dark ambient / noise

GH Records

What is this? A question my son asked when I started to listen to Abattior & Satori’s  Megaloschemos  for this review. Well, we can insure you that the transubstantiation  wasn’t a light one. The second partnership between Italy’s Lorenzo Abattoir and legendary UK project Satori is not an easily digestible piece of work. Lorenzo Abattoir is an underground harsh noise artist and sound engineer. His work is connected with contemporary art. The previous project of Abattoir (Psicopompo) was a collaboration with German composer Hermann Kopp. An experimental occult death opera was the result. Dave Kirby is the only original member of the power electronics-dark ambient project Satori which has already released more than a dozen stunning recordings. 

Megaloschemos starts with a dark ambient intro. The whirring and echoing machinery teeth on The Great Vow give the track a scary depth. The hunting electronic choruses are inserted many times more than in their previous work (Aether) and create an obscure atmosphere. There is a little more mercy on this album. Second hell: Hesychasm, starts with noise but instantly changes into Gothic movements sending us to immense deep loneliness. This is no music for untrained ears.

Sabasius (God on horseback) and Adrastus (King of Argus) refer to the Greek Mythology. The deep distortion and religious chants take us back to the days without light on this planet. The nightmare continues with Eschatology and Hermetism. 

Octoechoes took us back to their first album Aether, noise brutality with pauses filled with deep pitch black chants. Abattoir & Satori serves us tracks filled with dark obscurity, glitchy noise and Gothic breading engines colored with jabbering soundscapes. 

Megaloschemos is an experimental search of sound boundaries and emotions without a knowing end. This is a grotesque, brain boiling work with very doom and frightening sound architecture. Dark ambient lovers will be very keen with this profound album. CD limited to 300 copies.


​Patsker

dark ambient

Quote from Antonius Stark aka Ravin:  “There are no limits to how art is created!”

Blind your windows, move to your cellar or dig a dark hole somewhere near a graveyard. Don’t forget to take your headphones with you. Ravin creates dark ambient and drone music. He released his debut album Daemonography on Darkon Records. This Canadian artist gets his inspiration from the dark and humming nature where he lives. Eight frightening dark ambient tracks where born during long insomniac nights he was suffering from.


Unhuman Presence In The Flesh starts with an evil hart beat surrounded in drones that will cave you in. Daemonography takes you even deeper to that dark dungeon, doubting that you probably will never get out. The drones are boosted with strange noisy sounds just like cold winds freezing the door of your prison cell. The tension is build up and vanishes slowly while you los starting e grip on your senses. The compositions contain enough changes to keep on the undergoing journey in this cinematic world. The Circle Downstairs and Desolation guided us in an Archeronian SF mood. 

The next trip Sofia Is Not Alone felt like we wanted to quit listening. The droning stays too long on the same level. It takes a long while when something happens. Something Is Here Within has more variability but has the same problem like the previous track. Turmoil wants to give some turmoil with beats but gets stuck in the noisy drones.

Unmarked takes us back into the grim atmosphere like the first part of the album. Dark sounds coloured with choirs confirming your hell. Unmarked  and  Daemonography are the best creations on this album by far.

Conclusion: Ravin composes interesting dark ambient sounds with a noisy touch. The first part of the soundtrack is very good but loses after track four in strength, due to lack of variation. The ending gives us back the thoughts of buried evilness. I need a drink.


​Patsker

dark ambient

Common Eider, King Eider creates deep, creepy drones that bring you to a dark alien universe. A Wound Of Body should be the first part of a two album series. The music collective is based in San Francisco California and has already produced some good dark ambient albums since 2007.

The members of this fellowship explore the boundaries of the psyche, creating shivering soundscapes with the experimental use of strings and choirs. Darkness will be your friend while listening to this album.
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‘Remembrance A Threnody’ starts with a drone, slowly  opening the gate to an interesting dark ambient journey filled with desolated landscapes and abandoned places. The strings and the drones generate an atmosphere filled with doleful reflections so addictive that you want to stay in. The same tension continues with ‘Sinew Stretched Over Crumbing Bones’.

A viola rules the track ‘We Sing Over These Bones So That They May Rise Up And Run A Way Into The   Night’, and makes you feel the absolute loneliness with no escaping from mind disintegration. The intensive drones with some ritual sparks on ‘Helene’ will energize your fear of walking in dark woods, because the sounds make you feel like something is waiting for you behind every tree.

