Dark Ambient Review: Nusquam

Review by Casey Douglass

One of my favourite films is Alien. I like it for a number of reasons, but one element that I really enjoy is the duplicity of Ash the synthetic. As if it’s not enough to have to worry about the strange acid-bleeding alien, the crew of the Nostromo also have to contend with a malicious product of human ingenuity too. Nusquam is a dark ambient album from Aegri Somnia, and it delves into the feelings and notions of transhumanism and the interfaces between our technological and biological selves. When I listened to it, it brought about the same kinds of mixed feelings that Ash did in me, especially about how amazing technological advances might lead to evil. Although Ash is a robot that mimics being a human, I’d imagine the ability to create such a robot would be part of the wider tale of transhumanism in general. That’s my thinking at least.

Nusquam creates this same feeling of unease by mixing sounds that you might not think of mixing. Many of the tracks feature rain or dripping water, but also the sounds of machinery that seems to have a life support function: beeping heartbeats and sighing breathing apparatus. I guess it’s the difference between imagining a patient in a state of the art, clean hospital, and one in an underground tunnel with flickering lights above and water pouring down the walls. I must admit it brought out a kind of Frankenstein’s monster notion in my mind, some kind of clandestine, immoral experiment being conducted at the fringe of society and dooming us all.

The opening track Throne encapsulates this feeling nicely. Crackling and signal-sweeps meet dripping water and scraping. A drone fills the soundscape with ominous threat and a sound like a warped dot-matrix printer rises and falls. A little later some beeps can be heard that sound like a heart rate monitor, with snaps and hisses that might just be electricity dancing through newly awakened muscles and synapses. Other tracks create this feeling too, in their own way. I particularly enjoyed the ones that seemed to contain a breathing analogue, maybe rasping hisses or prolonged exhalations that seem to permeate the soundscape.

One of my favourite tracks is Antithesis. It opens in a bassy space, with rustling wind and a kind of “opening out” feeling. A faint heartbeat-like rhythm emerges, and what sounds like deep, tech-assisted breathing, but prolonged and hissing. Later comes a gentle, tickling puttering sound, a little like cockroaches scurrying around. Near the end of the track, a crackling egg-shell type sound can be heard, with a few sounds that just might be swallowing. The images created in my mind by this track were of a new form of technologically enhanced human, wandering the night-time streets of a large metropolis, finding, and dragging off, a sleeping hobo, to delve metal fingers into the unfortunate’s brain.

Many of the tracks caused this kind of imagery to float through my mind, dark and brooding, with the augmented brushing up against the “normal”. A track that stood out as being a little different was Archetype of Fraud. This track felt a little trippy, like someone being caught in a digital house of mirrors, the data and impressions falling past their eyes, feeding into each other in a destructive feedback loop. The sounds seem warped, and have a power-building dynamo aesthetic. Maybe the newly augmented human is stuck in a software error, or maybe its creator is trying to shut it down before it kills again. Who knows? It’s fun to think about though.

Nusquam feels metallic, wet and ominous, and paints an emotive atmosphere that could well be the soundtrack to humans being the creators of their own obsolescence. This is another impression that I really enjoy, and it also gels with my opening thoughts about Alien and the greedy corporation-led technological future it plays out in. It’s a dark ambient album full of clanking metal, data-transmission squeals and biological functioning, and it’s a fantastic, brooding listening experience.

Visit the Nusquam page on Bandcamp for more information. You can also check out Throne below:

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Nusquam

Album Artist: Aegri Somnia

Label: Cryo Chamber

Released: 22 Sept 2020

Dark Music Review – Endtime Psalms

Dark Music Review – Endtime Psalms

Review Written By Casey Douglass

Aegri somnia returns with his long awaited second album on Cryo Chamber. The hum of the Endtime Psalms echo through burnt out buildings. Awaiting impending death as the sky grows dark. Black smoke wheezing from charred windows. We were born from stardust, but are but puppets in a mindless game of DNA manipulation, life. Deep analogue drones rumble under the heavy boots of the human machine. Aegri Somnia plays the role of field recorder and audio manipulator with surgical precision.

