Witch house

Witch house: a genre, a microgenre, perhaps just a twisted state of mind. We have to consider all three hypotheses, and therefore none of them, because in an age of electronic manipulation and cross-contamination it's easy to coin a new term every day to attach to a given sound that's otherwise hard to classify (witch house is, after all, in excellent company, alongside vaporwave, cloud rap, horrorcore, and so on).

In truth, this name was coined as a joke back in 2009, when Travis Egedy of Pictureplane (an eclectic project straddling synth-pop, house music and darkwave) tried to put a label on his music, steeped as it was in occult references. Witch house was the answer, a tag that quickly began to spread through a handful of specialist magazines (Egedy himself, in interviews, almost unwittingly admits he wasn't the only one making it). A strong symbolic bond formed between Pictureplane and witch house, one that brushes up against but never fully sinks its claws into what would become the genre proper, as shown by the significant "Dark Rift" from 2009: if we want to track down the sonic manifesto of this shape-shifting creature, we need to wait a few more months.

After a series of undeniably strong 7-inches, 2010 is the year of "King Night" by Salem, still to this day the only album released by this American act: with "King Night" you plunge into darkness starting with the band's very name, which conjures up the site of the infamous 1692 witch trials. The atmosphere turns bleak, oppressive and alienating, while the music manages to piece together scattered fragments from seemingly distant galaxies. Icy synthesizers, drum machines, shards of hip-hop embedded in a gothic-esoteric fabric (the tremendous "Sick") - "King Night" is all this and much more, the bomb that manages to legitimize the alienation of a new generation of Americans. The weird side of electronic music is served.

Before further contamination sets in (not least from trap), witch house solidifies through the fusion of many individual ingredients drawn from different backgrounds: ambient, ethereal, darkwave, industrial, hip-hop, UK garage, drone and more, with the difference that each project uses these various facets however it pleases, balancing - or not - the dosage of these influences. That's why some names devoted to witch house sound quite different from others. In England, for instance, some artists rework the path laid out by Burial (Holy Other's UK garage influences are plain to hear), while in the States dark, industrial-rooted blends dominate (San Diego's ∆Aimon), or ones inherited from rap, especially in California, where trendy esotericism pairs perfectly with the indecipherable attitude of many new musicians. The dark inclination of these figures walks hand in hand with the fashion of the moment: long tunics and t-shirts adorned with all sorts of occult symbols start to spread everywhere, a trend that soon mutates into the more urban health goth style.

In Russia (another extremely active scene), moods range from dreamy to oppressive (one name above all: Fraunhofer Diffraction), because deep down there isn't much difference between witch house's electronic nightmares and the spiral typical of certain depressive black metal bands. In this respect, "Forever" by the aforementioned Russian artist perfectly embodies a hypothetical symbiosis between black metal (the malevolent growl) and the mental state of wh, a compendium of horror and negativity that genuinely instills fear. But Russian witch house is much more besides: parties inside abandoned buildings, drugs, and a celebration of the HIV virus that's as controversial as it is tongue-in-cheek - a harrowing, dark rave consumed within the strangest of underground nihilism.

When discussing witch house, it's worth spending a few lines on the almost obsessive use of pitch, since all vocals are, without exception, unnatural, either slowed down or sped up. It's a deliberate rupture with the surrounding world, because witch house is a balcony with no railing, looking out onto darkness, the black deconstruction of pop culture resurfacing from the shadows like a deformed monster with a thousand tentacles. It's an absolute delirium distinguished either by moribund, claustrophobic African-American voices (just listen to "In Your Eyes" by Russia's Suicidewave) or by the exact opposite (the eternal melancholy of Blvck Ceiling's "Wvfflife") - different souls arriving at one and the same disorienting result. Then there are those who pile on countless samples, experimenting far and wide with all sorts of other tangents more or less assimilable to a genre that keeps relentlessly shedding its skin.

What unites countless witch house projects, on the other hand, is a cryptic, occult imagery: it's easy to spot who's making this music, since the name often flaunts a riot of crosses, triangles or esoteric symbols, mixed with numbers and letters drawn from any alphabet imaginable - a dark folklore that undeniably has its own magnetic appeal. Hence the emergence of acts like GL▲SS †33†H, oOoOO, †‡† (i.e. Ritualz), M△S▴C△RA and Crim3s, just to name a few.

Over time, YouTube channels devoted to the genre began to proliferate, since physically buying this kind of music is far from easy. Some manage to release their output on CD or vinyl, but most of these acts fall back on digital formats, or on vintage-style CD-Rs and cassette tapes. The lo-fi look, at least in its early days, is in fact another key trait of witch house, especially when it comes to album covers or the (homemade) videos circulating online, many of which are inextricably tied to a certain fringe brand of cinema.

Beyond the inevitable tributes to "Häxan", "Twin Peaks" and "The Blair Witch Project", images and suggestions are also reworked from many other films, from Ken Russell's "The Devils" to the more recent "The VVitch", not to mention works of a fantastical and/or grotesque nature, such as "A Jester's Tale" (a 1964 Czechoslovak film that pairs beautifully with the video for Salem's "Better Off Alone", remixed for the occasion by Atari Teenage Riot).

When it comes to manipulation, there's no shortage of bizarre reworkings of famous tracks, completely twisted here into a horror-tinged register: we've already mentioned Salem's “Better Off Alone” (the original was a massive eurodance hit from the late Nineties), but the list goes on and on, and we can't fail to mention Fraunhofer Diffraction's “Kvrt In Space” (Nirvana filtered through witch house), King Plague's “Ave Plague” (Schubert has never sounded this dark!), or ± |lemniscata|'s remarkable “Show Me Love” (remember t.A.T.u.?).

Over the course of the decade now drawing to a close, it hasn't been easy to piece together this ever-evolving puzzle, but it's our duty to highlight the projects (more than the records) that have embodied the history of WH. So many releases, too many singles, a programmed chaos that bombarded us daily — better, then, to make room for those who materially contributed, step by step, to the genre's growth. Some names have been linked to witch house while also being capable of exploring more or less adjacent territories, all while still exerting major influence on the genre at large: besides the already-mentioned Pictureplane, a mention is also owed to Crystal Castles, to Kap Bambino, and finally to the Canadian duo Purity Ring, who even ended up releasing on the storied 4AD.

Leaving aside other projects already mentioned in the article, the list of true thoroughbreds continues with White Ring (their seminal 2010 12” “Black Earth That Made Me”), who recently returned with “Gate Of Grief” (2018) but have lately been left without vocalist Kendra Malia, who passed away at just 37 from causes still being determined. Alongside them, Unison (their sickly, ethereal 2011 self-titled album, the underworld meeting shoegaze), then also FUNΞRΔL ‡ FLØWΞRS, Chvrn, Clams Casino, Balam Acab, IC3PEAK (with one foot in trap), Mater Suspiria Vision, V△LH△LL, Summer Of Haze, Monomor†e, or again the English producer Jake Lee, aka Sidewalks And Skeletons, responsible for an endless string of self-released output, all of excellent quality (don't miss his macabre version of Born To Die by Lana Del Rey).

What future for witch house? In theory we don't know, because somewhere someone once wrote that it's a genre that will never die, since it was already (born) dead. Over these ten years, it's been a path that has well represented the uncertainties and fears of a society in constant flux, on a cultural level too, and especially within underground scenes, where reference points now either get swallowed up by mainstream trends or end up disappearing within a short span of time. What matters, though, to borrow from a famous Scorsese film, is having been King for a night.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google