Unto Ashes

Gothic, electronic, madrigal: The distinctive vision of Lockhart's Michael Laird swirls through a catalog of seven beguiling LPs bewitched by centuries-old traditions. His band's first compilation, Ghosts Captured turns on an axis of pop/rock covers found on prior platters. A few pieces of low-hanging fruit aside (the Cure; fellow travelers Current 93 and Qntal; Projekt labelmates Lycia), the set list takes stylistically incompatible standards and gives them radical but reverent reinterpretations. Filtered through Laird's pagan prism, New Order's "The Him" transforms into a haunted hymn, while Neil Young's "The Needle and the Damage Done" becomes a droning communion with a melancholy spirit. Unto Ashes lifts the melody from Norwegian synth-pop troop Apoptygma Berzerk's "Kathy's Song" and turns it into gorgeous folk, and filters the Butthole Surfers' "The Birds Are Dying" through a choral-enhanced string section. Ethereal acoustic versions of Blue Öyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" and Van Halen's "Runnin' With the Devil" nets two more Ghosts Captured.