The analogue drones of Endtime Psalms really put me in mind of some of the 80s synth-type soundtracks seen in sci-fi or horror movies of that era. While not the same, I must admit to half expecting a sun-glasses wearing leather jacket clad hero chewing a toothpick and squinting into the twilight of sunset to appear. Those images soon left me once I broke into the album proper though, the soundscapes created by Aegri Somnia far darker than any film.

Most of the tracks feature a selection of field-recordings that sit well with the drones, from water-based dripping or waves, to more industrial metal creakings, clankings and scrapings. Some of these effects are toyed with and twisted into something more sinister, distortions and strange echoes creating an immersive narrative, even if you don’t fully know what is happening and can only guess. A good example of this is the very first track C.A.H.R, a track that begins with the gentle sound of water, is met by a textured analogue drone and android scream-like distortions, but ends with what sounds like a pursuit through crunching snow.

The track Endtime Psalms also features some wet field-recording, but I must admit that the wet flapping at the start made my mind think more of a body being skinned for some reason. Maybe that is just me being twisted though. A sacral drone and a deeper counterpoint interplay with static as things thicken. The midpoint of the track features voices, insects and more wetness, before a lighter melody sees the track to its end.

DNA Cult is another track that I particularly enjoyed, its gentle start of static and quiet squeaks soon joined by pleasing tones, but around the midpoint changes into a grinding insect-leg scratching space, furtive scurryings accompanied by a quiet bell tolling and chimes. The track ends with delicate beeps of Morse code, changing slightly into a more buzzing-beep as it ends. I liked DNA Cult for creating the sensation of lightness and darkness, and with the title of the track in mind, the inference of a future-looking immortality project being thwarted by human frailty and evil intentions.

Something else that Endtime Psalms does very well is to toy with the listener’s expectations when it comes to how a track is behaving. A number of tracks feature the building of layers, maybe a drone, other tones and field-recordings, but sometimes, just as one element sounds like it is slowly fading out, it might end even more abruptly than you thought, leaving a void that the other sounds still playing make seem even more powerful. This isn’t glaring or disrupting in any way, just a very clever device for keeping things slightly unpredictable.

Anyone who has read enough of my dark ambient reviews will probably know that I appreciate albums that make quite heavy use field-recordings, so I found myself almost naturally liking Endtime Psalms. The analogue drones were something that I was struggling to find words to describe, they certainly feel like they have a warmth or texture that other drones might lack, and I appreciate their effect on the way the other sounds are received by the listener. The soundscapes created are dark and interesting, and the level of talent that has gone in to making this album certainly shines through. If you like drone-heavy field-recorded dark ambient, this is an album well worth checking out.

Visit the Endtime Psalms page on Bandcamp here for more information, and be sure to check out DNA Cult below.

I was given a free copy of this album to review.

Album Title: Endtime Psalms

Artist: Aegri Somnia

Label: Cryo Chamber

Released: March 7, 2017

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Dark Music Review – Monde Obscure

Written By Casey Douglass

Field recording heavy dark ambient from Croatia. This album is an unsettling tale taking us from the abandon dilapidated high rises where the portals from another world cracks open to leak its black ink into our world. Great attention to detail and layers means this album will be replayed many times before it can all be taken in. Not for the faint of heart.

The above album blurb is certainly accurate, the layers found in Aegri Somnia’s Monde Obscure give the ear a great amount of detail to listen to, and do a fantastic job of conjuring up some strange and twisted mental impressions. Monde Obscure will certainly take your mind on a fantastic journey, each track saturated with strange things and sinister sounds.

The Tracks

Naissance – Footsteps and the squawking of birds backed by a series of sinister drones and beats before being joined by lighter notes and swirls of sound. This track very much hangs from the footsteps, a lone explorer walking through an area that they are ill advised to venture into alone. Near the end of the track, a strange chant resonates, as if the denizens of the place have noticed the intruder and are signalling the creatures within to get ready for lunch.

Esoterique – A gentle chiming mingles with a looming drone filled with the hard edge of metal and magic. A deep chant underpins this, hinting at a ritual setting or place of worship. The dark undertones certainly don’t mark this as a white light praising area. The track swells at the midpoint, a harsh thickly-textured sound covered in grain. This gives way to water splashes and the distant vocalisations of the residents of this dark place.