The last track, River of Blood, ends with drones and soundscapes which paint hallucinating images of unknown creatures in your mind. The mournful viola pushes your thoughts further into the shades of Hades and beyond.  Common Eider, King Eider succeeds in keeping up the dark cavernous vibes with enough variation to have this album in your music collection. I am already curious what the second part will bring.

Patsker

doom / sludge metal / drone / dark ambient

This EP, or single, is long, seventy minutes but in that timespan Boobs Of Doom takes you on a trip through your own darkest imagination. Just download the album, because this is a full length, turn the volume knob to neighbour levels and drift away. Carrie will appreciate it, Boobs Of Doom will appreciate it.

drone / ambient

death metal

gothic rock

bandcamp

drone / dark ambient

Sombre Soniks

drone / dark ambient

dark ambient / ritual / drone

death metal / black metal

drone / dark ambient

ambient / experimental / downtempo

dark rock / art rock / blackgaze

traditional / folk 

ambient / experimental

I'm not sure if Troum really needs an introduction. Formed in 1997, these Germans have been paving the path for ambient, dark ambient and experimental drone acts for twenty years. Armed with a wide array of instrumentation, Troum inspired thousands of people to explore the world of drones and soundscapes. 

So it's no wonder that, for Troum's twentieth birthday, an international bunch of likeminded people have decided to remix, rework and transform the band's sounds. Nineteen acts appear on this compilation, each one of them honoring Troum in their own way.

The whole thing opens with a gloomy, minimal and droning remix of 'Times' by Allseits. This track plunges the compilation right into the darkest regions of the ambient scene. 'The Silent Fish' by Contrastate adds heavy percussion and an almost violent atmosphere. Inade answer with another cinematic ambient piece, one quite typical for both Inade and Troum, which obviously is a good thing. So three tracks into this tribute compilation and I'm already sold. There are sixteen more to go, with well known names like Nadja, Raison D'Etre, Cisfinitum and Reutoff patiently awaiting their turn.

One of the longest tracks is 'Giascei' by Vance Orchestra (the longest one being the vast droning experience of Mutler). This one is a pitch black river of meandering drones, haunting soundscapes and intense noises. Halfway through it becomes rhythmic and repetitive while maintaining that angsty atmosphere. That being said, it will probably be quite clear that there is few percussion and even fewer beats to be expected on this compilation. Tarkatak's rendering of '_vs_brinnan' has percussion but not in a danceable kind of manner. This nudges more towards the ritualistic side of the soundscapes spectrum.

Looking for highlights on this album is not an easy task. Every track has its own identity, depending on the character of the respective artists. Yet, what Raison D'Etre did with 'Ananke' is brilliant. He turned the track into a classic dark ambient piece, perfectly capable of standing next to many Cold Meat and Cold Spring releases from back in the day. Also bringing out their classic sound is Nadja, who calmly sail on the everlasting drones of 'Mirrored in You'. The masters themselves appear too, along with Martyn Bates. Together they bring the song 'An Untitled Protest', a blend of neo folk and ambient soundscapes.

Disc two opens with 'Kapotte Muziek by Troum', remixed by QST. At first there is noise. Then glitchy beats appear, turning the track into the most danceable yet. This is one of my favorites, perhaps because it adds the necessary amount of variation to this compilation. I mean, most of this album can be categorized as dark ambient. Acts like Ure Thrall, V.O.S., Dual and Bad Sector have delivered splendid version of Troum classics. Supplementing that, the earlier mentioned QST and Θ16 vs. Myrrman add electronic beats. In the end, Markow C., Cisfinitum, Reutoff and Moljebka Pvlse deliver some more beautiful ambient pieces. More of the same? Yes, but also more of the same high quality.

So, what to think about this album? I guess it's quite clear. 'Troums Transformation Tapes' is an excellent tribute to a groundbreaking band. Most of the contributing projects stayed quite loyal to the original sound and to their own. Some stepped outside of the genre's boundaries, with nice results too. For Troum fans, this is an absolute must-have and for aspiring dark ambient aficionados, this is a fantastic introduction into the genre. I can only recommend this album to all fans of dark, lingering and hypnotic music, that's for sure.


