Hasufel’s Dylan Ettinger is back to haunt us with
yet another tape of dark drones and unsettling synth compositions, this time
taking on a truly scary and formidable entity: organized religion! Ettinger
grew up in the Mormon tradition, so who better to take us on a disconcerting
ride through history and personal experience? No one! Not even me, although I,
too, grew up amongst the religiously organized. No LDS in my background though.
Winter on
Cumorah Hill traces it all the way back, back to the very beginning – the
very beginning of the Latter Day Saints church, anyway. Cumorah is a “drumlin”
in Manchester, New York, the hill upon which Mormon founder Joseph Smith
discovered the Golden Plates that “he translated into English and published as
the Book of Mormon.” (All citations from the lovely Wikipedia, naturally.)
Cumorah is alternately referred to as “Mormon Hill,” “Gold Bible Hill,” and
“Inspiration Point.” Cumorah is a revered location in LDS custom.
But we all know what happened to Joseph Smith,
right? Killed by a mob in 1844 in Carthage, Illinois. From there the church
headed west and relocated to Utah, where it is still headquartered today. But
there are some heavy customs that Mormons go through as they grow up, and
Ettinger applies some equally heavy hymnody to illustrate the precariousness
and insidiousness of mass indoctrination. Taking the themes of the church and
filtering them through a pagan lens, Ettinger calls forth from his own mind the
spectral beings of opposition, directing them to subvert all that he’s
experienced with all that he’s learned. The spiritual battle is great, but
Ettinger and his instant séances masquerading as plodding goth metal are up to
the challenge.
Like Peter Murphy leading a satanic cult, Ettinger
as Hasufel warps the perception of “the greater good,” thereby shaping it in
his own image, an image of freedom from convention and control. Only through
the scourge of dark, midwinter fires can lasting change occur.
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