Here are the dark ambient albums that we at This is Darkness have been listening to this month – some are new releases, but a few are older gems we’ve just (re)discovered. Please check these out by clicking on the Bandcamp links, and consider supporting the artists. Enjoy!
Mortemhize – Herald of Doom
I’ve been a huge fan of Russian neoclassical ambient artist, Mortemhize, for some time now, so I was thrilled when I learned he was releasing this new 6 track album. This is hauntingly sad music, played beautifully on piano and stringed instruments, complimented by subtly blended ambient soundscapes. The end result is music that evokes strong feelings of melancholy and despair – yet provides a wonderful listening experience.
Teeth Engraved With the Names of the Dead – It Will Be Dark Soon
This is one of those albums that just blew me away on the first listen – with its dark ambient, drone, and industrial elements coalescing to create the definitive soundtrack to the apocalypse. No, it’s not an easy listen, but that’s the point. If you’re looking for something on the noisier side of the dark ambient genre, then this album is definitely worth checking out.
Extinct Anatomies – Above The Wandering Land
I’ve had this album from Chilean dark ambient musician Extinct Anatomies on repeat play for the last couple of weeks – its blending of dark ambient and down-tempo industrial elements hitting a sweet spot that I’ve been drawn to again and again. I can’t wait to see what this artist releases next.
Desiderii Marginis – Departed
I’ve been eagerly awaiting for this album to be released ever since Johan Levin mentioned it in an interview last year. It was worth the wait. This is an incredible album of atmospheric dark ambient soundscapes – powerful and emotive music that draws you in and takes you to another world. The inclusion of reworks of 3 classic Desiderii Marginis pieces – Deadbeat, Worlds Apart, and I Am Without Rule (Sum Sine Regno) – is an added bonus. Once again, Johan Levin has shown why he is considered one of the masters of the genre.
Grove of Whispers – Borderland
Grove of Whispers is fast becoming a favourite of mine – his drone-ambient albums always striking the perfect balance between the darkness and the light. Borderland is an album of unsettling drones and eerie dark ambient soundscapes… but its subtle layers and underlying gentle vibe provide the perfect soundtrack to relax, reflect, and lose yourself to.
Keosz – Vigor
The latest album from Slovakian ambient / electronic musician Keosz is actually the soundtrack to Vigor – a “…free-to-play shoot ‘n’ loot game where you build the Shelter in post-war Norway…”. And, as a soundtrack album, some of the music here is a little more uplifting or hard hitting than your typical dark ambient. But because it all flows together so well, I found myself drawn in and enjoying the whole album experience – regardless of whether certain parts of it were dark ambient or not.
Various Artists – ++Transcend Transmute Kreate++
The Sombre Soniks dark ambient label specialises in music of a “… ritual or ethnomuzikologikal nature…” and this latest album, a compilation of tracks from twenty-seven artists, is the perfect showcase for the consistently high quality output the label releases. Each track offers something different, yet the pieces all fit together to create a wonderfully unified audio experience that leaves the listener feeling touched by something special.
Mørket – Shadows of Existence
This impressive dark ambient release from Greece, is described by its creator, Mørket, as “… a journey to the subconscious and the hidden, darker aspects of the mind, the moments that are stored within the memory…”. It sums up this album perfectly – where evolving drones and repeating electronica combine together to create a sublime dream-like soundtrack. I will definitely be checking out more from this artist.
Here are the dark ambient albums that we at This is Darkness have been listening to this month – some are new releases, but a few are older gems we’ve just (re)discovered. Please check these out by clicking on the Bandcamp links, and consider supporting the artists. Enjoy!
Beyond The Ghost – Eternal Drift
I’m a big fan of Beyond The Ghost‘s previous offering, You Disappeared, so I was thrilled when I heard he was releasing another album on the Cryo Chamber label. Eternal Drift is a dark, brooding album, of cinematic soundscapes that provides the listener with an audio experience that manages to be both melancholic and disturbing. The unsettling drone sounds are complimented by haunting piano and cello work, resulting in music that is sad and despairing, but has an underlying human warmth to it. This is an incredible album, and with it, Pierre Laplace has firmly established himself as one of the masters of the genre.
Bonzaii – A Person / Life on a Blade
These two tracks from German artist, Bonzaii, have been stuck in my head for the last week, in a wonderfully endless loop of wistful poignancy. Discordant drones and low tempo synth patterns are expertly blended together to create something very special. This music provides the perfect soundtrack for reminiscing over days long past and remembering old friends… and maybe a spot of soul-searching. I can’t wait to see what Bonzaii releases next.
Paul Vinsonhaler – Antigonish
Strictly speaking, this isn’t dark ambient – not in the purist sense – but, this electronic / industrial / soundtrack album definitely includes a number of dark ambient elements. This is dark and edgy music, the kind that grabs you by the throat right from the off and doesn’t let go until the album has finished. As a result, Antigonish may not be for everyone – but I was completely blown away the first time I played the album… and I’ve had it on repeat play ever since.
Equal Stones – Catharsis
Ambient producer, Amandus Schaap, describes his latest release as “… a very personal record, mostly functioning as a form of therapy and to release long emotional blockage…” which gives you a good idea of what to expect of Catharsis. This is heartfelt, powerful music – sad, moving and almost overwhelming at times. It’s beautiful, yet bleak stuff, and if you’re in the mood for something on the downhearted side, this album is perfect.
Anne Sulikowski – Bedroom Drone
This impressive collection of drone and lo-fi electronic music is the latest release from Canadian composer, Anne Sulikowski, who uses guitar, loops, synths and pedals to create unique sonic landscapes. This is a laid back, chilled out album of experimental electronic and ambient music that is soothing and cinematic in equal measure. I will definitely be checking out more of Anne’s music, and with with an extensive back catalogue of 73 (!) releases, I know there will be plenty to keep me entertained for a long time to come.
Mind over MIDI – Skuddår
Mind over MIDI‘s latest release is an album of arctic inspired drone ambient. Helge Tømmervåg has done an amazing job of combining natural field recordings with subtle synth work and drone sounds, to create beautiful meditative polar soundscapes. This album transports the listener to the far, wild reaches of Norway, away from all the every day stresses of modern life. Wonderful.
Here are the dark ambient albums that we at This is Darkness have been listening to this month – some are new releases, but a few are older gems we’ve just (re)discovered. Please check these out by clicking on the Bandcamp links, and consider supporting the artists. Enjoy!
I’ve been a huge fan of bvdub since I first found his work on Glacial Movements 2017 album, Epilogues for the End of the Sky (read my 2017 review here), which was a beautifully bleak piece of arctic drone with fleeting glimpses of more trance/electronica type vibes. Ten Times the World Lied returns Brock van Wey to the Glacial Movements label for another album which shares many similar vibes to the aforementioned work, ranging from moments of engulfing tension to a minimal and endearing, piano-laden beauty. As if one is wandering alone through a mild northern storm, reminiscing on times of love and others of despair, giving each their due importance. As many of us walk/sit/work alone during these hard times, bvdub‘s sounds seem ever-important and timely.
Mount Shrine is back with another variant on their signature combo of delicate field recordings, slowly evolving drones and the occasional samples of ‘radio-transmission’ voices. Shortwave Ruins brings these radio samples to the forefront, making for a more active listen than the previous albums. It’s certainly a perfect album for the hours winding down before bed, and for those that sleep with the TV on, this would be a useful replacement! For me the album evokes the same sort of frigid ambient, which simultaneously has a heart-warming effect, for which I often go to Northaunt, which is my next recommendation for the month!
This is an album that solidified my love for dark ambient. It is inspired by ‘The Road’ by Cormac McCarthy. While there is never a bad reason to pull this vinyl out and give it a spin, it seems even more appropriate during this current pandemic. You can check out my previous deep analysis of the album/book here, and an interview I did with Hærleif Langås of Northaunt here.
Old Sorcery is back with a new EP, An Inkling of Void, running slightly over 20 min. The album is presented on Electronic Purification Records in a vinyl edition, which also includes 2018’s The Path Lies Hidden EP on it’s reverse side. An Inkling of Void is one of the more subtle releases by Old Sorcery, focusing more on dreamy synths than their more frequent and overtly dungeon synth vibes of the previous full-length releases.
Daniel Edenfield’s previous releases have been black metal / darkwave (Throne of Anguish), dungeon synth / soundtrack (Seregost), and cinematic audio horror stories (The Night Keep). His latest project, Obsidian Relic, takes the dark ambient elements present on those albums, to the next level – with brooding synth work, eerie drone soundscapes, and post-industrial undertones. The end result in an impressive album that I’ve had on repeat play for days. I will definitely be watching out for future releases from this artist.
Through is an album of mesmerising, melancholic soundscapes – where drones, strings and synths have been expertly combined to create music that is incredibly beautiful… and almost unbearably heartbreaking. All five tracks are imbued with a real sense of sadness and regret, and the listener is taken on an emotional journey of sorrow and self-reflection that is simply wonderful.
Hiemal is fast becoming a favourite of mine – the winter-themed drone ambient soundscapes he creates never failing to chill me out and transport me away from everything. Vacant is one of his more meditative albums, with long form drones blended perfectly with the gentle sounds of wind-swept trees and distant birdsong. This is music to lose yourself in.
This album of drone ambient / dark ambient provides the perfect soundtrack to the unfolding pandemic, with its bleak, haunting soundscapes… and pleasantly soothing undertones. This is deep, multi-layered music, and listening to it is an intense experience. The world is going to hell, but The Sleep of Reason tells us there is still hope…
Israeli Wings of an Angel describe the music they create as “… spiritual ambient & drone music for meditation, dreaming and sleep… “ and, listening to the dreamy warm drones of Surrender to Emptiness, I have to say that’s an accurate description. This is beautifully calming music, ideal for unwinding and drifting off to sleep at the end of a hard day.
The latest release from French artist, Archean Nights, is an album of unsettling dark ambient / drone ambient, that conveys a real sense of dread and growing unease as it plays. The immersive soundscapes are truly captivating, with so many subtle nuances to pull you in, and each listen provides a powerfully emotional experience.
Here are the dark ambient albums that we at This is Darkness are currently listening to – some are new releases, but a few are older gems we’ve just (re)discovered. Please check these out by clicking on the Bandcamp links, and consider supporting the artists. Enjoy!
New Risen Throne – The Outside
This album of post-industrial dark ambient is incredible – its dark, cinematic soundscapes providing an audio experience that is simply breathtaking. Both Michael and Rich here at This is Darkness and have had this album on repeat play since they first heard it. Read our full review of the album here.
NERATERRÆ‘s second album, Scenes From the Sublime, is even more impressive than his well-received debut, with ten tracks of dark ambient and drone inspired by visual masterpieces from the world of art. This is a wonderful album, with so many textures and levels of detail to it that each listen is a joy. Read our full review of the album here.
The latest release from Hiemal features relaxing drone sounds and subtle field recordings… and is almost six hours in length(!) Summoning the Hall of Stars is another drone ambient triumph by the French musician, and is the perfect soundtrack to chill-out to. Read our recent interview with Hiemal here.
This is an album of seriously eerie and brooding dark ambient from Russia. Drone, dark ambient, and noise elements are expertly combined together to create a sinister soundscape that provides a wonderfully unsettling listening experience. Impressive stuff!
Against Civilization is a guitar-driven dark ambient album that provides the perfect soundtrack to the self-isolation apocalypse… the music is a haunting, melancholic blend of atmospheric ambience and field recordings, and listening to it makes you want to stay inside, turn the lights off and escape from everything.
This album of incredibly atmospheric polar ambient was actually released back in March 2018, but since discovering it earlier this month, Rich has been listening to it almost daily. Dark ambient and drones sounds are expertly combined with field recordings of snow storms, blizzards and cracking ice flows, to create a powerful audio experience.
Over the last couple of months, Scottish dark ambient musician SVR has released five albums / EPs, each showcasing fantastic lo-fi electronic drone music. It’s minimalist stuff, but the experimental soundscapes have a depth to them that you can lose yourself in. Wonderful!
This impressive collection of drone / ambient drone tracks features a number of well known names from the scene, as well as some lesser known artists. As you’d expect from a compilation album, there is quite a range of musical styles and tones featured across the twenty-five tracks, but there is no filler and nothing here disappoints.
Missing Heart Pieces is a melancholic album of ambient and dark ambient compositions, overlaid with spoken contributions from a number of the musician’s long lost friends. The resulting pieces of music are all tinged with sadness and regret, yet beautiful. Powerful stuff.
The latest release from Czech ritual artist Jindřich Spilka features four tracks of ritual ambient / drone music that grab the listener by the throat right from the off, and don’t let get until the album has finished. It’s wonderful stuff – dark and heavy, and laden with the soundscapes of ancient otherworldly forces.
Italian sound designer & composer Macrogramma creates beautiful electronic ambient / drone music, that provide the perfect soundtrack to self-reflection and dreaming. This album is simply mesmerising, and listening to it is an uplifting and life-affirming experience.
This neoclassical ambient album is evocative and atmospheric, with soaring dark ambient soundscapes complimented by haunting piano work. It’s unsettling in places, sad in others – but all hangs together perfectly to create a unified sense of melancholy. Outstanding!
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I’ve been wanting to speak with Atkiak since I first heard the album Ashen Winter of Chernobyl. His music is haunting, ancestral and primal – conjuring up images of ancient snow-covered forests and forgotten mountain regions. I hope you will all enjoy this interview and the following overview of several of my favourite Hiemal releases, and consider supporting the artist. He has some great work on his Bandcamp page, which is linked to at the bottom of this article!
Interviewer: Rich Dodgin
Interviewee: Atkiak (the man behind Hiemal)
Rich: Hi Atkiak! First if all, a massive thank you for this opportunity to interview you for This Is Darkness, and to give our readers a chance to learn more about you and your music.
Atkiak: Hello Rich. Thank you for asking for an interview. It is a pleasure.
Rich: For those who aren’t familiar with your music, can you provide a brief overview of Hiemal.
Atkiak: Hiemal is an ambient solo project from France, created in 2017. Musically, it is winter-themed drone ambient with layers of field recordings, the objective being to create an immersive, cold soundscape.
Rich: Do you have a preferred approach to creating your music, and what techniques and / or equipment do you use?
Atkiak: I spend a lot of time outside to get inspired. Hiemal is my personal sanctuary and the ambience I create is a reflection of my thoughts. When an idea comes to me, I always start by recording small synth tracks. I overlap them in order to create a first sound layer. Depending on what I want to produce, I add recordings of other instruments: electric guitar, piano, cymbals, etc. The synth I use the most is the Mininova from Novation.
To create a longer, more atmospheric result, I stretch the track and add a deep white noise for the bass. The last step is adding field recordings as a background for a more enveloping ambience, but also to give a more organic feel to the music.
Rich: Do you perform your music live? If so, how do you find that experience, and do you prefer it to studio work?
Atkiak: Hiemal will probably never go live. I think it is best to listen to this music alone, at least it is what I intended. Think of it as a contemplative soundtrack to a long walk in the woods at night.
Rich: Can you tell me about your own journey of musical discovery and experimentation? How did you discover / fall in love with dark ambient / drone music, and how did your creation of music develop over the years?
Atkiak: I discovered and fell in love with dark ambient through black metal. The first releases were more influenced by it, some being pure dark ambient instead of the melancholic drone I tend to record more often nowadays. Hiemal’s general aesthetic (logo and artworks) could be considered black metal. I did create a side project for the darker releases: Astrahentium.
Over the years, I tried many different approaches to create ambient. Faster paced ambient with synth pads, piano compositions, granular synthesis, etc.
Rich: Are there any particular musicians who have inspired or influenced you?
Atkiak: Black metal-wise, Alrakis, Midnight Odyssey, Lustre, Vinterriket and Lunar Aurora to name a few.
The ambient artists that influenced me to start a project of my own are Robert Rich, Ugasanie, Hammock and Steve Roach.
Rich: How would you describe the current state of dark ambient / drone music?
Atkiak: Just like with black metal, it is expanding fast. A lot of new projects emerge every week and it is hard to make a selection. I tend to focus more on older releases then the newer ones.
Rich: What are your future plans for Hiemal?
Atkiak: I don’t have any particular plan for Hiemal. I will continue producing ambient soundscapes in my free time, and participating in collaborations / compilations every now and then.
Windswept Stillness is the perfect introduction to Hiemal’s winter soundscapes. From the opening sounds of a blowing mountain gale, this album transports the listener to an isolated snow-covered forest, providing an audio experience that is somehow both relaxing and unsettling at the same time.
Despite the name, Mist of Dissonance is one of Hiemal’s lighter albums. The winter soundscapes are still very much present, but the delicate synth work results in music that is more comforting than that on some of his other releases.
This is my favourite Hiemal album. Over the course of almost two and half hours, waves of incredible drone and synth sounds wash over you, taking you away from your surroundings and transporting you to the bleak Russian landscape. The music is beautiful and uplifting in some places, yet haunting and disturbing in others – for example, on Chernobyl’s Shine the use of strings adds an almost unbearable tension to the mix. This is powerful and emotive stuff!
It is with great pleasure that I present to you the video footage for all four full sets from Phobos X. Martin (of Phelios / Sphäre Sechs and the man behind the annual Phobos Festivals in Wuppertal, Germany) was kind enough to add some substance to this collection with an introduction, detailing his thoughts on the Phobos festivals – in general, as well as this year’s festival – in particular. So, without further ado, I give you Martin Stürtzer!
Phobos X marks the ten-year anniversary of a series of concerts focused on dark ambient music. When I started to release music with Phelios, I was often annoyed by the way this kind of music was presented in a live situation. People talking, no seats and bad amplification are side-effects that I encountered a lot as a musician and as a guest. My idea was to present this music in an ideal environment where both artists and listeners can focus on the atmospheric sounds and video projections. The church (Neue Reformierte Kirche Wuppertal) has a long tradition with experimental arts and music and offers the perfect space for this event.
