Dark Ambient Review: My House Is Full of Faces

Review by Casey Douglass

Sometimes, it’s the most innocuous things that we focus on. Maybe you notice the sound of a blackbird singing in the garden while you are vomiting into the toilet, or maybe someone is insulting you and all you can notice is the dried skin on the side of their nose. It feels surreal, to me anyway. Mutestare’s My House is Full of Faces is a dark, ambient experimental album that, pleasingly, left me feeling the same way.

Mutestare describes the album in his email to me: “It fits into the broadness of the ambient genre but never really settles into it: There's electroacoustic, noise, modern classical and electro influences throughout. The tone is generally surreal and emotionally, it's got something to do with memory, intimacy, sexuality, regret, and the feeling of being bound to a situation that's inescapable. It runs through the path of darkness and recovery and light.” I have to admit that the mention of feeling stuck in a situation is what really spoke to me, as I often feel quite futile about my own life.

Broadly, upon listening to the album, I found a pleasing blend of tones and drones, from plucked guitar strings to fuzzy vibrating low tones, with plenty of warping and echoing for good measure. Certain of the tracks also included field-recorded sounds that helped give the soundscapes a feeling of depth and distance, whether snippets of bird song seemingly caught through an open window, or the more visceral and central use of the sounds of crowds and applause. What all of the tracks seem to share is a dose of the surreal, and it was fun to ponder what was actually happening during each one.

One of my favourite tracks is the opening track Golden Furniture in a Fading Room. It features guitar notes and other twisting and warping tones. There is a squeaky floorboard aesthetic too, with various beeps and crackles creating a charged but heavy atmosphere. Towards the end of the track, there are snatches of voice and birdsong, along with echoing footsteps. This track really did bring to mind the atmosphere in a room, with snatches of outside life wafting in through the open window.

Predicament is also a track that stood out as, once again, it seemed to deftly embody the track title. A low growing drone gets things started, with higher tones becoming apparent at the edges. A faint jitter and whisper-like vibration dances around plucked notes, creating an airy but dark feeling. There are echoes and a metallic clink, and a sudden buffeting feeling. Things get screechy and distorted, like a storm is brewing, and after a while, a male and female voice can be heard. For me, this track felt like two people who live together having a big row, and the anger and calm that ebbs and flows as a consequence. This track seems to contain a whole host of feelings and moods, and this adds a tension that feels like a maelstrom of peace and frenzy.

Another track that I really liked was Faces. It begins with horn-like tones. These are soon joined by the sounds of clapping and whistles. This track feels like the curtain call at the end of some kind of show, but one in which a hint of dark discord begins to grow. After the midpoint of the track, the notes begin to distort into a kind of self parody. There is a topsy-turvy feeling, a low metallic vibration, and a harsher high pitched tone that chimes and warps and makes everything seem to waver. To me, this track had a number of moods, from the way that our self critic berates us when we make mistakes, to the folly of trying to gain approval from other people and how quickly it can be taken away for no reason. The track ends with a pounding beat that merges with the following track, which I will talk about next.

Feels the Same in the Crimson Room creates the soundscape of sitting in a nightclub, the babble of voices, music and the tinkling of glasses. There is a slight warpy feeling and things halt around sudden laughter. There is a distorted mic thump and a feeling of isolation and anxiety that feels similar to the previous track Faces. This track felt like trying to get away from your mental demons by going out and meeting people, only to find, as always, that you can’t get away from yourself or your shitty mental health. I enjoyed the way that this track was a total departure from the others in the way of being a beaty, dancy affair, but one corrupted by a darkness that still keeps it in line with the general tone of the album. A pleasant surprise.

The final track that I wanted to mention was Imp. Twisting, tinny electronic tones rise and fall, soon joined by piano-like notes that feature a bit of a lumping “spang” at the fringes. A high buzz joins a while later, with a higher tone sitting above everything. For me, this was a track of creeping shadows, of sitting in a dark room with the door opened a crack and a narrow dart of light highlighting the bare floorboards. Later, there are scuffing motions and warbling, twisty plucked notes. A flute-like tone also joins the fun. This track felt like a peaceful exploration of numbness, of that nothing feeling where you and the world both feel like nothing, and all there is, is the light cast on the bare wooden floorboards.

My House Is Full of Faces is a dark ambient album that does a fine job of creating moods that sit at the more subtle end of the spectrum. While it might be easier to give audible voice to more clear-cut and extreme emotions, this album nestles languidly in the grey areas, seemingly presenting those moments of pre or post-emotional numbness and despair that are easy to miss when more overt feelings of doom dominate. If you enjoy music that explores feelings of stagnation, ennui and disconnection, you might like to check out My House Is Full of Faces on Bandcamp.

 

I was given a review copy of this album

Album Title: My House Is Full of Faces

Album Artist: Mutestare

Released: 23 March 2025

Witchcraft, Murk and Madness is Out Now

Just over a month ago, I released Witchcraft, Murk and Madness, the 7th music release under my Reality Scruncher dark ambient project. It's themed around idiots provoking ancient powers and meeting a mucky end.

