer within and throughout the duo’s sculpted vocals.

Such an approach can be intriguing and even enthralling at times, but it can also become tedious.  In The Garden Of Ghostflowers has a very solemn, plodding air about it, which is only enhanced by the often portentous lyrics sung, chanted, and intoned by Vanflower and Renner.

Not surprisingly, In The Garden Of Ghostflowers‘s strongest moments come when the album is at its most roots-y.  Here, the band’s sound warms up slightly and strands of more traditional instrumentation (guitar, banjo, dulcimer, harmonium) drift within hearing range, offering something a little more solid and substantial to lean on.

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I was talking with an elder at my church a few weeks ago about our shared affinity for the sort of gloomy post-punk that only the 1980s seemed capable of producing. I’m referring to bands such as The Cure (whose output during that decade is, in my opinion, almost entirely unrivalled), New Order, and Joy Division, but also Josef K, The Durutti Column, and many others. It seems like much of that music died off by the time the 1990s rolled around, with grunge and its ilk coming along to assuage the angst of teens everywhere.

However, the truth is that the sort of gloomy, atmospheric post-punk that we all knew and loved never really died. It simply went underground. There, bands such as Lycia (pronounced “lie-see-uh”) took the genre — if it could even be considered a genre — even further.

If you want to pick nits, I find it difficult to really label the songs on The Burning Circle And Then Dust “goth” (which Lycia and so many of their contemporaries are often labelled), due mainly to the amazing amounts of atmosphere that Mike VanPortfleet, David Galas, and Tara Vanflower pack into these songs. The result is a sometimes claustrophobic and overwhelming album that, like much of Lycia’s music, embodies nearly every stereotype that comes to mind when thinking of “goth/darkwave/etc.”, and then just easily transcends them again and again.

Originally a two-disc release on Projekt Records, VanPortfleet chose to pare this re-release down to a mere 18(!) songs, as had been the original plan. This is probably a good thing (it could be argued that the disc could stand even a bit more trimming, as there are several short tracks that seem like nothing more than filler). Although Lycia’s music is clearly not a one-trick pony, a fact that becomes even more apparent upon a closer listen, the prevailing tone of the album, as well the various synth and guitar effects that VanPortfleet et al. use, does lead to a certain monotony.

Many of the songs follow a similar progression, usually beginning with murky synths and spiralling, ice-laced guitars immediately looming over the listener in a rather bombastic fashion, while cold, clunky drum machines pound away in the song’s center. Then, VanPortfleet’s snarling whispers come drifting around from the edges, like a cold winter wind sweeping across isolated spaces.

Like many of Lycia’s peers in the darkwave circles, there is certainly some pretense to their music. But unlike so many similar artists, which often stike up a theatrical pose that at best seems fake and at worst is just plain silly, the intensity that VanPortfleet et al. brings to these songs does lend them a certain amount of conviction. There certainly isn’t a lot of subtlety to the group’s music, due to the singular mindset that they bring to so many of the songs on the disc. However, that singular mindset and sense of focus actually allows the songs to achieve the epic sense of gloominess and despair towards which VanPortfleet and his cohorts constantly aspire.

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