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Wicca Phase Springs Eternal Released New Single & Video “Farm”
Wicca Phase Springs Eternal is gearing up for the release of his self-titled new full-length, due out 2nd June 2023 from Run For Cover Records, and today the enigmatic songwriter is back with one more taste of the expansive album via new single ‘Farm’. For over a decade the Pennsylvania-based singer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist, Adam McIlwee, has been […]
Photo by Ebru YildizWicca Phase Springs Eternal is gearing up for the release of his self-titled new full-length, due out 2nd June 2023 from Run For Cover Records, and today the enigmatic songwriter is back with one more taste of the expansive album via new single ‘Farm’.
For over a decade the Pennsylvania-based singer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist, Adam McIlwee, has been using the Wicca Phase Springs Eternal moniker to create a vast catalogue that’s as unpredictable as it is impressive, and now the name is also the title of his latest full-length. Wicca Phase Springs Eternal offers the musician’s most finely honed and welcoming songs to date, but it’s more than just a self-titled album–it’s a portal, an entryway into an entire world.
The album’s earlier singles ‘Moving Without Movement’ and ‘It’s Getting Dark’ delved into cinematic synth pop and hazy acoustic balladry (garnering attention from the likes of The FADER, BrooklynVegan, CLASH Magazine, and more), now ‘Farm’ shows just how big the songwriting on Wicca Phase Springs Eternal can go. The song’s dreamy intro explodes into a powerful cut of driving drum machines and haunting synth arpeggiations, all leading to a massive chorus that reaches new heights for McIlwee’s ever-changing sound.
McIlwee discussed the new song saying: “There’s an intersection between the natural world (a farm) and some sort of higher dimensional plane that overlays the natural world. That’s where this album exists, and this song is a descriptor of that intersection. There’s secrets (“mysterious lessons”), doppelgangers, and an overlying tension that suggests that not everything is as it appears. It’s at this intersection that emotions are incredibly heightened and don’t seem to make complete sense, words are spoken in code, light reflects in unusual ways, and the only thing we can do is accept that strange imbalance of what’s known and the unknowable.”
Wicca Phase Springs Eternal has been a fittingly enigmatic umbrella for McIlwee’s work, but with his self-titled album he extends a guiding hand through the mists to welcome new listeners and longtime fans alike. Working closely with Darcy Baylis and Ben Greenberg, McIlwee focused on going deeper than ever into the world-building aspect of WPSE, while also expanding his sound in new directions. Drawing on elements of house, trance, new wave, and more, Wicca Phase Springs Eternal is bursting with mood and mystery, conjuring detailed imagery and cutting emotion in equal measure. It’s an album that sums up what McIlwee does best: capturing both the romanticism and inscrutability of life’s biggest feelings. “I probably say the word ‘mystery’ a hundred times on this record,” he explains. “That’s what I’m trying to bottle up–this idea of something that’s hard to know, but enticing.”
When Wicca Phase Springs Eternal ends, you find yourself compelled to play it again–to enter the portal and once more find out where it leads.
Wicca Phase Springs Eternal out 2nd June 2023
via Run For Cover Records
Wicca Phase Springs Eternal has been the moniker and creative persona of Pennsylvania-based singer, songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Adam McIlwee for over a decade. The name is as enigmatic as McIlwee’s work, a fittingly esoteric umbrella for his ever-growing and ever-evolving catalogue of music that’s been released at a stunning quality and pace. So it’s with great intention that the name is now also the title of McIlwee’s latest full-length: Wicca Phase Springs Eternal offers the musician’s most finely honed and welcoming songs to date, but it’s more than just a self-titled album–it’s a portal, an entryway into an entire world.
As 2019 merged into 2020, the former Tigers Jaw member and Gothboiclique founder was looking to step away from the hyper-concentrated melancholic Trap of 2019’s Suffer On, and set out to breathe fresh life into the WPSE project by creating a broader sonic landscape. “Suffer On and a lot of the music I was making around that time was just so emotionally heavy,” McIlwee explains. “It felt like I was putting a lot on the listener and on myself. So I started thinking about early Wicca Phase and the world building I was doing–I was just throwing things at the wall then, but now I have ten more years of songwriting experience. I realised I wanted to just keep developing a depth to Wicca Phase, I didn’t want to just scratch the surface.”
