Abraxas Horn - Liminal Darkness
One man projects naturally allow for more freedom. You don’t have to consider the views of bandmates, or manage personalities and differing creative goals and aspirations. Brandon Legion has that freedom with Abraxas Horn. He can take the vehicle anywhere he wants, as long as it is dark and sinister. The first album began purely as an electronic world. Shadow Mountains (2022) was void of light, an ambient and harrowing synth driven album. For Liminal Darkness, Brandon expanded upon that synth palette, he has incorporated guitars, and has collaborated with Matt Priso on drums and Mike Hill on vocals.
“Beholder” opens with Mike in pain, deranged and evil also (these are regular tones). Hell is unleashed. Mike challenges the listener. Do you see? It is not a comfortable sound. Do not come to Liminal Darkness looking for glorious melody. The synths, drumming, vocals and guitars all meet to take you to the point of disconnection, where there is no longer a reality. It is all over the place, but strangely feels fluid. Priso brings a beat in towards the back end of “Beholder” that you can almost take hold of, but then it is ripped away just as quickly.
The textures are very consistent across the album. It ebbs and flows, and leans into the drums for a moment, then into Mike’s poetic spoken word part on “The Black Room,” or even the Sunn O))) like guitars that are everywhere, but the synth is the backbone that guides it towards the black hole. It was a good decision to break the album up with standalone synth tracks with “Nothingness,” “Descent” and “Lycanthropic Transfiguration” because the others are so intense and stark that the overall experience requires some soft landings, although those soft landings are still dark and ominous.
“Abysmal Void” puts you into an industrial wasteland. I get serious Stalker (Tarkovsky) vibes here. Everything is turned up to 10. You don’t get a chance to move or follow any pattern for long. Mike is tortured, and he sounds very authentic, you fear for his sanity and health regularly. After a while you do not consider it to be a human voice. The guitars are jagged and industrial, yet colossal and droning at the same time. There is a small opening, led by the synths approaching the halfway mark, but somehow it gets even more disturbing and harrowing as you move through the space created by Abraxas Horn.
The opening to “Yellow King” sounds like a piano is giving birth to a mechanical cow, or vice versa. The way Abraxas Horn mix and allow the percussion and the synths to converge is brilliant and seamless. You never want things to sound forced or calculated, but this just works. When Mike drones with anguish over the top of the cacophony, it sounds like he is removing his intestines from his abdomen.
The nightmare does not end, “Lycanthropic Transfiguration” is a throbbing, swirling and hellish synth track that does not let up. It is a waiting area between the darkness of the night sky, and space. When you feel like it is ending, you get a slight moment of relief, a time to breathe, and then it covers you up again in a canopy of night.
Liminal Darkness is truly a unique piece of art. I do not recommend listening to this in the dark. Actually, I do, please do this. It is what Abraxas Horn want. This is Brandon Legion’s baby, but the performances of Mike and Matt are important and also crucial. I get the feeling that this is not the last time we will see them on Abraxas Horn. The possibilities for Abraxas Horn are endless. Get inside this and connect to its world - it is a killer album.