"Locrian, to me, is visual music. When sound becomes so abstract that it transcends any preconceived ideas surrounding structure, tonality, and more, it stretches beyond its traditional boundaries and evokes rather than simply reflects. Now stretched across the eastern portion of the United States, this trio's new album marked a return to the more obscure and electronics-heavy drone of their earlier works. Now releasing a video [Note: see video section] for the song "Mortichnia" from their latest record New Catastrophism, Locrian branches into the literal and physically visual, something at which they'd only hinted in the textures between tones in the past.
Directed by Sean Dack and Lucy Swope, "Mortichnia" tells a post-apocalyptic tale about a witch–the last survivor of a mysterious virus–who is becoming ill. She crafts sigils and potions to purge herself of the virus, and adventures through desolate, post-urban landscapes until the sun sets. Pairing with Locrian's music, the strange landscapes which filled my mind over years of seeing them live at venues (and one time in an apartment!) made sense and were given digital flesh. Strange colors and textures were suddenly given context; Dack and Swope's Locrian visions mirrored mine..."
--Jon Rosenthal, Invisible Oranges
"Starting from a slow fade in, Foisy's guitar appears, layered and dense, as Hannum's synths underscore, resulting in a slow, yet cinematic expanse of sound...the overall sound is dense and varied, giving a greater sense of intricacy and focus than heard on their previous, similar works."
-Creaig Dunton, Brainwashed
"Opening opus ”Mortichnia” begins with an unsettling drone and the track evolves introducing swathes of synthesizer pads, guitar feedback and exquisite electronics to create what to me sounds like an otherworldly coronach at an ethereal funeral procession. "
-Dan Dolby, Veil of Sound, August 8, 2022
"Opener "Mortichnia," the album’s longest piece and named fittingly after the last walk or death march of a living creature, establishes a tone for what's to come as listeners step out into the barren sands Locrian have led them to. Speaking to life as a human in 2022, or as a tetrapod emerging from the ocean at the dawn of life on land; the universal finality of death is invoked by the band's distant sirens and pulsating, corrosive synth work. Like all well made drone, the song weighs on the expectation of the listener, offering sonic clues and feints as to the direction in which it’s headed. In the particular case of Locrian we might expect the song to burst forth and conclude noisily or violently, but they stick to the bit, they understand that the death march ends in the gradual exhaustion of life’s final energy, so fittingly the song first writhes, then falters, then whimpers, before ceasing entirely."
--Invisible Oranges, August 12, 2022
Locrian was formed in late 2005 by André Foisy and Terence Hannum. Allmusic has described the band as an ”eclectic mixture
of black metal, electronics, drone and noise rock”. The band have identified krautrock and '90s death metal as influences as well....more
I love the light and shade between Bryan's dirty and Emma's forlorn vocals. There are so many layers to this recording that are driven home through contrast. Plus the riffs are brilliant and get me moving. I can't stop listening to Thou and Emma in general lately. spaceman2250
The Belgian band explore heavy psych, tribal rhythms, free-jazz freakouts, meditative drone and the vast, shadowy spaces in between. Bandcamp Album of the Day Jun 22, 2020
A foreboding black-doom metal dirge, meditating on a dark world caked in ash, resulting from all the Earth’s nuclear arsenal detonating at once. Bandcamp Album of the Day Jun 14, 2018