If you like dark ambient, drone, horror music, you can check out Witchcraft, Murk and Madness below or on Bandcamp.

Dark Ambient Review: Internal Winter

Review By Casey Douglass

There’s a pleasing irony in listening to music titled Internal Winter when the sun is shining brightly outside and the air is humid and heavy. Not only does it contrast in the most obvious of ways, but the meaning deepens when you consider how our internal landscapes can be so at odds with the external world. Examples of this might be someone contemplating suicide while smiling in the midst of their own birthday party, or someone else sitting alone on an isolated bench at the coast, happier than they’ve been for months as they watch the grey storm roll in.

G. M. Slater and Rojinski’s Internal Winter is a dark ambient album themed around “five journeys through inner demons, conflict, and turmoil” and is the perfect accompaniment for those moods when the difference between the internal and external is so great that you just want to laugh or cry in astonishment. It’s a dark and ominous album that’s full of thick, brooding soundscapes, with a wind-blasted droning and chiming aesthetic.

I think that the first track, A Blanket of Shadows, is my favourite. It opens with the sound of a gale and what sounds like echoing footsteps. There are wooden creakings and rustlings, punctuated by the occasional shrill whistle of the wind finding small cracks to howl through. Low tones and drones begin to sound at intervals amidst the crackling static of what might be snow on frosted windows. A faint chiming drone sparkles higher in the air, lending a notion of some light to what feels like a dark and decaying scene. The track grows more aggressive as time passes, with various of the tones and wind noises ramping up to create the precarious feeling of a tipping point being flirted with. I would say that the album artwork of the decrepit snow-covered house was designed for this track.

Tunnel of Disillusions is another track that stood out to me, as when I listened to it, I noted down that it felt like a hellish trip to Narnia. It begins with a reverberating chime and soft choral feeling, but soon deepens to create the sensation of being enveloped by a cacophony of whispers and voices. It feels claustrophobic and dark, with sharp-edged tones cutting the air. The insect-like vibrations sit alongside bell-like tolling, and things just seem to go down and down and down. Around the midpoint, things open out again, and I felt like I’d emerged from the tunnel mentioned in the track title. It feels a little like emerging into the farm of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre family, in tone at least. The heartbeat like rhythm and door slamming beat certainly rub nicely against the ahh-like drone floating above them.

Internal Winter is a fun journey into the shifting miseries of the human psyche. All of the tracks felt atmospheric and gritty, with enough elements of softness to prevent them from feeling a little too unrelenting. I felt that the higher drones and chimes lend a notion of looking for help from some higher power, while the lower elements do well to keep the listener mired in the mud and the murk. If you like your dark ambient heavy and questing, you’d do well to check out Internal Winter.

Visit the Internal Winter page on Bandcamp for more information.

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Internal Winter

Album Artist: Slater & Rojinski

Released: March 24, 2023

 Dark Ambient Album: The Abyss Hunts The Noisiest Prey

I just released another album under my Reality Scruncher music project. It's called The Abyss Hunts The Noisiest Prey and is themed around a ritual that destroys the realities in which it is performed. I aimed for the music to reflect that notion, so each track is the audio impression of the event.

Dark Ambient Review: The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack

Review By Casey Douglass

It’s funny how the ghouls and spectres from the non-digital past seem to be all that much more mysterious and sinister for it. The fog of hand-me-down memories and the way that we always think that we know better than our more “simple” or less “enlightened” ancestors creates a strange kind of grittiness to the topic, an almost feral air of interest. For The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack, criptid corraller and myth master Mombi Yuleman has turned his attention to the bouncy and sinister Victorian folklore of Spring-Heeled Jack.

Spring-Heeled Jack was the name that society bestowed on the perpetrator of a number of mysterious attacks in Victorian Britain, his most popularised characteristic being his ability to jump to great heights. He was also apparently of a sinister aspect, and at the time, set imaginations and hearts racing. Mombi’s musical style of bouncy electronic notes and rhythms lends itself so well to this subject matter, and from the very first track, this smoke-laden, industrial slab of British history jiggles and jounces into the listener’s lugs.

The opening track, Hammersmith 1837, does a great job of setting the scene and feel of the album. A bubbling, clock-ticking, bell-like opening produces bouncy notes and melodies, backed by choral swells, organ tones and guitar chugging. For me, this track had “chase music” written all over it, and I had a pleasing mental impression of Victorian London at midnight, pale moonlight illuminating chimney smoke, and the fleeting shadow that happens to be bounding from rooftop to rooftop. The latter half of the track features a kind of whirling, helicopter “whup-ping” sound which greatly aids in this mental image. A fun but also sinister track.