​Serge

post punk / new wave / goth rock

Heading from Bristol, Naut decided to ignore all current trends and to look back to the dark eighties. Now, this five-piece comes with a baffling debut EP, containing five pitch black goth rock tunes. Influences from bands like Sisters Of Mercy and Killing Joke run rampant and come with the overwhelming energy of post punk acts like The Jesus and Mary Chain. Song like opener 'Disintegration' and 'I'm Here' are destined to fill dark dancefloors everywhere. My personal favorite here is closer 'XVI'. It makes me curious and hungry for more, but for now I'm sure that this EP will be an excellent addition to every post punk / goth rock collection. 

doom / sludge

Sheffield doom mongers Kurokuma return with a two track EP, based on the Dope Rider strip from High Times in the 70s. The artwork comes from Paul Kirchner, the creator of the strip. The music is another slab of severe psychotic sludge doom, five and eight minutes long. Part 1 also showcases something industrial, reflected by repetitive, almost methodical drums. Part 2 simply continues to slow but brutal pummeling. Fans of bands like Conan, Dopethrone and Yob can easily trust Kurokuma to deliver the monolithic riffs and fierce vocals they crave so much. So if you want your sludge metal as destructive as a wrecking ball, this EP should do.

post-metal / doom / alternative rock

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Several months after the release of 'Serrated', Dutch heavy rockers An Evening With Knives unleash three songs that did not make the album because of the limited space on the vinyl. Yet, these songs were to important for the band to be ignored. Opener and title track 'Fade Out' deals with the death of Marco’s father due to Alzheimer disease. It's a long, heavy and cathartic lamentation, showcasing the darkest side of this band. The other two songs follow that example, be it a bit shorter. They all walk a similar path as the songs on 'Serrated', and thus would also fit perfectly into every sludge, doom and grunge collection. These guys are growing steadily, that's for sure.

electronic / ambient / experimental

An alienating two track EP that will leave you confused and entangled, that is what Soho Rezanejad delivers. Subtle electronics, minimalist drones, gloomy soundscapes and her vocals come together in two lengthy modern day folk songs. I can't help but think about a mix between Zola Jesus and Diamanda Galas, be it a bit less creepy than the latter. Yet, there is emotion, there is fear, mourning, wonder and hope in these two tracks. There is a mystifying atmosphere, one that borrows elements from dark ambient. Yet, above all perhaps, this is a unique piece of work, reminding me of an act like Dark Ensemble. Recommended only for eternally wandering souls.

post rock / post metal / stoner / sludge

In today's post rock scene, new bands pop up like mushrooms. Würzburg residents The Man Within are one of those newcomers. Mostly, that first effort comes with a low production and a careful introduction in what the band really is capable of. Yet, here that results in a full-blown post metal album with seven outstanding tracks. Most of them, including 'Mount Santo', my favorite 'Institution' (that rolling bass is hot!!!) and the massive 'Limitless' can easily entertain audiences far and wide. Although firmly rooted in the post-scene, elements from sludge metal, psychedelic rock and stoner rock are never far away. A great introduction, now let's hope they can confirm this in the near future.

dark ambient

The new brainchild of Nachtzeit, the man behind ambient dark metal project Lustre, comes up with an interesting dark ambient album. Although playful at time, this album takes us back to the mysterious  and dark age of the Norse gods. Early in 'Drömmarna' acts like Mortiis (on Cold Meat Industry) and Wongraven come to mind. Synths, soundscapes and dreamy melodies guide the listening on a musical tour of medieval Europe, so it seems, highlighting in 'Löftet' and 'Tårarn'. Strangely, the title track 'Hädanfärden' has an X-Files OST feeling about it, which isn't bad, on the contrary. Fans of old school medieval dark ambient can easily appreciate this album.

alternative rock / hard rock / grunge

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Belgian hard rock duo Breakfast At Midnight proves that two is enough to create heaps of noise. On this debut EP they blast seven tracks through our speakers, beginning with the heavy rocking 'Kidi Coke'. From then on, the rock doesn't seem to stop. Inspired by anything between Tool, Queens Of The Stone Age and Stone Temple Pilots, these two feed an everlasting fire. Most tracks drive on sheer energy but in 'What I'm To Say' and in '1813', the band delves deeply into the Pearl Jam version of grunge rock. Here, the vocals are excellent and clean while the other tunes contain heaps of aggressive screams. Not that I mind, this is pure rock 'n roll: raw, rough and heavy.

