A haruspex was a person trained to practise divination by the inspection of the entrails of sacrificed animals. Haruspex is also the title of the debut album of the trio of Brazilian, Copenhagen-based vocal artist Marcela Lucatelli, American, Oslo-based double bass player (and sound artist) John Andrew Wilhite, and American, New York-based polymath, guitarist and synth player Elliott Sharp (the head of zOaR label, who mixed, mastered, and released this album), which first performed in Oslo’s Blå in April 2024.

Haruspex was recorded remotely with Lucatelli in São Paulo and Copenhagen, Wilhite in Oslo, and Sharp in New York, and features six free improvised pieces. Lucatelli sets the distressing atmosphere with her Diamanda Galás-tinged, wordless but emotionally intense, breathtakingly frightening extended vocal techniques and pounding on the piano. Sharp injects bluesy, slide guitar lines and vintage analogue synth sounds and futurist electronics, and Wilhite, who uses the cod mating calls as a sonic foundation,  intensifies the restless sonic mayhem with his stubborn, bowed double bass work.

Can not speculate if this experimental, fearless trio reached some insightful divinations about the future of mankind or the globe. Its obsessive exploration of Haruspicy produces an intense and merciless atmosphere that matches ritual destruction and generative sonic expansion, but always maintains a tight narrative arc. This unpredictable, extreme sonic mayhem may tell us enough about the future of this fragile planet.

Eyal Hareuveni

Marcela Lucatelli (voice, piano), John Andrew Wilhite (double bass), Elliott Sharp (guitars, synthesizers)