Another track that really stood out for me is Jack be Nimble, Jack be Quick. Sitting at just under three minutes long, it opens with a mechanical, hissing, factory-like environment. Twisting plucked notes and a bulbous deep tone sit in the soundscape alongside a knocking beat and sounds of activity. A ghostly chorus emerges with a squelchy melody, and then, manic laugher backed by what sounds like a hammer hitting an anvil. This is another track that suggested the notion of being chased to me. Maybe Spring-Heeled Jack is trying to evade capture by bounding through an active foundry?

The Devil’s Footprints follows, and begins with a warped clockwork knocking rhythm. It’s a fuzzy track, but one that features a gnat-like melody that really buzzes into your mind. This track had a melancholy or at the least, a more peaceful feel. Maybe this track is depicting the carnage left in Jack’s wake, the common city-dwelling folk waking up and finding bloodstains outside of their homes. A really enjoyable track and a different kind of mood, although that mood does shift slightly as the track approaches its conclusion.

I briefly wanted to mention two more tracks that grabbed me. I enjoyed Exploits at the Astronomical Clock for its “heist movie” feel, particularly when the string-like notes emerge in the latter half. Terrorizing the SS also really comes to mind as a great track that would sit well behind a newspaper headline montage in a movie, the escalating headlines backed by its blend of stabby notes and darting strings. They both have the urgent feeling of “things happening”, which is something that I enjoyed.

The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack struck me in a very “filmic” way, the visual impressions and movie angles that I seem to have pondered only something that I noticed when writing this review. This is to Mombi’s credit of course, and shows why he chose “soundtrack” as one of the tags for this album on Bandcamp. The album is full of fast, bouncy, and often jaunty melodies, but all backed with that twisting, creeping weirdness that Mombi is so good at injecting. As in his previous album Witch-Works, and others, Mombi has brought the Halloween-type spirit to a dark piece of British folklore. If you enjoy forteana with a light-hearted yet sinister aspect, you’d do well to check out The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack.

P.S You might also like to check out Mark Hodder’s Burton and Swinburne series of books, the first of which is called The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack, an excellent steampunk alternate history saga that I read some years ago.

Visit the The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack page on Bandcamp for more information.

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: The Curse of Spring-Heeled Jack

Album Artist: Mombi Yuleman

Released: Feb 3, 2023

Dark Ambient: The First Year of Reality Scruncher

Things often exist without a name, even if that label is created a little later. Before the notion of Reality Scruncher came along, I found myself attempting to create music similar to the artists that I most enjoy, trying to capture that glorious, awe inspiring quality that the dark ambient genre holds.

I enjoyed creating sinister drones. I enjoyed wandering the house with my Zoom H1 in hand, creating my own field recordings to toy with. I enjoyed how a track coalesced into something, that even with my own lack of music creation chops, nevertheless, sounded like what I was hoping for.

My initial tracks ended up on my Soundcloud page and as a handful of videos on my YouTube channel, but not for long. I don’t really rate Soundcloud as a platform, it mainly seemed like “bot-city” to me, and so I deleted my years old account. My YouTube offerings got culled when I left social media in the Summer of 2022, although I did ultimately return to YouTube as it’s the most convenient place to post videos, in my opinion anyway.

A few months later, I got the itch to attempt to merge some of my previously created tracks into an entire dark ambient album and put it up for free on Bandcamp. This turned out to be Deep Space Impingement, a rumbling, droning space-infused album in a minimalist horror style. This is also when I had to create my music project name, concocting Reality Scruncher as a reference to the other realities that I hoped to create and destroy with my music.

I gave out a lot of free Bandcamp codes for Deep Space Impingement, and it also got a good number of free downloads through the “free” button on its Bandcamp page. Dave over at The Dungeon in Deep Space gave it a very kind review, as did some other kind people, and all in all I was very pleased with how it turned out.

Since then, I’ve released four more albums:

The Miasmic Bridge, themed around occult spirit communication and unnerving, looming drones.

Nature Abhors A Personality Vacuum, a brief three track album about a depressed man being swallowed by nature. Yes, I was deeply depressed at the time.

Hell Isn’t Physical, It’s Digital! a collaboration with musician Scott Lawlor, playing with notions of Hell and technology.

Bootleg Virtue Injection, an album with a concept set in the tech-infused future, where a lone hacker finds a way to make the ancient philosophy of Stoicism more accessible to the people who want it.

Very recently, I decided to set my albums to “£1 or more” on Bandcamp, and was pleasantly surprised to make my first couple of sales. I didn’t think it would happen to be honest and still found myself amazed that people even wanted my music for free.

Making dark ambient music has become an enjoyable hobby for me, but as is the case with anything that I start to get into, my mental and physical health slaps it down and makes it hellish for me to move forward.

My OCD picks away at things, my chronic fatigue sees me struggling to sit at the PC for more than 30 minutes, and my depression rolls in with stuff like “What’s the point?” and “The people who listen to your stuff are only being nice”.

