Sol Invictus (band)
Encyclopedia
Sol Invictus is an English
neofolk
and neoclassical group fronted by Tony Wakeford
. Wakeford has been the sole constant member of the group since its inception, although numerous musicians have contributed and collaborated with Wakeford under the Sol Invictus moniker over the years.
on Wikipedia.
After disbanding his controversial project Above the Ruins
, Wakeford returned to the music scene with Sol Invictus in 1987. Since then Sol Invictus has had many musician contributions, including Sarah Bradshaw, Nick Hall, Céline Marleix-Bardeau , Nathalie Van Keymeulen, Ian Read
and Karl Blake
.
Wakeford repeatedly referred to his work as folk noir. Beginning with a mixture of a rough, bleak, primitive post punk
sound and acoustic/folk elements, the band's music gradually evolved toward a lush, refined style, picking up classically-trained players such as Eric Roger, Matt Howden, and Sally Doherty. In the mid-1990s, Sol Invictus spun off a side project called L'Orchestre Noir (later changed to Orchestra Noir) to explore an even more classically influenced direction. 2005 saw the departure of long time contributors Roger and Blake, leading to a new line-up including Caroline Jago, Lesley Malone and Andrew King.
Wakeford formed his own label, Tursa, already in 1990 to release his material and the music of other artists. The World Serpent Distribution Company previously distributed this material worldwide, followed then by Cold Spring Records. In July 2007 the label was re-launched as a partnership with Israeli producer and musician Reeve "M" Malka. In 2009 Sol Invictus signed to Prophecy Records. In June 2011 Sol Invictus announced the end of their partnership both with Cold Spring Records and musician Andrew King.
for 'the unconquered Sun', derives from the Roman cult of the same name
.
The band's imagery and lyrical content, in its early days, was influenced by traditionalism
and antipathy towards the modern world and materialism
. A superficial interest was the Italian philosopher Julius Evola
who Wakeford admits to "shamelessly stealing from" for song titles even though he found his books "unreadable". A more serious influence was the poet Ezra Pound
: "I think Pound is one of the greatest poets ever, although some of his work is mind-numbingly obscure. I disagree with his antisemitism but that should not blind people to his worth as an artist."
The band also had considerable interest in heathen
and Mithraist themes, often reflecting an explicit antipathy to Christianity: the 1997 album The Blade incorporates an Odin
ic chant, Gealdor, into its varied lament
s. Wakeford tended to write from a melancholic position of doomed Romanticism
, which lamented the loss of beauty
, love
, and culture
. He saw the American influence on global culture as very damaging to Europe
, something he expresses with black humour
in the song "Death of the West", from the album of the same name. The later albums have seen a turn to a more personal writing style, as interest in what Wakeford calls "knee-jerk anti-Americanism and anti-Christianity" has been rejected.
Sol Invictus album artwork has often showcased the expressionist paintings of American artist, musician and friend Tor Lundvall
.
, alongside the Nazi groups Skrewdriver and Brutal Attack, has meant that Sol Invictus have been accused of neofascism by detractors. Wakeford has responded to this criticism various times, stating that his involvement with the National Front "was probably the worse (sic) decision of my life and one I very much regret", and that various members of his band (including his then wife of eight years at the time) "would be at best discriminated against or at worse dead if a far-right party took power" and further that "none of the artists I work with hold such views either, and I doubt they would want to work with me if they thought I did." In June 2011 the band, following attempts to cancel one of their concerts in London, stated that all its members "are personally completely and unequivocally opposed to fascism, racism, anti-semitism and homophobia, [...] and our work makes no attempt to appeal to an audience looking for this kind of message", also stating explicitely that they didn't have "any sympathy with national anarchism, or any desire to work with its adherents".
