Posted in Whathaveyou on August 30th, 2023 by JJ Koczan
Portland-based psych-turned-heavygaze outfit Blackwater Holylight will launch a month of European touring at Desertfest Belgium in the company of Amsterdam’s Iron Jinn. The band presented a comparatively grim thesis with 2021’s Silence/Motion (review here), taking the atmospheric penchant of their first two albums and, in part, using it as a means to explore the drear of its time, not that either the time or the drear are necessarily over.
I finally got to see the band after wanting to since their debut about a year ago at Psycho Las Vegas (review here), and they took to the main stage there with according mastery of their sound and approach. The latest album put them on their first US headlining tour, and they’re headliners internationally now too, their outward growth in sound greeted with a corresponding uptick in listenership. Well met, and all that.
If you didn’t hear it, Iron Jinn‘s 2023 self-titled debut (review here) is a dark-prog smorgasbord, which makes this a good pairing. Plus, Iron Jinn will have just been out in September supporting Alain Johannes and doubling as his backing band, so they should be plenty warmed up.
Blackwater Holylight posted the dates as follows:
BLACKWATER HOLYLIGHT- (#128165#)EUROPE(#128165#) WE COMING FOR YA(#128165#)
Cannot wait to return to so many countries and friends we’ve missed dearly. Please join us and @iron_jinn for a month a mayhem LETS GO!
@doomstarbookings and BWHL present CHAPEL OF ROSES TOUR: 20.10.23 Antwerpen (BE) – Trix / Desertfest 23.10.23 Paris (FR) – Supersonic 24.10.23 Nijmegen (NL) – Merleyn 25.10.23 Eindhoven (NL) – Stroomhuis 26.10.23 Bochum (DE) – Die Trompete 27.10.23 Dresden (DE) – Chemiefabrik / Heavy Psych Sounds Festival 28.10.23 Berlin (DE) – Urban Spree / Heavy Psych Sounds Festival 29.10.23 Malmö (SE) – Plan B 30.10.23 Gothenburg (SE) – Skeppet GBG 31.10.23 Stockholm (SE) – Bar Brooklyn 02.11.23 Helsinki (FI) – Kuudes Linja / Sonic Rites Fall Fest 03.11.23 Tallinn (EE) – Hungr 04.11.23 Riga (LV) – Vagonu Hall 05.11.23 Vilnius (LT) – Narauti 06.11.23 Warsaw (PL) – Chmury 07.11.23 Krakow (PL) – Zascianek 08.11.23 Prague (CZ) – Modra Vopice 09.11.23 Vienna (AT) – Arena 10.11.23 Budapest (HU) – Instant 11.11.23 Ljubljana (SI) – Channel Zero 13.11.23 Munich (DE) – Feierwerk 14.11.23 Zürich (CH) – Klub Komplex 15.11.23 Frankfurt (DE) – Nachtleben 16.11.23 Lille (FR) – La Bulle Café
* Ljubljana date has been changed to Channel Zero.
Posted in Whathaveyou on February 11th, 2022 by JJ Koczan
Blackwater Holylight headlining with support from Bleakheart on the East Coast and Spirit Mother on the West Coast? And that’s following up on the European run they did with Monolord in Europe? Yeah, this is probably the kind of show you’re going to want to go to. It’s only due to circumstances outside my control, and much to my regret, that I’ve never seen the band live, and the prospect of catching them on their first US headlining stint feels like good timing. Who the hell knows what the world will be like by then, but since the occasion is a celebration of 2021’s Silence/Motion (review here), I’m at least willing to let myself pretend for the sake of this post that I’m willing to let myself err on the side of optimism.
The PR wire dutifully delivered the dates:
Blackwater Holylight announce Summer 2022 headlining North American tour
Portland, OR band Blackwater Holylight announce Summer 2022 North American headlining tour dates today in support of their third album Silence/Motion on RidingEasy Records. The tour kicks off on May 9th. Please see complete dates below.
Quote from the band: “We’re gearing up for our first US headlining tour and couldn’t be more excited to be sharing the road with Bleakheart and Spirit Mother! We will have a ton of merch available and can’t wait to see you all out there.”
