La Breiche – Le Rite
Cold Spring Records
CD – DL
Out Now
La Breiche (“the witch”) features Yan Arexis and Patrick Lafforgue the creators of the cult festival L’Homme Sauvage, held in Midi-Pyrenees each year and members of bands like King Eider, Sus Scrofa, Stille Volk and Hantaoma respectively. They describe the sound of La Breiche as being ‘situated at the crossroads of early music and dark ambient’. Fighting Boredom have been listening, see what we thought below.
This is a beautifully constructed piece of folk music, but folk music in the sense of using old instruments and adding in field recordings and analogue synths. They also use ritual objects, the precise nature of which isn’t divulged but sounds quite terrifying. The photos that come with the recording are of what looks like some sort of pagan funeral rite. This music reflects the otherworldly feelings you have when attending something of that nature.
It’s soft, precise and perfectly balanced. In the main it’s old instruments and new sounds blended to give a sense of wonderment and awe, it does slip into metallic guitars but this isn’t the defining moment by any means, they are soon buried under chants and small sounds. It sounds like a sunrise over a huge dark forest, like the light dappling through ancient trees, like a fox catching a luckless rabbit and biting in. It’s light and it’s dark, it mixes the two and makes them dance together. It’s a reminder of past times and different beliefs.
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La Breiche have a Bandcamp page.
You can buy the CD from the Cold Spring Bandcamp page
All words by Adrian Bloxham
