A white-eyed mask of wisdom emerges from the pitch black of the thicket… speaking with knowing concern, revealing itself from a flurry of gloomily plucked nerves and loose feathers as a gender-fluid “goth” beauty in funeral garb, a devotee to the art of “ambient dream-grunge” dressed in drapery fit for a goddess of mourn. Mourning is the key to our shared release, a path through despair in the reverently conjured vision of Swedish singer-songwriter JONATHAN HULTÉN as their work saunters through sympathetic tones and points of interpersonal wisdom beyond their years. From this point of intimacy ‘Eyes of the Living Night‘ reveals an inner-blossoming sense of cinema, a theatric folken arcana used to convey the timeless pains and pleasures of personal change, loss, and the search for purpose. The humble spiritual tones and choral arrange of previous releases still persist but now feed into an oeuvre expanded in exponent, tasking decades-spanning reference as medium for a walk from confrontation of personal truths ’til oneness with the universe is achieved.

Hultén evolved from an early millennium thrasher in Hazard to death metal changeling between well-regarded beginnings in Stench and Tribulation. The directorial transformation of the latter in their hands was impressive and apparently successful in some sense though I have forever been stuck, stunned in appreciation of ‘The Formulas of Death‘ (2013) and especially ‘Venture‘ (2014) and too impressed with those works to move on as a fan. Those records’d so clearly benefitted from the artist’s direction not only in terms of the music but the aesthetic and packaging deployed, as distinct a signature as the music itself whatever it were. Would I listen to Tribulation beyond ‘The Children of the Night‘ (2015) anymore today? No, probably not. Though I did follow the artist as the idea of solo work breached its germinal state beyond 2016 or so, unsure of what to expect based on his overall personal aesthetic transformation.

While I’d seen some potential in the artist’s first EP (‘The Dark Night of the Soul‘, 2017) the initial choice to go minimally forth wasn’t one I’d understood at the time, if only for the sake of knowing the fellow could do more. The trial and induction unto a solo artist was off to a compelling start, it had to be self-made and sincere, but we’d only gotten the general shaping of the songwriter and his craft. For most it’d been a soul-searching release on paper but without any particularly unheard-of experimentation or interest, unsure how hard to scrape the self loose from the barrel. The sparse, self-built and intimate bearing of Hultén‘s first LP (‘Chants from Another Place‘, 2019) was a surprise for its simple folken stylings, using vocal arrangements and acoustic guitars to express uniformly brief folk-meditative and harmonized/chorally built songs. This’d felt like a battle with the introverted nature of the individual as much as it was an exploration of prettier, often haunting vocal harmonies which bear their own moodiness and reverence.

I’ll be frank in describing these early stages of the artist’s solo venture as unique but toothless, missing the fangs of the experience for the sake of a humming atmospheric signature which hadn’t yet formed a complete avatar on that album. The real force of vocally driven music created for populist audience naturally demands a breaking of the personal shell ’til belted (or, felt) with convincing stature. I would suggest ‘Eyes of the Living Night‘ not only addresses this but expands the melodic voice of the artist wielding Hultén‘s range to belt out bluesier peaks (“Riverflame), every shade of wailing chorale, and his own 60’s-cum-70’s dreamy psychedelic warbling (“Falling Mirages”) via an impressive sensibility for arranged layers and heavy rock balladry. That is to say that the soul arrives not only within the bolstered vocal oeuvre of the artist but through vast exploration of instrumental possibilities, referencing the humble bardic charm of Manu Chao and John Martyn‘s diverse 70’s ouevre among others in crafting a record that is expansive in its style and presentation yet still intimate, song-driven work by design.

Shimmering organ tones, all manner of piano-tapping Swedish rock drive, rusty acoustic guitars and such give ‘Eyes of the Living Night‘ Hultén‘s familiar oaken shape but the heavy use of electronics, synthesizers and such feels moderne, solemn just short of say, something like the sombre tip of Katatonia‘s ‘City Burials‘. Dramatic opener “The Saga and the Storm” does well to give us some sense of this reach between analog and digital textures as the theatre opens but it is the the gorgeously resonant craft of “The Dream Was the Cure” that accentuates the success of this glom set outside of time, a song which includes personally selected details and sounds which only add to a song which could frankly live and die by its vocal harmony alone. The subject here isn’t production values, instrumentation, and harmonies (as much as these things do matter) but rather the level of connectivity achieved, the artist’s voice finding its conversation and carrying it through to the wisdom at the heart of the full listen, a self-liberation… living more freely in sight and acceptance of impermanence.

Living, dancing, and dying. — This album is irrevocably the funeral for a recent death in my family. Listening to ‘Eyes of the Living Night‘ while essentially sorting and discarding decades and decades worth of belongings, secret worlds and dead dreams under my arbitration meant that the album became a part of the process of grief. As it turns out, this music was perfectly suited for this task after getting a closer look at the lyrics. My experience with shock and grief was not a confounding factor but right in line with the subjects Hultén addresses herein; Throughout this process I was struck by the hymnal, hopeful yet mournful sensitivity of the album as a whole, though certain songs speak louder than others: The droning, easy step of “Afterlife”, the meditation upon relationships and disconnection via “Falling Mirages”, the piano settled relief of “Through the Fog, Into the Sky” and “Dawn”, the farewell of “The Ocean’s Arms”, etc. Each piece has its own relevant moment to add to the whole of its feeling and there is a clear outward spreading wave of realization coming from its lyrics in the intended ordering.

If you haven’t had a comparatively unique experience with the album just yet I figure Hultén‘s work will read as surprisingly eclectic from an artist stepping beyond folk chanson built from solitary moments and quietly struck songwriting. It is still a “popular rock” album in most every sense but a love for progressive rock is just as vital here in terms of creating some overflowing interest and I think the ultimate destination of “Starbather” gives us some hint of where this sense of loft and variety comes; Beyond the funeral and the fancy of it all lies humility and reverence, a sensitivity cut loose of its introversion and this sweet spot of vital passage found on ‘Eyes of the Living Night‘ occurs somewhere between “Riverflame” and “Song of Transience” as the deepest pockets of grief and release cohere. I’d found the intensity, or, serious tension and strange dance of Side A overwhelmed the more freely struck realizations of Side B to start ’til I’d realized there was a method and an experience intended per the running order. The full listen is maybe one vignette too long but otherwise surprisingly coherent as an eventful sitting with deeply connective intent. Granted, I could give all manner of testimony as to how valuable this album has been to me but it counts for something that I can still recommend it on its own merits sans my own experiences. A high recommendation.

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