The Irish word Rún can mean secret, mystery, or love, or perhaps some elusive combination of the three, reflecting the many aspects of life that defy easy explanation. In wrestling with these, it can become necessary to commit oneself entirely, to jump in at the deep end in search of the vibrations and feelings at hand. This is where the band Rún comes in.
The debut album of Rún is the result of three powerful artists – Tara Baoth Mooney, Diarmiud MacDiarmada and Rian Trench – locking horns and forming a spiritually intrepid outfit who alchemies experimental methods and improvisatory states to reach intimidating heights of sonic and psychic intensity. An extremely diverse range of musical influences also make their presence felt here, from William Basinski and Pauline Oliveros to Om, Coil and The Necks.
A centrepiece of the album drawn from such is the potent ‘Terror Moon’, on which a thunderous percussive backdrop is matched in intensity by potent chants and mantric ululations from Tara as well a ferocious tumult of layered noise and fevered invective. ‘Your Death My Body’ meanwhile projects exorcising vocal meditations through a musical prism that touches on the lineage of spectral beat-driven atmospherics that connects Portishead and Tara Clerkin Trio.
The stakes are high in the creative realm of Rún, with the record’s ritualistic approach leading it to the territory of the truly elemental and primal. Yet this is a record with the metaphysical firepower to cleanse the spirit even whilst it stares darkness full in the face.
As Ursula Le Guin once said – “In so far as one denies what is, one is possessed by what is not, the compulsions, the fantasies, the terrors that flock to fill the void” – in the increasingly materialistic and inhospitable realm of 2025, there can be few better companions than Rún to embrace reality and confront this void.