Even so, I didn’t expect to be sitting here a year on, with a few albums to my name, a collab and a few pennies from real money sales. So thank you to everyone who has ever listened to my music, even just once. Even if it wasn’t your kind of thing. And if it was and you enjoyed it, even better!

I hope to create more, and I hope to make more progress with the technical side of things too. Time will tell.

Thanks for reading :)

 Dark Ambient Album: Bootleg Virtue Injection

I've released another album under my Reality Scruncher music persona: Bootleg Virtue Injection. It's a droning, synthy, stormy dark ambient album in which I wanted to pay homage to the ancient Greek philosophy of Stoicism. It’s the most compelling philosophy that I’ve ever studied or practised, and it is also one about which we only really know a tiny fraction of what they taught. I wanted to echo this in the way that I framed the album, sitting it in a future where even more has been lost. This is an “eyes closed, headphones on, comfy bed” type album, one in which the tones dance in murkiness and obfuscation, slowly edging towards a clarity and strength as the track progresses.

Description: The year is 2314. Life has devolved into a quantum-tech-infused dictatorship. Knowledge is lost daily, and even though the world appears to sparkle, it’s rotting from the inside out. 

A lone hacker decides not to stand for it. 

Trawling the most illegal avenues of the online world, they comb through the meagre bones of the Stoic philosophy and manage to create a dirty injection patch for their own black-market implants. A hack that aids the mind in uncovering the owner’s buried Virtues, hot-wiring synapses into behavioural inclinations that bring forth the innate Wisdom, Courage, Temperance and Justice that reside deep inside. It works. 

Months later, the hacker creates an audio file that stealthily injects the Stoic code into the most common of hearing-boosting implants, one that more than ninety percent of the world uses. The layers of tone shift and obfuscate, creating twirling cascades that bedazzle the monitoring technology and seduce the listener’s mind. 

For now at least, the security protocols can’t detect the hidden instructions. 

For now at least, willing people have a way to jump-start their path into becoming what they were meant to be. 

Just look for the owl. 

It might be nesting in a hidden frame of your favourite show. It might be an after-image that you can see if a certain dazzling pattern flashes from an advert. It might even be a lone “hoot” whispering in your favourite audiocast. 

Wisdom is watching.

Bootleg Virtue Injection is currently free on Bandcamp, with plenty of codes for people to add it to their library if they like it enough to do so. Thanks for checking it out :).

Dark Ambient Album: Nature Abhors A Personality Vacuum

I've released a new dark ambient album called Nature Abhors A Personality Vacuum. It's currently free on Bandcamp.

My Dark Ambient Album The Miasmic Bridge is Out Now!

I just released my second dark ambient album, The Miasmic Bridge, over on Bandcamp. This one is themed around the occult and is also free. The album description from the Bandcamp page says more:

A perpetually lonely person embraces the occult as a means to open up a whole new realm of connection. 

The endeavour takes years and culminates in three spirit communication sittings, held on three consecutive evenings. 

After the last of these, the person never attempts to reach out to the other side again, as like most connections, not everything that passes in each direction is to be wholly desired, or even trusted. 

Loneliness has its charms. It’s certainly safer most of the time... 

These tracks feature subtle, smooth, soul-scraping drones that sit uneasily at the threshold between the mind and the spirit.

If you decide to check it out, there are free Bandcamp codes on the store page if you'd like to add it to your Bandcamp library. You can also find my previous album, Deep Space Impingement, which is also free and has recently received a very generous review from The Dungeon in Deep Space.

Merry Xmas :)

My Dark Ambient Album Deep Space Impingement is Out Now

Almost one month ago, I collected some of my own dark ambient tracks together into an album and released it on Bandcamp. It's called Deep Space Impingement and I've decided to give myself the artist name of Reality Scruncher. The album is themed around a deep space starship and its descent into weirdness and madness. The full album description is:

A starship journeys far beyond the known, delving into strange twisted distortions of the reality that birthed it. 

Presences watch it. Probe it. Toy with it. The starship can take it. The crew... not so much. 

A droning, rumbling, space-infused album, one created in the hopes of transporting the listener into vast, futile, and malignant soundscapes.

The full album is also up on YouTube and I`ll embed it below if you'd like to check it out that way. If you listen and find yourself liking it, it's currently a free download on Bandcamp. I will also paste some Bandcamp codes at the end of this post if you'd like to add it to your library in a more permanent way. 

Bandcamp codes to redeem at https://realityscruncher.bandcamp.com/yum :

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Dark Ambient Interview: Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse is a dark ambient musician whose music features unnerving atmospheres, spacious claustrophobia, and impressions of murk and horror that provide a soothing escape from the mundane. His YouTube channel has videos with views in the millions, and his music is often used as the backing for creepy story readings and video games.

In the interview below, Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse shares why dark ambient music is an escape for him, and why dark things can exert such a pull. He shares some of the elements of his creative process, such as the tools he uses and the feelings that he is aiming for. He also discusses some of the music that most influenced his own tastes, and how he grew his YouTube channel over the years.