The four concerts were recorded with two cameras. The audio signal is from the mixing desk and also two room microphones to capture the reverb and ambience of the church room. It is rather dry compared to large cathedrals, but still noticeable. Arktau Eos played with the room acoustics by walking through the church during the performance and playing several un-mic’d instruments.
Arktau Eos – Photo by: Hans-Hermann Hess
What you don´t see on the videos is the meeting point and place of social gathering that the Phobos Festival has become over the years. There are large stalls from the labels where new releases are presented and where you can chat with the artists about their music. In the breaks between the concerts is time to talk to each other, exchange the experiences of the music or simply meet like-minded persons. The guests arrive from all over Germany and other countries. My idea of this video coverage is to give listeners who live too far away the opportunity to listen to the concerts for the first time – or to re-listen at home in a familiar listening situation for the audience.
Photo by: Hans-Hermann Hess
The friday-meetings became a classic of this weekend. Most artists arrive a day before the shows and we use the rare opportunity to talk about our music, the struggles of modern music „industry“ and our individual approaches to music. My personal highlight of this weekend was the guys from Arktau Eos playing the synths in my home-studio in underpants, after we got struck by heavy rain on the way from the church home to my place. One bag was lost in the flight and we were checking which of the instruments could be replaced by gear from my studio. It was good luck that the bag was delivered a few hours before the show on Saturday.
Phobos X musicians at the Friday meeting before the event.
Check out TeHÔM’s latest full-length release on Cyclic Law, Lacrimae Mundi.
Also, their most recent album, Live Assault on Essentia Mundi and Cyclic Law, which we reviewed here.
Last night I got to witness an event I would have never expected. Mortiis, playing exclusively Era 1 material, in Baltimore Maryland! After the Cold Meat Industry festival in late 2017, I figured I’d missed out on a once in a lifetime experience. But Mortiis has been taking the Era 1 material on the road recently and it looks like his upcoming album will be a return to this style. There is a new music video in the Era 1 style (which you can watch below) and he’s just kicked off his U.S. tour playing this material!
I don’t do much live coverage and I’m not a professional photographer. So take my account for what it’s worth. But I definitely wanted to share a few photos from my evening at the show last night, and to alert anyone in the relevant cities to the rest of this awesome tour!
The venue was the small/medium sized Metro Gallery in Baltimore. This was my first time attending an event there, but the sound and setting were very fitting for the show.
Before I get into the musicians that played last night, here’s the flyer for the tour and a link to the relevant Bandsintown.com webpage where you can find tickets to the rest of the events.
The event was DJ’d by Letitia Gabrielle Getka a.k.a. DJ Candy Corn, who started the evening off, and filled the void between sets with some proper dark dungeon music to keep the night moving appropriately. You can follow her on Instagram.
Worms of the Earth
I was almost as pleased to see Mortiis as I was to finally meet and witness a performance by Dan Barrett as Worms of the Earth. Dan is known through the dark ambient community for this project, as well as his wonderful zine Wounds of the Earth, which has been on a bit of a hiatus in recent years (hopefully not permanent, I always love to hear Dan’s opinion on recent releases!) Dan also releases music as Venal Flesh.
Worms of the Earth has been a rather versatile project over the years. Having started as a mostly ritual dark ambient project, it has moved in recent years into a goa-trance direction. This was predominately the style that he played last night, which I really really loved! However, I’ll share a recent quote from Dan which points him back in the direction of dark ambient.
“Started working on a new album over the weekend. After being largely directionless in the months that followed the completion of the Redux, a pathway has been illuminated to me. Soundwise, it is cinematic, ancient egyptian-themed dark ambient which I am writing during my rituals to understand the “deities” of old kingdom (and prior) egypt, mainly dhwty/Thoth and their esoteric knowledge. More info to come as it develops and takes shape”
This was my first encounter with STATIQBLOOM, as they fall outside the realms of dark ambient. This post-industrial electronics project consists of Fade Kainer (also known for his work with Batillus and contributions to the Theologian album Pain of the Saints) who seemed to mainly cover the vocal duties, and Denman Anderson contributing a glorious controlled post-industrial electronic chaos.
Their music should certainly be to the liking of those that love old-school post-industrial. I would highly recommend digging into their catalog and seeking them out at shows. (The gents hail from Brooklyn, New York.)
Mortiis
Mortiis delivered exactly what I was hoping to hear. A beautifully rendered set of tracks which all followed his Era 1 style, with classics from the Cold Meat Industry era as well as some new material from an upcoming album, which looks like it will be focused on the Era 1 style.
Check out his latest music video for the track “Visions of an Ancient Future”, which was performed last night.
At this point, anything I could really say about Mortiis here likely all of you will already know. So suffice to say, the performance was exquisite. The backdrops by David Thierree were perfect for capturing the dark dungeon and overall magical feel of the performance. Mortiis has returned to old-form like he never left CMI! It was beyond heart-warming to see him fill a venue in Baltimore Maryland focusing on an Era 1 style that has seen two decades since most of this material was last highlighted. If you are in range of the upcoming performances, GO!
The end of 2018 is upon us. This has been a trying year, world-wide. [Insert endless political rants.] However, it’s been a pretty great year for new releases in the dark ambient genre. We are so proud to have spent another year with the dark ambient community. We really can’t thank you all enough for riding along on this journey, which started a few years ago as little more than a side-project. We hope to have another productive year ahead of us in 2019 for the dark ambient community.
It’s not all been great this year though. As the world gets more troubling, more and more people find themselves in dire straits. The wage gaps between rich and poor have never been greater, on a global scale. As we further divide, people are finding less and less “entertainment money”, instead focusing on the essentials of life and family. While this is absolutely understandable, I’d like for people to reflect, going into this new year, on what aspects of our underground community are absolutely essential to you. If, say, your favorite label closed up shop tomorrow, how would you feel? As we spend less on music, the labels in turn have less to work with for future releases. They begin digging into their personal savings to make a release happen, or close up shop for good, seeing that they are no longer able to keep the business afloat. Decide what is important to you, and instead of that Starbucks coffee, or new movie on Amazon, maybe think about directing that money toward buying a new release from your favorite label/mailorder. I am positive that every single one of them that I cover will appreciate this more than you could imagine!
As usual, I have let this edition build up for a few months. So there is a ton of news here for you to absorb. Don’t try it all at once! Bookmark the page and come back over the coming weeks as you have time to absorb/discover more new releases. Every single album I’ve covered in this list is, in my opinion, absolutely worth hearing/buying! Without further ado, here’s the news!
Sodom & Chimera Productions
I discovered Sodom & Chimera a while back when they were working on Flesh of the Void (2017). They are currently preparing Tears of Apollo for its premiere, and meanwhile, Daughter of Dismay is going into post-production.
We have just published an interview with James Quinn, auteur behind these productions. Check out the interview here.
Tears of Apollo – Teaser (2018 Horror Short)
The story of Tears of Apollo, a throwback flick to low budget horror films from the 70s, revolves around a suicidal woman, who, during the apocalypse, meets just the person in what are supposed to be her last minutes on earth that no one should ever meet in a situation like such, let alone at all. Morbid doom ensues.
Shot on 16mm.
Find out more at sodomchimera.com.
The Quantum Terror – 1st Trailer Unveiled
The twin sister and ex-boyfriend of a missing grad student lead their friends down a labyrinth of dark tunnels inhabited by an alien entity, in search of her. A story of terror and madness, in the tradition of H.P. Lovecraft, David Lynch, and old school practical effects.
Directed by Christopher Cooksey (Total Moonlight Productions)
Music Videos
Apoptose – time-lapse city
Released over the summer, “time-lapse city” is a music video for a track from their latest album Die Zukunft.
Ashtoreth & No One – Redemption (Teaser)
“Redemption is a remarkable collaborative effort between Belgian artists No One and Ashtoreth. Ashtoreth improvised a track and then No One worked his magic. He took the track, decomposed it, and recomposed it, with soundscape, drones, field recordings and arrangements added. “Redemption” grew organically out of the ashes of the Ashtoreth improv into a thrilling and utterly gripping work of art, making the one hour trip a truly enthralling, yet galling redemption.”
Ashtoreth & Grey Malkin – Pilgrim
This video is for the track “Pilgrim” from the new release of the same name on Cursed Monk.
Black Mara Records – Palaces of Darkness (Video Teaser)
Black Mara presents the dark ambient / folk compilation “Palaces Of Darkness”. Featuring:
Corona Barathri, Ad Lux Tenebrae, Nubiferous, Sol Mortuus, Mrako-Su.
Empty Chalice – Treblinka’s Snow
From the forthcoming album, title and release date TBA, the first official video of the track called “Treblinka’s Snow”!
Gamardah Fungus – Crossing the Wasteland (Album Teaser)
Gamardah Fungus – Immortality
This is by no means a new track or album. This released back in 2013, but Gamardah Fungus found a few extra physical copies and I revisted the album. This music video, I think, is quite impressive. I had never seen it before and assume most of you haven’t either, so I thought I should share it! Screenplay and lead actor are Igor Yalivec (Gamardah Fungus). He shared editing and directing duties with Antoine Miroshnichenko, who also operated and edited the short.
Iluiteq – A Prayer for the Departed
Ivan Kamaldinov – Inreversed
Bonus track from “Unrest”.
M. Kardinal & Monocube – Apparitions: III. Substratum
“III. Substratum: An inner garden, a sacrament place for the one who yearns and seeks the place to restore themselves from the shattered cosmos. Slowly emerging into the light – one’s nature reveals itself exposing the beauty of a human mind’s substratum. Imagine a Hortus Amoris, which provides bewildering path into inner life and having a cryptic dialogue with themselves.
APPARITIONS: III. Substratum, the performance of M. Kardinal & Monocube is the third part of APPARITIONS series to reflect and embody elusive happenings beyond human’s perception using analog technique. With progression APPARITIONS becomes ominous and bleak, the collaboration of M. Kardinal and Monocube is an immersive and compelling work, seamlessly bound together in an embrace of beautiful darkness.”
Mebitek – Chi No Torrat & What I Have Lost
Moral Order – Dead Bodies
The new album Krypteia by Moral Order is due for release on Malignant Records soon!
MZ.412 – Svartmyrkr – (Album Teaser)
MZ.412 ‘Svartmyrkr’ CD/LP (CSR257CD/LP) Out 8th February 2019 on Cold Spring
Shibalba – Stars Al-Med Hum (Album Trailer)
Ritual ambient powerhouse Shibalba are back with a new album on Algonia Records.
Vanessa Sinclair & Carl Abrahamsson – Live @ Fylkingen – 14 Sept 2018
Vanessa Sinclair & Carl Abrahamsson, live at Fylkingen, Stockholm, September 14th 2018. Live mix by Kali Malone and Per Åhlund. For more information, please visit: patreon.com/vanessa23carl and highbrow-lowlife.com
Misc. News
Endarkenment – Dark Ambient Newsletter
Danica Swanson has started a subscription-based dark ambient newsletter. She will be focused on specific themes and artists, instead of a standard news website like This Is Darkness. Her first exclusive edition included an in-depth interview with Ulf Söderberg of Sephiroth. Danica’s enthusiasm for his work, as well as the rarity of an interview with him, makes this an essential read for fans of this artist and other CMI era musicians!
Last month’s edition featured another in-depth interview, this time with Pär and Åsa Boström of Hypnagoga Press, and this month Swanson speaks with Northumbria!
Sign up for her newsletter at: https://endarkenment.substack.com
Noise Receptor Journal – Issue No.6 Pre-orders Available! A highly respected and long-standing journalist in the post-industrial world for over two decades, Richard Stevenson first ran the Spectrum Magazine and later would change name and format to Noise Receptor Journal. Stevenson, as I said, is highly respected in the community and I have gathered a decent bit of my knowledge from the pages of his zines. Also, keep a look out for a Spectrum Compendium, all issues of Spectrum compiled into a single book.
“Noise receptor journal is a specialist micro print endeavour which constitutes the physical manifestation of the noise receptor website, but contains new interview and art content to differentiate it from the already published web-based reviews.”
https://noisereceptor.bigcartel.com
Events
Phobos X – An Evening of Dark Ambient Music On 16 March 2019 in Sophienkirche Wuppertal, the Phobos Festival will have its tenth event. This year’s line-up looks to be glorious with performances from: Arktau Eos, Circular, TeHOM and Vortex. Martin Stürtzer, the organizer behind Phobos, asked me to mention that the event this year will be held in the old church, not the same place as last year’s event!
Pre-sale tickets and info are available at www.phelios.de
New Dark Ambient Releases
A Cryo Chamber Collaboration – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“A 2 hour dark soundscape album recorded by 20 ambient artists to pay tribute to H.P. Lovecraft.
Dark sounds from dreamy dimensions to never ending cursed forests. Join us in the ritual of lust for the Black Goat of the Woods.
Shub-Niggurath is an Outer God (or Outer Goddess) in the pantheon. She is a perverse fertility deity.
An enormous mass which extrudes black tentacles, slime-dripping mouths, and short, writhing goat legs. Small creatures are continually spat forth by the monstrosity, which are either consumed into the miasmatic form or escape to some monstrous life elsewhere.”
Alphaxone & Xerxes the Dark – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“Alphaxone & Xerxes the Dark brings an unsettling space collaboration to Cryo Chamber with Aftermath.
Dark swells, pulsating shimmers and endless reverberations greets you on this dark space exploration album.”
Alone in the Hollow Garden – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“Septem Spectris Metallum” was channeled as an incursion into the alchemic realm of the Seven Noble Metals and their esoteric correspondences found in every manifestation emerged from the all encompassing Fabric of the Stars.
All rituals were recorded live, only with the aid of a modular synth system and of a few metal piezo devices self made by A.I.T.H.G., with no overdubbing and other unnecessary embellishments and with the clear intention of keeping the alchemical flame of creation and dissolution in the purest, natural and spontaneous possible form.”
Ambiguous – New Album Released (aliensproduction – CD/Digital)
“One of the darkest Aliens production releases is momentarily actual thanks to this gentleman. Igor aka Ish and his devious side returns after a longer silence under the wings of Aliens Production. Once again Ambiguous is opening the gates of the mystery where is no boredom to dig and the remains of dead souls over which the sacred dust is decomposing will alive. Movies atmospheres are a strong source of energy and pulsating percussions shifts this piece into industrially tuned proportions. Atmospheric backdrop is wrapped in scary areas in which on the places embrace ancient testaments and abstract images. Painful but beautiful beginning of the end where various testaments and undiscovered corners meet.”
Apoptose – New Album Released (Tesco – CD/Digital)
“In the four years of production Apoptose selected a wide range of different singers for this album. Most outstanding is classical trained tenor Daniel Sans. He sings “What Power Art Thou” – a song that was composed by Henry Purcell in the late 17th century. Apoptose and Sans preserve the complex harmonic structure of the original translating it into a breathtaking five minute ride in apoptotic soundspheres. They succeed in conjuring up Purcell’s “cold genius” that had already fascinated legendary countertenor Klaus Nomi in the 1980s. Other voices on “Die Zukunft” include the gloomy spoken words of the advance single “Time-lapse City”, the lost girl’s voice on the title track and two female singers on “Dornen”. Consistent with the album title Apoptose does not look back, but is heading for novel territories within the dark ambient music genre.”
Argyre Planitia – New Album Released (Essentia Mundi – CD/Digital)
“Dystopian dark ambient – unplug from the network while still possible. The version of our future connecting strong AI, IoT and cyberhumans and a dark outcome…thou shall escape!”
Arktau Eos – New Album Released (Aural Hypnox – CD only) Check out our review here! Highly recommended!
Arktau Eos unveil a new album, Eremos, one of their most involved and intense creations. While intentionally minimal on the surface, layer upon layer of subtle, haunting, and evocative sounds are slowly revealed to the attentive listener. Eremos aims at nothing less than the total transition of the listener to the desert realms implied by the title. Old synthesizers and ritualistic acoustic elements are seamlessly blended with even more obscure aural phenomena, including field recordings done in Northern Finland and the untamed steppes of Mongolia.
As has been the testimony of wise men and women of all faiths, solitude bestows its own distinct gifts upon the seeker, a process here treated in less intimate terms than on the voice-led Catacomb Resonator. Eremos is more expansive; the desert that opens before the listener is not a locus of temptations or simple retreat, but a vivid inner mindscape of dramatic confrontations and transformations between flora, fauna, stellar matter, earth, and stone. Gradually they shed away the humanness in its most banal sense, until man identifies with the scorpionic voice of power that carries to the ends of the earth – and cosmos.” Order here.
Ashtoreth & No One – New Album Released (Consouling Sounds – CD/Digital)
“Redemption” is a remarkable collaborative effort between Belgian artists No One and Ashtoreth. Ashtoreth improvised a track and then No One worked his magic. He took the track, decomposed it, and recomposed it, with soundscape, drones, field recordings and arrangements added. “Redemption” grew organically out of the ashes of the Ashtoreth improv into a thrilling and utterly gripping work of art, making the one hour trip a truly enthralling, yet galling redemption.”
Ashtoreth & Grey Malkin – Preorders Available (Cursed Monk – CD/Digital)
Pilgrim is the first in a series of collaborative works between ASHTORETH and Grey Malkin, that was initially released as a limited (50 ex.) CD by UK based house of wyrd Reverb Worship in June 2018.
The album sold out within a week and got much acclaimed in the music press.
