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Earth Mirror

by Hawthonn

supported by
Bill Shannon
Bill Shannon thumbnail
Bill Shannon Memerizing and haunting while also beautiful and sedating. Earth Mirror is a beautiful record and Hawthonn a superb and necessary project. We are far apart on the political spectrum and also geographically but this music makes a real connection with me. Superb! Favorite track: Odo Galse.
YNG ZNG
YNG ZNG thumbnail
YNG ZNG I love playing this at night because I can still listen when I'm already sleeping Favorite track: Circles of Light.
vertov
vertov thumbnail
vertov Cat's Cradle started playing while I was minding my young kittens, who all took a break from wrestling to sit around the speaker, entranced. Favorite track: Cat's Cradle.
TARANTULA FACE
TARANTULA FACE thumbnail
TARANTULA FACE Incredible, visionary work! I thought The Red Goddess would be hard to follow, but this one is beauty!

Hawthonn interview we did: arvozylo.medium.com/interview-with-hawthonn-no-part-of-it-interview-series-32-248631ce5a9a Favorite track: Drowned Light.
Peter Irish
Peter Irish thumbnail
Peter Irish Pure Magic...a masterpiece of occult ambiance, Hawthonn keeps getting better and better.
more...
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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      $6 USD  or more

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    The Earth Mirror CD comes with full color CMYK print on disc body with a 4 pannel wallet on 16 point SBS Board and gloss UV Coating featuring artwork by John Godbert.

    Special reduced shipping rates for UK orders

    Includes unlimited streaming of Earth Mirror via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 5 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      $11 USD or more 

     

  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    12" standard black vinyl version of Earth Mirror with full color 4/0 CMYK print on 20pt SBS board and standard water base coating featuring artwork by John Godbert

    Special reduced shipping rates for UK orders.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Earth Mirror via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 7 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      $20 USD or more 

     

1.
2.
Dream Cairn 05:42
3.
Odo Galse 06:53
4.
Cat's Cradle 06:01
5.
6.
Vehiel 08:37

about

An Earth Mirror is a magical device. Found in German occult literature, it is a clod of earth sandwiched between layers of glass. Gazing into the Earth Mirror is said to reveal the locations of hidden treasures. Magical visions and the revelation of mysteries in the landscape are two prominent features of Earth Mirror, the new album by Layla & Phil Legard alias Hawthonn, and their second for Ba Da Bing.

Somewhere between moon musick and ethereal pop, the songs of Earth Mirror reflect the band’s transition from studio project to live performers in the wake of 2018’s Red Goddess (of this men shall know nothing). The themes for the songs on Earth Mirror reflect the Legards’ experiences, magical and mundane, in the wake of Red Goddess and as the world then headed full-tilt into pandemic.

On Earth Mirror, Layla’s heavenly voice accompanies a sonic palette encompassing field recordings of ice cracking on an ancient Corpse Road, mysterious hymns sung in disused medieval chapels, spectrally processed horse shrieks, electronic textures, rumbling organ, crystalline electric piano, and modulated jaw harp. No guitars appear on this album. Nor do conventional song-structures: the compositions of Earth Mirror organically developed from dreams (‘Dream Cairn’), experiments with inducing magical visions (‘Odo Galse’, ‘Vehiel’), ruminations on lunar beings (‘Crowned Light’, ‘Circles of Light’), and ecological anxiety (‘Cat’s Cradle’). Their literary influences include English witch Andrew Chumbley, nihilist philosopher Emil Cioran, the Enochian language of John Dee and Edward Kelly, and even Kurt Vonnegut.

As ever, Hawthonn fuses sensibilities of sound design and electroacoustic music (- Phil is a university lecturer in these subjects -) with unusual atmosphere and emotion. Beyond music, the pair are serious students of the variegated histories of occultism, most recently with Phil’s publication of An Excellent Booke of the Arte of Magicke (with Al Cummins), which presents the first edition of a magical manuscript written by 16th-century adventurers Humphrey Gilbert & John Davis.

The cover art by John Godbert, an archaeological illustrator and musician, (also known for The Fall’s Live at the Witch Trials artwork) is inspired by the ancient Welsh dolmen Maen y Bardd (Stone of the Bard). Such ancient sites, scattered across present-day Britain, have a reputation for turning anyone who spends a night in them into a madman or a poet. Ever favored by Hawthonn, these liminal places hint at the possibility of using the landscape to move from one form of consciousness to another. For Hawthonn, they are literal earth mirrors.

As true practitioners of niche occultism and sound manipulation, Hawthonn could easily have been an inscrutable project. However, under the careful guidance of the Legards, Earth Mirror feels close and immediate, minimal and expertly atmospheric.




For more information contact Ben or Katie - press@badabingrecords.com
www.badabingrecords.com

credits

released October 22, 2021

Written and performed by Layla & Phil Legard
Additional cello on 'Dream Cairn' by Briony Charvas
Additional vocals on 'Odo Galse' by Emily Clavering
'Odo Galse' recorded at Lead Chapel, Saxton
Drawing by John Godbert
Photo by Layla Legard
Layout by Phil Legard

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Hawthonn Leeds, UK

A digital archive for the music of Phil Legard, Layla Legard and related projects: Hawthonn, Xenis Emputae Travelling Band, The Pneumatic Consort, etc.

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