I hope you enjoy reading this interview as much as I enjoyed learning about him.

* * *

Casey: In your 2019 interview with Readersvoice.com, you revealed that you started making music when you were 12, and that you made your first ambient tracks around that time. What do you think drew the young ICA into creating music at that time in your life, which other styles/genres did you experiment with, and what do you think eventually brought you into focussing on the dark ambient genre in recent years?

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: Music was an escape for me. Creating, also, was an escape. With the exception of movies, I've always created my own forms of every media I've enjoyed. When I was young I was very much into visual arts, first, but that went by the wayside when I lost all the comics I collected. Music felt more like a career possibility, too. Also, music was more of an escape for me. I could lay down and listen to it in the dark for hours and just zone out. A more passive experience, you might say.

I think my best memories of being a kid were when I was entirely alone in an empty house, with no responsibilities, and I was just creating or consuming media. I'd say that there's been aspirational quality in my music, in the sense that it's an audible way to access a better reality. Or unreality, rather. I want to make music that sounds like the world I'd rather live in.

I've done a lot of different styles over the years, but I tend to focus on minimal and hypnotic things. Nothing has really felt true to myself but dark ambient, however. Well, harsh noise is something I also enjoy and feel a kinship with, but I'm not really satisfied with the results when I make it. I think it lacks the textural subtleties I want. And, realistically, it's not healthy for me to make anymore, considering I already have a little tinnitus going on.

Casey: Music certainly seems to have therapeutic power, whether helping someone to escape from mundane reality, or a particular issue that is dragging them down. Was there a particular period in your past where you felt that consuming or creating music, whether dark ambient or not, probably saved your life, and if so, is it something you can speak about a little?

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: Music definitely gave me something to do when I really needed distractions. Also, I think having some of kind skill to hone was also useful. There were many times when music provided an oasis of escape. I prefer people hear my music in light of their own interpretation and experiences, so I don't want to get into specifics, but a lot of my sound comes from very dark times. Even better than the distracting aspects, I think making music allowed me to do something with my inner poison rather than just letting it erode my mind. I suspect that's true of a lot of art. It's an escape, a distraction and also a form of sublimation.

Also, a lot of times music has allowed me to deal with negative emotions in a way that gave them a sense of "place" or "context" rather than them being just these jagged, terrible things. A type of self-communication. Many musicians have said things I felt, but more eloquently, and their eloquence gave me more clarity. A good example, to me, is Chris Cornell. I think he has one of the best voices in music and there's so many songs of his that seem to embody my life. It may be overplayed by now, but when I first heard Black Hole Sun around age ten, it was like a religious experience. I think it was the first time I heard a song that made it okay to wish for the destruction of all things, including myself. Socially, it probably had a bad effect on me and increased my desire to be a delinquent, but it felt really good to hear. It was honest. Before I heard stuff like Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Tool, etc. I only heard my mom's religious music, Michael Jackson and Billy Ray Cyrus. And both were way too hopeful for my actual temperament. Hearing Grunge for the first time gave me access to a whole new approach to music.

Later I got more into extreme forms of music, dark ambient being one, but I think the same principle applies. Being able to aesthetically reconcile, and embrace, one's own demise, and the demise of everything, is useful, to say the least.

Casey: I feel the same way about dark ambient music, in the way that it feels true to my own self. I think, for me, it stems from being so afraid of the dark, or the things that might lurk in it, when I was younger. Now, when I hear a dark ambient track that inspires awe with rumbling drones and strange scratches, it feels like I’m immersing myself in the beauty of the thing that used to scare me. A letting go maybe. What feelings or impressions do you most enjoy when listening to dark ambient music, and do you have a dark ambient track or album that you’ve listened to more than any others?

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: I relate to dark ambient and all "horror"-themed media in the same way. I suspect the concept of a "counterphobic attitude" probably describes some of the appeal of art with dark themes. Not all of it, but there's something psychologically satisfying about getting close to the things that frighten, sadden and agonize oneself, but without them being real. Symbolic or abstract things are a way to do this. I would be constantly interested in dark fictional media even while very young while, at the same time, trying desperately to escape the real darkness and threats that were in my life.

Brian Eno's Neroli is the dark ambient piece I've listened to the most. He called it "thinking music," I believe. It's not the most distinguished piece, but it's wickedly effective.

There's a few songs I'd like to mention, also, which will give an insight into how I formed my sound. They are:

Last Ap Roach by Squarepusher.
Wildlife by Penguin Cafe Orchestra.
Flowered Knife Shadows by Harold Budd.

Of these, Flowered Knife Shadows is almost up there with Eno's Neroli. The music of Sunn O))) and Thomas Koner's works like Daikan, Teimo and Permafrost are hugely influential, too. After hearing these works, you can see how nothing I do is very original. It's a recreation of stuff I've most enjoyed.

