RISE ABOVE
Flute-wielding occult rockers get the wind taken out of their sails
Blood Ceremony look towards a brighter yesteryear
HIPPY-TRIPPY RETRO VIBE merchants with a yen for witchy rituals, gather round: Toronto’s occult rock sensations return after seven years and several setbacks. They’ve been missed – especially their trump card, Alia’s magic flute – and the folk-doom-psych scene that mushroomed in their wake has kept a candle in the window for the safe return of a leading light. ‘Safe’ is an unkind keyword for this sort of music, but Blood Ceremony’s Canadian occultism is more jasmine tea than goblet of gore, and this fifth album leans more towards the polite and chirpy than is optimal, the thick doom chords and murky atmospheres of their early work now a memory.
The snappy pop sass of
