One Leg One Eye — the “Irish blackened-deconstructed-folk project” of founding Lankum member Ian Lynch and veteran noise monger George Brennan — have announced their second album, CRONE, out 22 May on AD 93. To mark the announcement, the duo have shared the album’s first track, Many are my Names Besides, featuring vocals from legendary actor, performer and writer Olwen Fouéré.
Fouéré, known for her work with Operating Theatre, brings a formidable presence to the track. Her vocal performance was improvised in a single day, channelling the figure of the Morrigan — the crow-haunting war goddess of Irish mythology — over Lynch and Brennan’s already-composed music. “I invoked her energy as a starting point, using text extracts that Ian sent me from the Ulster Cycle and other sources,” Fouéré explains. “Listening back, at this time in our world, I can only wonder at how much blood and war the Crone/Crow of sovereignty is preparing to unleash now. Watch out.”
The track’s title is drawn from a passage in the Togail Bruidne Dá Derga, in which a terrifying lone woman recites a litany of names to King Conaire — among them Némain, Badb and Mache, all faces of the Morrigan. It’s a potent source for an act whose work has always drawn from the darkest seams of Irish tradition.
Visuals for Many are my Names Besides by Ryan Carroll (NRTHRD).
CRONE follows the 2022’s …And Take The Black Worm With Me (released on Nyahh Records), which we reviewed on KLOF as a powerfully impressive and unflinchingly dark debut. Where that album paired traditional song with long-form drones and raw vocals, CRONE moves further from conventional song structures entirely, with four tracks that shapeshift through psychedelic miasma, channelling energies from Irish mythology in the form of obscure incantations and dire pronouncements.
Notably, much of the material predates One Leg One Eye as a formal entity — Brennan was working on the CRONE project while Lynch was completing …And Take The Black Worm With Me, giving the album a deep prehistory that mirrors its subject matter’s reach into the remote past.
One Leg One Eye are currently on a UK and European tour supporting Godspeed You! Black Emperor, before heading to Canada to support Efrim Manuel Menuck in May. A UK headline tour follows in June, including a London show at ICA on 20 June.
CRONE will be available on black vinyl and CD from 22 May.
Stream/Pre-Order: https://ad93.ffm.to/crone
One Leg One Eye Tour Dates
9 April – NANTES, FRANCE, Variations Festival
10 April – LONDON, UK, Troxy *
11 April – ANTWERP, THE NETHERLANDS, Trix *
12 April – EINDHOVEN, THE NETHERLANDS, Effenaar *
13 April – ANTWERP, THE NETHERLANDS, Trix *
14 April – REIMS, FRANCE, La Cartonnerie *
8 May – HAMILTON, CANADA, Mill Hardware ^
9 May – GUELPH, CANADA, Sonic Hall ^
10 May – ST CATHERINES, CANADA, Warehouse ^
12 May – WINDSOR, CANADA, Meteor ^
13 May – TORONTO, CANADA, St Stephen In The Field ^
14 May – KINGSTON, CANADA, Broom Factory ^
15 May – MONTEREAL, CANADA, Pouzza Festival
16 May – QUYON, CANADA, Studio Cimetière ^
18 June – BIRMINGHAM, UK, The Castle & Falcon
19 June – MANCHESTER, UK, The White Hotel
20 June – LONDON, UK, ICA
21 June – BRISTOL, UK, Strange Brew
24 June – GLASGOW, UK, The Hug and Pint
25 June – NEWCASTLE, UK, Star and Shadow
26 June – LEEDS, UK, Brudenell Social Club
27 June – BLACKPOOL, UK, The Black Lies
* Supporting Godspeed You! Black Emperor
^ Supporting Efrim Manuel Menuck