Track: Esben and the Witch - 'Sylvan'

I first saw the gothic post-rock trio Esben and the Witch in a draughty Manchester hall sometime around 2010. They were supporting The Big Pink, but easily upstaged them with their simplistic yet frantic paeans of despair and dark enchantment.

(Incidentally, does anyone remember The Big Pink? They were a Jesus Jones-esque electro-rock outfit who had a minor hit with 'Dominos' and then disappeared into obscurity. Although their debut album 'A Brief History of Love' was one I remember listening to quite frequently when it was released ... perhaps one to revisit, or visit for the first time should you feel so inclined.)

I was equally taken with ESTW's debut album 'Violet Cries', deeming it to be a foreboding and haunting well of mature compositions that conjured up images of Norwegian pine forests, Brothers Grimm tales and German silent expressionist cinema like 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari'.

However, my interest in their following two albums never quite reached the same level; I deemed them incapable of moving beyond the sepia-toned field of woe they had ploughed very well on 'Violet Cries', and I gradually forgot about them.

So I was pleased, earlier this week, to hear their new track 'Sylvan' and find myself suitably impressed.

At 13 minutes-long, it ebbs and flows with the same plaintive vocals from Rachel Davies and atmospherics that swirl like a morass of ghostly fog. When it erupts though it is cataclysmic and epic, with the same kind of operatic dread that made 'Lucia at the Precipice' so enthralling. A good omen for further new material later in the year.

Have a listen to 'Sylvan' here...