Cober Ord – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
“3rd album, and first for Cyclic Law, by the enigmatic French Pyrenean ritual ambient act created by Yann Hagimont (Habsyll, « O », Ecce Homo) and Yann Arexis (La Breiche, Stille Volk, Ihan). Recorded in various natural locations throughout the mystical Pyrenean landscape, in ancient temple caves, sacred mounds and ruins using an array of acoustic and electronic sources and local field recordings. Cover Ord functions as an ode to lost ruins and mineral elements, chants summoning the rising of nature, a post-modern ritual for times of ecocide. They’ve weaved and channeled an exceptional soundtrack exploring the confines of matter, spirit, time and space.”
Dahlia’s Tear – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Read our review here.
After 6 years of silence this veteran dark ambient producer is finally back with a new album. Through the Nightfall Grandeur is a dreamy and multi-layered melancholic journey through worlds both inner and outer.
The album revolves around a spiritual awakening where the shattering loneliness of the protagonist fuels the search for meaning. We follow through moonbathed nights on a journey through dark abysses, snowy mountains and desolate moors.
A detailed and layered album that takes many repeat listens to fully explore all the complexities, one mystery at a time unto enlightenment.
Daina Dieva – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“At the moment Daina Dieva aims at creating sounds that would become a shared experience between her and the listener. Based in Lithuania, she is interested in dystopia, non-human futures, dehumanising technologies, postindustrial landscapes, capitalocene, catastrophe, (green) activism and alternatives to the current state of affairs.”
‘hibou’ was created for Kaunas Magazine and consists of a plethora of sounds collected in the second half of 2018. Collected sounds include: bridge, under the bridge, freedom avenue, castle roundabout, night busses, sea st., street piano, sliced piano, construction site, mindaugas ave., cranes, night, keeping watch, silenceless spaces.
Dead Melodies – Preorder Available (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Dead Melodies presents us a dark cinematic space album with Primal Destination.
Deep drones, sweeping atmospheres and a mysterious setting creates an immersive setting for this sci-fi journey.
Desiderii Marginis – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – LP/CD/Digital)
“Long awaited new material by one of Sweden’s most revered Dark Ambient acts.?“Vita Arkivet” translates from Swedish as “The White Archive” and is an official document detailing ones funeral arrangements. In death our existence is whitewashed, the slate wiped clean. We start all over and we bring nothing with us were we go. We lose the agency of our own memory and leave it for those left behind to attend to, to continue our story, to write our eulogy. Vita is also the latin word for Life, so the meaning could also be “The Life Archive”. White is the colour of the casket lining, the plaster death masks and the walls of the chapel, it is the colour of the first and last pages. What is kept in between the covers of our life archives? This record is a personal reflection and manifestation of that process, the loss and the great detachment from life, from others, and from ourselves.”
Distorted Void – New Compilation Released (Distored Void – Digital Only)
This latest compilation on Distorted Void is a nice combination of some of my personal favorite under-rated dark ambient artists, as well as others I’ve not yet discovered. Definitely worth checking out to find some new talent!
Dronny Darko & Apollonius – New Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – CDr/Digital)
“In the darkest places, there’s always a light. Hidden, untouched yet always omnipresent since it is its nature. The deepest sea levels, the vastness of space, the darkest corners of the human soul. It’s always there, waiting for the call, eager to unfold and to show an unexpectedly wide horizon of possibilities. On the fundamental level, it’s not even light as we know it – just feasibility of action, of motion and creation. We all have it. It’s a boundless sea and we are always on its shores.”
Embers Below Zero – New Album Released (Sombre Soniks – Digital)
“Urban Witchcraft tells the stories written on the walls of abandoned buildings. The tales of strange rituals performed on the last floors of glass skyscrapers. The stories of digital sorcery and of the nightsky that looks just as beautiful as it did centuries ago. While making this album, I had in my mind the image of a XXI century Jonathan Strange taking a mescaline trip on a summer night in Tangier. Just like the debut, “The Oblivion Sea”, released by Shimmering Moods Records, with atmospheric ambient as a foundation, this release derives from various types of experimental electronic music – from noise to dub – to build a passage between alchemy and technology.”
Endless Melancholy – New Album Released (Dronarivm – Vinyl/CD/Digital)
“‘Fragments of Scattered Whispers’ is a collection of soft piano melodies and transparent ambient textures, gently flowing one into another. On this album Endless Melancholy continues with the tape sound explorations, started on his previous album ‘The Vacation’, but in a new, more distinctive way. On this occasion, Oleksiy teamed up with Krzysztof Sujata (known for his musical outfit Valiska), who did some outstanding job on processing the tracks through different kinds of tape recorders and mastering them afterwards. Accompanied by a stunning artwork by an acclaimed artist Gregory Euclide, ‘Fragments of Scattered Whispers’ is meant to evoke hazy reminiscences from the deepest corners of listener’s mind, like a blurry photograph suddenly falling out of an old book.”
Experiment#508 – New Album Released (attenuation circuit – Digital)
The Hollow Ward is a dark ambient that lies firmly on the more experimental side of the genre. Staticy washes of sound and synthetic noises merge forming a post-apocalyptic sort of feel. ‘Name your price’, so check it out!
Foudre! – New Album Released (Gizeh – Vinyl/Digital)
“Improvised and recorded live at Le Rex de Toulouse supporting the 10th anniversary of French doom metal band Monarch!, KAMI神 extends the cosmogony and the sound of the band by taking excursions into the invisible and ambiguous side of nature. In this orgiastic and surprising mix of sonic textures and rhythms, you may hear strange phenomena, summoning of animistic spirits, shamanic calls, siren yellings and growls. The original chemigram artwork was created by French artist Fanny Béguély by painting with chemicals on light-sensitive paper.
Following the sold-out EARTH soundtrack (GZH71, 2015), KAMI 神 delivers an immersive soundscape for abstract clubbers, where kosmiche electronic, power ambient and industrial punk music are freely invited to commune. This pagan ceremonial is an ode to the ever-changing vortex of life – a sonic dream machine for the occurring now.”
Gamardah Fungus – New Album Released (Flaming Pines – CD/Digital)
“After a trip across the India, we decided to dedicate our new album to the Thar Desert, a large, arid region in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent that forms a natural boundary between India and Pakistan.
This album is our vision of modern and sacral Asian culture – rich, mysterious and insufficiently explored. And this is probably our most minimalistic album to date. We deliberately refused the multiple layers of sound forms and methods that were used on previous records. We wanted to concentrate on sound repetitions and pauses, like in Indian mantras and folk music, trying to achieve a deep trance with minimal arsenal – only guitar, modular synthesizer and tanpura.”
Hiemal – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“Five Drone Ambient tracks over a single field recording. Three hours under the northern lights, soothed by the cold tapestry of sound whispering softly among the mountains.”
Hilyard – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“Hilyard brings his first solo album to Cryo Chamber with Furthermore. A deep space adventure that lets you float in zero-G and gaze upon the anomalies of the universe.
Escape from a tired and dying world into the realms beyond quasars. Journey in isolation through thick dark matter in search of answers. Drift in quiet melancholy, past the failed floating structures, gas giants and furthermore, into an endless horizon.
Sweeping electronic drones combine with analogue bass to create a multilayered space ambient album that is emotionally captivating and enlightening.”
Holotrop & Vrna – New Split Released (Qualia – CD/Tape/Digital)
“Welcome to the Sleep Temple! Holotrop and Vrna, two of the best kept secrets of the contemporary dark ambient and ritual music scene, immersing into the profound mystery of dream incubation.
The religious practice, of sleeping with the intention of experiencing a divinely inspired dream, was practised by many ancient cultures all over the world.
Both projects reflecting and interpreting in four so called Onirokons their own practical dream work.
ENKOIMESIS works on the highest sensory level of perception. Typical ritual instruments like bells, gongs, chimes and drums mixed with drone and ambient soundscapes leading, accompanied by cryptic and mysteriously whispers, deep into the land of dreaming and opening the way to sacred gates.”
Ivan Kamaldinov – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Edgeless pulsating tones, vocals submerged below waves of droning static, completely sanded smooth output that strikes an excellent counterbalance between golden noise and sustained tones.
Full of neo-classical elements but taken into a proper electronic droney space through the held tones and electronic haze that permeates the tracks. Chords are held forever as if trapped in amber. The sounds vibrate in a wavey haze.
Surrender yourself now.
La Santa – New Album Released (Wannamarchi.club – Cassette/Digital)
“Calabria, Southern Italy — a landscape of unmarked graves hidden by abandoned construction sites left as monuments to a corrupt state; a code of silence masking a culture of extreme cruelty; age-old folk traditions and occulted religious rites which refuse to acknowledge the passing of time; the secret brotherhoods; the holy bloodline and birthplace of the ‘Ndrangheta – part business, part religious order and part ancient military, now one of the most powerful organised crime groups in the world.
Broken Britain Cassettes inaugurates its World Service imprint with Pax Mafiosa, the first dispatch from La Santa, a native Calabrese, who delivers a concoction of ceremonial death chants, phone tappings and initiation rituals. Based around collaged samples from an inherited record collection, Pax Mafiosa invokes visceral fear and spiritual ecstasy with biting electronics and harrowing field recordings.
In Calabria the sacred and the profane are not mutually exclusive. The name ‘La Santa’ refers to both the Virgin Mary and the highest, most secretive level of The ‘Ndrangheta, a secret society within a secret society which links the top bosses with freemasons and extremist terror organisations. Pax Mafiosa is a sonic mapping of this dysfunctional marriage of mafia and religion.”
La Tredicesima Luna – New Album Released (Lighten Up Sounds – Cassette/Digital)
“Italian solo artist Matteo Brusa (otherwise known as Medhelan) returns to the imprint with his remarkable project LA TREDICESIMA LUNA. This second full length from the project brings focused illumination to dark waters with a singular form of celestial luminescence.
The debut album from October 2017 brought shadowy tones and other-wordly fog, but with this newest work Oltre L’ultima Onda Del Mare (Beyond The Last Sea Wave), our Mother Moon guides us upon a grand ancestral voyage. A shard of guiding light breaks through blackened sky, the prismatic spectrum reflected across infinite sea.”
Lunar Abyss Deus Organum – new Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – Cassette/Digital)
“Endless steppe, dry and cold air, the grass is everywhere… It lasted almost an eternity, no changes. Day after day, season after season… But someday the wind turned to ice blades. It wounded the sky and the snow started to fall. Sun was still bright, but the snow was falling more and more. The snow was so soft, that he started to feel sleepy. He stopped his life-long walk. He closed his eyes. It seemed that the glaciers were moving, melting, freezing, moving again… He saw how winds crafted some amazing figures off them. He saw the rains, the trees, the moss… And ice again, the wind. Birds were getting smaller in the sky. Then vanished. Then metal ones replaced them, leaving long trails behind. He saw the distant lights, heard sirens and rumble when metal things pierced the sky once again, leaving the fire behind. The rumble went still, the lights faded. It was silent again and the ice was bright when it started to melt. He opened his eyes. It was dry and cold again. He tried the grass – it was juicy and fresh. “What a wonderful dream”, he thought. And continued his walk.”
Mordançage – New Album Released (Facture – CD/Digital)
“Mordançage: an alternative photographic process that alters silver gelatin prints to give them a degraded effect. The mordançage solution works in two ways: it chemically bleaches the print so that it can be redeveloped, and it lifts the black areas of the emulsion away from the paper giving the appearance of veils.
Mordançage creates a degraded appearance by physically altering the film. The excellent new collaboration from Andrew Tasselmyer and Tobias Hellkvist has experienced the same process of slow alteration, its grey-washed ambient emerging from the recesses of a dark room. Standing in a rectangle of light, its music is a new being that’s experienced its own process of development.”
Med Gen – New Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – CDr/Digital)
“The quiet humming of the earth and high-pitched bird calls, reflections of the autumn sun in the bog puddles… Silent steps on the path well-hidden in the thickets. No winds here. Just mesmerizing swaying of branches. Maybe they’re giving you signs not to partake in this journey, maybe better turn back and go home while you can… Yet this smell, these colors, those mysterious rustles in the deepness of the woods. One step after another and the story begins to unfold. What lies beneath these murky waters, between the layers of peat and on these oddly colored tussocks? Sun is approaching the horizon, so don’t hesitate, breathe in this night.”
Mortaur – New Album Released (Digital Only)
After a very long silence, Mortaur has returned with another horror ambient offering. This album takes him into more dynamic territory than he’s previous works, but keeps the deep darkness we’ve come to expect.
MZ.412 – Svartmyrkr available for preorder and streaming (Cold Spring – CD/Vinyl/Digital)
“Swedish behemoths MZ. 412 return with their first full-length album in 12 years, once again asserting their dominion as the true Kings of Black Industrial. “Svartmyrkr” is a massive tour de force that reinvents the classic sound of MZ. 412 whilst retaining their trademark malevolent harshness.
This album is dedicated to the true hell of the north – Helheim – and the giant goddess that rules it, Hel. From blackened ritual incantations, to bleak yet beautiful dark ambient arrangements, to harsh bombastic orchestrations, this album exceeds all expectations.
MZ. 412 blur the lines between music, magick and reality. The earth trembles… the mountains quake… all light is vanquished. The Swedish overlords darken the hearts and extinguish the souls of all who bear witness to “Svartmyrkr”.”
Northumbria – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“Vinland is the third and last album in Northumbria’s trilogy inspired by the Norse discovery of Canada.
The journey was long and hard, you lost good men sailing across the never ending sea, but now you stand on foreign land. The father of gods watches over you as his ravens circle the funeral pyre to bring his warriors home.
Using guitar and bass, and recording their improvised compositions live, Jim Field and Dorian Williamson create a deep textured sound world. Evoking the ancient wonder that the Norse explorers must have felt discovering Vinland, the Windswept Land.”
Oestergaards – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“You do not quench the sun with a jug of water” is an expression that no-one has said before but can match the dark ambient artist Oestergaards. Step by step, his dark-lied world receives attention internationally in that slightly shadowy genre. After the debut album Rötterna and the subsequent remix album Rötterna Decomposed, he is now back with a 4-track EP that goes deeper into the dark ambient genre. The titles of the songs are extracted from his acclaimed dialect Ovanåkersmål. A flashback in the past among one’s childhood home dreams, with the memory of time becoming increasingly foggy.
O Saala Sakraal – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
“A new collective led by former Hadewych member Peter Johan Nÿland. Etmaal (“natural day”) is the first in a series of explorations that aim to serve as a channel between the ethereal and chthonic, sacred and profane, the innermost black well and the outermost white sun. The album follows the circadian path as an analogue to the revelation of the actual self, with the sun as the inverted eye that unveils all things in their temporality, opposite the eternal inner black of night. Sudden transitions between coercive percussive hammering and sharp boreal drone pieces seek to mirror cosmic events; from glacial movements to throbbing punctuation and sudden death and with each end resolved arises a new tension and an attempt at cleansing and delving deeper with the intent of finally arriving at the inner clearing. In the recording process for Etmaal, the group effectively alternated between states of extreme focus and hiati in which subconscious impulses were allowed to arise and the result is an album that skilfully wanders an essential pathway between two planes in its own distinctive way.
Otovan Veret – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
“Syvys is the second demonstration of how Finland’s OTAVAN VERET decipher the pulse of the great cosmic filaments. The radiation from the distant otherness takes audible form in four pieces of ethereal, pulsating atmospherics, where the multitude of transmissions is implemented via a curious amalgam of electronic and acoustic sources operated by Kaarna & XVL. As a result “Syvys” reflects the many phases of a stellar journey in a dreamlike state, encountering both enchantment and anxiousness.”
Phragments – New Album Released (Malignant – CD/Digital)
“New full length from Phragments based on collaborative works done with Atranenia, Mindspawn, Rasalhague, Shock Frontier, and Terra Sancta. 40 minutes of sweeping textural doom, cinematic drift-scapes, and smog covered drones. Forlorn and dramatic music for the end of days, from the master of apocalyptic electronics. Limited to 300, released in collaboration with Construct.Destroy.Collective. Mastered by John Stillings, Steel Hook Audio.”
Rafaael Anton Irisarri – New Album Released (Umor Rex – Cassette/Digital)
“Rafael Anton Irisarri continues his string of post-minimalist releases with his third for Umor Rex: El Ferrocarril Desvaneciente. While composed as an ode to an overnight train journey through Spain he took many years ago, the music picks up sonically where his previous album Sirimiri left off. Irisarri focuses on deploying sonic cycles throughout these four shorter pieces, basing much of this sweeping ambience around looped sounds and distant pulses. The sound is however kept in a state of forward motion and constant evolution, invoking the slowly rumbling night train that inspired it —not to mention its cargo of misfits and travelers. Irisarri’s skill, set as a manipulator of minimal sound input, is at full strength here, imbuing even shorter pieces such as “El Espectro Electromagnético,” with chasms slowly cresting drama. The phantasmagoria of “Un Saltador” was even composed as a departure for him, toying with synths and pedals in a “modular kind of way,” letting an experiment unfold with minimal interaction.”
Randal Collier-Ford – New EP Released (Digital Only)
“Inspired by the musical work of Akira Yamaoka
This record is a dedication to the millions of individuals who have, will, and still do suffer from the effects of crippling depression, anxiety, and what comes of these inner conflicts. Written during a state of depression, Cyclic is a cathartic messages of acceptance of this void that never fades away, but can only be subdued for a time. To be a reminder of what this state of mind brings about, from the lies we tell ourselves to the realities we must face and overcome, this EP is an ode to this age long conflict
Please, don’t go it alone. Seek help, seek strength, seek open arms.”
