Dark Music Review – Book of the Black Earth
Review Written By Casey Douglass
The old leather bound book smells of crusted honey. Flecks of dust and dried parchment rain from it's interior as you open it. Ancient hieroglyphs and diagrams point the way to the obsidian gate.
A year later you walk through long forgotten caverns with lantern lit. You've finally found the underground lake. A tired face stares back at you from it's reflection. The air tastes sweet down here and in the distance flutes echo of a buried civilization. The feeling of dread washes over you. This is your last chance to get her back from the underworld.
Dark bass drone rumbles in the caverns under long forgotten cities. Ager Sonus has succeeded in creating an Egyptian backdrop that is accentuated with flutes and atmospheric layering. Occult and ethereal, this album is for lovers of Necromancy and the unexplored ruins beneath the sands of Egypt.
An Ager Sonus album
(also known in the world as Thomas Langewehr) was one of the
very first dark ambient albums that I reviewed that wasn’t from an
artist on the Cryo Chamber label. Now, a good few years later, I am
really happy to see that Thomas has joined one of the best known and
respected dark ambient labels out there. I know that he has wanted to
make an Egyptian themed album for some time as well, so the fact that
it's his first Cryo Chamber released album just adds a cherry to the
icing on the cake. Hang on, this is dark ambient, so maybe it should
be that it added the field-recording to the drone on the soundscape.
Dodgy jokes aside, lets get on with the review.
Book of the Black
Earth is a dark ambient album that makes tremendous use of the
ideas that an Egyptian backdrop would bring to mind. Wind blows hot
clouds of hissing grit against old ruins, animals howl, and when
there is a lull in the soundscape, it becomes something steamy and
pregnant with echoes and strange rustlings. Opening track Through the
Desert is typical of this sandblasted vista, with the added
ingredient of some flute notes. This sets up a pleasing balance
between the harshness of the environment, versus the mellow music
notes. A bit like someone saying “Yes it’s harsh out here but it
can also be beautiful!”
Second track The Dead
City is an example of the other style of soundscape. The Dead City
has an echoing shimmer to it, for want of a better description. A
little like a lone adventurer finding an abandoned desert city at
night, but a city in which every surface has baked for so long in the
hot sun, that they give off a kind of anti-heat, a voidal coating of
darkness marked by the absence of the light that birthed it.
Discoveries is up next,
another soundscape in which uneasy movements jostle against the
listener, the sounds of searching, flapping paper and other raps and
tappings setting the scene with the suggestion of movement and
secrets being unearthed. I had the mental impression of someone
pulling back a curtain and revealing the true form of the wizard from
the Wizard of Oz in some strange, half-linked way.
The next track is
probably my favourite on the album, Inner Sanctum. Beginning with the
sound of a gong, it soon evolves into a wind brushed environment with
animal howls and an introspective air of abyssal meditation, a
sanctuary against the light in some ways, as it made me feel like I was deep in
the guts of an old temple. Add in a dose of some chanting and strange
guttural sounds, and I felt it was one of the darkest soundscapes of
the album. One element that didn’t really chime with me were the
piano notes that came later in the track, if only for the reason that
I had been enjoying the darkness, and they added a slightly
unwelcome higher energy to things. A personal taste thing though to
be sure.
Osriris’s Courtroom
next, another echoing soundscape punctuated by metallic shrills and
vibrating tones that hint at dead eyed statues and ornate gold
detailing at war with the dust, and also at war with the latest
intruder to their space. Layers of tradition rubbing against the era
that came after, causing a friction that sets the air to tingling
against the skin.
Apophis is the
penultimate track, and the flavour of this one is very much deep bass
throbbing and lots of interesting detail sounds like bubbling,
tapping and rubble falling. Around the midpoint, things shift to hint at
presences that grow and phase in and out around the listener, a
feeling of movement, threat and fragility all rolled into one.
The final track is Awakening, a 12 minute piece that is quite quiet and introspective. Whispers and a fast flapping rhythm are joined by insect-like effects, creaking and instrumental notes. A fitting track to see the album to its conclusion.
Book of the Black
Earth is a fine dark ambient album, one that takes the listener
from sun to shade, from scorched to chilled, and from open horizons
to sealed chambers. It gets a big thumbs up from me, even though
I must admit that Egyptian themed media doesn’t often appeal to me.
If you enjoy your dark ambient, your Egyptian lore, or even both, be
sure to check out Book of the Black Earth.
Visit the Book of the
Black Earth page on Bandcamp here for more information, and be
sure to check out Discoveries below.
I was given a free
copy of this album to review.
Album Title:
Book of the Black Earth
Artist: Ager
Sonus
Label: Cryo
Chamber
Released:
May 30, 2017