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
neofolk
Neofolk
Neofolk is a form of folk music-inspired experimental music that emerged from post-industrial music circles. Neofolk can either be solely acoustic folk music or a blend of acoustic folk instrumentation aided by varieties of accompanying sounds such as pianos, strings and elements of industrial...
and neoclassical group fronted by Tony Wakeford
Tony Wakeford
Anthony Charles "Tony" Wakeford is an English folk and neoclassical musician who primarily records under the name Sol Invictus.Wakeford lives in London and is married to Sol Invictus violinist Renée Rosen....
. Wakeford has been the sole constant member of the group since its inception, although numerous musicians have contributed and collaborated with Wakeford under the Sol Invictus moniker over the years.
Overview
For information on Wakeford's musical projects preceding Sol Invictus, please see his entryTony Wakeford
Anthony Charles "Tony" Wakeford is an English folk and neoclassical musician who primarily records under the name Sol Invictus.Wakeford lives in London and is married to Sol Invictus violinist Renée Rosen....
on Wikipedia.
After disbanding his controversial project Above the Ruins
Above The Ruins
Above the Ruins were an English Post-punk band fronted by Tony Wakeford.-History:After being asked to leave Death In June in 1984 due to his then membership in the British National Front, Tony Wakeford formed Above the Ruins. None of the group's releases name any of its members...
, Wakeford returned to the music scene with Sol Invictus in 1987. Since then Sol Invictus has had many musician contributions, including Sarah Bradshaw, Nick Hall, Céline Marleix-Bardeau , Nathalie Van Keymeulen, Ian Read
Ian Read (musician)
Ian Read is an English neofolk and traditional folk musician.-History:Read left school at 16, and at the age of 17, he became an adherent of Germanic neopaganism and began studying Germanic paganism . He was particularly interested in galdor or magical metrical poetry and the runes...
and Karl Blake
Karl Blake
Karl Blake is a vocalist, bassist, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist. Most of his own music can be described as progressive-experimental and sometimes psychedelic.-Musical career:...
.
Wakeford repeatedly referred to his work as folk noir. Beginning with a mixture of a rough, bleak, primitive post punk
Post-punk
Post-punk is a rock music movement with its roots in the late 1970s, following on the heels of the initial punk rock explosion of the mid-1970s. The genre retains its roots in the punk movement but is more introverted, complex and experimental...
sound and acoustic/folk elements, the band's music gradually evolved toward a lush, refined style, picking up classically-trained players such as Eric Roger, Matt Howden, and Sally Doherty. In the mid-1990s, Sol Invictus spun off a side project called L'Orchestre Noir (later changed to Orchestra Noir) to explore an even more classically influenced direction. 2005 saw the departure of long time contributors Roger and Blake, leading to a new line-up including Caroline Jago, Lesley Malone and Andrew King.
Wakeford formed his own label, Tursa, already in 1990 to release his material and the music of other artists. The World Serpent Distribution Company previously distributed this material worldwide, followed then by Cold Spring Records. In July 2007 the label was re-launched as a partnership with Israeli producer and musician Reeve "M" Malka. In 2009 Sol Invictus signed to Prophecy Records. In June 2011 Sol Invictus announced the end of their partnership both with Cold Spring Records and musician Andrew King.
Imagery and content
The name Sol Invictus, which is LatinLatin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
for 'the unconquered Sun', derives from the Roman cult of the same name
Sol Invictus
Sol Invictus was the official sun god of the later Roman empire. In 274 Aurelian made it an official cult alongside the traditional Roman cults. Scholars disagree whether the new deity was a refoundation of the ancient Latin cult of Sol, a revival of the cult of Elagabalus or completely new...
.
The band's imagery and lyrical content, in its early days, was influenced by traditionalism
Traditionalist School
The term Traditionalist School is used by Mark Sedgwick and other authors to denote a school of thought, also known as Integral Traditionalism or Perennialism to denote an esoteric movement developed by authors such as French metaphysician René Guénon, German-Swiss...
and antipathy towards the modern world and materialism
Materialism
In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance...
. A superficial interest was the Italian philosopher Julius Evola
Julius Evola
Barone Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola also known as Julius Evola, was an Italian philosopher and esotericist...
who Wakeford admits to "shamelessly stealing from" for song titles even though he found his books "unreadable". A more serious influence was the poet Ezra Pound
Ezra Pound
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...