I'd say dark ambient takes me to a place I'd much rather be. A world without people or things. Just large, empty buildings, barren mountains, gray skies. When I played Doom a lot as a kid, I wish I lived there. I would see the backgrounds and the sky and it was just so much better than anything else. I'd also see artist's depictions of the early earth, before life evolved, and those always seemed much better.

A weird horror writer I like, Thomas Ligotti, spoke of the aesthetics of decay. That's also something I'm very into. Not the decay of organisms, but old buildings decaying, old objects. Moth and rust, corrupting it all. I've had the pleasure of exploring such buildings before and there's always a peaceful, dark sense to them. Same with natural landscapes where there aren't many people. Old photographs, too, are very interesting to me.

In many of my videos, I try to have images that represent what the music sounds like to me. Not all of them, but a lot of the desolate images are very much a visual parallel to the sounds.

If my nausea could handle VR, I'd try to stay in places that looked like that as much as possible.

Casey: Something else that you said in the Readersvoice.com interview is a remark about how you make your dark ambient music, calling it a “very mechanical and unintuitive process”. I really liked your honesty in describing your process in this way, as in the age of social media, it’s so easy to be tempted into embellishing or overcomplicating things in an effort to gain clout, or mystique, or whatever. When you’re exploring and manipulating sounds, how do you know when you’ve found something that feels right, that seems to be what you are looking for, and how often are you surprised by the things that emerge?

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: With my music now, I just polish it until it sounds addictive. When the song sounds like something I could listen to for hours, then I know it's done. It's really as simple as that.

I'm part of the audience when I create, but, for example, when I do visual art, the main goal is to see how distortion changes the feel of an image. In the same way, it's the effects and distortions and blemishes that form the addictive and attractive qualities of the dark ambient. I especially do this with my project, Death on Cassette. With that, I wanted to make something even more personally rewarding. It aligns with my aesthetics even more so than Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse, usually. At least lately. I'm often surprised by what emerges.

To clarify about the unintuitiveness of it, though, I would say it's not at all like playing an instrument, which I see as more intuitive and interactive. In the way I create, it's more like working with images. Taking a single image and juxtaposing it with other images, or decaying and distorting and filtering the image until new qualities are seen in it. It's more detached and cerebral than coming from a place of feeling. It's construction rather than expression.

Casey: What equipment or software do you currently use when creating your dark ambient tracks, what does your creative workflow tend to look like, and how do you deal with things such as motivation, energy management etc.?

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: I use FL Studio, Ambient Grains, Ambient by Audio Bulb and Audacity, primarily. The workflow is always the same:

1. Start with a simple motif. Could be a drone, or a bit of noise. Something that sounds good.

2. Slowly add in other sounds that complement it, or distort it through effects.

3. Keep doing this until the desired result is achieved.

It really is not complicated. I have done much more complicated music before and this is nowhere near as involved.

Motivation is never a problem. I monitor my mental states, constantly. If I feel like it's time to make music, and I have time, then I make it. It's a compulsion. I have to create things. I'll stop when I'm dead. I may not do music forever, but I'll be doing something. I think if people find trouble being motivated to create art (of any kind), they're probably not cut out for it.

Saying that, a lack of motivation may come from someone not being really clear to themselves about what they want. There's a difference between thinking you want something and really wanting it. If the sounds are compelling, I'll be motivated to make more of them. Even though I can technically do more complex and "normal" stuff, I just don't feel the need or interest.

Energy management is harder to deal with, though. I tend to be lethargic or irritated a lot of the time. I don't have nearly as much energy as I'd like. So, when I feel like I have the energy to do something, I always do it. I don't know when I'll get another chance.

Casey: Your YouTube channel currently gains around 300,000 views and 1,000 subs per month, and certain of your videos sit at over one million total views. Have you made use of any particular strategies for growing your channel, and what do you think about the general appetite for dark ambient out in the big wide world? I ask this second part as someone who finds it incredibly rare to meet someone who has even heard of the genre.

Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse: When it comes to growing a channel, the best strategy I've employed is make a video that a lot of people will click on. It's an algorithm game, really. YouTube controls your reach. That's just a fact. So, you have to play their game. There's no getting around it. Something simple and direct like "Nuclear Winter" did great. Simple and direct usually does, so long as the image is good. I don't do it with every video, but it's helpful.

That all said, growing a channel is a very slow process. G. M. Danielson made a video about me very early on and I immediately started getting more views. I'm eternally grateful to him for that. Other narrators like Lets Read also used my audio early on. I advertised that narrators could use my sounds in their videos, royalty free, and that definitely helped my work spread. I think a lot of artists start out asking for too much money and being too controlling of their work. I like Creepy Pastas and audio narration things, so it's just cool to me that I can be a part of that. But even beyond that, it's a smart move to get one's name out there.

