But sonically, it goes many ways
Esben and the Witch have been at this for longer than people may realize. Their debut album, coming out nearly seven years ago, showed a fairly different side of the band than what they produce now. It’s done with intent—the trio pride themselves in tackling different genre styles in a manner that doesn’t seem like they would successfully work together, yet, for the most part, they do. At times the band veer between shoegaze, post-rock, folk and even doom, but their inability to fit into one category is sort of their “thing.”
On their latest record Nowhere, Esben and the Witch go hard into an ancient neo-folk feel, particularly due to a vividly beatific vocal delivery from Rachel Davies. As enchanting as the combination of these elements is, something about it grows tiresome after a while, and it’s kind of distracting.
Nowhere starts with the dreamy and incredibly gazey “A Desire for Light.” The over seven-minute-long track is the first introduction to Davies’ emotive release as it goes into the heavier doom-laden “Dull Gret,” but as the album goes on it becomes harder to focus on the individual songs. The singing approach doesn’t really vary from track to track, which starts to nag at the ears as the album plays on. Once you get to “The Unspoiled,” you start to wonder what choral daze you’ve been for the first 20 minutes.
Setting this aside, the instrumentation on Nowhere is really where it shines in Esben and the Witch’s discography. It’s one of their more beautiful displays of amalgamated genre production, with sweeps of wistful arpeggios during the softer moments meeting distorted riffs and crashing drums during the heftier ones for the perfect balance. Nowhere is still a good addition to the German band’s collection, and even if it ends up inducing a daze, you end up being pretty okay with it.
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