ION at last reveals his long-awaited new EP, Like A Sickness, a work that delves deep into the themes of insanity, occult wisdom, and spiritual preservation. This experimental body of work offers a sonic journey into the ancient roots of human spirituality, weaving together intense soundscapes that evoke a raw and tender exploration of divine cognizance.
The EP marks a profound shift in ION’s creative direction, embracing a multidisciplinary approach that blends music with deep ritualistic and spiritual undertones. It reflects an artistic metamorphosis, inviting listeners into a world where the boundaries between sanity and insanity blur, and the echoes of long-forgotten sacred practices come to life.
“This EP is monumental for me,” says ION. “Like A Sickness, is the initiatory body of work in my transmutation as an artist. It represents a shift towards ritualistic, more intimate expressions of the occult. Through these songs, I aim to reawaken the purity and sincerity of early spiritual devotion, and this transformation will only continue to unfold.”
Like A Sickness, heralds the beginning of a new era for ION’s music, steeped in both ancient wisdom and modern experimentalism. It is not just an EP, but a sonic rite, drawing listeners into a deep contemplation of the madness and mysticism inherent in the human experience.
TRACK BY TRACK
Mercurii Ritual: This is an improvisational composition designed to be played on an organ. Its recital is intended for situations of initiation, signalling zealously the beginnings of journeys (spiritual and/or physical) that you may embark upon. A provident send-off for your explorations.
Homesick: The intention with ‘Homesick’ was to craft a soundscape akin to an aboriginal chant. To create the atmosphere of a ceremonial homecoming. Providing an alluring welcoming back to the indigenous ways that nurtured early human spirituality. A tribal anthem that vitalises our ancient traditions to bring us together in dance and folly, in veneration and reclamation of our vestigial sacred past.
Surface Tension: ‘Surface Tension’ contributes to the EP’s themes of insanity by being a frantic documentation of how one can feel ‘suffocated’ trying to live under the confines/control set by society, consequently being deemed as ‘going insane if we fail to adhere. The music video visually magnifies these concepts, using the imagery of a psychiatric ward as a raw mental representation of this ‘suffocation’ and ‘trapping’.
Lost In Translation: A folk song that ION wrote in his own language (Albanian). The term lost in translation here refers to the idea of ancient forms of spiritual expression being lost to history and time and subsequently losing our understanding of them in the modern day. The tune depicts an individual brooding over this sad reality. Of humanity forgetting this past way of perceiving, ultimately distancing ourselves from the pagan principles built by our ancestors, in exchange for an existence less connected to divinity.
iamvessel: ION’s intention with ‘iamvessel’ was to encapsulate the intoxicating feeling of escapism, portraying the experience of running away to ‘our own little sanctuary’ as a means of coping with the circumstances of the world that we find ourselves in. His interpretation of this concept paints a picture of hypnotic reality created by the figment of our imagination. Using ambient synthesis combined with lullabying delivery to build this whimsical depiction of the dreamlike state that offers us escape from the real world.
You Hear Her Too?: The closing song of the EP plays in two dichotomous parts, exploring the contrasting perceptions of the witch from opposing perspectives. The first depicts how witches amongst themselves view each other and their practise. Benevolent, harmonious, devoting themselves to the healing of nature and its’ dwelling spirits. The second part deals with perceptions of the witch from the outside, established over centuries of manipulative conditioning to imprint the image of the crone into any and all associations relating to the witch. Malevolence, dissonance, wickedness and insanity are all themes at play in this portion of the composition. The title plays on the idea of delusion, of hearing voices. It’s up to the listener to decide whether they dismiss this as lunacy or to accept and embrace the metaphysical reality that witches around the world have been interacting with since the dawn of man.
ARTIST BIO
From the recluse of his altar, in fervent commune with the spirits forming the sentience of nature. A cherubic entity known as ION documents his spiritual interactions in the shape of sound.
Originating from the Balkans. He cherishes and protects the exposures of his upbringing frolicking in the mountains of Kosovo with indigenous vigour, deeming the environment’s purity and verdure to be guides in shaping his unrestricted abstractions of the world. These influences have led him to embody experimental music performance as his modality for expression. A spearhead driven by one sole directive; to return the use of sound back to its ancient function of ritual.
For ION spiritual and musical explorations are one and the same. By adopting a consecrated creative process he is able to bind together his ritualistic practicemusics with the playful nature of sound experimentation. Labyrinthine ambient textures, field recordings made during his pilgrimages, and instrument selection of primaeval roots all sew together in an enchanting reminiscence of the archaic. A delicately woven tapestry emblematic of the fourth-world genre of music.
ION symbolises the vestiges of our pagan-spiritual past, an untiring evocation of our original nature by means of multidisciplinary rites. Garbed in vestments and channelling from within the circles cast through his set design, he shimmers ardently in the sustenance of the divine ancient.
