Since forever the universe has been trying to teach us about the concept of interconnectedness, that what affects one person, one town, one region, one country, will sooner or later affect everybody else on the planet. Depending on your worldview, you might call that concept by a different name, maybe karma or maths, entropy or just plain physics. The label you assign to it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we as a species are obviously unable to grasp it. Numerous crises throughout history couldn’t teach us what some consider basic maths. Neither could the latest pandemic. The problem is that with every new crisis and every new level of human development the stakes are getting higher. Our resistance to learning, our inability to teach all of us this most crucial of lessons is threatening our very existence.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is yet another example of a failure to learn and yet another example of interconnectedness. The seismic shift caused by the war is affecting everything we thought we knew about the world and our time, uncovering connections we didn’t know existed. Hunger in Africa is one direct consequence of the conflict, and just one in a row of dominos about to fall. Sooner or later, if they haven’t already, the effects of the war will reach your doorstep as well.
From day 1 of the war, Ukrainians White Ward have been trying to do what they can to use the little influence they have to remind their fanbase and the world of what is happening, of what’s at stake and what might be coming. Their hometown of Odessa is a major port on the shores of the Black Sea, a region that the Russians for strategic reasons are aiming to control completely. Like every other Ukrainian male between 18 and 60 the quintet is legally not allowed to leave the country. The longer the war drags on, the higher becomes the possibility that they will be directly involved in the conflict in one way or other. Simply because those that went before them have died.
How the band in the face of death, chaos and destruction managed to complete a new album, their third in a row, is beyond me. Although False Light had been in the making for three years, finishing touches must have been applied while the crisis was underway and ongoing. While the album was not written or recorded with the experience of full-scale war unfolding in the country, the conflict was already burning low scale in the areas Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk, and one cannot help but to interpret False Light’s raging black metal passages through the lens of war.
However, thematically, via its lyrics, spoken word parts and samples, the album takes on not only armed conflict, but everything else that’s wrong with the world. The topics the songs’ deal with include for example “imminent environmental catastrophes, police brutality, domestic abuse, the psychic emptiness of cities, the falsity of modern mainstream culture and ill-effects of overconsumption”. And, of course, all these subjects are connected and reinforce each other.
Musically, False Light builds on the appealing combination of the genres featured on previous album Love Exchange Failure. Fans who loved the noire sound mixture of black metal, brass-led dark jazz and hardcore will be glad to hear that those elements are still all there on the new album, and that the melange has been expanded to include gothic Americana and clean vocals sung by various guest musicians. Both, clean singing and gothic Americana, are a fitting addition to the band’s music, blending in seamlessly and adding to the dystopian atmosphere.
Of the album’s eight tracks with a total running time of over an hour I would single out title track False Light, a monster of a number, lasting almost 15 minutes. It begins with a jazzy notes and switches abruptly into intense battering and throaty vocals, taking many unexpected twists and turns in its course while constantly upholding intensity. A good example of the band’s songs-as-stories approach, the track will leave you exhausted and disillusioned, but also with a feeling of having experienced some kind of catharsis.
White Ward’s third album False Light is a worthy successor for Love Exchange Failure, showing a band further developing their sound and displaying potential for additional growth. Let’s hope they and we live to witness it.
To honour the band’s unwavering dedication to their music and to help them through these difficult times with a modest contribution, if you are a fan of things black metal and avantgarde, in 2022, the year of the unlawful Russian invasion of Ukraine, this, to put it in very simple terms, is an album you have to buy. And spread the word.
(8.5/10 Slavica)
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