Country : Canada Label : Hand Drawn Dracula Genres and styles : Art Rock / Dream Pop / Experimental / Contemporary / Gothic / Post-Punk Year : 2022

Praises – In This Year: Hierophant

· by Levi Gogerla

The Tarot could be described as ‘God’s picture book,’ or it could be likened to a celestial game of chess, The Trumps being the pieces to be moved according to the laws of their own order over a checkered board of the four elements. Yearly, musician Jesse Crowe draws a tarot card from a deck to help shape an album’s stories and characters within. 

Whereas Jesse Crowe’s first Praises album—In This Year: Ten of Swords, found the singer solely responsible for writing and performing the songs and arrangements of the record (co-production credits going to their long-time Beliefs bandmate and collaborator, Josh Korody), the newest, In This Year: Hierophant sees Crowe return to a full band. The writing process for Hierophant is akin to a Bad Seeds record with key players contributing through feeling alone with little guidance and the sparse backing of a demo track. This distant songwriting process plays to Crowe’s strengths as a songwriter, producing a record that’s instinctively sombre, and gorgeously intimate. 

Much like the Major Arcana, Hierophant, Crowe’s arrangements highlight the delicate, inspirational, and ever-persistent nature of their songwriting craft. In this Year: Hierophant is a record that’s both patient with the listener and commanding of reverence and evocation. Hierophant builds slowly through a quagmire of rich reverbs and the hypnotic cadences in Crowe’s voice sound hopeful amidst the decaying synth backdrops, and sparse instrumentation. Praises is not so much a side project of Beliefs co-front but an extension of a darker more hypnotic palette of the artist’s inner machinations. In This Year: Hierophant is a record that weighs the sorrows and joy over one’s lifetime acuminated; it’s a vulnerable record peppered with allegory and sincerity and the culmination of Crowe’s nocturnal ideation. 

Latest 360 Content

FIJM | Anomalie and Lettieri: A New Musical Friendship, Developing in Real Time

FIJM | Anomalie and Lettieri: A New Musical Friendship, Developing in Real Time

FIJM | Linda May Han Oh, A Role Model for Female Double-Bass Players

FIJM | Linda May Han Oh, A Role Model for Female Double-Bass Players

Nuits d’Afrique | La Chiva Gantiva As Seen by Rafael Espinel

Nuits d’Afrique | La Chiva Gantiva As Seen by Rafael Espinel

Suoni | The Spiritual Quest, The End in Transcendence

Suoni | The Spiritual Quest, The End in Transcendence

FIJM | Thundercat, A Feline on The Loose

FIJM | Thundercat, A Feline on The Loose

FIJM | Bill Frisell, Thomas Morgan and Rudy Royston Exposed

FIJM | Bill Frisell, Thomas Morgan and Rudy Royston Exposed

FIJM | Branford Marsalis Among Four MF’s Playin’ Tunes… Live!

FIJM | Branford Marsalis Among Four MF’s Playin’ Tunes… Live!

FIJM | About Derrick Hodge’s Idea of the Color of Noize

FIJM | About Derrick Hodge’s Idea of the Color of Noize

FIJM | Queen of Afrobeats, Ayra confirms her status as a Global… Starr

FIJM | Queen of Afrobeats, Ayra confirms her status as a Global… Starr

FIJM | Black Jazz by Marquis Hill

FIJM | Black Jazz by Marquis Hill

Festival de Lanaudière | Leonardo Garcia Alarcon/Monteverdi’s Coronation of Poppea: being marketwise

Festival de Lanaudière | Leonardo Garcia Alarcon/Monteverdi’s Coronation of Poppea: being marketwise

FIJM | Nate Smith and his Supremely Talented Quartet

FIJM | Nate Smith and his Supremely Talented Quartet

Nuits d’Afrique 2025 | Tyrane Mondeny Presents Her Mandingo Soul

Nuits d’Afrique 2025 | Tyrane Mondeny Presents Her Mandingo Soul

FIJM | Nai Palm? Creature of Exception! Hawa B? Future Star!

FIJM | Nai Palm? Creature of Exception! Hawa B? Future Star!

FIJM 2025 | Funky funky, Trombone Shorty

FIJM 2025 | Funky funky, Trombone Shorty

FIJM | Nubya Garcia Becomes a Star in MTL

FIJM | Nubya Garcia Becomes a Star in MTL

FIJM 2025 | Symphonic Avishai Cohen: Bewitching magic

FIJM 2025 | Symphonic Avishai Cohen: Bewitching magic

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Phantom Island

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Phantom Island

Common Holly – Anything glass

Common Holly – Anything glass

FIJM I Hanorah Sets the TD Stage Ablaze with Soulful R&B

FIJM I Hanorah Sets the TD Stage Ablaze with Soulful R&B

FIJM | Jeff Goldblum: Storyteller, Comedian and Pianist

FIJM | Jeff Goldblum: Storyteller, Comedian and Pianist

FIJM I Still Taking Us There, Mavis Staples Electrifies Montreal JazzFest

FIJM I Still Taking Us There, Mavis Staples Electrifies Montreal JazzFest

FIJM | Gabriella Olivo, Musical Journey in Three Languages

FIJM | Gabriella Olivo, Musical Journey in Three Languages

FIJM | Orchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp – Ventre Unique

FIJM | Orchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp – Ventre Unique

Subscribe to our newsletter