RNGMNN – New Album Released (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
“RNGMNN is Ronny Engmann, a multidisciplinary musician working from his base Berlin, Germany.Combining his minimal dark ambient with contemporary horror music making an own experimental style he’s now entering the Reverse Alignment territory with the new album “On Darker trails”. Releasing several contributions on various net labels since 1999, “On Darker Trails” is the first official physical release on CD. The album takes a dive into the skies above and phenomena that, for humans unreachable, space and there after.”
Sacra Fern – New Album Released (Black Mara – CD/Digital)
“Protected by forest spirits, shining in the rays of magic fern, this stone has absorbed all the power of the Sun. It will open doors to a world of magic in the shortest night of the year for who follows his own willpower.”
Senketsu No Night Club – New Album Released (Aquarellist – CD/Digital) Check out our review here.
“As in the most successful outcomes, the artistic alchemy of Vincenti, Leonardi, and the british saxophonist Ian Ferguson, generated a feverish and endless activity. Only a year ago the trium was busy laying the foundations of its debut album, recently pressed by Old Europa Cafè.
The sonic product of Senketsu No Night Club, floating between jazzy movements, dark ambient soundscapes, and power noise ruptures, celebrated then the far east extreme cinema whilst the Furachi Life’s fetish imaginary – if you are familiar with the perturbing japanese artist – was the band concept’s perfect incarnation.
Stunning yet sensual, as in the best representation of the sex/death duplicity. Today, with
a different approach, “Shikkoku” represents the nocturnal spleen and its melancholy, the erotic lyricism of Mishima’s novel “Nikutai No Gakko, ????”, and the eternal clash of Eros and Thanatos by G. Bataille. The beauty, the crime, the violence, the anguish.
100% Doom-Noir Jazz in a dark connection between Rome and Tokyo.”
S.E.T.I. – New Album Released (Loki-Found – CD/Digital)
“Right in time for the long nights Andrew Lagowski is back with his probably most ambitious project to date! A deep ambient space soundtrack of nothing less than eight hours on eight CDs presented in a beautiful cardboard box. These recordings have been composed, sequenced and mastered in such a way as to allow for periods of hazy dreams, deep sleep, time displacement and finally, awakening. Please use them as you see fit – perhaps as a toolbox for your own sleep travels and dream experimentation.”
Shibalba – New Album Released (Agonia – CD/LP/Digital)
“Shibalba is an otherworldly, meditative project from the members of Greek and Swedish black metal bands, Acherontas and Nåstrond. It differs greatly from the aforementioned acts, with main focus set on expressing shamanic, trance-like states, by the use of ethnic instruments and musical technics peculiar to religious rituals. In doing so, the band also incorporates contemporary synthesizers and guitar drones. Some of the more traditional instruments they use include Tibetan horns & singing bowls, bone & horne trumpets, darbukas, ceremonial bells & gongs as well as percussion instruments made of bones and skulls. The music is richly detailed and multidimensional, while its outcome is deep, unsettling and subconscious. As a whole, it offers an otherworldly voyage.”
Shinkiro – Preorders Available (Limited CDr and Digital)
Shinkiro continues with the release of his archives through this fourth edition in the series. Find out more about Shinkiro and the first three archives in our recent review here on This Is Darkness.
Shrine – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
“Based on the fictional story for Tomb Raider III, created by the British game studio CORE in 1998, the story begins in Antarctica millions of years ago, where a meteorite has crashed into the landmass and when the continent was still located in the tropics. Millennials later it was discovered by the ancient Polynesians who had reached the Antarctic coast and they soon realised that strange otherworldly powers surround the celestial rock and so the people began to worship it as a deity. After severe mutations started to occur among their newborn, the settlers fled in terror and never came back but before they left, they sealed the meteorite into a deep underground chamber, locked by four “keys”, four unique objects crafted from the same alien material as the meteorite itself. In the 19th century, a group of sailors travelling with Charles Darwin came to Antarctica and rediscovered the artefacts. The story follows the search for the four artefacts and the rediscovering of the meteorite, hypothesised to contain the most important findings in genetics and evolution since Darwin. We are aurally taken through this unique world through 6 singular chapters of pristine sonic grandeur.”
Slowlodger – New Album Released (Outside Noises – Cassette/Digital)
Slowlodger presents “A violent soundtrack for a non sense life” as the second reference of Outside Noises. This album is in the opposite concept side from the previous work by Blovk: AVSFANSL is a record located in the field of drone, dark ambient, noise or avant-garde music.
Thinked as a soundtrack that sonorize the moments in which a human can thinks that life make no sense, in this modern times and the coming future. Composed during the darkest moments of 2018.
Snowbeasts – New Album Released (Chthonic Streams – CDr/Digital)
Combining their knowledge and skills from previous releases, Snowbeasts deliver a new album which is as likely to linger in dark ambient despair as it is to erupt into post-industrial ferocity. These is another brilliant release from a project that has been delighting listeners since their 2014 debut. The highly limited (only 25!) and quite beautiful CD release, comes in a archival box with 3 art prints, by Noah G. Hirka, mounted on black boards and a pouch of talismans. This one is another tour-de-force in presentation by the Chthonic Streams label, run by Derek Rush (COMPACTOR, . Highly recommended.
Sun Through Eyelids (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – CDr/Digital)
Liminal states and unexpected discoveries they bring – means of the evolution, a constant call inside some weird ones. Travelers, visionaries, tricksters, magicians, artists… Explorers of the Earth, of Cosmos and, hence – the deepness of the human possibilities. Which land will lull them in their last sleep? Will be it under tall trees or in the midst of iced tundra? Radiowaves and bird calls, forgotten rituals and enigmatic fossils – no one knows where and when this mystery will give some keys to its essence. But there is always someone ready to follow this path, no matter where it ends.
Syrinx – New Album Released (Sombre Soniks – Digital)
“Thee first album from Syrinx since their ‘Speaking Alone’ was released on Sombre Soniks in 2011! They return with just under an hour of material taken from an improvised session rekorded earlier this year…
Syrinx is thee kollaborative work of members from several Projekts inkluding Ghoul Detail, Pink Venom and Glowing Pixie.”
Valanx – New Album Released (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
Water is flooding. Land is obsolete. Scattered tribes rule their part of the world. Struggling. Adapting. “Tidelands” is Valanx soundtrack to a post-apocalyptic future where water is abundant and the circumstances of living has changed radically.
This is the final album by Valanx and Reverse Alignment is very happy to release it. We’ve been fortunate to work with such great artist.
Arne Weinberg says:
“This album is the swansong of my long musical journey and I would like to dedicate it to the most important person in my life, my wife Petra. Without her I’d be lost in nothingness. Eternal love.
I’d also like to thank Kristian Widqvist for his continued belief in Valanx and his dedication to the project.
Last but not least, a big thank you to all the listeners over all these years.”
VelgeNaturlig – New Album Released (Winter-Light – CD/Digital)
On ‘Kundalini’, Ivo Santos presents us with an album, layered with a rich tapestry of dense drones, reverberating sub-bass and circulating processed sounds, cleverly woven together with field recordings.
As with most, if not all of VelgeNaturlig’s work, on ‘Kundalini’ the tracks flow together as one, creating vast musical landscapes to traverse within the minds eye. The music weaves an infinite pathway between the light and the dark, sometimes isolating but always keeping the listener engaged.
‘Kundalini’ is an album of true awakening, invoking a clash of primordial sounds and energies. Let the currents flow….. Check out our review here.
Winterblood – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Self-released & ‘name your price’ new album by Winterblood.
“Musica di Mezzanotte’, is a concept focused on the rêverie, the contemplation of the fire, specially a candlelight; a journey through the rooms where the reader dreams, stares at the window, waiting for nothing. A dreamscape worth to be reached, to never come back.
Most of the music performed on Analog Paraphonic Synthesizer ‘Nyx’. Nyx is also the Greek goddess (or personification) of the night…”
Wolves and Horses – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“This album is about Earth, our Earth.
Each track name is based on a place or an interesting phenomenon around us.
I encourage you to check where and what these are.
We all have to change our attitude if we don’t want to lose all of this, if we want to have a place to leave to the next generations.
This is my tiny little brick in the wall…..and I hope you’ll enjoy the music.”
Zoloft Evra – New Album Released (Signora Ward – CD/Digital)
“Wounds of No Return “, the third album from ZOLOFT EVRA is a fierce merciless ritual, blood soaking void. Pure murderous sonic intercourse where death cult, self destruction, sexual fetish obsessions, antichristianity cross the fields of eerie negative industrial ambiences.”
My sincere apologies for the long delay since our last Frozen In Time, but I have continued from where I left off in July. So there will be no skipped time still! Of course this means the list is rather massive. I urge you to take your time, bookmark the page if you must, so that you can give each of these artists their deserved chance.
I’ll be away again for the first half of October, so I will try to stay current on correspondences, but if you don’t hear back from me I will be returning soon enough!
Reminder of New Physical Address for Submissions! Michael Barnett 9100 Blues Alley Apt.G Laurel, Maryland, 20723 USA
Feedspot has named This Is Darkness as one of the top 15 ambient music blogs in their latest update. We are pleased to be alongside well known and respected zines in the dark ambient world such as Heathen Harvest and Noise Receptor. Hopefully this will help bring some more new fans to the genre! See the list here.
Martin Bladh – New Book Released The new novella, “Marty Page”, is a body horror romp through a self-imposed dungeon of depravity and sensory excess, written by Martin Bladh. Martin Bladh is a Swedish writer, artist and musician, leader of the post-industrial band IRM, the musical avant-garde unit Skin Area and co-founder of publisher Infinity Land Press. Stapled booklet. 56 pages. 8.5 x 5.5 in. $10 Buy here: https://amphetaminesulphate.bigcartel.com/product/marty-page
Events (Please inform us of your relevant upcoming events: info@thisisdarkness.com)
Apoptose – “Time-Lapse City”
“Time-Lapse City” is the first video single of the upcoming Apoptose album Die Zukunft.
Ionophore – “Blade”
“Blade” is the first offering from the new album Whetter which has just released on Malignant Records. This is a side-project of Leila Abdul-Rauf, who has also released a new album on Malignant. The video was created by: Rhea DeCaro.
New Releases:
ᚾᛟᚢ II // ᚦᛟᚦ ᚷᛁᚷ – Alpha Ænigma (Digital Only)
ᚾᛟᚢ II // ᚦᛟᚦ ᚷᛁᚷ is Henrik Nordvargr Björkk and Thomas Ekelund (not to be confused with their other project “Det Kätterska Förbund”).
With every repetition of these curses, the emanating energies are multiplied by one order of magnitude. Each current becomes a shining dagger that cuts through the flesh, and bone, and souls of treacherous men.
Abbattoir & Satori – New Album Released (GH – CD/Digital)
“Satori, continuing a project first started in the 1980’s founding member Dave Kirby brings an onslaught of industrial soundscapes, pounding drums and a dystopian vision of a world commited to destroying itself.
Comprising a mixture of harsh noise and power electronics with a harder and heavier percussive beat than before Satori enter 2018 with a collection of new songs “Dispossession” based on the physical and mental disconnect facing everyone in the modern world. A constant pervasive undercurrent of violence, the feeling of a society on the brink of a total meltdown and the fears and torments of the powerless individual.
Lorenzo Abattoir is an Italian-based noise artist and sound engineer from Torino. His work takes shape in a context of underground extreme noise music to become accessible through projects related to sound art. ‘The sound of chaos merging with order, where every detail and nuance seems to be carefully regulated and controlled’.”
Akhtya – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“Elements of Apotheosis is a recording for the ritual chamber, meditation, visualization and to inspire astral and dream projection. Akhtya recorded and presented the track at the 2018 Flambeau Noir during Michael W. Ford’s presentation on Demonic Symbols and Basic Magick. This recording explores the Miltonesq representation of Satan/Lucifer and the Fallen Angels as Bringers of Wisdom, Power and Balance in this life. The planet Venus is depicted twice to represent the Morning & Evening Star. The recordings are interwoven heights and depths of acasual streams of the adversarial current which holds dominion over the casual world and brings transformation or decay to the natural order. This balance, represented by the darksome journey into chaos finds spells and incantations upon the winds; light is that Black Flame of spirit which takes form under the Deific Mask of the Adversary and fallen angels taking many forms. Invocations and Names of Power of the Watchers, Satanic and Luciferian demons and deities are uttered to unlock forgotten gates in our subconscious, opening the Left-Hand Path to Apotheosis or becoming “As a God”. Simply put, Luciferian Theurgy is to master the self and build your own domain according to your will in this life.”
Alaskan Tapes – New Album Released (Facture – CD/Digital)
“You Were Always An Island opens with a downpour of rain. Staring out at its constant fall, listeners can only wait for it to stop. The music’s already waiting: for someone, and for a moment that will never arrive…
Alaskan Tapes aids in the clear-up operation, helping to cleanse the air if not the growing solitude. Quiet drones and sullen strings dispel the rain, but it lingers in the streets, overflowing around the mouth of its gutter. The music has been invaded by a longing which spreads like a tendril of ink in clear water, bruising the atmosphere with its purple, sour colour.
An event shakes the soul with the magnitude of an earthquake. In this case, the cruelty of distance and the greater cruelty of war which separates a couple. As a man leaves to fight, his beloved has no other choice but to wait for his return. She sends unanswered prayers. His absence grows longer with every sunset. Unable to wait and growing increasingly anxious, she sets off to look for him, a lighthouse offering a faint lifeline in the gathering gloom, only to sadly learn of his death. The separation is permanent – death us do part.”
Andromalar – Preorders Available (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
“Reverse Alignment welcome ukrainian Andromalar to the fold. After three self released titles this magic drone act now found it’s way to our label. Vast, dreamy soundscapes is expected. Listen and you’ll understand what Andromalar is all about.”
Ataşehir – New Album Released (Sumatran Black – Digital)
The new side-project of Sumatran Black, Ataşehir, is a residential development on the Asian side of Istanbul, Turkey. The titles for Colorful Places to Live and Play are taken from aspirational advertising slogans of various residential developments from around the world.
Atrium Carceri – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – Vinyl/CD/Digital)
“Atrium Carceri returns with Codex, an album 3 years in the making. Dark drone, industrial beats and brooding choirs set the tone for exploration of a world beyond the illusion. Deep in the roots of the citadel a sea of white robes ever flows. Those Fallen from Elysium kneel here, with blissful smiles and fearful eyes. The sorrowful melancholia of a thousand whispered prayers lies heavy about the place. Prayers for the Demiurge to return, and grant them once more the warm embrace of their paradise.
The DigiBook version of this release contains artwork Simon has been working on for years with accompanying writing. A glimpse into the world beyond, where we once ruled as gods. The CD version comes in a 16 page hard cover deluxe DigiBook with matte lamination.”
Bjärgö – New Albums Released (Digital Only [currently])
Peter Bjärgö, known for his work in Arcana, Sophia and Karjalan Sissit is back with another solo album, this time under the moniker Bjärgö. Make that two solo albums! From Arcana’s Facebook post: “Peter has once again finished a new album under his project name BJARGO. And once again his beautiful soundscapes fill the room. Listen with high volume!”
Asked about a physical version they responded: “Not now, later! In the speed Peter is producing now we don’t want to wait for releases of cd’s:)”
Bonini Bulga – Sealed Now Available On CD (Hypnagoga Press/Cyclic Law – Cassette/CD)
“Sweden’s enigmatic and highly productive Pär Boström of Kammarheit, Cities Last Broadcast and Altarmang presents yet another singular project under the name Bonini Bulga. His debut Sealed was originally recorded and released in 2017 as a limited edition cassette on Boström’s own label Hypnagoga Press. We gladly present a remastered and extended version of this release. In recent years Boström has been exploring new sonic territories through his various projects, and with Bonini Bulga he’s chosen a more lo-fi loop based approach to his musical creations, bleak and minimalistic, we journey through a careful blend of processed analog synth layers and poignant revolving passages. This expanded edition includes three new tracks, which further exposes Boström’s unique vision and creative pact with the unknown, giving listeners the complete scope of his contemplative sonic magick.”
Caleb R.K. Williams – New Albums Released (Eagle Stone Collective – Digital)
I’ve been following the music of Caleb R.K. Williams and Co. from The Eagle Stone Collective more and more recently. Williams has a pretty grueling release schedule, with something new usually every month. But, unlike many artists rolling through such an enormous amount of material, each album seems emotional, fresh, and different from his previous works. With everything on their label set as “name your price”, it can’t hurt to give them a try! Highly Recommended.
The Caretaker – New Stage Released (HAFTW – CD/Vinyl/Digital)
“Stage 5 – September 2018 (K+L+M+N)
Post-Awareness Stage 5 confusions and horror.
More extreme entanglements, repetition and rupture can give way to
calmer moments. The unfamiliar may sound and feel familiar.
Time is often spent only in the moment leading to isolation.”
Common Eider, King Eider – New Album Released
(Cyclic Law/Sentient Ruin Laboratories – Vinyl/CD/Cassette/Digital)
“A Wound Of Body is the first chapter in Common Eider, King Eider’s Wound “duology”, forming the group’s most focused and fully realised work to date. Offering a sprawling, audial exploration of wounds at once physical and spiritual, social and societal, natural and environmental. A Wound Of Body is a beautifully stark soundscape, dolorously dense, suffocatingly oppressive and utterly claustrophobic. An immersive black hole of bleak, cavernous drone music and disquieting, desolate ambience, each track a hushed and harrowing ritual; the surface minimalism underpinned by a churning morass of sound, a layered liturgy of blackened invocations and nebulous strings hovering in the shadows. Presented in a beautiful black and silver duotone sleeve, adorned with images of micro-landscapes rendered in bone, stark images of the alien, otherworldly topography that lurks beneath the skin, emblematic of the inevitable decay and disintegration of our physical forms: the ruin we become, and the ruin we leave behind. Layout Design by Yoli at Aponeurotica.”