: "I think Pound is one of the greatest poets ever, although some of his work is mind-numbingly obscure. I disagree with his antisemitism but that should not blind people to his worth as an artist."
The band also had considerable interest in heathen
Germanic Neopaganism
Germanic neopaganism is the contemporary revival of historical Germanic paganism. Precursor movements appeared in the early 20th century in Germany and Austria. A second wave of revival began in the early 1970s...
and Mithraist themes, often reflecting an explicit antipathy to Christianity: the 1997 album The Blade incorporates an Odin
Odin
Odin is a major god in Norse mythology and the ruler of Asgard. Homologous with the Anglo-Saxon "Wōden" and the Old High German "Wotan", the name is descended from Proto-Germanic "*Wodanaz" or "*Wōđanaz"....
ic chant, Gealdor, into its varied lament
Lament
A lament or lamentation is a song, poem, or piece of music expressing grief, regret, or mourning.-History:Many of the oldest and most lasting poems in human history have been laments. Laments are present in both the Iliad and the Odyssey, and laments continued to be sung in elegiacs accompanied by...
s. Wakeford tended to write from a melancholic position of doomed Romanticism
Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...
, which lamented the loss of beauty
Beauty
Beauty is a characteristic of a person, animal, place, object, or idea that provides a perceptual experience of pleasure, meaning, or satisfaction. Beauty is studied as part of aesthetics, sociology, social psychology, and culture...
, love
Love
Love is an emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. Love is central to many religions, as in the Christian phrase, "God is love" or Agape in the Canonical gospels...
, and culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...
. He saw the American influence on global culture as very damaging to Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, something he expresses with black humour
Black comedy
A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...
in the song "Death of the West", from the album of the same name. The later albums have seen a turn to a more personal writing style, as interest in what Wakeford calls "knee-jerk anti-Americanism and anti-Christianity" has been rejected.
Sol Invictus album artwork has often showcased the expressionist paintings of American artist, musician and friend Tor Lundvall
Tor Lundvall
Tor Lundvall is a painter and musician who is based out of East Hampton, New York.-Art:Lundvall has a B.A. in studio art with a minor in literature from the American University in Washington D.C. . His oil paintings are quite vivid and luminous due to his use of vibrant colors and the strong...
.
Controversy
Wakeford's mid-1980's membership in the British National Front and the appearance of a track from his band, Above The Ruins, on the "No Surrender!" compilation released in 1985 by Rock-O-Rama RecordsRock-O-Rama Records
Rock-O-Rama was a German record label started in 1980 by Herbert Egoldt. The label folded in 1994 after a police raid.Egoldt bootlegged 1950s rockabilly recordings in the early 1970s before starting the Rock-O-Rama mail order service, which was the first significant source for English and American...
, alongside the Nazi groups Skrewdriver and Brutal Attack, has meant that Sol Invictus have been accused of neofascism by detractors. Wakeford has responded to this criticism various times, stating that his involvement with the National Front "was probably the worse (sic) decision of my life and one I very much regret", and that various members of his band (including his then wife of eight years at the time) "would be at best discriminated against or at worse dead if a far-right party took power" and further that "none of the artists I work with hold such views either, and I doubt they would want to work with me if they thought I did." In June 2011 the band, following attempts to cancel one of their concerts in London, stated that all its members "are personally completely and unequivocally opposed to fascism, racism, anti-semitism and homophobia, [...] and our work makes no attempt to appeal to an audience looking for this kind of message", also stating explicitely that they didn't have "any sympathy with national anarchism, or any desire to work with its adherents".