BLACKWATER HOLYLIGHT – TOUR 2022: 5/09 San Diego, CA – Casbah* 5/10 Scottsdale, AZ – Pub Rock* 5/11 Albuquerque, NM – Sister* 5/14 Lafayette, LA – Freetown Boom Boom Room 5/15 New Orleans, LA – The Goat 5/16 Atlanta, GA – 529* 5/18 Charlotte, NC – Snug Harbor* 5/19 Durham, NC – Pinhook* 5/20 Baltimore, MD – Metro Gallery* 5/21 Philadelphia, PA – Johnny Brenda’s* 5/22 Brooklyn, NY – Saint Vitus Bar* 5/24 Boston, MA – Middle East (upstairs)* 5/26 Montreal, QC – Le Ritz* 5/27 Toronto, ON – Garrison* 5/28 Youngstown, OH – Westside Bowl* 5/29 Columbus, OH – Natalie’s* 5/30 Indianapolis, IN – Black Circle* * Bleakheart supports
6/01 Chicago, IL – Sleeping Village** 6/02 Milwaukee, WI – Cactus Club** 6/03 Green Bay, WI – Lyric Room** 6/04 St Paul, MN – Turf Club** 6/05 Omaha, NE – Slowdown** 6/07 Denver, CO – Hi-Dive** 6/08 Salt Lake City, UT – Metro** 6/09 Boise, ID – Neurolux** 6/10 Seattle, WA – Chop Suey** 6/11 Vancouver BC – Rickshaw** 6/12 Portland, OR – Revolution Hall** 6/15 Sacramento, CA – Café Colonial** 6/16 San Fransisco, CA – The Eagle** 6/17 Santa Cruz, CA – Felton Music Hall** 6/18 Los Angeles, CA – Lodge Room** ** Spirit Mother supports
Blackwater Holylight: Allison “Sunny” Faris – Vocals/bass/guitar Sarah McKenna – Synths Mikayla Mayhew – Guitar/bass Eliese Dorsay – Drums Erika Osterhout – Guitar (not on LP)
Posted in Reviews on October 18th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
There is a quote by the author Margaret Atwood that comes to mind in considering Blackwater Holylight‘s third album, Silence/Motion: ‘Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them.’ It says something that as human beings, we live in a culture in which sexual assault, rape, and the killing of women by men is a cliché. It’s a trope of tv storytelling. How many “gritty” procedurals define themselves at the expense of the feminine body? Sexual violence, fetishized. Blood dried on nude flesh.
In the backing screams of “Delusional,” the creeping synth line of “Who the Hell” and tense guitar that accompanies, in its flourishes of minimalist sadness and distorted blowout, its engagement of extreme metal in closer “Every Corner” or the earlier “MDIII,” Silence/Motion conveys and at times seems to push against inherent male-gaze violence. It is a specific attempt being made to transform objectification and victimization into expressive power, to convey through rich and deep-running atmospherics that transcend what the Portland, Oregon/Los Angeles, California, outfit of bassist/vocalist/here-also-guitarist Allison “Sunny” Faris — who discussed her history with sexual violence in a recent interview here — guitarist/bassist Mikayla Mayhew, synthesist Sarah McKenna, drummer Eliese Dorsay and recently-joined guitarist/backing vocalist Erika Osterhout (who does not appear on the album) accomplished in melding together heavy psychedelic, pop, and metal on their first two LPs, 2019’s Veils of Winter (review here) and 2018’s self-titled debut (review here). Even in the transition of the title-track itself, from its acoustic beginning and string-laced midsection surge, Blackwater Holylight find the beauty in horror without shying away from the horror in horror.
What does that mean? On the most basic level of listening to Silence/Motion front to back, it means that those who took on the band either or the self-titled or Veils of Winter, or both, might be surprised at the darker spaces Silence/Motion inhabits. Melody is central to the songwriting as it has been all along, but there’s no question that this material puts even the edge of melancholy in the prior record in an entirely new context. It’s of course worth noting that for the first time, the band worked with an outside producer in A.L.N. of Mizmor, and that Faris is backed on “Delusional” by Thou‘s Bryan Funck and on “Every Corner” by Mike Paparo of Inter Arma, both male vocalists, bookended, but the sense of exploration in their sound that comes through is more than just studio happenstance. Silence/Motion feels like Blackwater Holylight using their songs to do something new.