black metal / death metal

Grab onto something now because Ukrainian trio Goatsperm is about to unload a hellish, chaotic and vulgar EP, loaded with orthodox black/death metal. 'Voice In The Womb' contains three tracks, each one being a pummeling piece of extreme metal, as dark as Satan's butthole but with an ambient breather here and there. Somehow, this trio manages to combine atmospheric passages with sheer metallic terror, something that might indeed make a lot of banging heads turn their way in the near future.  Besides, 'Into The Deep Waters Of Catacombs' is one of the fiercest black metal tunes I've heard this year. If you're a self-respecting extremist, you need this.

krautrock / shoegaze / punk

What would have happened if Ramones used My Bloody Valentine's guitar effects? What would a punk rock cover album of Neu! songs sound like? Well, Finnish six piece Teksti-TV 666 might have a decent answer for you. 'Aidattu Tulevaisuus' delivers six high-octane krautrock tunes with the raw energy of punk and the immersive nature of shoegaze. I admit, it is something different from the usual slabs of rock 'n roll that appear here but 'Turbo-Mondeo' and 'Aidattu tulevaisuus' can easily get your behind shaking. My favorite here is the somewhat slower 'Rauhankone', which might be described as a down-to-earth space rock track. Recommended? Hell yeah!

ambient / electronic / experimental

Hailing from Porto, Vitor Joaquim is a sound sculptor and visual artist, active around the strange borders between soothing ambient and otherworldly noise. This new album, 'Impermanence' contains seven tracks, revolving around repetitive soundscapes, almost subconscious loops and immersive musical textures. Here and there vocals samples have been added to increase the narrative nature of the music. That, along with the minimal soundscapes, makes the title track my favorite here but I'm sure that every fan of decent ambient music can appreciate these sounds. Obviously, this comes highly recommended.

ambient / drone / experimental / noise

bandcamp

An even more noisy and experimental variation on ambient sounds comes from Han, a project by Vitor Joaquim and Emidio Buchinho. This album revolves around live improvisation and real time processing, which results in something severely unusual and highly experimental. Yet, behind the gritty freestyle on the guitar, beautiful ambient loops lurk. These seven tracks are weird, immersive in one way, yet restrained and peculiar. Somehow this album feels like the early days of drone experimentation, when artists were exploring the other possibilities of their instruments. In all, this is an interesting release to dive into, but only for experienced avant gardists...

Serge

dark ambient

bandcamp

A fifteen minutes EP with four tracks, Dark Hymns lives to the glory of its simple, but energetic and suggestive title. With a very dark, subtle and obscure sound, the sensitive premises of the style are afflictive to the fullest – despite being paradoxically peaceful and serene –, and seems to anticipate the imminence of a profoundly terrible doom. While the work presents to the audience a very simple and surreal sound, its nuances are dense, and the excellence of its atmosphere dissipates a graceful and somber fear over the boundaries of the melodies. There is nothing too exceptional or extraordinary about this work, but for dark ambient genre enthusiasts, the vivid, morbid intensity displayed by the artist behind the project is certainly vast, very meaningful, and spiritually consistent. 

electronic / darksynth / dark electro / synthwave

Crossing Lights is an album released on June 22, by German electronica/ synthwave act Collapse Project. A wonderfully splendid album, with eleven tracks – Where everything began, Crossing Lights, Arise from the darkness, M.e.n.s.c.h., Pursuit,
Bloody Dancefloor, Cemetery Walk, Starfighter, Nightshift, Test Drive and Rewind – this marvelous and majestic state of the art work has colorful harmonies, a vibrant, lucid and energetic pace, an intense and cohesive style and a superb sense of rhythmic rapture. With softly pungent, dense and dynamic mordacious melodies that engraves its formidable intrinsic strength at the voracious pace of the music, the album is fulfilled with a tremendously aggrandizing and creative originality, displaying a talent that has everything to stand out as uniquely authentic in the contemporary underground scene. Showcasing a sensational musical grandeur whose artistry is effectively sidelined with the most vivid and hallucinating melodies, the genuine musical abilities of Collapse Project is a gigantic cosmic evolutionary step in what concerns the general development of the genre. With some of the most beautiful songs that I’ve ever heard, Crossing Lights is an unprecedented milestone in the history of electronica. Certainly, deserves not only to be fully appreciated, but highly highlighted as one of the most beautiful, sensational and singular albums ever conceived. 