As far as the general appetite for dark ambient, I don't know what I think, really. It might get more popular. It might get less popular. It's really hard to say. I think, though, that ambient music in general is becoming more popular. Even "lo fi beats for study" is technically used as a form of ambient music, in the sense that Brian Eno defined "ambient". YouTube makes it easier. So, while the interest in "dark" ambient may have an ebb and flow over time, I think ambient music in general is here to stay. Or, rather, people will be using instrumental music in more ambient ways. It will become more common as a way to enhance other activities.

* * *

Thanks very much to Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse for taking the time to answer my questions.

You can find the dark ambient of Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse and his other project Death on Cassette on Bandcamp:

https://ironcthulhuapocalypse.bandcamp.com/

https://deathoncassette.bandcamp.com/

On YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/c/IronCthulhuApocalypse/featured

And also by searching on platforms such as Spotify, iTunes, Amazon and Google Play.

You can also read my review of one of his Death on Cassette releases: The Dead Dreamer Tapes.

Dark Ambient Review: Black Stage of Night

Dark Ambient Review: Black Stage of Night

Review by Casey Douglass

The Victorian era always seems to be such a rich vein for media that likes to draw on the dark side of life. From the opium dens and the diseases that dogged the huddled masses, to the dabbling with the occult and emerging sciences, there are plenty of places to look for darkness. Black Stage of Night is a dark ambient album that hits a rich vein in this regard, and whether that vein is found by a sad soul in a mine with a pickaxe or by the prick of a needle, it doesn’t matter. Black Stage of Night is dark and twisted, and is a fantastic album.

Dark and twisted though it maybe, there is a gentle melancholia to many of the sounds and tones, from delicate piano notes and acoustic tones, to a hissing static and warping notes. It very much comes across as an album of the night, the time of the day when the shadows deepen and the world feels more closed in, the universe ending at the reflection in your window panes. It’s very easy to imagine a Victorian lady or gentleman standing vigil at a window, the light from their lantern hindering their view as they struggle to peer past their own reflection.

Chaos Unmade is my favourite track by quite some distance. It opens with a repeating rhythm that put me in mind of the arrangement you might find in some kind of warped country music. It wouldn't be a song about cattle wrangling or unrequited love though, this one would more likely be about a skeleton on a horse trying to capture errant ghosts in a misty, moonlit valley. A tone rises and falls with this repeating rhythm, later joined by a more trilling, whistling sound. Things quieten near the end of the track, with it ending with a staticy looping sound, maybe hinting that the skeleton horse-rider has disappeared over the hill.

The Great Order of Things is another track that stood out for me. It opens with a howl-like sound and a deep stuttering tone that pulses into life every now and then. An “Ahhh-like” vocal meets the howls as the track progresses, lending the track a church-like feeling. This track could be about another misty, moonlit valley, but this one has a dark church at its centre, with people huddled inside praying for the wraiths outside to go away. The howls become more cat-like in the last third of the track, which to me, made me think of someone on an opium high, sitting near a flickering fire and being woken from their reverie by the family cat wanting to go outside.

The other two tracks I’ll mention are the first and the last: Mind Turns to Night and Night Becomes Morning. They are great bookends for the other tracks as the first seems to deepen as it continues, while the latter lightens. This felt very fitting for two tracks that could be the soundtrack for the fading daylight at night’s approach and the lightening effect of the sun rising the next morning. Almost like an hypnotic induction and a “Wake up” call, they smooth the way from, and back to, reality.

Black Stage of Night is a ghostly dark ambient album, the cobwebs and coal-smoke of another age mingling with the mind that is looking back at the past. For me, brings up all manner of Victorian aesthetics, the one thing they all have in common being the way that they are tinged with the lust for things to be different to how they are, whether that be by dream or occult means, wishful thinking or prayer. Atrium Carceri and Cities Last Broadcast came together to make Black Stage of Night the welcoming, dark thing that it manages to be, and if it is based in the world of dreams, I’d be eager to see what the nightmares that come after may contain.

Visit the Black Stage of Night page on Bandcamp, and check out the track Mind Turns to Night below:

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Black Stage of Night

Album Artist: Atrium Carceri & Cities Last Broadcast

Label: Cryo Chamber

Released: October 22, 2019

Dark Ambient Review: Beringia

Dark Ambient Review: Beringia

Review by Casey Douglass

I’m often up for music that takes me on a bit of a journey. Whether explicitly with characters actually delivering dialogue, or more subtly, it’s a nice feeling to open your eyes again and feel you’ve gone from “there” to “here” in the hour or so you’ve been listening. Creation VI’s Beringia is a dark ambient album that falls into the latter category, a shamanic-styled journey of drones, rattles and drumbeats, that lull the mind and lead it into potent spaces.

The soundscapes on Beringia are textured and often rhythmic, with piping and clacking going hand in hand with anything from field-recordings of water to the twang of a jaw harp. That’s not even mentioning the drones and didgeridoo. The tracks carry themselves along in their own rhythm, the main drone or beat gaining flourishes or extra detail sounds around it but largely following a rhythmic, trance-like predictability.