Les Temps Ont Changé – Chimes and chittering begin this track, a wide-open soundscape filled with flight and movement, the creaking and groaning of ancient machinery far out of sight disturbing the vermin that live here. A rustling sound takes over, other things falling more silent, strange speech bouncing from the walls, melodic yet alien. The track is seen out by haunting piano notes and a low drone.

Noir et Blanc – Wind blowing through eerie tubes provides the backing to trickling water and abbreviated coughs, a vibrating drone and wet splats mingling to finish the effect as voices rise in a chant. The whole track puts me in mind of a church surrounded by the gurgling darkness of Satan's masses. The second part of the track is a quieter affair, gurgles and muted rhythms suggesting the church is now totally covered.

Culture Aveugle – A grainy sound begins this track, accompanied by a metallic beat, the atmosphere thickening as a drone seeps in, escalating notes taking on the aspect of cries and calls from strange creatures. Whispers and water join the fray, hinting at a large space full of judgemental and opinionated souls passing verdict as the listener passes through. A lumbering rumbling sound wades in, the opinionated audience falling silent as something more than a match for their bile imposes itself on the place.

Faux Prophete – The sounds at the start of this track give the impression of a large static-filled TV screen struggling to show any strong sense of picture. Tiny figures climb its sides trying to repair it, the clank of their tools and labour echoing around the abyssal space. A beat starts a little later, accompanied by the sound of what could be crunching bones, if your mind is of a particular persuasion. The sounds of more industry ensues, with wolf-like howling beginning in the distance.

Obscurite Totale – Tinkling chimes and guttural noises start this track, the atmosphere darkening as a drone ripens with higher notes and chanting reverberations interplaying with the sound. Most of these fall silent as more furtive scurrying sounds emerge, insectoid and chitinous, a swelling resonance behind it building into a metamorphosing soundscape. As other tracks, this one enjoys a more relaxed second act, soothing breathing intermingled with clattering chimes setting up a great contrast with the first part of the track before it ends with more chanting.

Vitesse D'évasion – Dripping water and reverberating juddering sounds begin, a high pitched screeching melding into a distant drone. Things fade to a squeaking space full of rustling and distant chiming. A more distinct creaking and clattering begins, distant calls jostling with deeper notes that loom over the soundscape of creature noises.

Sortie – A thrumming drone surrounded by the sounds of hissing steam and metallic clanks. This track gives the impression of what it might be like to enter an airlock and have the various decontamination systems kicking in, scanning you, disinfecting you.

Sortie II – Beeps and mechanical sounds ratchet into the ear, shortly followed by a swelling noise that hints at things about to happen. What sounds like a robotic cry for help dopplers away from the listener, a pregnant space full of dead technology.

Portal I – Whispers and a metallic beating with a high-pitched backing drone creates a soundscape that feels claustrophobic, in so far as being surrounded by people can feel claustrophobic. That is, until it all fades and leaves the listener alone with something coming their way through the darkness.

Portal II – Bat-like chittering vies with a rumbling drone, wet impacts and what sounds like distant thunder competing with strange speech and industry. A rumbling and slightly confusing soundscape that leaves the listener curious at which way to mentally turn. Things turn technological towards the midpoint which gives the listener more questions than it answers.

My Opinion

As I said at the start of this review, Monde Obscure will take your mind into dark places, dipping your brain in vats of unspeakable grime before laying it out in the swamp for the carrion birds to pick over. There were a number of tracks that I would happily apply the label of “Favourite” to, each for their own particular charm.

Culture Aveugle I love because to me, it really did sound like a room full of beings who thought they were so strong and mighty being cowed by the appearance of a true power. A bit like the difference between a murderer finding themselves face to face with Hannibal Lecter.

Faux Prophete just conjured such interesting images to me, technology and animal sounds mingling to create something strange and unsettling.

Obscurite Totale I enjoyed for the space that opened up part way through the track, the breathing and chimes tinkling one of the most peaceful and relaxing soundscapes I have heard for quite some time.

I give Monde Obscure 4.5/5 and think you would be well advised to visit the link below and have a listen for yourself.

Have a look at the Monde Obscure page here on Bandcamp to find out more.

I was given a free copy of the album to review.

Album Title: Monde Obscure

Artist: Aegri Somnia

Label: Cryo Chamber

Written, Produced and Performed: Jurica Santek

Mastering - Simon Heath

Artwork - Crossfading

Released : 19 May 2015

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