One can still find plenty of ethereality in their work, as the touches of airy post-rock guitar floating at the outset of centerpiece “Floating Faster” remind, the vocals entering a vibe like grunge made to float, but as the song plays out, the drums foreshadow a turn to come after its slowdown, and sure enough, it is the lower-end rumble that wins the day of the track. The song does not “get heavy” in the same way as the subsequent “MDIII,” with its squibbly guitar and charred textures, but it emphasizes the purposefulness that is behind the material across the 41-minute span of the outing, each piece contributing something toward the greater intent of the whole.
True to the time of its making, Silence/Motion fits easily across two vinyl sides, but it does not do so evenly. Side A ends with “Falling Faster” and side B begins with “MDIII,” and while that transition is crucial in giving over to “MDIII”‘s metallic incorporations, the poppier false security of “Around You” and the consuming paranoia payoff of “Every Corner,” the story being told throughout is linear, a narrative conveyed as much through ambience and instrumental shifts as in the lyrics to “Silence/Motion” itself.
So I guess this is the part where I make it feel safe for dudes, right? Maybe, except much as I might support what the band and or RidingEasy Records get up to with a given release, it’s not my job to sell records. Yeah, Blackwater Holylight have been and remain a largely deeply accessible band, working with classic verse/chorus structures, vibrant harmonies, and a catchiness that even the looming threat of “Who the Hell” can’t/doesn’t entirely cast away. But just because they make it sound like them doesn’t cut off the powerful resonance of Silence/Motion itself. If anything, it makes it all the more vital and a more resilient showcase for other women who might relate.
There’s no way I would have demographic statistics to back this up, but as somebody who’s spent a fair enough portion of his life at gigs, I imagine the majority of Blackwater Holylight‘s audience is dudes, and there is a sense of challenging the dehumanization that takes place when one is objectified — the point that men on stage become objects for men in the audience as well is one that not-surprisingly few make; a tangent for another time, but not entirely irrelevant — and not just pushing back on how easily violence against a person becomes when they’re no longer human, but of turning that gaze back on itself. Silence/Motion offers nothing so trite as a ‘girl-power’ salute to what women can accomplish in a male-dominant culture, but instead speaks toward the conditions in which such a thing might be passed off as genuine progress in the first place.
Accordingly, no, Silence/Motion is not an easy listen. It shouldn’t be. I suppose it could be divorced from its own thematic context — it was apparently a good time in the making, if that helps? — and taken as just a collection of songs with some screams at the start and end, but that feels like cheapening what Blackwater Holylight actually accomplish with the material. It is a showcase of craft and performance as one would expect from Blackwater Holylight sonically progressing into their third long-player, and if that’s enough, fine. But to not engage with Silence/Motion with a deeper, experiential consideration, to not at very least acknowledge what’s being confronted, regardless of one’s own gender identity and where one resides within the stakes Atwood lays out above, is missing a big part of the point.
Right now it’s looking like Blackwater Holylight‘s Fall tour of Europe alongside Monolord is going to happen. It would not be the soon-to-formerly-be-Portland-Oregon-based outfit’s first run alongside the Swedish trio, but it arrives as a herald for Blackwater Holylight‘s third album, Silence/Motion, and that’s a significant distinguishing factor. Due next month through RidingEasy, the record brings new darkness and flourishes of extremity that coincide with the flowing psychedelia and melody previously established in the band’s sound.
Much has already been made and more surely will of the band — bassist/vocalist Allison “Sunny” Faris (also guitar on the record), guitarist/bassist Mikayla Mayhew, drummer Eliese Dorsay and synthesist Sarah McKenna — working with guest vocalists on Silence/Motion like ALN of Mizmor, who also produced, as well as Bryan Funck of Thou and Mike Paparo of Inter Arma on the record’s opening and closing tracks. I’m not saying that’s not interesting — it sure as shit was something I wanted to talk about in the interview — just also to consider the downward motion of guitar in the suitably titled “Falling Faster,” or the burst in the latter half of “Silence/Motion” itself, the charred-style squibblies in “MDIII” or the bleak post-punk in “Around You.” Yes, “Delusional” is a striking opener with Funck‘s rasp behind Faris‘ clean-sung verse, and “Every Corner” branches into territory Blackwater Holylight have never gone in its consuming second half especially, but there’s no less growth to be heard in the tense synth and guitar of “Who the Hell?” than in the novelty of the company the band are keeping.