Inspired by the musings of ‘60s and ‘70s British folk bands such as Fairport Convention and Pentangle, McIlwee hunkered down in the Western Catskills and Abbington Township in Pennsylvania, absorbing the scenery and trying to translate the beauty of his surroundings into an immersive experience. He began to expand the WPSE lore and fashion a more colourful and descriptive body of work–one where he still wears his heart on his sleeve, but now all of the longing and heartache exist in a vivid space that’s strikingly real and otherworldly all at once. The sound of Wicca Phase began to grow as well: never wanting the project to be defined by a genre, McIlwee worked closely with longtime collaborator Darcy Baylis, as well as newcomer Ben Greenberg, to continue to bring new styles and moods into WPSE. Looking to incorporate his love of EDM, trance, and house sounds, McIlwee and co. created an amalgam of ‘80s and ‘90s breakbeat style drums, modernistic 808s, shimmering synths, and washes of reverberating guitar and organic bass.
The more McIlwee wrote, the deeper he went into the universe he was creating, and his heartfelt songwriting transformed into a moving and breathing sonic display of the fine line between reality and mysticism. “It felt like this could be a starting point if you don’t know what Wicca Phase is about,” he says. “You’re still getting the melodrama that’s in all my lyrics, but you’re also getting this description of the world–what it looks like, what it feels like. Why wouldn’t that be self-titled?”
McIlwee makes his intentions loud and clear from the start: Wicca Phase Springs Eternal’s latest album, Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, opens with a song called “Wicca Phase Springs Eternal.” In cinematic fashion, the track’s three distinct movements draw the listener into the themes, settings, and sounds that permeate the record. McIlwee’s instantly recognizable baritone voice croons over bubbling synth arpeggiations and thumping beats, describing a blend of the natural (a lake, pines, wild horses), supernatural (magic, mystery, a tesseract), and unexpectedly mundane (a Subaru, a puffer jacket, a Dodgers hat), offering just enough grounding to leave the listener wondering if they’re in our world or on some other plane that only resembles it. “Sometimes when I’m writing I’ll be off in the fifth dimension and realise that I need to bring it back to the real world,” McIlwee says. “I’m not interested in music that’s totally ethereal–I want to relate to music and I want people to be able to relate to my music, too.”
That inescapable emotional core and McIlwee’s sincere nature still resonate throughout Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, but this time it’s stronger, imbued with a new wisdom. On “Farm,” he sings “My love lives on a plane, and when it presents itself overwhelmed and overtaken, silent and sacred, total, unknowable in shape,” his voice calling out into the night through driving breakbeats and pulsing synth lines before being swallowed up by his own echoes. Elsewhere, McIlwee and Zola Jesus duet on the fingerpicked outlaw ballad “Mystery, I’m Tied To You,” , while “One Silhouette” is Wicca Phase Springs Eternal’s version of a dance song, its pounding four-on-the-floor beat colliding into hazy slide guitar and McIlwee’s mournful hooks to conjure up an imaginary collaboration between Robert Smith and Underworld.
On “Who’s Watching Me,” a trip hop beat and ghostly keyboards create surprising uplift, like the moon shining through the clouds as McIlwee describes his arrival to “the doorway of desire and intrigue.” It’s a moment that sums up what Wicca Phase Springs Eternal does best: capturing both the romanticism and inscrutability of life’s biggest feelings. “I probably say the word ‘mystery’ a hundred times on this record,” McIlwee laughs. “That’s what I’m trying to bottle up–this idea of something that’s hard to know, but enticing. For whatever reason, my natural strength is writing about emotions, though my interest is always more in describing the moment and describing the intangible. I definitely will keep singing about heartbreak, but I want to do it in a different way.”
McIlwee’s devotion to traversing the unknown–both emotional and extra-dimensional–is palpable and contagious. When he sings “I spent hours trying to tap into the mystery” on the eponymous opening track, you believe him, and are also reminded of what a rare joy it is to be fully captivated by a piece of art that’s this richly detailed, while still leaving so many questions unanswered, so many twists left to be discovered with every listen. When Wicca Phase Springs Eternal ends, you find yourself compelled to play it again–to enter the portal and once more find out where it leads.
Source: thoughtswordsaction.com
