Of the four or five gigs I’ve seen at St John’s, tonight’s is lit the best, with red uplight directed through a mesh of some kind to suggest a bloody pentacle over the altar and to highlight the paintings either side (Station 8: ‘Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem’ to the left, I think, and Station 9: ‘Jesus falls for the third time’ to the right). And it could not be better suited to the pairing of Finnish acts that Old Empire have arranged for us tonight.Īrktau Eos make ritual dark ambient music and seem to take their self-described “religion with no name” very seriously.
It’s a testament to the diversity of our capital that you can buy a tasty ale (for £3!) from the vicar himself and make pleasant conversation about the gory paintings of the Stations of the Cross (by Chris Gollon) that surround the interior. But we’re all very glad that tonight’s venue, the fine St Johns on Bethnal Green, welcomes those with heathen leanings into their atmospheric building. “Real music should aspire to magic,” Hexvessel main-man Matt McNerny reminds us at one point in tonight’s show, “and I’m glad to have these musical magicians with me.” The pagan themes and ritual performances on display tonight are not the usual kind of magic that you’d expect to find in a practising Anglican church, although there are thick clouds of frankincense hanging in the air.
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