Corona Barathri – New Album Released (Grey Matter Productions – CD/Cassette/Digital)
“A new ritual material written on the eve of the Great Sabbath, dedicated to all the dark souls – Faithful to Diabolus! ”
Corona Barathri & Emme Ya – New Album Released (Noctivagant – CD/Digital)
Renowned ritual ambient musician Emme Ya has come together with Corona Barathri, a much younger ritual ambient project, which has torn through the scene over the last few years. You can find out some of the specifics about this release in our new episode of The Inner Sanctum!
Deathstench & Phurpa – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“Evoking Shadows of Death is a collaboration between Russia’s ritual collective Phurpa and California’s occult misanthropists, DEATHSTENCH. Fusing ultrasonic vibrations and grim necro-atmospheres with the harmonious chants and deep, droning reverberations of the tantric voice, these two tracks are designed to help the chod practitioner tap the power of absolute terror. Only those who have visited one of Tibet’s charnel fields and witnessed the offering of a corpse to vultures may be able to understand the full impact of what the Chöd tradition refers to as places that inspire fear.”
DeepDark & Noctilucant – New Split Released (Noctivagant – CD/Digital)
“Paginae Nigres pairs the work of DeepDark (Russia) with Noctilucant
(USA) on this split album where both projects step away from their
familiar sound and explore more ritualistic dark ambient stylings while
still maintaining the cinematic sound they are known for. DeepDark and
Noctilucant take the listener on a ill-lighted path through profund
dream/nightmarish realms, barren landscapes and clandestine ritualistic
sanctums.”
Desiderii Marginis – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/LP/Digital)
“Long awaited new material by one of Sweden’s most revered Dark Ambient acts. Vita Arkivet translates from Swedish as “The White Archive” and is an official document detailing ones funeral arrangements. In death our existence is whitewashed, the slate wiped clean. We start all over and we bring nothing with us where we go. We lose the agency of our own memory and leave it for those left behind to attend to, to continue our story, to write our eulogy. Vita is also the latin word for Life, so the meaning could also be “The Life Archive”. White is the colour of the casket lining, the plaster death masks and the walls of the chapel, it is the colour of the first and last pages. What is kept in between the covers of our life archives? This record is a personal reflection and manifestation of that process, the loss and the great detachment from life, from others, and from ourselves.” Note: Along with this new release, Cyclic Law has released a re-issue of Deadbeat, which sees a new CD/Vinyl pressing.
Draugurinn – Preorders Available (CD/Digital)
During the winter of 2017 Erik Gärdefors of GRIFT invited DRAUGURINN to perform at his special and unique harvest fest TREDINGSRITEN in Hällekis, Sweden on August 4th 2018. Inspired by the harvest theme, the circles of life and death and – as always – the forces of Nature, DRAUGURINN created an exclusive live ritual for this occasion only. With percussion and meditative chanting, the four songs invites the listener through birth, life and death. Spíra will take you on a journey along the circle of life. Transcend into Spíra and ride the circle of life through the eyes of DRAUGURINN.
Emerge – New Album Released (Required Rate of Return – Digital) Maze is a deceptively complex pair of drone tracks. Emerge creates something that balances the lines between dark ambient and noise very well. With contributions by: elektrojudas, Niku Senpuki, Danijel Zambo, Prinzip Nemesis, and Deep.
Endless Chasm – New Album Released (Chthonic Streams – Cassette/Digital)
“Endless Chasm hails from Lawrence, Kansas with sonic and ritual explorations into the unknown. Saṃsāra Eternal is a contemplative journey into dark tones merging the organic and the synthetic, almost worshipful with an undercurrent of dread.” Read our new review of the album here.
False Mirror – New Album Released (Malignant – CD/Digital)
It’s been 8 long years since the release False Mirror’s highly acclaimed Derelict World, and SIGINT marks the return of one of the giants of the dark ambient genre. Thematically centered around the gathering of intelligence via the interception of signals, SIGINT is an hour long creation of desolate beauty and isolated intricacies, where droning textural flow is incorporated with floating wasteland debris, distant transmissions, and fluid layers of climatic tones. Like all False Mirror’s work, the attention to detail and subtleties are unparalleled, striking a balance between field recordings and synthetic sounds in a perfectly conceptualized harmony of calming warmth and barren isolation.
Flowers For Bodysnatchers – New EP Released (Digital Only)
“Alive With Scars is the prologue mini album to the forthcoming full length album Alive With Scars. This album begins to explore the life long struggle of living in a diseased body. A body slowly being destroyed from the inside out by its own central nervous system. A body that with the passing of time will waste and wither to its own unique sonnet of pain and torment.”
Haft Teppeh – New Album Released (Autarkeia – Cassette/Digital)
“Yume’ is the first full length work by Romanian project Haft Teppeh. We must admit, the way they approach the dark ambient music scene is really impressive. Despite being formed in 2013, the full length is the first material ever released by Haft Teppeh, and it sounds highly professional so far. All the compositions are very complex, skillfully polished and produced. Abstract and massive waves of sound are very dramatic and deep. The whole album seems like a one solid piece. each track floats smoothly, with extremely beautiful and natural transitions from one theme to another. Dark, mysterious and brooding; the tension stays with the listener throughout the whole release. With every new track, after brief moments of quiet, it strikes again with a heavy atmosphere, which keeps you hypnotized and holds you in your place until the very end of the composition. We pledge – Flavius Ion, the mastermind of Haft Teppeh is a truly promising artist whose first release is as impressive as if it would be crafted by Par Bostrom [Kammarheit] or Peter Andersson [Raison d‘Etre].”
Hiemal – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Smooth and highly contemplative melancholic drone ambient with rain recordings.
Recommended for fans of Mount Shrine, SiJ, and other field recording heavy drone projects.
How To Disappear Completely – New Album Released (Digital Only)
“A study in deliberately soothing textures designed to give the listener space to find stillness and collapse into rest – late night lullabies.
How To Disappear Completely presents Mer de Revs III, third installment of our experimental sleep music project. Almost eighty minutes of new music composed and recorded over twelve month period (a song per month), 2017/2018. Recording this album we wanted to keep the same aesthetics as on the last two volumes – simple as possible, minimal amount of gear as possible. Volume III of Mer de Revs is a culmination point of the trilogy and a summary of the first two installments.”
Item Caligo – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Item caligo is a one-man project of Sergey Epifanov. Based in Volgograd. The tracks “Painful Sleep” and “Wishing Only To Die” parts I & II were written especially for the short film “MER” by Hesam Rahmani.
Jinthra – New Album Released (Sombre Soniks – Digital)
“Psychopathy originally meant pathos (suffering) of Psyche (the Soul). Therefore I can also see the Path of Psyche as a way of pathologizing (logos of pathos); an autobiografikal need to understand my daimonikal wounds from a deeper perspective of the Underworld. Let’s pathologize!”
Julia Kent & Jean D.L. – New Album Released (Gizeh – CD/Digital)
“Recorded in Charleroi, Belgium in 2015 during a video installation with Sandrine Verstraete, the music was created using field recordings, processed guitar and cello and serves as a soundtrack to the video of the same name.
The album is an aching, ambient wonderland that ensues beauty at every turn. It was built as a whole and, indeed, should be consumed as a whole. The repetition is hypnotising, a lulling sense of calm entwined in hints of unease that flows seamlessly in and out of sleepy melodies and broken drones. Unfolding over a brief twenty-six minutes, The Great Lake Swallows cannot out-stay its welcome. Everything contained within feels necessary, each movement informing the next, a conversation between two outstanding musicians.”
Kashya – New Album Released (Digital/”name your price”)
Since I first heard Kashya I’ve enjoyed these releases as the last thing I hear before falling off into sleep. The warm drone ambience of this project is always deeply relaxing for me.
Kirill Mazhai – New Album Released (Shimmering Moods – CD/Cassette/Digital)
“This album was made between August 2015 and March 2017, which was in some way a transition period for me. Some life stages ended, some relationships failed, some changes happened. All the tracks on the album are dedicated to several places from those times, that meant or still mean something very special to me. A house by the lake, an apartment on the first floor, a park in the middle of the city – the places that stuck with me for a long time and don’t let go.
It’s a tribute to those times, but also some kind of closure. The album was mostly a reminder to myself that when you feel attached to something in one way or another, you need to keep going, to move forward, that you really don’t belong anywhere. It was a reminder that it’s never too late to move on.”
kj – Preorder Available (Dronarivm – CD/Digital)
“kj’s third album and dronarivm’s 54th release, is a wandering into the dark side of nostalgia — labyrinthian refrains evoke the mind’s tendency to reach for the past.”
L’Égarement d’Esprit – New Album Released (Digital Only) Laudanum Euphoria is a mind-bending new project from the man behind Embers Below Zero and the Santa Sangre zine. It’s as if he’s blended something like Cities Last Broadcast – The Humming Tapes with Blood Axis & Les Joyaux De La Princesse – Absinthe – La Folie Verte, topped off with some old film samples. Highly recommended and “name your price”!
LVMMVX – New Album Released (Danvers State – Cassette/Digital)
“Debut release from Josh Yelle (KINTAAN, HARD DRUG)’s solo “chamber noise” outfit. Heavily layered, looped, and rhythmic dark ambience is enunciated by the cavernous pounding on the hull of a beat up cello. 40 minutes of miniature horror film scores devoid of any light or hope.” Purchase cassette here.
Maha Pralaya – New Album Released (Noctivagant – CD/Digital)
Ritual dark ambient project Maha Pralaya returns with another devastatingly dark ritual on their latest album Nataraja Tandavam, which is now available on Noctivagant.
Manifesto – New Album Released (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
“Magnus Zetterberg is returning with a new haunting opus of darkest industrial ambient accompanied by Axel Torvenius wonderful art. Hive is a ghastly exhibition into the foul world of humanity. A soundtrack to devastation.”
Mount Shrine – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Mount Shrine (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) serves us a warm and inviting ambient album. Rain pounds the temple as you look out across snowy mountains from a lotus position. A wet furred hare seeks refuge beside you, curious about the kettle of hot tea that rests at your side. A distress call led you here, transmitted to a frequency on your Ham radio. The journey here was long and filled with majestic sights. Isolated villages, melting snow in forgotten valleys, the robed order of the silent all calmed your mind. The rolling fog followed you every step of the way to enlightenment.
Recommended for lovers of subtle field recordings and sleep ambient. Warm, inviting and atmospheric. Best enjoyed with a cup of hot beverage on a rainy day. Read our review of the album here.
Murcof – Preorders Available (Glacial Movements – CD/Digital)
“In Lost in Time, two parallel narratives intertwine: the first follows a helmet-clad, faceless horse and rider adrift in an indeterminate landscape of ice and snow, quite literally lost in time and space, while the second seems to allude to a strange scientific experiment. Lost in Time plunges us into perpetual renewal, each ending leading to a new beginning. The protagonists – two beings bound by a certain mutual dependence – are forever trapped in a time loop where life and death ceaselessly rotate.The use of what are almost exclusively black figures against white landscapes produces a menacing, otherworldly atmosphere that is also stunningly beautiful. The original soundtrack of the film, blends the aria of the Goldberg Variations sung by Les Petits Chanteurs du Mont-Royal with a composition by Murcof. The soundtrack also exists as an autonomous work entitled Lost in Time (Goldberg Experienced.05). Coproduction Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal and Casino Luxembourg. With the support of the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the Canada Council for the Arts.”
Murderous Vision – New Album Released (Live Bait Recording – CD/Digital)
“Upon returning from a successful gig in Helsinki, Finland several inspired late night recording sessions began to take shape and morph into something a bit more cohesive. Voided Landscapes is a bleak journey into the paths of dark industrial and minimal death ambient. Using an arsenal of electronics, field recordings, strings and less conventional items, Voided Landscapes is a shifting beast that covers a lot of ground, but stays on a course that will not disappoint long time followers of the project. Features guest appearances by Robert O’Lexa (Vengeance Space Quartet), Pauline Lombardo and Rebecca Potter (Both of Cunting Daughters). Packaged in a 6 panel digisleeve with photography by Andy Henry that is printed on heavy uncoated retro paper stock.”
North Atlantic Drift – New Album Released (Sound in Silence – CDr/Digital)
“Departures, Vol. 2 is in line with last year’s Departures, Vol. 1., showcasing North Atlantic Drift’s atmospheric side of minimal ambient and presenting eight new impressive tracks in a running time of about 50 minutes. Moving away from the melodic post-rock orientation of their earlier releases, North Atlantic Drift have stripped away most of the percussive elements, glockenspiel and more prominent guitars and have achieved a captivating sound of subtle textures, overlapping tones and slowly evolving soundscapes. Built around washes of sustained and reverberant electric guitars, warm and comforting synths and glacial drones, and expertly mastered by George Mastrokostas (aka Absent Without Leave), Departures, Vol. 2 is an intimate, relaxing album with a truly immersive quality, bringing to mind the works of Brian Eno, Stars Of The Lid, Loscil and other artists of similar mien.”
The Penitential Station – New Album Released
(Other Forms of Consecrated Life – Digital Only)
“Plaintive music for the ‘ghostly’ darkness described by the anonymous author of ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’, blinded from what is both above and below; isolated from the spiritual and earthly worlds. Partially composed of fragments from the masses of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525-1594), the music itself seems cut off – as if heard from great distance – a faint and elusive refrain of ecstatic communion, endlessly repeated but never quite resolved.”
Peter Andersson (raison d’être) – New Album Released (Old Europa Cafe/Yantra Atmospheres – CD/Digital)
“Timewaves presents moments of history in a flow of eternity. Each moment may or may not be clearly connected with each other. But when examining the past, does not every moment intertwine with some other moments, and suddenly everything is connected with everything in strange and unclear ways.
In Timewaves it is clear that those moments presented on the album are bound to civilisation. Is it our civilisation, or someone elses, or just a dream? We don’t know. It may be even a nightmare. All we know for sure is that the clock is ticking. But ticking for what? Good times or bad times? Hope or fear?
Peter Andersson (Sweden) is most known for the dark ambient project raison d’être and a bunch of other projects like Stravtm Terror, Atomine Elektrine and Bocksholm (a collaboration project with Deutsch Nepal). Sometimes he releases albums under his personal name, mostly music for museum exhibitions and short movies. The majority of the tracks on Timewaves has been used in various exhibitions in some Swedish museums. This time the music is a bit darker, more industrial and experimental than previous exhibition albums from Peter Andersson, but still enigmatic.”
protoU – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“Sasha further explores the themes of her collaboration album Earth Songs. While her album Khmaoch explored the roots of civilization and The Edge of Architecture probed into the future of the modern age, Echoes of the Future guides us in taking our final steps to leave Earth.
A deep space ambient album that invites you to take part in the discovery of cosmic anomalies and abandoned space stations in search of a new home.”
Ruptured World – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
“Ruptured World is the cinematic ambient project of Alistair Rennie (UK), who is also known as an author of Weird Fantasy and Horror Fiction. Exoplanetary features fragments of transmissions amid sonorous and distorted interpretations of narrative events as the mission faces up to the challenges of off-world exploration and the inescapable fact that, on Proxima Centauri b, the human visitors are not alone.
Cosmic horror combines with ambient evocations of a real-life futuristic drama in the face of alien estrangement and a prevailing aura of existential persecution. Radio transmissions are superseded by melodic inferences of atmospheric detail and the otherworldly drones of cosmic landscapes and the mysterious twilight roaming grounds of the Krivren.
The Exoplanetary CD package comes with a documentary booklet featuring a 16-page executive summary of the mission’s objectives and a detailed profile of the planet’s geophysical characteristics, as well as its inherent dangers. Digital Booklet also included with download.
It offers a unique listening and reading experience that integrates sound orchestration with speculative dark fiction to present a quasi-scientific account of future possibilities rendered in sound.
Recommended for fans of cinematic dark ambient and spoken word.
You can read our interview here, and our review here.
Sacra Fern – Preorders Available (Black Mara – CD/DVD/Cassette/Digital)
“Protected by forest spirits, shining in the rays of magic fern, this stone has absorbed all the power of the Sun. It will open doors to a world of magic in the shortest night of the year for who follows his own willpower.”
Sana Obruent – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Sana Obruent delivers another hauntingly dark release, this time a ghostly affair entitled Songs about Death and Redemption.
The Serpent – New Album Released (Noctivagant – CD/Digital)
The inspiration of this dark ritualistic ambient album has been the story of Ani’s soul passing through the Egyptian underworld – Duat as well as the soul’s voyage in general through the dark realm of the dead, judgement and test. The conceptual background is being expressed in a way which aims to progressively narrate a story regarding the stages of the after-death experience as mentioned in the ancient Egyptian texts which is deeply tied to a wide variety of the mythos and tradition of ancient religions and Orders.
Silent Vigils – New Album Released (Home Normal – CD/Digital)
Molenbrook, Mossigwell, Zwartewall, Fieldem… places neither here nor there; half in the world, half in the mind. We began this project as an exchange of gestures across the water, a dialogue motivated by mutual respect and revolving around our shared love of the minimal, the graceful and the understated. We completed it on 23rd March 2017 – the day of the Westminster attack, one year to the day after the Brussels bombings. These four pieces have become our personal dedications to the quiet strength of blended culture, free thinking and open borders. Silent Vigils.
Skadi – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Finally we see a brilliant new release by the well respected dark ambient project Skadi, founded in 2001 by Alexander Leßwing. The project combines dark ambient scapes with ethnic and ritual passages.
In a place where the heart is not allowed to flourish its emotions, darkness will grow.
In a place where the soul is not held with care, only emptiness remains.
SiJ – New Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – Digital [currently])
In memory of Dmitriy Vasilyev.
