Musicka Magicka

"Spires That in the Sunset Rise are a Chicago-based, all-female quartet whose ecstatic, communal psych-folk draws on the same fragrant smoke that fed the otherworldly likes of such vintage acts as Comus, Jan Dukes De Grey, or COB, as well as on the crypto-ethnicity of the Sun City Girls' Carnival Folklore Resurrection series or the Gothic spiritualism of Current 93. On their second album Four Winds the Walker, the foursome emit such inspired gusts of collective fire that they resemble a witches' coven almost as much as a band, their shadow-draped music seeming to issue forth organically from the soil like a sulfurous hot spring. When operating at their peak, which is the case on much of Four Winds the Walker, Spires That in the Sunset Rise can invoke the unbounded, ageless music one might expect to hear emanating from the deepest forest, as mysterious black-cloaked figures dance around the fire-ring. Whether that sounds more like a warning or an invitation is left up to the traveler." - Pitchfork



I've had the pleasure of seeing Spires That in the Sunset Rise perform live here in Chicago...they are totally surreal. I was elated to hear they are playing at the Musicka Mystica Maxima Festival presented by Ordo Templi Orientis! I won't be able to attend, but I'm still so excited to hear something like this is actually happening! "Two nights of Musick made by practicing magicians or practicing musicians who's work celebrates the Magical lifestyle, as well public performances of Ceremonial and other Magick ritual." The Musicka Mystica Maxima Fest takes place at Santos Party House, New York, NY, 21 and 22 September 2009. Apparently the enchanting Larkin Grimm is co-curator of the event, so it's going to be fabulous!!! By the way, Miss Angeliska did a lovely, intimate, interview with Larkin Grimm for Coilhouse...check it out HERE!



"Larkin is a magic woman. She lives in the mountains in north Georgia. She collects bones, smooth stones, and she casts spells. She worships the moon. She is very beautiful, and her voice is like the passionate cry of a beast heard echoing across the mountains just after a tremendous thunder storm, when the air is alive with electricity. I don't consider her folk though - she is pre folk, even pre- music. She is the sound of the eternal mother and the wrath of all women. She goes barefoot everywhere, and her feet are leathery and filthy. She wears jewels, glitter, and glistening insects in her hair. She's great!" ~ Michael Gira