The Breakdown
Celestial, ethereal, bestial and brutal, woven with beauty and darker mysteries, you need a tapestry of adjectives to describe the music of Maud the moth. The project of Spanish-born / Scotland-based pianist and singer-songwriter Amaya López-Carromero, each Maud the moth album has been unapologetically ambitious but not at the expense of authenticity.
Following her debut ‘Inner Wastelands’, 2020’s acclaimed ‘Orphnē’ was a stunning collection of sonic murals, their gothic and surreal imagery entwined within adventurous avant-pop arrangements. Her last recording ‘Bordando el manto Terrestre’, a collaboration with dark ambient synthesists trajedesaliva, was similarly cloaked in otherworldly atmospheres, adding to Maud the moth’s growing reputation for innovative music making. Here was an artist as intense as Keeley Forsyth, as singular as Joanna Newsom and as dramatic as Diamanda Galas.
Now comes the fourth Maud the moth statement ‘The Distaff’. Written fundamentally as a set of piano/voice songs then broadened to include Alison Chesley on cello, Fay Guiffo on violin, the great Seb Rochford drumming and co-producer Scott McLean on guitars plus more, it’s an album with its own bespoke sonic intensity.
Opener Canto de enramada, a swirl of gothic acapella and electronics, fills you with dramatic anticipation before the jolting chords of A Temple by the river toll. There are distant squeals and vaulted voices above the pounding here which soon crumble to leave López-Carromero’s sombre piano and aching weary voice. “My body is a temple by the river, a crypt of flesh turning into stone” are the first words she sings, setting the tone for the complex web of reflections that ‘The Distaff‘ goes onto unravel.
You could say that this is the expected dark, deep Sacred Bones territory that Maud the moth albums tend to explore but this time around López-Carromero seems to be dealing less with the imaginary and more with the personal. Talking about these new songs she has mentioned their autobiographical resemblance, reflective tone and connection to her subconscious memories of rural Spain. It’s such emotional proximity that gives ‘The Distaff’ an added bite. Not that this album is in anyway some orthodox confessional. Maud the moth/ López-Carromero shrouds her words in the mythical and metaphorical then sets them in surreal, often deconstructed song-form.
Take Exuviae where bird-song amongst the piano’s stark chords is matched early on by López-Carromero’s searing soprano. From there the uncanny melody twists upwards, its progress encouraged by sweeping high pitched strings as if desperate to escape. The bird call motif returns for Burial of the patriarchs where the piano’s Latin flourishes and Rochford’s percussive shading both smooth the piece’s intricate progress.
With all this complexity ‘The Distaff’ could become overwrought but López-Carromero and co-producer Scott McLean’s sensitive approach ensures that the album has balance and allows room to decompress. On Siphonophores López-Carromero’s thrilling soprano yearns again, gliding over the cymbal splashes and scratchy harmonics. Here though the song is more defined , founded on a recurring piano pattern, returning melody lines and a steady build to a cathartic crescendo. Fiat Lux begins mournfully, a dramatic ballad rich with piano swells but unsettled by ghosting drum fills and a distant, calling violin. Unexpected guitar strikes and cymbal crashes stomp in, matching Maud the moth’s chilling summons “Beast of burden arise”. Sounds clichéd but within the swathes of fine imagery that López-Carromero creates, these moments remain wrapped up in the album’s overall atmosphere.
Amongst the epic ambitions of ‘The Distaff’, Despeñaperros is a track with operatic intentions of its own. Referring to (maybe) the famed Andalucian canyon and (possibly) fuelled by the songwriter’s memories of that place, the song cascades through close to ten minutes of high drama. With López-Carromero in full piano forte flourish, her poetry potent and voice laced with a Galas-like chill, everything erupts into a pounding procession of dark metal and circling strings. You’re soon lost in this loud-quiet cycle which resonates with the classic, unrestrained ‘prog-ness’ of ‘Pawn Hearts’ era Van der Graaf Generator and pulses with Anna von Hauswolff dynamism.
These heavy doom moments align with healthyliving’s music, the alt trio that López-Carromero and McLean also frequent. Such avant-rock traits simmer through the ominous procession of Kwisatz Haderach. Dune referencing, this final track reverberates within a multi- layered dream wave sphere, López-Carromero reaching impossible notes before Rochford’s fluent jazz rhythms steers the song towards the final engulfing sound-quake. At this point you look back and take in the distance travelled on the album. There’s a theatrical flair underpinning the songs that often defies description, a factor which can unsettle those into broodier anorak experimentalism. But ‘The Distaff’ deserves approaching with an open mind, it’s an impressive re-imagining of the post-classical form.
Get your copy of ‘The Distaff‘ by Maud the moth from your local record store or direct from Bandcamp HERE
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