Discography
| Year | Title | Format, Special Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1987 | Against the Modern World Against the Modern World Against the Modern World was the first release credited to the English industrial and Pagan neoclassical group Sol Invictus.Against The Modern World was a mini vinyl LP rooted in traditional European folk music and modern Industrial. It featured distorted electric guitars, acoustic guitar, and a... |
Mini-EP |
| 1989 | In the Jaws of the Serpent | Live LP |
| 1989 | Lex Talionis Lex Talionis (album) Lex Talionis is the name of the third album by the English pagan folk/neoclassical group Sol Invictus. The LP was originally released in 1989 in a box set with albums by Current 93 and Nurse with Wound... |
Part of box set with Current 93 Current 93 Current 93 is an eclectic British experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet .-Background:Tibet has been the only constant in the group, though Steven Stapleton has appeared on... and Nurse with Wound Nurse with Wound Nurse with Wound is the main recording name for British musician Steven Stapleton. Nurse with Wound was originally a band, formed in 1978 by Stapleton, John Fothergill and Heman Pathak... |
| 1989 | Fields | 12" with Current 93 and Nurse With Wound |
| 1990 | Sol Veritas Lux Sol Veritas Lux Sol Veritas Lux is a CD release by the English folk/rock band Sol Invictus. It combines the first Sol Invictus release, the mini-LP Against the Modern World, with the second release, the live album In the Jaws of the Serpent, onto one CD.... |
CD |
| 1990 | Abattoirs of Love | 7" |
| 1990 | Lex Talionis Lex Talionis (album) Lex Talionis is the name of the third album by the English pagan folk/neoclassical group Sol Invictus. The LP was originally released in 1989 in a box set with albums by Current 93 and Nurse with Wound... |
CD |
| 1990 | Trees in Winter | CD/LP |
| 1991 | The Killing Tide | CD/LP |
| 1992 | Death In June/Current 93/Sol Invictus Death In June/Current 93/Sol Invictus Death In June/Current 93/Sol Invictus is a CD album recording of a March 24, 1991 concert by Death In June,Current 93, and Sol Invictus at the Frankfurt Sound Depot in Frankfurt, Germany... |
Live CD with Death in June Death in June Death in June are a neofolk group led by English folk musician Douglas Pearce, better known as Douglas P. The band was originally formed in Britain in 1981 as a trio, but after the other members left in 1984 and 1985 to work on other projects, the group became the work of Douglas P. and various... and Current 93 |
| 1992 | Looking for Europe | 7" |
| 1992 | The Lamp of the Invisible Light | 7" compilation track |
| 1992 | Somewhere in Europe/See the Dove Fall | 7" |
| 1992 | Let Us Prey | Live CD |
| 1992 | King & Queen | CD |
| 1994 | The Death of the West | CD |
| 1994 | Black Europe | CD |
| 1995 | In the Rain | CD |
| 1997 | The Blade The Blade (album) -Track listing:# "The Blade"# "In Heaven"# "Time Flies"# "The House Above the World"# "Laws And Crown"# "Once Upon a Time"# "See How We Fall"# "Gealdor"# "From the Wreckage"# "Nothing Here"# "Remember and Forget"# "The Blade"-External links:... |
CD |
| 1998 | In Europa | CD |
| 1998 | All Things Strange and Rare | Compilation CD |
| 1999 | In a Garden Green | CD |
| 2000 | Trieste | CD |
| 2000 | The Hill of Crosses | CD |
| 2000 | Eve | 7" |
| 2001 | Brugge | Live concert, 1996-02-03 |
| 2002 | Thrones | CD |
| 2003 | The Giddy Whirls of Centuries | Compilation CD |
| 2004 | The Angel | Compilation CD |
| 2005 | The Devil's Steed The Devil's Steed The Devil's Steed is a 2005 studio album from Sol Invictus. It comes in a fold out digipack style case.-Track listing:All words and music by Tony Wakeford / Sol Invictus, except where noted.# "We Are the Dead Men"# "Old London Weeps"... |
CD |
| 2006 | Walking in the Rain on the Ostrow Tumski | Compilation CD |
| 2010 | The Bad Luck Bird/Stella Maris | 7" |
| 2011 | The Cruellest Month | CD (Studio album) |