Featuring Singing bowls by Akoustik Timbre Frekuency and additional samples by Erik Osvald of Keosz. “A new installment in Shrine series, exploring deep minimalistic sound structures and imaginary landscapes. Inward journey through the memory, dreams, and contemplation on things which are inevitable.”
Sysselmann – Re-issue of The Northern Chronicles
I reviewed this brilliant debut here last year and really love the physical copy, I’m pleased to see it’s back in stock! A word from Sysselmann:
“Dear listeners, closing in on two years after the original release date we still get requests to buy this cd, finally we can happily announce that Sysselmann’s debut album is coming back into stock. We are very humbled by the continuous support for Sysselmann. Gorgeous vinyl style CD, booklet + some extra goodies for you not previously available…”
Tapes & Topographies – New Album Released (Simulacra – CD/Digital) Insomnia Drones seems to share similarities to both the drone heavy releases like Fathoms as well as the more field recording laden Signal to Noise, beautifully melancholic, highly recommended, under-rated artist.
Taphephobia & Bleak Fiction – New EP Available
(Reverse Alignment – Digital)
“Reverse Alignment has always been about making good relations and keeping artists long term. It seem to have been working with Taphephobia at least.
Leaving the ship when moving to Greytone in 2010 and leveling up to Cyclic Law 2013, the guy behind the strings; Ketil Søraker, returns once more to the label. We´re happy to see Taphephobia prosper, happy to meet again with a dear old friend.
This time we present a collaboration with Ezequiel Lobo’s Bleak fiction that’ve been releasing on m.i.s.t. records and GV Sounds from 2012 onwards. A new face to the label, another welcome. Nuuk is here.”
Theo Calis – New Album Released (Petroglyph – Digital)
Inspired by the beautiful wildlife sounds and pictures of Glacier Bay. And the commitment of NPS to preserve nature. Stop global warming!
Tim Six – New Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – CDr/Digital)
It is generally believed that noise is the creation of human hands, while nature is even more full of noise simply of a different kind. Such an actual problem of “sound ecology” as opposes urban noise to either sounds of nature, or just silence – while silence in nature is not so easy to find. This record can be considered a non-dualistic approach to this problem. This album, in the best traditions of drone music, consists of one track made of field recordings. Night rustles and bird trills collected in the woods near Ivanovo, Russia, remote city hum and agricultural works in the Crimean steppe, recordings of bird nests in an abandoned feed mill and all sorts of audio situations along the irrigation canals of Crimea – all this is repeatedly layered on each other and built in gradually developing composition. Presence of Noise is not a verdict but a reality within which we exist. The fact that nature is full of noise does not negate the problem of “sound pollution” of the urban environment, but gives an illustrative example for the reconstruction of urban acoustic environment “in the image and likeness” – striving for softer forms, smoother corners and fluent transitions of the acoustic landscape. Infinity of aural interpretations in the simplicity of everyday noise.
Vacuum Templi – New Album Released (Weird Tapes/Svbterrean – Cassette/Digital)
“God is always the shadow and the nightmare of the human being,even though we’ve have just passed the post-human phase.
Despite our civilization level,religion is surviving and give us our daily fear towards life and death.
“Death Chamber Musick” is an anti-religion sound collage composed by seven spells,recorded with (un)sacred reversed samples,ruined organ and anguishing synths.
The pessimistic and blasphemic mood reign in this new record,where the catholic religion and the figure of the suffering Christ are the mirror of the human destiny.
The ideas of religion and faith are raped and the hopeness for Human being is destructed,in a liturgic black reversed-mass recorded on magnetic tapes.”
Valanx – Pre-order For New Album (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
“Water is flooding. Land is obsolete. Scattered tribes rule their part of the world. Struggling. Adapting. Tidelands is Valanx soundtrack to a post-apocalyptic future where water is abundant and the circumstances of living has changed radically.”
VelgeNaturlig – New Album Released (Winter-Light – CD/Digital)
“Having previously released the full length Opalescent Pust on our label, the Portuguese sound sculpture VelgeNaturlig returns with an album of deep, immersive ambient drones – Kundalini.
On Kundalini, Ivo Santos presents us with an album, layered with a rich tapestry of dense drones, reverberating sub-bass and circulating processed sounds, cleverly woven together with field recordings.
As with most, if not all of VelgeNaturlig’s work, on Kundalini the tracks flow together as one, creating vast musical landscapes to traverse within the minds eye. The music weaves an infinite pathway between the light and the dark, sometimes isolating but always keeping the listener engaged. Kundalini is an album of true awakening, invoking a clash of primordial sounds and energies. Let the currents flow…”
On the Periphery
Antechamber – New Album Released (Instruments of Discipline – Vinyl/Digital)
“Antechamber’s debut explores the ghost architecture of industrial music, etheric and oppressive in its suspension.
The newest alias from Mahk Rumbae a.k.a. Codex Empire and one half of Industrial act Konstruktivists, Antechamber sees a spacious almost dub influenced realm being explored, a dark-ambient nether in which lurching rhythmic giants consume the fragments of their composition, as though some military exercise had arrived at the collapsed edge of history and remained forever there suspended, war-games in the ether, anodic purgatory.
The LP is at times drone-scape, at times big-room stepping; white noise carved into shuddering rhythms & barrel bomb impacts; Antechamber’s debut shows a producer who is able to both summon and resuscitate worlds with only the bare minimal elements, a contained violence and a violent restraint.”
Ashtoreth – Second Disc In Sleep FUSE series (mini cdr/Digital)
“Ciuthach is one twenty three minute atmospheric drone folk masterpiece, based of a Scottish folklore creature myth of the Ciuthach.”
BRUTALISM – Debut Single Released (Anathemata Editions – 7″ square lathe)
“Deterritorialization. Intimate Brutality at the very moment of participation in surrounding nature.”
Debut of Atmospheric-black-metal inspired by Brutalist architecture from Terence of Locrian. Full-length The Charged Void available 2019 from Annihilvs and Cloister Recordings.
Clearlight & Owl – New Album Released (306- CD/Cassette/Digital)
306 recordings is proud to present Inverted Horizon by Clearlight & Owl. A deep piece of ambient music which takes you into your deepest thoughts, traveling between darkness and enlightment. A total of 10 tracks spanning 68 minutes, which take you to the deepest, darkest & inverted horizon.
Ionophore – New Album Released (Malignant – Digital/CD[delayed])
Ionophore is the project of the Bay Area/London-based multi-instrumentalists Leila Abdul-Rauf, Jan Hendrich, and Ryan Honaker. The trio weave dark electronics and neoclassical soundscapes with heavy drones, seamlessly melding the orchestral strings of Honaker, the horns and voice of Abdul-Rauf, and electronic interpretations of Hendrich. Whetter is the follow up to 2016’s well-received Sinter Pools, and continues along a similar trajectory; gauzy, ethereal ambience augmented by late night textural smear, rhythmic pulsations, and abstract, affected glitch, drifting in and around and through each other in hazy patterns, warm and enveloping, pulsing and reverberating, an indistinct blur… almost tangible, but ineffable.
Keosz – New Album Released (Vinyl/Digital) No Future Vol:2 shows a more beat-driven, slow-tempo, bass-laden version of what we know from Keosz’ Cryo Chamber releases. The production of this one is really epic, highly recommended for late night driving or other inward adventures.
Kintaan – New Album Released (Annihilvs/Danvers State – CD/Cassette)
“The long awaited official debut from Providence, RI’s premier extradimensional post-music trio. A disgusting mix of industrial tinged noise and sparse, dissonant doom metal with hints of psychedelia spread across four tracks, totaling 31 minutes. Thick, saturated production battling minimal, jarring composition. This is living, breathing terror from absolute masters of their craft.” Purchase cassette here: https://danversstate.storenvy.com/products/24588543-kintaan-untitled
Michael Idehall – New Album Released (raubbau – Digital)
“to those who enjoyed michael idehall’s ‘prophecies of the storm’ release on ant-zen, raubbau is proud to present a further outing of this outstanding artist’s self-coined ‘seancetronica’ sound exploration – a one-of-a-kind combination of death industrial, apocalyptic tunes with a subliminal song structure and dark, structured ambience. once again the swedish producer/performer evokes a crude, vicious force carrying intense tempers of menace, aggression and sadness with a strong streak of esoteric themes and personal poetics shaping the mood and tone.
Idehall’s rich baritone intoning ritual chants and secretive whispers with a solemn atmosphere, highlight the arcane bent of the heavy electronics pushed with striking tautologic sequences. from sparse throbs and slow paced beats to cinematic ambient elements and industrial overtones, ‘aion reborn’ displays a captivating mixture of alluring vocals, throbbing bass, pounding beats, ominous drones and metallic tremors.”
Morego – New Album Released (D.M.T. – Vinyl/Digital)
Similar to the above release by Keosz, we have a side-project of a well known dark ambient artist, (in this case Morego Dimmer of Xerxes The Dark) creating crystal clear production on glitchy bass-laden tracks, predominately with accompanyied by various percussions. For the dark ambient fan, this (along with Keosz) is an album that will be perfect for those times when you want to hear something much more active, but don’t want to sacrifice the brilliant craftsmanship of a top-notch dark ambient artist. Highly recommended.
N.K.R.T – “Cantus II” from Confiteor
The next release of Cold Dark Matter Records (Red Harvest, Ende, Fange) is a collaboration with NKRT, the ambient and ritual project of Frater Stéphane (Rosa Crux, Spleen XXX). “The equinox, the moment when everything is extremely ephemeral, Confiteor is a rite of repentance to all the sordid things to raise his soul to the summit”
For lovers of Zero Kama / Abruptum / Gregorian chant
Paleowolf – New Album Released (Digital Only)
Fifth full length album by Paleowolf. Archetypal stands as a powerful, monolithic fusion of ancient prehistoric archetypes that have been shaping and challenging Mankind since its dawn of the planet.
Powerful and energetic tribal drum-works are pumping the adrenaline and awakening the inner strength of a Warrior, Shaman and Survivor archetypes. Shamanic chants and voices that echo through timeless caves and archaic forests are calling and praising the divine forces of Nature. The tribe grunts and shouts to charge the collective body, mind and spirit with the eternal energies of the Wilderness.
As the charge completes and fires slowly extinguish, the ancestors enter the Old Dream, while moonlight is reflecting the shadows of giant megaliths in the distance. Archetypal is definitely one of the strongest and most intense Paleowolf releases so far.
Rafael Anton Irisarri – Preorder Available (Umor Rex – Cassette/Digital)
“Rafael Anton Irisarri continues his string of post-minimalist releases with his third for Umor Rex: El Ferrocarril Desvaneciente. While composed as an ode to an overnight train journey through Spain he took many years ago, the music picks up sonically where his previous album Sirimiri left off. Irisarri focuses on deploying sonic cycles throughout these four shorter pieces, basing much of this sweeping ambience around looped sounds and distant pulses. The sound is however kept in a state of forward motion and constant evolution, invoking the slowly rumbling night train that inspired it —not to mention its cargo of misfits and travelers. Irisarri’s skill, set as a manipulator of minimal sound input, is at full strength here, imbuing even shorter pieces such as “El Espectro Electromagnético,” with chasms slowly cresting drama. The phantasmagoria of “Un Saltador” was even composed as a departure for him, toying with synths and pedals in a “modular kind of way,” letting an experiment unfold with minimal interaction.”
Randal Collier-Ford – New EP Released (Digital Only)
“The first chapter in a new branching storyline, featuring the newest protagonist, ɒm.OS. Season One will serve as the thematic and musical push into this layer, tying together the roots of the ‘main’ storyline.”
Self Harmony – New EP Released (Digital Only)
An interesting combination of a lot of different styles which the artist describes as: “Pan-Dimensional Night Bass, for Silver Cord Cutters and Mystery School Dropouts.” This seems about right. Definitely should be a nice midnight drive soundtrack.
Understated Theory – New Album Released (Sparkwood – CD/Digital)
“With each of the two half behind the project bringing new perspectives from their respective solo-endeavours to the drawing table – Tom Moore (Dead Melodies) and Colin Crighton (nil.co, Sorrow Floats) –
Understated Theory leaves the vast expanse of treacherous seas (Critical Drift EP and Juxtapparition) to continue their journey across dry land. The desolation blues remains however, as we follow in the footsteps of what might be one of the few survivors roaming a post-apocalyptic wasteland, commonly just referred to as The Shadowlands.”
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It’s been a while since the last Frozen In Time, these articles are by far the most time-consuming part of This Is Darkness, and I’ve pondered ways of improving on the structure. In a way this is the same as usual, but I am covering the time period since April and the selection of releases I’ve chosen will be more focused.
I include sections of album descriptions which I find interesting/relevant. If there is no album description I will write a short one based on my knowledge, or I will skip the release. Context is everything with dark ambient. So, I find it increasingly frustrating to see a flood of releases with no description/context. Hopefully, my increased selectivity will make the time you spend here more valued and efficient. When my opinion is expressed below, it will be italicized. All other opinions are of the label/artist.
I’ve started with recent music videos, then we have my chosen selection of the latest album releases, then a selection of interesting odds & ends; unrelated things which you might enjoy, and finally an overview of recent articles on This Is Darkness.
I’d be happy to hear any feedback on Frozen In Time, your praise or criticism can be helpful going forward with this general-news-element of This Is Darkness.
Thank you all so much for following This Is Darkness and for all your support!
Artaud 1937 Apocalypse – Letters from Ireland
by Antonin Artaud This is a powerful video promoting the new book released on Infinity Land Press.
Ashtoreth & Grey Malkin – “Pilgrim” “Pilgrim” is from their new collaborative album The Hare and the Moon.
Johnny Jewel – “Spiral Staircase” Johnny Jewel came to my attention with his dark jazz track “Windswept” in two episodes of the new Twin Peaks season. “Spiral Staircase” is from his latest album Themes for Television.
Leila Abdul-Rauf – “Hindsight” “Hindsight” is from her new release Diminution, out now on CD through Malignant Records and vinyl through Cloister Recordings.
Nordvargr – “Sweet Death Triumphant” From his new album, Metempsychosis on Cyclic Law. Video by Dehn Sora.
Templum N.R. – “The Unseen Tailor” This is a track from the new album Memoirs of the Recoilers on Aural Hypnox.
Vortex – Valhalla (live) “Valhalla” is from their new album, As Gods Fall, released on Cyclic Law. This live performance was captured at Leipzig Fire & Sun during the summer solstice of 2018.
New Releases
156– New Album Released (156 Collective – Cassette/Digital)
Binaural field recordings of Brooklyn’s Bed-Stuy neighborhood.
“Do or Die” is a 47 minute compiling of 10 A-sides of 10 field recording cassettes, while “Dead and Done” is 10 B-sides compiled.
“Do or Die Twenty Times” and “Dead and Done Twenty Times” are the original two tracks, with the same track over-layed backwards.
“Do Die Dead Done Forty Times” is “Do or Die Twenty Times”, and “Dead and Done Twenty Times” atop of one another.
Alone in the Hollow Garden– New Album Released (CDr/Digital)
Seven ritual musick offerings to the Goddess of Love inspired by Sumerian, Babylonian and Egyptian spiritualities, adorned with ancient hymns and lyrics by Aleister Crowley.
Alphaxone – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Alphaxone is back with his long awaited 5th solo album on Cryo Chamber. Explore empty space and float above silent planets on the Edge of Solitude. Lush synths combine with wide atmospheric drones, recommended for space drifters.
Cameron Day – New Album Released (Facture – CD/Digital) I’ve recently discovered these beautifully crafted releases on Facture. I highly recommend this one, and you should have a look at other offerings from this label, though they are not always ‘dark’.
Physically, structures will fall into disrepair without proper maintenance, but decay can occur on many levels: spiritual, mental, cultural. Power corrupts, but it also leads to downfalls, as seen with a dictator who refuses to stand down even when the bombs are dropping and the end is nigh. As if it were at some nightmarish New Year’s Eve party, Cameron Day’s music sings the distorted, drunken line of ‘out with the old and in with the new’. Ghastly grey areas and forever loops have come to replace the old, familiar verse of popular song: the first shoots in an indecisive, post-truth era. The collapse of a once-mighty kingdom can be ugly theatre, but the music’s decline is a thing of ashen beauty.
A drooping rose, or the artistic movement of ‘urbex’, which photographs and explores abandoned, decaying urban structures, oozes with a fading beauty. Cameron Day’s music jitters and stumbles, but these melodies are very much alive, still trying to pull through the pain. Beautiful (and sometimes familiar) song-bursts splutter and trip as they fail, like a well-worn record. The tape is distorting, crinkling and tying itself up in impenetrable knots. Choral music is not immune to this, either: a piece will loop and gently reverse, reverberating a rosy death in music that should be full of life.
Cameron Day’s tape loops are alienated things, taking on vacant expressions when removed from their original context (the looping trumpets on ‘Born On Christmas Day’ are tinted with rust). The icy sheen of winter, and the chilly draught of loose morality, lives inside the music, but there are two sides to every coin, and this garden ‘represents a possible peaceful future beyond the current institutions of power’. Resilient shoots reclaim a Victorian dereliction. The strings are weak and distorted, lying on their hazy deathbed of hiss. The Castle and the Garden is music for the immediate dislocation – for changing times.