I’m going to review the album (I kind of just did; whoops), so I’ll stem the opinion-izing there as much as possible, but in atmosphere and dynamic, Silence/Motion is a pull in a new direction from 2019’s Veils of Winter (review here) and 2018’s self-titled debut (review here), and deserves to be considered in its own light and in terms of what it portends for the band. Apparently new guitarist/backing vocalist Erika Osterhout can scream. Faris talks about wanting to write some death metal. I’d be up for that as interpreted by Blackwater Holylight.
There was, in fact, a lot to talk about, from making the album on a deadline underscored by a pregnancy in the band to working with an outside producer for the first time, to broadening the stylistic reach, to touring, to playing Psycho Las Vegas last month, to the sexual abuse that inspired the title-track, to moving to Los Angeles from Portland — which I think happened last week — to what kind of protein powder Faris puts in her morning shake alongside the peanut butter and banana. Spoiler alert: it is made from the crushed bones of her enemies.
Please enjoy the interview:
Blackwater Holylight, Silence/Motion Interview with Sunny Faris, Sept. 1, 2021
Blackwater Holylight release Silence/Motion Oct. 22 on RidingEasy Records. As of this post, their Fall tour of Europe with Monolord is still a go. Dates follow. Their early-2022 tour dates with All Them Witches are here. Check the links below for updates.
Monolord w/ Blackwater Holylight Europe 2021: 18/11 DE Oberhausen Kuttempel 19/11 NL Utrecht DB’s 20/11 NL Nijmegen Doornroosje 21/11 BE Antwerp Zappa 22/11 UK Bristol Exchange 23/11 UK Glasgow Stereo 24/11 UK London Underworld 25/11 UK Manchester Soup 26/11 FR Dunkerque 4 Ecluses 27/11 FR Paris Petit Bain 28/11 FR Toulouse Rex 30/11 SP Madrid Caracol 01/12 SP Barcelona Boveda 02/12 FR Annecy Brise Glace 03/12 CH Aarau Kiff 04/12 AT Vienna Arena 05/12 DE Dresden Chemiefabrik 06/12 DE Berlin Zukunft am Ostkreuz 07/12 DE Hamburg Bahnhof St. Pauli 08/12 DK Copenhagen Stengade 09/12 SE Gothenburg Pustervik 10/12 SE Stockholm Debaser Strand 11/12 SE Malmo Babel 12/12 NO Oslo Youngs
Posted in Whathaveyou on August 10th, 2021 by JJ Koczan
Listen to the damaged jangle and fuzzy undercurrent of the new Blackwater Holylight track. Really let those layers sink in. And that melodic drift. Fuck yes I’m dying to hear this album. The Portland, Oregon-based once-again-five-piece have a slew of tour dates domestic and international slated for the coming months, starting in just a couple weeks at Psycho Las Vegas before they head abroad to join forces with Monolord — with whom they also toured the US in the before-times — this Fall, then post-holidays, they’ll be out with All Them Witches for a run that was supposed to happen in Spring 2020 and I think rescheduled once or twice along the way. Who can even remember?
Silence/Motion is the name of the new Blackwater Holylight LP, and it’s out Oct. 22 on RidingEasy Records as the follow-up to 2019’s Veils of Winter (review here). I know there’s a lot of cool stuff coming up, but this is my most anticipated album for the rest of 2021.
The PR wire has details:
Blackwater Holylight – Silence/Motion – RidingEasy Records
‘Empty surrounds all of me.’ It’s a poignant line from the third album by Blackwater Holylight that encapsulates the search for self when suddenly everything has changed. There’s a theme of processing vast personal trauma throughout Silence/Motion that eloquently — both lyrically and musically — and simultaneously embodies the crushing emptiness, sorrow, strength and rebuilding of recovering from personal devastation.
“There was so much grief both in the world and interpersonally during the process of creating Silence/Motion,” says vocalist/bassist Allison “Sunny” Faris. “The four of us gave one another more space to be ourselves, to experiment with each other’s ideas and to be gentle with one another more than we ever have before. So, we knew this tenderness would manifest in extremely honest arrangements, and I think that you can hear that throughout the record.”
Curiously, considering the dark times in which it was created, this is the band’s most melodic and catchy music so far. Blackwater Holylight, as the name suggests, is all about contrasts: It’s a fluid convergence of sound that’s heavy, psychedelic, melodic, terrifying and beautiful all at once. And, Silence/Motion finds the band honing those contrasts, letting ideas and moods fully develop from song to song, rather than filling every song with a full range of their capabilities. It allows the band to go fully prog-rock here, and simply stay hushed and intimate there. There’s a new confidence to the band in how seamlessly they wield their stylistic amalgam.
