Possibly drawing upon a reference in the Ambrose Bierce short story “Haïta the Shepherd”, and/or stories in Robert Chambers‘ collection The Yellow Sign, H.P. Lovecraft added Hastur the Unspeakable to his pantheon of the Great Old Ones in his tale “The Whisperer in Darkness”.

Spawn of Yog-Sothoth, the half-brother of Cthulhu, and possibly the Magnum Innominandum, Hastur was a vast monstrosity of hideous power drawn from nameless aeons and inconceivable dimensions. And that terrible thing seems to have been an inspiration for the Irish musical duo who chose for themselves the name Hasturian Vigil.

However, these two — multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Cxaathesz and drummer Shygthoth — were not content to set their music solely within Lovecraftian spheres. For their debut album Unveiling the Brac’thal they created a mythos of their own, Yith-Melle, inspired not only by Lovecraft but also by Machen, Lord Dunsany, and Yeats, all the better to “embrace their fascination for cosmic dread, deranged pantheons, and unspeakable curses”.

So says the materials accompanying the album which we have received from the publicist for Invictus Productions, which will release Unveiling the Brac’thal on February 2nd. We also have these prefatory words from Hasturian Vigil: Continue reading »