Opal Spine connotes pain, although it is not painful to play. Partially inspired by “the composers’ mother health issues linked to the weakness of her spine,” the album also features a spine, and when looking at the cover, one can’t help but ask, “Is that her spine? That can’t possibly be magnetic imagery, can it?” One can feel the pain of the curvature, the jagged brittleness, and seeks the safety of a comfortable couch.
From this starting point, Augustin Braud (recording as Ohr Hiemis, which means “winter sun”) expands the real-life scenario into a metaphor. Society’s spine is brittle, broken, weak, abraded. External pressures have caused it to crack. The capitalist-consumerist economy bears down on the weak, as the populace acclimates to totalitarian threats.
Ohr Hiemis elaborates on these themes with a pas-de-deux between order and chaos. The album begins with the two-part “No One Incants Our Dust,” based on Paul Celan’s Psalm, which can be either dour or divine depending on the angle from which one views it. Humanity rises from the dust but once, order out of chaos, but then becomes chaos. The electronic blasts imply dangerous growth, a proliferation of threat, while orchestral elements, low in the mix, are the final bulwark against total collapse. The beats arrive in part two, reining in the disorder, offering a framework onto which both forces can latch; but when the sirens arrive, the balance is upset. A cauldron of electronics bubbles over: multitudes containing multitudes, too many elements to coral, to return to the box from which they came. The massive blasts of the title track are like cudgels, striking again and again: bad news, bad turns, too much pressure for any spine to bear.
Side B begins with “Catachony,” another diptych. As the first part is titled “NEO” and the sonic sheen is sci-fi, one cannot help but think of Neo in “The Matrix,” although this association is likely unintentional. Better to focus on the rare word “catachony,” roughly translated as “time-mining” or “a seeking of the lower depths” that may eventually touch upon the soul. Ever-so-slightly, the album tilts back again toward order, or what the liner notes refer to as negentropy. “Lower than the ground,” the composer intones, “the Hydra drags me back to myself.” This shift is presaged by a moment – 4:35 of “part.2” – that recalls the opening of The Police’s “Don’t Stand So Close to Me,” an absurdist island poking above a blackened sea.
Is there hope for the crooked spine? The question dangles in the air. On any level – physical, societal, spiritual – the answer seems to be perhaps, but every way forward involves the risk of deeper pain, with no guarantee of relief. Opal Spine implies that the damage is already so great that any chance, no matter how small, may be worth taking. (Richard Allen)
a closer listen 