“Writing this album was extraordinarily difficult emotionally, however it did come to fruition fairly quickly,” Faris says. “In the past, the theme of vulnerability has always been a big player and it definitely showed up full force while writing this album.”
Blackwater Holylight recorded the album as a four piece: Faris on vocals and guitar (on “Silence/Motion”, “MDIII”, “Around You” and “Every Corner”) and bass for the remainder, Sarah McKenna on synths, Mikayla Mayhew on guitar (and bass when Faris plays guitar) and drummer Eliese Dorsay. New second guitarist Erika Osterhout will perform the songs with them live. For Silence/Motion the band chose to work with a producer for the first time, bringing in A.L.N. (of Mizmor, Hell) to produce, along with recording engineer Dylan White — who also helmed their previous album Veils of Winter (2019) — at Odessa Recording Studio in Portland, OR. Guest vocals on album opener “Delusional” are by Bryan Funck (Thou.) Mike Paparo (Inter Arma) and A.LN. (Mizmor, Hell) lend guest vocals to album closer “Every Corner.”
Silence/Motion opens softly with interwoven folky single note guitars over an ominous sounding drone for the first minute, akin to moments from Pink Floyd’s Echoes. Suddenly an irresistibly head-nodding, groovy droptuned riff kicks in with the drums and it’s a full on blackened rocker with soaring synths and Funck’s witchy whispers over the top. “Who The Hell,” the track quoted above, takes proceedings into a Krautrock direction, centered around McKenna’s arpeggiated synth loop and Dorsay’s tom-tom triplets, while 16-note guitar strums add tension as Faris wearily sings, “So tell me who the hell would want to live this way — so afraid/ To feel this void, to dwell in it… I can’t describe this pain I wear/ It suffocates and you left it here.” It’s an incredibly powerful 6 minutes.
The title track delivers the 1-2-3 punch of the album’s brilliant opening trilogy. It starts with lightly plucked acoustic guitar, plaintive piano chords and Faris’ voice gliding so softly it sounds more like a Mellotron. The song builds slowly toward crescendo, led by a swinging tom pattern, that abruptly switches back to a heavier version of the opening melody. “Silence/Motion” is about digesting and healing from sexual assault. As Faris explains, “It is an ode to the juxtaposition of feeling paralyzingly blank and and like your entire life is moving through you simultaneously.” Elsewhere, Black Metal guitars collide with dreamlike melodies. “Around You” brandishes a hopeful, hummable synth melody and shimmering shoegaze guitars like throwing down a gauntlet. In the end, it becomes undeniably clear just how completely into their own Blackwater Holylight has come.
“The analogy is that with our first record (Blackwater Holylight, 2018) we were getting into to the car and buckling up,” Faris says. “The second (Veils of Winter, 2019) we were turning the car on, and with this third we have kicked into drive toward our destination. Our destination is a bit mysterious and has the ability to change from day to day, but we’re on our way.”
Silence/Motion will be available on LP, CD and download on October 22nd, 2021 via RidingEasy Records.
Artist: Blackwater Holylight Album: Silence/Motion Record Label: RidingEasy Records Release date: October 22, 2021
01. Delusional 02. Who The Hell? 03. Silence/Motion 04. Falling Faster 05. MDIII 06. Around You 07. Every Corner
01.21 – Dallas, TX – Trees # 01.22 – Austin, TX – Mohawk # 01.23 – San Antonio, TX – Paper Tiger # 01.24 – Phoenix, NV – Crescent Ballroom # 01.27 – San Diego, CA – Belly Up Tavern # 01.28 – Los Angeles, CA – The Regent Theater # 01.29 – San Francisco, CA – The Fillmore # 01.31 – Portland, OR – Wonder Ballroom # 02.01 – Vancouver, BC – Commodore Ballroom # 02.02 – Seattle, WA – The Showbox # 02.04 – Salt Lake City, UT – Kilby Court 02.05 – Denver, CO – Gothic Theater # 02.06 – Fort Collins, CO – Aggie Theater # # w/ All Them Witches
Blackwater Holylight: Allison “Sunny” Faris – Vocals/bass/guitar Sarah McKenna – Synths Mikayla Mayhew – Guitar/bass Eliese Dorsay – Drums Erika Osterhout – Guitar (not on LP)
