Dark Ambient Review: Davidian
Review by Casey Douglass
Davidian is a
dark ambient album from Council of Nine, and it’s an album that is
themed around the twisted and corrupt things that come from the way
cults and mass followings can rob humanity of, well, its humanity.
The album art above is pretty stark in its imagery, a silhouette
watching a church or temple burning in the distance. Sadly, it was
one of only a few images that Davidian gave me.
To qualify that last
sentence... one of the things that I most look for in the dark
ambient that I listen to is the way that it can kick-start my
imagination, the soundscapes prodding and hinting at images and
scenes. Davidian is at the smoother end of the scale of dark
ambient, and while relaxing, and containing a maudlin melancholy at
times, it didn’t really enrapture my mind.
To be sure, there are
some nice textures and touches. The first couple of tracks contain
sounds that seem to hint nicely at some kind of buzzing hive-mind
type activities. Revelator seems to embody a kind of
electronic-surveillance-type aesthetic, and to also evoke a
sunlight-through-dusty-windows-shining-on-a-dead-body feeling. Day 51
also has tones that made me think of a desert hallucination, but one
taking place in the middle of the night. Certain notes and melodies
seem to repeat through different tracks, tying them together into a cohesive whole, which is also something that I can appreciate.
I didn’t dislike
Davidian, I just think that at this particular time, it
probably isn’t for me. Maybe in the future I’ll come back to it
and feel differently, but if I was going to listen to a Council of
Nine album right now, I’d probably go back to the excellent Trinity
as that was an album that really did grab me. Davidian is an
album of tender tones and contemplative struggle, I’d just have
liked it to have a harder bite.
Visit the Davidian
page on Bandcamp, and check out the track Day 51 below:
I was given a review copy of this album.
Album Title:
Davidian
Album Artist:
Council of Nine
Label: Cryo
Chamber
Released: August
13, 2019