The Caretaker – New Stage Released
(History Always Favours The Winners – LP/CD/Digital) This is the fourth stage in Kirby’s brilliant Everywhere at the End of Time, which can be purchased digitally on Bandcamp, with one small price covering the entire previous and future stages of this serious. Also on vinyl, but they move quickly, I bought a reasonably priced copy of Stage 2 on Discogs last month. Highly recommended! Kirby says of Stage 4:
“Post-Awareness Stage 4 is where serenity and the ability to recall singular memories gives way to confusions and horror. It’s the beginning of an eventual process where all memories begin to become more fluid through entanglements, repetition and rupture.” Reviews on This is Darkness: Stage 1-2, Stage 3-4
Coph Nia – New Album Released (Old Captain – CD/Digital)
Recorded almost two decades ago this obscure compendium by Aldenon Satorial for years remained a secret now regained to enlighten the pilgrims’ progress. A Collection of Dead Drones and Aborted Soundscapes as a subtitle for the album, sums up a gateway to the darker realms reflecting the inherent duality of being. From mortal sins to immortality the symbolic circle made of branches and roots encapsulates us to provide ancient esoteric vitality Coph Nia is famous for. Discover your Verus Pastor at the base of the tree where ‘Everything Is True’.
Corona Barathri & Emme Ya – Pre-orders Available
(Noctivagant – CDr/Digital) This is one of the recent Noctivagant releases that has caught my eye for its physical options and has been making a lot of noise in the occult music scene. Definitely worth exploring!
A new opus of the occult project Corona Barathri recorded together with Emme Ya (Edgar Kerval, Colombia), dedicated to the aspect of Principivm/Leviathan.
Council of Nine – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
The latest Council of Nine album, Exit Earth, focuses on the Heavens Gate cult, 39 members of which committed suicide in Ranch Santa Fe, California, on March 22, 1997. They did this in waves lasting three days, they received a signal in the form of a comet known as Hale Bopp. Once every 2000 years a signal from the level above human appears.
Cut The Light – New Album Released (Black Mara – CD/Cassette/Digital) Aphotic, total darkness. A place where there is no light. The place where the demonic darkness reveals his strength. Like all Black Mara releases, Aphotic comes in a standard edition, this time in the cassette format, or in a special limited edition CD format, which comes with a hand-made magic book, natural black petroleum, and a black wax candle.
Dark Awake & Regard Extrême – New Album Released
(La Esencia – CD/Digital)
Regard Extrême and Dark Awake has managed to create the ultimate mythological concept split album about Ulysses and his adventures, inspired by the Greek Epic poem Homer’s Odyssey!!! Both bands worked on all tracks together, combining their styles and forces to create this opus. An album with a rare quality and class absolutely essential for any fans of Martial Industrial , Neoclassical, Epic, Ethereal, Dark Ambient etc..
The key parts of the Ulysses story are unraveled in a magnificent way both in terms of feeling and atmosphere.
Dead Melodies – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Dead Melodies is back with his second album on Cryo Chamber, The Foundations of Ruin. Following on from his last album, Legends of the Wood, we return to the isle of mist and dig deeper into the narrative.
“The wrought iron gate creaks open to the overgrown driveway. Up ahead, flickers of lightning make out the hazy silhouette of a large house veiled in a dense fog. Shelter! Finally, somewhere to rest your head after that terrifying ordeal in the wood.
The house, a ruinous crumbling remnant of better days stands lonesome in the unruly grounds; like a keeper bestowed with time itself. An ornate wooden door hangs broken on its hinge, the windows cracked and vines creep wildly from every crevice like tendrils from the netherworld. Something definitely feels wrong here, but with hours till dawn and the relentless storm wailing through the surrounding trees, the will to survive the night defeats all reason to fear this shady forgotten sanctuary.
Stepping inside the once stately ruin, the great hall teems with decay and an age of sedimentary dust covers every surface; any remnants of life that once knew this place are long gone. Doors and stairwells stem off in all directions. With a creaking silence and a deathly stillness consuming the air, you contemplate which way to go. But then, a noise… is someone there? The temperature drops and a familiar chill runs down your spine….”
Recommended for fans of soundtrack like experiences and cinematic dark ambient.
Desiderii Marginis – New Album Released (Digital Only) Vita Arkivet is a mini-album Desiderii Marginis quietly dropped a few months ago. This one, in my opinion is truly amazing and I’ve been meaning to give it more time and a proper review. Highly recommended! I’m hoping to see this beauty land on a vinyl somewhere, the 41 minute length really helps that along.
Dødsmaskin – New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
On their latest album the Norwegian duo pushes some of the hard hitting, mechanically textured aesthetics of their previous release “Fullstendig Brent” to the forefront. A dystopian commentary on the risks inherent to the antagonistic nature of humankind, and how the overwhelming and uncertain scope of Industry 4.0 – of progressively more powerful technology and strong AI – may end up amplifying those risks beyond human control. Given this conceptual framework, Dødsmaskin have aimed to develop a sound palette that shifts between both droning and pulsating brutality that represents unstoppable forces in motion and bleak atmospheres that denote an age of growing futility and – ultimately – self-inflicted extinction. Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio, NY.
Dødsmaskin – New EP Released (Digital Only) This EP is self-released by Dødsmaskin and was available for free in its first week after release. Djevelens Intervall is more in line with their Fullstendig Brent album, harsh dark ambient, this time focused on invoking the devil, through music.
Druhá Smrt – New Album Released (Sombre Soniks – Digital) Egocideum is a composition in three movements, a completely new sound ritual work, but in some sense it is continuing the journey of Transcurrence and Occurrentium albums, the second and third chapters of a first trilogy. After a long time, we were able to find the discipline to delve further, as the evolution of our life-current flowed closer to the source of the spring.
The theme of the latest chapter of the second trilogy is ‘crossing the Abyss’ in terms of magick, or ‘bridging the gap’ in terms of existentialism. We realized this musickal event from the perspective of Druhá Smrt by using our full concentration and intention.
Eagle Stone Collective – Latest Releases (Eagle Stone Collective – Digital Only) Eagle Stone Collective is a net-label out of Albi, France that I have recently begun to follow. Their releases fall more into an ambient americana realm than dark ambient, but the similarities are close enough to warrant coverage here. I am supplying several of their latest releases which you should certainly check out, as they are “name your price” and support if you so choose.
Eidulon – New Album Released (Malignant – CD/Digital)
Following an 11 year absence since his debut, Idolatriae, Eidulon returns a radically different entity. Whereas Idolatriae was haunting and minimal catacomb ambience, Combustioni is otherwise now a daunting, full on apocalyptic industrial, auditory excursion, complete with crushingly ominous brass chords, fearsome horn proclamations, organ, and doom filled atmospherics. Contributions of murderous, gnarled vocals courtesy of Nordvargr and Luca Soi, as well as caustic noise from Italian heavy electronic practitioners Naxal Protocol (ex-Cazzodio) add a powerful element, often cutting through a blaze of swelling tones and pneumatic percussive pummel, the only respite coming in the form of collaborative tracks with Kammarheit and Caul, which sees Eidulon returning to the foggy gloom and bleak isolationism that populated the debut. Collectively, it’s quite the provocative declaration, shattering genre barriers and setting the soundtrack for a world of incinerated cities, global plagues, and nuclear winters.
Eximia – New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Eximia presents us with a sound design and field recording heavy album about an alien invasion. You won’t find many harmonic elements on this album. It instead serves as a backdrop where Dominik has crafted a soundscape that sucks you into it’s atmosphere.
“For centuries people have been looking at the stars, wondering if we are alone in this infinite universe, or if there is someone else out there. Would they be friendly and if not, would we be ready for them?
They came without warning.
Our weapons pointless against these behemoths covered by storm. When I lay my eyes at their divine beauty in all it’s power and destruction, I feel no anger nor sorrow, I feel awe. Our new gods have arrived.”
Harrogat – New Album Released (CD/Digital) Harrogat is a dark ambient artist out of Rome, Italy that I’ve been following for a few years. His music falls on the more active and horror ends of the dark ambient spectrum. Of note, is an appearance from Cryo Chamber veteran Enmarta, whose viola work is always a pleasure.
Hezaliel – New Album Released (Eighth Tower Records – Digital)
“I made him just and right, sufficient to have stood, though free to fall.”
― John Milton, Paradise Lost
Hezaliel is a project from Belgian musician Steve Fabry. It is one of his three. This is his dark ambient endeavor whilst the other two, The Nighstalker and Sercati, are carved of melodic black metal and gothic/dark metal, respectively. Hezaliel explores the darkest territories of Fabry’s inner world, the subtle ultraterrestrial frequencies buried under his personal “paradise lost”.
Inade – New Album Released (Loki-Found – LP/CD/Cassette/Digital)
With the all new album after 9 years, Inade return with another work that indicates a codifying of their sound world full of mysterious design, unspoken secrets and dreams of ancient origin.
The immersive arrangements and haunting voices are supported by crackling electronics painting a dark and earthly picture. Infinite eons have passed through the labyrinthine hierarchy of deep fusing drones, tectonic soundscapes, percussions and ritual instruments – sonically sculpturing that which lies deeper than matter, time and space.
The intriguing tone colour on The Nine Colours Of The Threshold is generally one of heroic majesty, a kind of epic intimacy, with light and sparkling fragments. It is the narrow, hidden tracks that lead back to our lost homeland, what contains the solution to the last mysteries is not the ugly scar that life´s rasp leaves on us, but the fine, almost invisible writing that is engraved on our body.
Inner Vision Laboratory– New Album Released (Winter-Light – CD/Digital)
“The inspiration for this album came from different science-fiction and post-apocalyptic books and movies, but also from the artists’ personal thoughts regarding mankind’s condition.
Relics is a musical illustration for the very distant future, where humanity has failed in its progress and moved to total annihilation. Relics are the only things humanity has left behind. Other higher advanced civilisations will come to visit our now desolate planet to collect these relics; these fading tokens of the past. They come to visit the Museum of Savages, who destroyed their own habitat and rendered their once beautiful planet uninhabitable.”
Leila Abdul-Rauf– New Album Released
(Malignant [CD] & Cloister [LP] – Digital)
The follow-up to Leila Abdul-Rauf’s 2015 highly acclaimed Insomnia album, Diminution sees the San Fransisco Bay Area-based, multi-instrumentalist take a more stripped-down approach to her uniquely haunting and shadowy soundscapes. While retaining a firm grasp on the feeling of urban loneliness and early morning solitude, Diminution’s tracks are generally longer than previous works and feel more spacious and open, where sparse melodies and gentle textural flow meet ethereal choral vocals, distant trumpet, delicate guitar, and luminous, yet melancholy drones and warm tonal drift.
All songs on Diminution were composed, performed, and produced by Leila Abdul-Rauf, mastered by Myles Boisen at Headless Buddha Mastering Lab, and the album is completed with stunning artwork by Matthew Jaffe and layout by Kristoffer Oustad and James Livingston. Diminution is another spellbinding work from Leila for those seeking solace in quiet and introspective music residing just on edge of consciousness.
Lesa Listvy– New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Moscow based quartet Lesa Listvy debuts on Cryo Chamber with Way Home.
On this highly atmospheric release you get a mix of deep analogue drone, dark beats, ethereal walls of sound and subtle field recordings.
“Years ago the beat of the shaman’s drum pulled your tribe out of the motherland. Now as you make your way home everything has changed. The smell of burnt wood linger in the canopy of the forests, clicking machinery reverberate deep within. Trees malformed, technology fused with nature, the prophecy of the shaman was wrong. The ancient land now lies perverted by the swarm, but the tribe is coming home.”
Manifesto– Preorder Now Available (Reverse Alignment – CD/Digital)
Magnus Zetterberg is returning with a new haunting opus of darkest industrial ambient accompanied by Axel Torvenius wonderful art. Hive is a ghastly exhibition into the foul world of humanity. A soundtrack to devastation.
Releases 17 August 2018.
Mater Suspiria Vision – New Album Released (Phantasma Disques – LP/Digital) Not dark ambient, on most of their releases at least, but certainly of interest to dark ambient and horror fans alike, 666 is the latest full length album by this group which covers music and film. After the release of their last two films Phantasmagoria I & II, and a set of musical releases to accompany, Cosmotropia de Xam and Rachel Audrey return with a full length in it’s own right.
Moloch Conspiracy– New Album Released (Eighth Tower – CD/Digital)
“While the companions’ dread was reflected in the stones a way opened. The streaming water formed an ocean that crystallized the light from the incantations and spells of our guide. They discovered the cult that was upsetting the place and that was abandoning itself in despicable rituals from the depths of time”.
A metaphysical journey into a cave. Each track draws a path into an esoteric and mysterious story related to Mesopotamian myths. Cavernous drones alternate with glacial and cinematic passages, enriched by acoustic improvisations. Meditative, darkly elegant, the Moloch Conspiracy work often touches the impalpable consistency of avant garde music.”
Moss Covered Technology– New Album Released (Facture – CD/Digital) His Many Seas is a personal voyage, as the artist’s father was suffering from cancer at the time of the album being written. A well-travelled man, His Many Seas sets sail to quietly conquer and navigate another unexplored, painful continent: the frightening landmass of coming to terms with his father’s illness, steering through the trials of life as well as acting as a dedication to his father’s love of travelling. The illness itself heralded the beginnings of a new journey. Recalling the feel of the Arctic Ocean, His Many Seas thematically revolves around exploration, and the release includes vintage nautical Nories tables, Elisha Kent Kane – Arctic Exploration inserts along with ‘famous explorer’ double side prints.
Hand made book-bound CD covers (1260 g/qm FSC certified), lined inside / outside with luxury Italian paper from Florence, glass mastered CD (not CDR), vintage nautical Nories tables (circa. 1920) resting inside old glassine bags, vintage Elisha Kane Arctic Exploration inserts (circa. 1869), a collection of 9 x double sided A6 ‘Hassan’s Greatest Explorers’ prints, dried flowers. All rests inside luxury hand cut envelopes. Individually numbered / stamped.
MZ.412 – New EP Released (Cold Spring – 10″Vinyl/Digital)
The resurrection of the originators of Black Industrial.
NORDVARGR ᛣ DRAKH ᛣ ULVTHARM
2018 marks the 30th anniversary of MZ. 412. The long-awaited new album Svartmyrkr has been born and will be released later this year on CD and double vinyl.
But first, Ulvens Broder.
The limited edition 10″ Ulvens Broder is taken and adapted from the forthcoming album and features a very special B-side with Tomas from Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio. 412 x white vinyl – 412 x red vinyl – 412 x black vinyl.
IIII I II. Enki be proud!
Paleowolf– New Album Released (Digital Only)
Paleowolf continues the archetypal journey with the new thematic album. Fourth full length release Primal Earth delivers archaic, meditative paleo-ambient, and takes you on an atmospheric journey deeper into the obscure past. Witness the dawn of complex life on Earth – the mysterious and majestic Paleozoic-Mesozoic era. We embark on a voyage through the archaic Devonian seas and immense swampy forests of Carboniferous; across the amphibian Permian landscapes; up to the tropical Triassic, Jurassic and into Cretaceous – the final dominion of titanic reptilian beasts.
The vision you are about to experience is inspired by an ancient era when colossal reptilian beasts, gigantic insects, bizzare marine creatures and immense forests that spread all across the massive supercontinents, reigned this world supreme.
Primal Earth is a unique piece of art, a glimpse into the times before memory. This one-hour long soundscape invites the listener to completely immerse oneself into the fathomless world of ancient archetypes. They say that all that is left of these titans of Old are their remnants in stone and dust… But they are now here. And they live once again.”
光淵 (Pool Of Light) – New Album Released (ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ – CDr/Digital)
Giant slabs of stones moving towards eternity under the bright bottomless sky. Aerial view of the huge valleys covered with snow, which is about to start melting, welcoming new winds and filling with new aromas. It comes and goes, the spiral, the return. What is time for something which is immortal? Only a cycle, the multiplicity of forms, each speaking its own language but every time about same thing…
Rafael Anton Irisarri – New Album Released (Umor Rex – Cassette/Digital)
The NY-based producer returns to Umor Rex with a new album, in which the musical discourse and the physical form of the release have an equal, crucial importance. Sirimiri is made of four long and mid-length pieces, each composed of different perspectives, processes and identities. However, Rafael seeks to blend subjective time with the listening experience. A sort of loop and repetition, sub-sequence-based sound. Following Eno, nothing happens in the same way twice, perception is constantly shifting, nothing stays in one place for long. If The Shameless Years was located between beauty and active tragedy, Sirimiri travels inside the beauty and melancholy of an observing eye, a quiet rebel insurrection. Another substantial difference is the distance from general and globalized concepts; in these unfortunate times, Sirimiri looks for personal sorrows, and places its focus on the particular. Even the names of the songs evoke this in small ways, like in “Sonder”, the feeling of realizing that everyone, even a complete stranger, has a life as complex as one’s own. Sirimiri means ‘drizzle’ in Basque, and we cannot find a better word to describe its content.”
Skeldos – New Album Released (Cassette/Digital) Ilgės is the latest release by Lithuanian ambient artist Skeldos. In his words:
The album was inspired by a poem by the Lithuanian writer Antanas Škėma titled “A Lie”, which talks about the hope that there is something important beyond the desolate routine. Two extended pieces awash in melancholy and longing revolve around a silent question: perhaps that which is crucial is really nearby?
Ilgės was recorded in 2015-2018 using acoustic instruments (accordion, Lithuanian zither, guitar) as primary sound sources, with their imperfect creaks and resonant echoes intended to make the vast sonic horizons sound close.
“Still, what lay behind the hundred twenty fifth door?”
Sphäre Sechs– New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital) It is very interesting to see Sphäre Sechs release their album through Cryo Chamber, as I remember Simon Heath mentioning their previous album being his favorite release of that year. With Malignant Records schedule in hyper-speed for 2018, some of their label staples have over-flowed into other labels, this one finding its way to Cryo Chamber, and Dødsmaskin finding their way to Cyclic Law. I am happy to see a support network in place for situations like this, as fans we will win every time in these scenarios!
Sphäre Sechs is a project of Martin Stürtzer (Phelios) and Christian Stritzel.
