The last time I've gotten to cover Anna Von Hausswolff, it was for her previous album, All Thoughts Fly, where I did make the case that even though it was not the follow-up to Dead Magic that I was expecting, it was a really cool detour that focused solely on the instrument that made Anna famous, the pipe organ. But it being a solo album, one without any kind of backing band, had its detour feeling make the years since 2018, the last we heard a full album in a larger band setting, pass by even more slowly. The fact that we had something of it in a live setting with Live At Montreux Jazz Festival did make it easier, but it having been recorded back in 2018 did make the passage of time feel even more suspicious.
Now that the proper follow-up to Dead Magic is here, it's clear why it needed that much time to cook, as Iconoclasts is not only ambitious in its size, with its 73 minutes being the longest Anna Von Hausswolff record so far, but also because it does feel ambitious in its scope and presentation. There's a feeling within the music itself, as if one could be randomly placed within any minute of the album without any prior knowledge of the album and its runtime and feel that this is a huge album, and a lot of it comes down to how patient its flow is and how it manages to fill space even without being overbearing.
A lot of the band members from previous albums are returning here, but even though I did call this an album in a band setting, the orchestral feeling is much stronger here than it was on any of the previous records, something that is at times cinematic in the same way Wilderun can be. The change is one that makes the music overall less dark and wild than it was on Dead Magic, making it less Swans-like in tone (but not in flow), and by extension less overtly metal-adjacent. Anna's vocals, while still being somewhat of an acquired taste in their higher pitch, often remind me of Kate Bush in a way that I haven't gotten in the same way since the very art pop-y Singing From The Grave.
Aside from the orchestra, the most important extra contribution is brought by Otis Sandsjö, whose saxophone is so similar to Colin Stetson's that I had to check whether the latter performed on the record, but whose performance on "Struggling With The Beast" especially quickly turned it into one my most listened to songs of the year, the kind of instantly smashing saxophone impact one gets from hearing Eremita for the first time. The album's flow does make it gravitate to a couple of centerpiece tracks, from the more cinematic title-track, to "Stardust" being the moment where the album properly picks up its pace, to the aforementioned "Struggling With The Beast" picking up the leitmotif introduced in the "The Beast" intro and turning it into a gargantuan piece, to the catharsis of "Unconditional Love".
There are some guest contributions that make the album pretty interesting. Iggy Pop's vocals go for more charm than usual for the man in "The Whole Woman", but I don't think they gel particularly well. "Aging Young Woman" is the most conventionally pop tracks of the bunch, and a good excuse to get Ethel Cain an artist profile on here, with its sound being on the other side of the coin to "Struggling With The Beast" and both being songs I return to a lot. Abul Mogard's electronic touches on "An Ocean Of Time" offer a nice momentary sound palette expansion. And finally it's a bit odd to say that Anna's sister Maria is a guest when she has contributed vocals to many of her early albums, but her return here has her presence give "Unconditional Love" even more impact in its catharsis.
I know these are all a lot of words for me basically saying how much I love "Struggling With The Beast". I can mention that a couple more times just to be sure. If there's any poignant criticism I can raise is that some of its moments, especially in the earlier side of the record, feel like they drag on too much and there are certain peaks in the album that I already mentioned that the album struggles (hehe) to maintain.
