In the last 27 years, we’ve seen alternative music break into the mainstream and systematically change the entire landscape of popular music as we know it in both the western and eastern hemispheres. It is rather incredible that a subgenre, a label really, that was meant to encompass music that essentially rejected the established ethos of pop/rock in the 1970s and 1980s but didn’t fully conform to the essential ideology behind punk music.
The stage was set three decades ago, and now in 2018, we’re witnessing the most diverse group of artists ever to emerge onto the pop culture spectrum. This is truly a great time for music, and there’s no debating that out of all of the awesome acts emerging right now, Portuguese collective Lusitanian Ghosts and their self-titled rookie LP are one of the brightest gems among their contemporaries. Produced under the gifted command of Ricardo Ferreira, Lusitanian Ghosts is the amalgamation of numerous ancient European influences packaged into a forward-thinking, progressive alt-rock album. And for as wild and ambitious a concept as that may be, it’s a lot easier listening than even the most novice of music fans might be expecting.
Neil Leyton, the Portuguese-Canadian indie singer/songwriter behind The Betrayal of the Self, met Swedish musicians Micke Ghost and Nicke Andersson back in 2005, and their chance meeting is ultimately what set the Lusitanian Ghosts vehicle in motion. Using a number of ancient and medieval instruments in addition to a traditional rock set up, the trio added a number of other talented musicians capable of performing the calculated and cerebral material they compiled and pressed the project forward. Which brings us to present day. After years of simmering just beneath the surface, Lusitanian Ghosts is finally ready to make their virgin appearance before the world, and frankly, it couldn’t be a better time for them to be doing so.
Musically, 2018 has been a pretty exciting, albeit unpredictable, year. Nonetheless, we haven’t heard anything that has really shaken the critical community with a new sound or energy that we haven’t already heard in the 2010’s. It’s getting time for another change in the tide, for a new scene and group to bring forth the style that will dominate and influence the impending 2020’s. In their song “Blossom,” LG hint at their desire to be at the top of the heap when we enter this new era, and it’s evidenced by their uninhibited use of jarringly raw ambiance to create a ballad that penetrates our soul in an almost existential fashion.
No one else is even attempting to connect with us, the audience, with the same surreal intimacy as this group. “Our Own Light” is in the same vein, demonstrating to us that whether it’s vulnerable lyricism or sonically mammoth melodies that stir us physically in addition to emotionally, this ensemble has us covered. I usually don’t endorse anthological projects like this, but with tracks as indulgently intoxicating and memorable as these, it’s hard not to be an instant fan of what Lusitanian Ghosts are developing.
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-review by Sherry McCrae