Focused on the particle void of space this album reaches beyond the material. Recorded with a multitude of analogue gear this album has a warm saturated atmosphere with cold spacey overtones. If you like floating in cold space in a warm cozy spacesuit, this is your album. Recommended for fans of Space Ambient.
Stephanie Merchak– New Album Released (broken20 – 3″CD/Digital)
Broken20 return with the third in a run of 3” CD releases, Stephanie Merchak’s timely societal commentary cloaked in deep, foreboding drone, The Prospect of our Annihilation.
All four tracks were created using field recordings recorded by Merchak on construction sites in Lebanon. The recordings were processed beyond recognition to depict through sound an apocalyptic future where the earth has become inhospitable. Merchak writes: “This concept piece was inspired by some worldwide alarming news: the Svalbard Global Seed Vault partially flooding after permafrost melted, 1.12 trillion tons of iceberg breaking away from the Larsen C ice shelf and drifting to open waters, an Anthrax outbreak in western Siberia after an unusual heatwave melted permafrost releasing spores, a study by Chris Thomas and his colleagues at the University of Leeds warning that a quarter of land animals and plants may be doomed by 2050 due to global warming…”
She continues: “One of the culprits of climate change is the construction industry, which is one of the biggest sources of emissions and energy consumption. Humans keep building and replacing forests and green spaces with concrete thus endangering hundreds of species, increasing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and contributing to soil erosion. In summary, humans are destroying their home.” As the contemporary activity is extrapolated to an apocalypse in Merchak’s vision, so the field recordings are morphed to their logical conclusion. Hence sonically, the sense of mechanical dread is manifested in lumbering semirhythmic motifs that stagger on- and offstage like drunken actors, playing on unsteady stage-boards of atonal drone. In contrast to the glacial crawl of most dark ambient productions, nothing in ‘The Prospect of our Annihilation’ remains static for long – except the tone and its implied warning. Physical copies will follow on from the format of previous Broken20 3” CDs by Laica and Ordeograph, whereby the inner sleeve is crafted to disrupt its physical limitations, bringing forth further visual interpretations on the source material and its underlying message.”
Sun Through Eyelids– New Album Released
(Black Mara – CD/Cassette/Digital)
Hyperborea, the shards of the star race that reach us from the depths of time. Strength and power, immense energy somewhere far, far away, once much time ago. Hyperborea is in everyone’s heart. Total recall everything. You are a part of this.
Our search for Hyperborea is our desire to return to Paradise, the primordial spring of Human’s original existence. The importance of knowing the terrestrial location of a lost civilization at the northern regions is thus overshadowed by its symbolic relevance.
The Stone Tapes– New Album Released (Hare’s Breath Records – CDr/Digital) The Kingdom of Mercia is first and foremost a cinematic experience. Using a combination of string instruments, synth/drones, piano, saxophone, and spoken word, Matt and Kat Peach create an incredibly interesting and engaging atmosphere. Presented in a luxury “Evidence Bag” packaging. Super Limited Edition – Black vinyl-design CD-R in a brown card button & string sleeve.
Taphephobia– New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
Ghostwood is the new deeply introspective album by Norway’s Taphephobia. Opting for a slightly cleaner sonic palette than previous releases, using less processed sounds, and a more natural sounding approach to his guitar work, Ketil Soraker pushes what is now considered as Taphephobia’s signature sound. In the vein of his previous Cyclic Law release Escape From The Mundane Self, we are submerged in a skillful combination
of lush ambient guitar passages, sonic abstractions and processed flute. Ghostwood is a most personal hymn to experiencing the solace of the northern forest.
Taphephobia & Kave– New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital)
On this special collaboration album, both artists have showcased their unique take on atmospheric soundscapes. A soundtrack to vast, imagined uninhabited landscapes, unexplored and untouched by mankind. We’re given a bleak glimpse into a hidden world, both mentally and physically. The two long monumental tracks induce a calm, ominous and introspective setting, perfectly suited to drift within these envisioned barren lands.
Teahouse Radio– New Album Released (Hypnagoga Press – CD/Digital)
Teahouse Radio is a music project by Pär Boström, also known for his work as Kammarheit, Cities Last Broadcast, Hymnambulae, Altarmang and Bonini Bulga. (Quite the list, and all well worth investigating!)
Her Quiet Garden is the debut album, consisting of songs pieced together sporadically since 2004, and songs recorded in a creative frenzy during a few late summer days in 2016.
An album about summer houses and winter towers, about the changing of weather. How one feeling changes to another. The loss of a loved cat. A real garden becoming an imaginary garden. Depression as a pond. Years of therapy and music as the main counterpoint. About escapism. Psychoses. A giant who walked in and out of the world, decorating it nicely. An aural tale. Half in water, another half in the northern woods. Childhood through nostalgic binoculars. A wardrobe to another place, a gentle knock on the door in the oak tree.
Acoustic instruments are blended with electronic equipment, forming a sombre ambient music of tinkling tape loops and humming pedal drones. Final editing and mastering by Simon Heath. Read our new interview with Pär and Åsa Boström.
Templum N.R. – New Album Released (Aural Hypnox – Cassette)
We are excited to present the new release of the Templum N.R. ‘Memoir of the Recoilers’, c-20.
From outré dimensions the stare of fervent creatures descent. On this album the secret sect of the group has favoured a rather peculiar yet compelling approach. Minimally oscillating textures and immense melodies are accompanied with recited hymns read by previously unheard presence Madame Eternally Nameless. These songs are searching continually through the night, as spells calling to follow through the liquid mirror.
Memoirs of the Recoilers is enclosed inside screen printed cassette covers and comes with an 8-panel booklet. Limited edition of 98 copies.” Buy the album here.
Theologian & The Vomit Arsonist– New Album Released
(Cloister Recordings – Cassette/Digital)
This cassette contains two 30-minute pieces where isolating drones establish an underlying melancholy, while denser passages rise and fall within multiple layers of synth, tape noise, voice, and guitar…
Listeners will find themselves standing entranced within a silent and secluded world, among the most vile and pathetic surroundings.
Theologian– New Album Released (Cloister – Cassette/Digital)
Hot on the heels of The Icy Bleakness of Things, Theologian’s collaboration with The Vomit Arsonist, Cloister Recordings presents Reconcile. Timed to coincide with their live appearance at the DARKNESS DESCENDS festival, this 60-minute cassette (and digital) release contains brand-new material featuring input from Andy Grant (The Vomit Arsonist), Mike McClatchey (Lament Cityscape), Stephen Petrus (Murderous Vision), and Derek Rush (Dream Into Dust). The album was mixed by Mike McClatchey. The word “supergroup” has been jokingly bandied about in reference to this collection of artists, but the final product is indeed a unique composite of industrial sounds, reflecting another step in the evolution of Theologian.
Perhaps most notable is a return to an earlier, less harsh and distorted iteration of the project, with cavernous drones and thunderous percussion creating the sort of dense sonic environments found on the 2010 debut album, The Further I Get From Your Star, The Less Light I Feel On My Face.
Eschewing the long-form drone/ambient tracks of older releases, here we find Theologian attempting to approximate the immediacy and memorability of pop, using rhythm and melody to elicit slightly less sprawling emotional landscapes. The album’s eight tracks are interconnected by brief interludes, serving as touchstones along the journey to the album’s denouement. As the title suggests, Reconcile is ultimately about coming to terms with past versions of oneself, while examining the present and fretting over the future. Reviewed on This Is Darkness.
Ugasanie– New Album Released (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Ugasanie returns with his 5th album on Cryo Chamber. This time exploring the vast landscapes of Antarctica.
The snowstorm builds on the horizon as the ice crackles under your feet. The faint call of someone beyond the blinding blizzard.
A subdued and chilly album in the isolated style that is Ugasanie’s expertise.
Ugasanie & Xerxes the Dark – Preorders Available (Cryo Chamber – CD/Digital)
Ugasanie & Xerxes the Dark team up on this album exploring the darkest depths of the ocean.
The walls croak as you find your balance in the swaying research ship. A week in this storm is enough to make any mans stomach turn, but today you enter the depths of the ocean. You slap some pills into your food hole and climb to deck, the bathyscaphe stands ready. You’re 10 hours deep into the ocean when the power goes out. What the hell is going on up there? The darkness outside is thick, snake-like shadows worm around the vessel. Your trembling hand pushes down on the radio transmitter button, it’s dead.
For lover of deep drone and isolated soundscapes, you want to swim with the leviathan? This is your album.
Umu Tiamat– New Album Released (Noctivagant – CD/Digital)
This recent release on Noctivagant Collective has been catching the ear of more people recently as the album makes a bit of a name for itself, through word of mouth and such. Noctivagant put some extra work into this one, going a bit further than their usual CDr w/ folded card.
Joseph Mlodik of Noctilucant recently spoke in detail about the album on episode 3 of his Vlog ‘The Inner Sanctum’ which we’ve partnered with, here at This Is Darkness. You can see the episode here.
Visions & Phurpa– New Album Released (Cyclic Law – LP/CD/Digital)
Celebrating its 100th release, Cyclic Law presents an exclusive collaboration between label head Frederic Arbour’s long standing project Visions and Russia’s most enigmatic ritual formation, lead by Alexey Tegin, Phurpa. Merging Phurpa’s penetrating organic meditational chants and shamanic percussive elements with the slow-shifting, multi-layered textural drones of Visions, this unique joining of forces resulted in a vastly expansive and time bending opus. Channeled throughout are primordial sonorities to alter ones deeper psyche, a spiritual ascent unifying with the whole, the elemental cosmic life force that transpierces us, to the monad of creation.
You can read our review of the album as well as our interview with Frédéric Arbour, owner of Cyclic Law, and man behind Visions, Havan, Instincts, Skorneg, and Stärker, here.
Vortex– New Album Released (Cyclic Law – CD/Digital) As Gods Fall… celebrates the 10th year of existence for the German ritual cinematic ambient project by Marcus Stiglegger. It is the final part of the mythical trilogy that began with Kali Yuga (2013) and Moloch (2015). Inspired by the Nordic mythology of the Edda, this album revives the realm of the Old Gods in their final conflict. As before this musical reflection on mythology is used as a metaphor for a portrait of the present world out of balance. The tracks were composed after an intense journey to the ancient Viking relics of Scandinavia in 2015. Stiglegger says:
Breathing the air of history I felt ultimately connected to the past and heritage of the old Germanic tribes and their mythology, also understanding what this all means for what happens in the world today. As Gods Fall is a cycle of music invoking forgotten energies and lost wisdom…
For this album Marcus S. joined forces with many guest (including Michael De Victor of While Angels Watch), providing unique instrumental and vocal contributions. From pounding martial rhythms and hypnotic ritual chants via brooding drones to stunning and fragile melodic elements this album captures the essence of what Vortex stands for: ritual music. This release also contains a bonus-disc Helstrom featuring 2 unreleased Vortex tracks as well as remixes by Apoptose, Empusae, Phelios, Visions, Operation Cleansweep and more…
Wound– New Album Released (Cassette/Digital)
Experiments on sound matter – one dream at a time.
There is a weight of the clouds that is often not perceived; a weight on the shoulders and necks of you looking upward, yet inward. The shimmering lights cause a nostalgia flow for when everything seemed possible – a simpler time if only because of not understanding the limits. As the clouds flow, puffy whites, light-blue and pink smears in tandem, you see beyond. You gather your strength. The limits are still there but, under the starry ether, are you still sure you’ve reached them?
Other Sorts of Releases
Artaud 1937 Apocalypse – Letters from Ireland by Antonin Artaud
4th March 2018, marks the 70th anniversary of Antonin Artaud’s death, which means that the copyrights to his literary estate have been lifted.
Infinity Land Press is hereby proud to announce a release of Artaud 1937 Apocalypse – Letters from Ireland by Antonin Artaud, the first English translation for more than fifteen years. The book was translated and edited by Artaud’s biographer, Stephen Barber. You can buy the book here.
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Mortiis – Secrets of my Kingdom: Return to Dimensions Unknown
Created back in the 1990s and originally released in a highly limited edition form, Secrets Of My Kingdom provides an unforgettable insight into the otherworldly creations of dark ambient godfather Mortiis. An utterly unique and compelling collection of writings and illustrations (created by a number of talented artists), it significantly fleshes out the rich universe that is glimpsed within those early musical releases. Considered a legendary tome by fans, the rare original changing hands for literally hundreds of dollars today.
Considerably expanded with 100 pages of new material, this ambitious 240 page large format (30x21cm) hardback book contains the original in its entirety as well as previously unseen text and illustrations, an extensive new interview with Mortiis, plus words from peers, the book’s illustrators, musicians from the growing dungeon synth movement (including Mark Riddick, David Thiérrée, Albert Mudrian, Juha Vuorma, Proscriptor, Balrog, Forgotten Kingdoms, Chaucerian Myth and more). The book can be purchased here.
Zazen Sounds Magazine Issue #3 Again the latest issue of Zazen Sounds Magazine has sold-out within a matter of days. A great printed zine out of Greece, created by Nikolaos Panagopoulos of Shibalba and Acherontas. I highly recommend subscribing to their newsletter if you want to hear about the next issue before they are all gone. Panagopoulos says: “The third issue of Magazine is sold out. Few copies as always can be found in our distributors around.We shall return in Autumn with new plans and releases as we already work on them.Any question can be sent to: Acherontasvp9@gmail.com. At this same email also you can subscribe to our newsletter.”
Father Dagon Podcast: Season 2 Has Begun (3 Episodes Currently Available)
Father Dagon is a serial fiction podcast based on the works of famous weird fiction author, HP Lovecraft. Produced by Dread Falls Theatre, and original soundtrack by Seesar. Season Two airs June 2018, episodes released 1st and 15th of the month. Find us on Twitter @DagonPodcast or www.patreon.com/dreadfallstheatre
Latest Publications on This Is Darkness
Teahouse Radio / Hypnagoga Press – Interview Over the last few years we’ve seen a huge increase in the output of Pär Boström. Once known only for his oldest (main?) project, Kammarheit, Pär Boström has since created a multitude of wonderful albums, always more or less focused on dark ambient, as Cities Last Broadcast, Altarmang, Bonini Bulga, and now his latest project Teahouse Radio. Near the beginning of this recent bloom in releases, he partnered up with his sister, Åsa Boström, to start the publishing house/record label Hypnagoga Press, as well as collaborate on their first release as Hymnambulae. After my previous interview with them in 2016, not long before I started This Is Darkness, I thought it was time to catch up with the siblings and find out from Pär about the new Teahouse Radio album, and to get some general clairvoyance on the label and future releases from Åsa. Read the interview here.
Terence Hannum– All Internal – Book Review All Internal is a quick and enjoyable read. One that you could knock out rather quickly, if the story so engrosses you. I found my playlist of dark ambient awaiting review was the perfect accompaniment to this story, at certain times playing things on one end of the spectrum, but as the story took twists, I was adjusting the music’s themes accordingly. An all around enjoyable experience. I’m definitely hoping Hannum does more future work in this vein!
Read the review here.
Mortiis (Era 1 focused) – Interview Mortiis is hailed by many/most as one of the greatest originators of the now greatly expanding dungeon synth genre. His Era 1 releases considered classics, and highly sought out by the dungeon synth community, as well as by fans of the Cold Meat Industry label, in general, which was home to Mortiis Era 1. With a new round of concerts featuring Era 1 material, a re-issue of his book ‘Secrets of My Kingdom’, and re-issues of all many Era 1 albums, it seemed like a great time to have a conversation with the man behind Mortiis and pick his mind about the new book, his re-emergence within the Era 1 context, the Cold Meat Industry 25th anniversary festival and more!
Read the interview here.
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A highly respected and long-standing journalist in the post-industrial world for over two decades, Richard Stevenson first ran the Spectrum Magazine and later would change name and format to Noise Receptor Journal. Stevenson, as I said, is highly respected in the community and I have gathered a decent bit of my knowledge from the pages of his zines. Also, keep a look out for a Spectrum Compendium, all issues of Spectrum compiled into a single book.
On 16 March 2019 in Sophienkirche Wuppertal, the Phobos Festival will have its tenth event. This year’s line-up looks to be glorious with performances from: Arktau Eos, Circular, TeHOM and Vortex. Martin Stürtzer, the organizer behind Phobos, asked me to mention that the event this year will be held in the old church, not the same place as last year’s event!
The new novella, “Marty Page”, is a body horror romp through a self-imposed dungeon of depravity and sensory excess, written by Martin Bladh. Martin Bladh is a Swedish writer, artist and musician, leader of the post-industrial band IRM, the musical avant-garde unit Skin Area and co-founder of publisher Infinity Land Press. Stapled booklet. 56 pages. 8.5 x 5.5 in. $10 Buy here:
Over the last few years we’ve seen a huge increase in the output of 
All Internal is a quick and enjoyable read. One that you could knock out rather quickly, if the story so engrosses you. I found my playlist of dark ambient awaiting review was the perfect accompaniment to this story, at certain times playing things on one end of the spectrum, but as the story took twists, I was adjusting the music’s themes accordingly. An all around enjoyable experience. I’m definitely hoping Hannum does more future work in this vein!
Mortiis is hailed by many/most as one of the greatest originators of the now greatly expanding dungeon synth genre. His Era 1 releases considered classics, and highly sought out by the dungeon synth community, as well as by fans of the Cold Meat Industry label, in general, which was home to Mortiis Era 1. With a new round of concerts featuring Era 1 material, a re-issue of his book ‘Secrets of My Kingdom’, and re-issues of all many Era 1 albums, it seemed like a great time to have a conversation with the man behind Mortiis and pick his mind about the new book, his re-emergence within the Era 1 context, the Cold Meat Industry 25th anniversary festival and more!
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