death metal 

Coffin Birth is an album released on July 20, by Californian death metal group Extremity. With eight songs – Coffin Birth / A Million Witches, Where Evil Dwells, Grave Mistake, Umbilicus, For Want Of A Nail, Occision, Like Father Like Son and Misbegotten / Coffin Death – the record is a satisfactory, lucid and efficient, but hallucinatory and hazardous death metal album, that works decently the most traditional elements of the genre. With heavy, fast rhythms that exposes the voracity of their style, Extremity showcases a peculiar, brutal, direct style, atrocious to the core of its corrosive nature. Despite the fact that the album at some rare passages becomes a little predictable and monotonous, this does not affect the general layout of the sound, nor does any damage to the competent and precise style of the band. Their aggressive strength is somewhat inherent to the most brutal and extreme ramification of the genre, and the name of the band certainly stands for it. While you can’t expect too much of innovative features on this record, Coffin Birth displays a decent amount of virtuosity, talent and definition, and certainly honors the genre with a virulent and passionate degree of astounding sonorous hostility, that will entertain avidly the most dedicated enthusiasts of extreme death metal.    

grunge / stoner rock/ power metal / black metal / alternative rock

Released on June 22, Desolation is an album by alternative post grunge/ power metal rock group Khemmis. With six tracks – Bloodletting, Isolation, Flesh To Nothing, The Seer, Maw Of Time and From Ruin – this gracefully peculiar, audacious and cohesive record showcases the splendid abilities of a band that does an amazingly superb and exceedingly sophisticated work in their amalgamation of several different genres and styles of music. With a power metal core heavily infused by a post grunge alternative rock density, the music of Khemmis has its own singular and energetic creative groundwork, fuelled by an outstandingly voracious and rude nitroglycerine spontaneous synergy, that explodes directly in the brain of the listener. A little reminiscent of more classic and mainstream acts like Manowar, Creed and Blind Guardian – although exposing a formidable degree of uniqueness – the band does a surprisingly splendorous and excellent work on Desolation, that reveals itself as a marvelous, profoundly genuine and sensational album, all the way through. Undoubtedly, Desolation deserves to be classified as one of the greatest masterpieces of the year.  

electronic

A beautiful, outstanding, lancinating and colorful EP, Gated Soul has four tracks: Blues For Jekyll, Last Raver, Hocus Pocus and To The Woods. With beautiful melodies, and very sensible, delightfully plausible harmonies, there is a genius spontaneity coming out from these songs that actually make you feel quite enthusiastic about it. With an exceedingly serene, but at the same time ostensibly sensational and mandatory vibe, the artist reveals a subtle, but formidable sense of originality on the framework of the sound that is the embodiment of this work. From within, the melodies gradually expand from a synergy that relocates the rhythm directly to the point of its graciously moving syncope. Exposing lucidity and showcasing an extraordinary degree of creativity, this electronic music artist from Great Britain has no fear in demonstrating his superb, masterful and singular talent, that easily reinvigorates in a more sophisticated sonorous artistry the greatest elements of electronica. Here you have four amazingly wonderful songs, that you will be pleased to hear over and over again. 

black metal / death metal

A very impressive, hostile and energetic album – although widely using exceedingly crude and conventional elements by some standards – Krwawy Sztorm, by Polish extreme metal group Moloch Letalis, is an aggressive, furious and bloodthirsty album. Only thirty minutes long, the record has nine tracks: Wielka Egzekucja, Sztorm, Krwawa Ziemia, Zatańczysz Ze Mną Kurwa W Piekle ?, Przysięga, Zdychaj Psie, Palownik, Gotowy Na Piekło and Żar. With ostensive and abrupt rhythmic grievances, the style of the group is simple and direct, a little reminiscent of punk rock, given the atrocious voracity, objectivity and rudeness of its style. With a solid fidelity to the most brutal aspects of the genre, the work is amazingly competent and full of acid rage. Although there is nothing too aggrandizing nor original about the work, certainly this album is a pearl for avid enthusiasts of the genre, since Moloch Letalis literally practices closely the most ardent, extreme, raw and violent aspects of death and black metal, executing a refined breed of these marvelous genres. If you like astoundingly heavy material, Krwawy Sztorm is something you would like to hear. 

