Artist: Apus
Title: Invocación Equinoccial
Type: EP
Label: Digital
Ok. Some things you come across by sheer dumb, random, doomscrolling Bandcamp luck which I rarely do to be honest. This apparent quartet from Equador are most definitely the result of that though. But I took a listen and, Oh I don’t know, something about this EP captured me almost immediately. It felt… new. Vital.
It begins with ‘Niños chaska escarchados por la nieve’ (nope, not a clue but maybe something about winds?) which is an almost five minute instrumental that kind of walks that line between dungeon synth and even maybe folk. It’s delicate and simple but quite captitvating in its arrangement and feel. It ends with some voices, quickly englufed by winds but there is such a wildness to their sound and laughter seems to rise up. Mysterious but quite… beautiful.
‘Montañas andinas lloran sombras de ancestros congelados’ is from the outset black metal. The vocals are harsh, bitter sounding but the music is odd. Primitive somehow. Keyboard heavy, almost goth guitar jangling away in the background. The production is, with the best will in the world, primitive and the mix strange but when they hit the accelerator you hear this most definite folk tinge come through. It’s still dark and wild, as though part of some celebration in the wilderness whirls around the song. It also has such fine hooks in here too. I’m kind of shocked by this point.
‘Arcaica cordillera embrujada, invocación equinoccial’ has a more gentle beginning, a tune which sounds somehow familiar from my childhood…impossible but there you go. The vocals are fine indeed, like some witch or creature from the darkness and the wilds snarling and cackling. With the folk inflected black metal guitar it is such and eerie mix. Keyboards take up the melody, some clean vocals, female echo in the background. It’s oddly chaotic but there is, once again, an inexplicable feel of strange, twisted beauty here. It even manages to move smoothly to a guitar sound that is almost strightforward heavy metal but just a superb sound and tune to it.
A twenty minute introduction to clearly a very new band. They have thrown the lot into it too; black metal base, dungeon synth, a pinch of goth, a swirl of folk and a thin layer of heavy metal and simmer. The result is not only pretty original, but wild, magical and enchanting. Yes the production is primitive, yes there’s the odd error, yes occasionally it seems like two or three different bands in the same place but they always come together and create something greater from it.
But, damn, as a debut it’s really, really got something. Intriguing, potentially exciting, I really hope they fling themselves into the wild spirit in this EP and see where it goes.
Oh and I love the cover too.
Gizmo
Walking The Liminal Space 