Esben & The Witch – Hold Sacred

For a decade-and-a-half now, England’s Esben & The Witch have been making haunting ‘mood music’ that brings to mind the dark fairy tale that they’re named after....
Esben & The Witch : Hold Sacred
7.5 Nostromo
2023 
Esben & The Witch : Hold Sacred

For a decade-and-a-half now, England’s Esben & The Witch have been making haunting ‘mood music’ that brings to mind the dark fairy tale that they’re named after. This is not for the club, whether rock or dance, but rather home alone (or perhaps a forest) at night. This continues with the stark Hold Sacred.

Limiting their effects and instrumentation, much of Sacred is just singer Rachel Davies’ voice and the band’s background effects, echoing as if in an empty, abandoned church. There is some variation, such as the more pressing “In Ecstasy” or the better evocation of emotional pain with “True Mirror”, but the album is largely to be taken as a whole, a long night’s journey that has no light at the end, just a flickering candle throughout.

If you don’t want your darkness, if you don’t want to be alone, look elsewhere, but for those who crave solitude and embrace sorrow, Hold Sacred Esben & The Witch.

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