electronic / techno / industrial 

With six tracks – Entrance of Gargoyles, Dance or Die, The Order, Mechanical Vampire, The Cavern of Noise and Theunderdogme 2018hardrem1x – The Cavern of Noise, by techno industrial French artist McClane is a formidable, very intuitive and lancinating work. With abrasive and disruptive rhythms, increasingly grotesque and infuriating harmonies, cohesive dilapidation of sound and very unpredictable, dense musical compasses, The Cavern of Noise is an interesting work of art, astoundingly engraved at forefront of the best tradition of techno music. With elements that plays on the fundamental axis of the noise and industrial genres, the artist evokes at the colorful blast of the music an atmospheric vitality that rejuvenates the harmonies and the anatomy of the music. With a lucid, compulsory and graceful creativity that is exponential to the ardent mordacity of the melodies, on this album, you certainly get the best the genre will ever offer you. The title track – The Cavern of Noise – is absolutely the best, and will leave you with the dense exposition of what electro techno music should really sound like. 

black metal

Mysteries of Earth, released by British black metal group Blutvial on July 5th, is a formidable, lucid and splendorous album. Fully energized, mortally intense and with sordidly aggressive, rapturous and impulsive, but lugubrious and poetic guitar lines, Mysteries of Earth is better described as a marvelous state of the art work. With ten amazingly placid and cohesive tracks – beneath the moon, black silence, existential rite, vault of unrest, carving nihil, midwinter's halls, urnacht, doomed to eternal night, in praise of noctula and where graves spring open – this fantastic work, besides its subtle originality, extraordinary grandiosity and proverbial musical audacity, consolidates firmly and brings about intrinsically the best qualities of the genre: hostile mordacity, somber harmonies, an aggressive stylish impetus, creative melodies, a rapid pace and an exceedingly volatile density. With the organic virtue of a profoundly vital and conscious musical dynamic, you can certainly highlight this record as one of the best black metal pieces released this year. Mysteries of Earth is a punctuating device and a majestic work of art in the history of the genre.     

black metal

Cosmic Autumn is the debut album of an eponymous black metal project from Germany. Released on July 13, the record has five tracks: The Last Deception, Event Horizon, Indistinct Visions, Realms Of Eternal Light and Solitude (Instrumental). With a beautiful and very original musical layer, very sober and proficient, the sound is definitely strong, sensitive, dynamic and fundamentally cohesive. Although the record retains the fury typical of the genre, Cosmic Autumn is also a lesson on sincere and poetic artistry, as the music revolves itself around a shroud of mortifying serenity, like a twilight that dies in the agony of an everlasting moment of unspeakable affliction. Since the music translates into sound these imponderable passages of pervasive anger, the overall loyalty of the project’s style to the genre is emphasized, but without compromising the ability of the artist in showcasing his own peculiarities. A very good work, that certainly exposes the mordacious talent of an exponentially promising black metal artist, Cosmic Autumn is the opening gate for a musician that has everything to aggregate into the genre a whole new conjuncture of possibilities, with his audacious and ostensibly brilliant creativity. 

stoner rock/ psychedelic rock 

bandcamp

Earthborn is an album released by Greek stoner rock group Stone Age Mammoth. Forty minutes long, the record has seven tracks: Fearless, The Dark, Whispers, The Mysterious Life Of Mr Krips, The Secret, Earthborn and My Darkest Hour. An exceedingly calm, methodic and meticulous, but exceedingly vigorous and lucid album, undoubtedly, Earthborn is a fantastic state of the art work, that dissects, reverberates, comprehends and exposes the best aspects the genre has to offer. With singular, serene and soft guitar lines, a configuration of sonorous walls that grows from the sincere stylish leniency of the group and a marvelous sense of timing that knows from instinct what has to be done, Stone Age Mammoth has a formidable artistic security and a powerful domain over the genre, that comes out naturally. Revealing itself as a graceful masterpiece as the album evolves and revolves around its own atmosphere of calmness, omniscience and existential perception, the glorious creativity of the group certainly highlights them among other bands of the genre. With a singular conjuncture of sonorous qualities, Earthborn deserves to be greatly regarded, widely appreciated and publicized as the wonderful and fantastic work of art that truly is.

