Texas based ensemble Awen’s debut full length has redefined the genre and upped the bar by setting the haunting mood that most others only strive for. Erin Powell and company bring forth a mood of lost & forgotten history, only remembered by the ghost of our ancestors and faith in one’s own past. Twelve ghostly refrains struck with a European sensibility while channeling their own unique local influences into this formalized opus.

While most modern neofolk relish in predictability, The Bells Before Dawn strikes a tome of apocalyptic grievance with a professional, clarion symphony of a warlike orchestra accompanied by vocalist Powell’s baritone delivery of prophetic and oracular verse.