black metal

Nostalgia is an EP released on July 23 by German black metal artist ColdWorld. With five tracks – Cosmos Devourer, Demon Speed, The Dark Ages, Let The Devil In and Silva Nigra – the EP, almost twenty six minutes long, is concise. Exceedingly beautiful, with the typical elegance that is an engraved milestone of the artist, the proverbial guitar lines and the poetic harmonies anticipates the general conflagration of its overall majestic serenity, deeply fulgurated with the sensible character of its everlasting, elegant and somber  horizon of artistry. With rapid passages that are profoundly surrounded by graciously atmospheric interludes, the music on Nostalgia is overloaded with the imperial fragrances of its own rudimentary darkness, that is sustained by a lucid and dense, but marvelously whimsical ferocious resentment, whose vitality extrapolates the shadows of its own arrogant beauty. With everlasting precipices of color surrounding the rhythmic fortunes of the songs, I must confess that I wasn’t particularly overwhelmed by this work. Nevertheless, Nostalgia has all the elements that are characteristic of a ColdWorld work, and, to a certain extent, has enough qualities to be deemed valuable for its sincere and splendid level of singularity.    

post rock / experimental

Return is a three tracks EP released on July 25, by a musician from India, who works under the nom de plume of Phet. With three marvelous songs – Return, Distance and Liberation – Phet works very distinctively the interior perception of the harmonies, to articulate an ascendant, protuberant and expansive, but at the same time discreet, lucid and introspective degree of sonorous exhilaration. With a pungent, incisive axis of conscious melodic devices, correctly assimilated by the lenient, but purposeful stability of its glorious symbiosis of organic dissonances, that seems lethargic at first, the intrinsic nature of the rhythmic serenity that grows within this musical horizon slowly works towards the digressive elements of the harmonies, revolving around a certain complexity that obliterates the cosmic volatility of its formidably eloquent style. With a futurist, colorful, modernist musical approach that made the external shape of the songs, indeed, to sound in an exceedingly beautiful and elegant fashion, Return can be positively described as a very gracious, audacious and original work of art. The last track, Liberation, I would certainly highlight as my favorite. If you want to listen to something very surprising, astute and genuine, I definitely recommend this marvelous and surreal EP. 

Wagner

dark ambient

In recent months, I have been binge-watching documentaries. First I devoured several episodes of Time Team each night and currently the dark and obscure history of Europe appears on my computer screen. From the downfall of the Roman empire over the Knight's Templar and the Holy Grail to the inhuman circumstances of World War One, I take it all in. Over the ages, the human race has been so decadent, so evil, so vile, it's almost inimaginable. You might now wonder why I'm writing about this, or why I'm watching these things in the first place. For me, a writer, these documentaries work inspiring. Also for me, a fan of dark music, some of these come with epic soundtracks.

This album by Moloch Conspiracy, released on the Italian quality label Eighth Tower Records, could be one of those epic soundtracks. In fact, parts of it have been recorded in World War One forts near Verdun, which somehow perfectly illustrates the entire atmosphere of the album. It's almost as if pieces of that angsty history have been recorded too, as if spirits of the past shines through in the music. 'Kulullû' for example is a grim piece of dark ambient with an overwhelming feeling of solitude and madness. A soldier slowly ascends into desillusion, despair and insanity. For him, all hope is lost and in the end he patiently awaits his ultimate faith while the sounds of the battlefield fade away in the distance.

See, I told you these documentaries and this music work inspiring. Other songs on this album can easily evoke other fantasies too, like ancient rituals at Stonehenge in 'Apsû' or mystifying adventures in remote forests in 'At The Entrance To The Cave'. All you really need is your imagination and this album can take you to every single mysterious world you can possibly imagine, even fearsome and haunting ones with 'The Awful Ritual'. I can say that this is an interesting album for fans of everything between Raison D'Etre, Ashtoreth and Rapoon. That would be rightful too but I guess I'll just go with the phrase "an outstanding piece of ritual dark ambient". Fans of the genre will know more than enough with that.

Still, for the late-understanders: absolute recommended album!!!


​Serge

ambient / experimental / noise

Krysalisound

doom / sludge metal

experimental / avant garde

drone / electronic / ambient

hardcore / crust / black metal

psychedelic rock / stoner rock

indie / alternative rock / psychedelic rock

dream pop / trip hop

dark ambient / neoclassical / dark jazz

krautrock / psychedelic rock

death metal / deathcore

rock

groove metal

Serge

post-metal / doom / alternative rock

dark jazz / ambient / experimental / trip hop

hardcore

acoustic blues

dark ambient / noise

doom / occult metal

death metal

black metal / doom / death metal

post punk / synth pop

breakcore / industrial

alternative rock / blues

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style of Tool and quite a bit of grunge - vocals that remind of Cobain included. So go buy this one if you appreciate something that refuses to fit into one box.

ambient / experimental

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