I think my favourite track is Haunted Shore, a soundscape that really brought to mind a dripping, misty shore, with the sound of muted things knocking in the distance and a strange little repeating tone that seemed to hint at the unease of the location. It also features a sound that I liken to “insect gloop” and the kind of rain that sounds like it is hitting a plastic bag. A drone rises at the midpoint that lends the whole thing an added feeling of menace or threat, a bassy beat fleshing out the edges.

I did really enjoy the final track, Conversation of Elements too, another track that opens with the sound of water, but languidly builds up to feed the listener gusts of wind and later, the crackle of fire. There are rattling wooden wind chimes, exhalations and sounds of snuffly activity, that might just hint at being underground at one point. I guess that’s all of the usual elements covered, earth, wind, fire, air and water. If you include spirit in the mix, that would be the people making the journey, in my humble opinion. Or the listener, if you want to get a bit meta about it.

In Beringia, Creation VI has made another fine album, one that uses rhythm and shamanic/tribal sounds to create a space that is a refuge from the mundane world. Gone are the annoying chimes of social media notifications and outrage-fueled news. They get smothered and muffled by the warming drones, energised drum rhythms and insect-like buzzes that remind the listener of the more primal parts of the human psyche.

Visit the Beringia page on Bandcamp, and check out the track Haunted Shore below:

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Beringia

Album Artist: Creation VI

Label: Cryo Chamber

Released: September 17, 2019

Dark Music Review – Liminality

Review Written by Casey Douglass

This is my third album, sort of an conceptual album. I tried to give a sense of place to places you might never visit or scenarios you might never want to go through. I appreciate all of your support. Please enjoy!

As the album description above says, Liminality is the third album that I've reviewed from dark ambient artist Ager Sonus, following on the heels of the excellent Shortwave and Interdimensional, my reviews of both you can read by clicking the album titles. I did hear a snatch of the Metro track from Liminality when it was posted on Twitter so I am pleased to see that it made it onto this album, as I thought it was very good indeed. It seems I have strayed into reviewing the tracks before I even meant to so I guess I should just get on with it!

The Tracks:
 

The Monastery – The first track on the album gets things off to an atmospheric start. It begins with the sound of wind and rain but with an underlying vibration that is soon joined by swells of notes and chimes. Chanting comes later and later still, rasping sighs and cries. The Monastery is a great example of a potentially peaceful soundscape being the false face of something far more sinister.

Lunar Outpost – This next track begins very softly, wafting tones and water droplets creating a lovely spacious soundscape for the listener’s mind to decompress inside. I felt the the voice-like sounds, drones and echoes all served a great purpose and created a real sense of being on some kind of lunar outpost, far away from help, with only ghosts and memories as your friends.

Foggy Resort Town – A deep watery drone gurgles up into the listener’s ear, a breathy exhalation joining it that moves from ear to ear. If you have ever walked in a fog and had the impression that someone was nearby, but you just couldn’t see them, this track will conjure that feeling quite nicely. Things turn decidedly metallic as the track progresses, giving more the impression of a foggy junk-yard than a seaside town.

Metro – Now we get to the aforementioned Metro and I will say right now that I think it is my favourite track on the album. What begins with the listener surrounded by the babbling voices of a crowd, the clanks and rattles of turnstiles and clinking of coins, soon turns into a tunnel exploration nightmare of echoes and strange noises. I half wondered if the protagonist of the track might be someone suddenly taken over by an external influence and only awakening when it is too late, already lost in the dark of the eerie tunnels. I think I also clicked with Metro as it triggered some pleasing memories of playing the video-game Metro 2033, it and its sequel being two of my favourite games in recent years.

Capsized – This track gave me the impression of a hapless soul coming up for air in an underwater cave, complete with slithering things and ominous distant sounds. It certainly felt like somewhere that you wouldn’t want to hang around in too long.

Pripyat – Titled after the ghost town of Pripyat, of Chernobyl disaster fame, this track is full of grain and shuffling, electrical notes and tinkling clatterings. It is a very atmospheric and eerie place to mentally roam, distant cries and slams, crying babies and sirens going off. Echoing metal bangings carve out a beat in the desolation as the main melody begins too. A great track.

Cave Of Crystals – An ominous wind seems to blow outside, a resonance hanging in the air as water drips in the recesses of a dark space. A quiet melody begins, simple but growing more complex as the air currents swirl and taste the listener. The wind noise fades and a looming bass note pulses beneath everything. The melody stops and gives way to a more furious swirl of wind, a sinister banging and resonance rises, hinting at energies awakened. Harsher electronic notes stretch from ear to ear as the track enters its last third or so, soon joined by human cries of alarm. This cave begins to seem like the last place anyone would want to stay.

Meadow – Gentle evening sounds start this track, crickets and wind setting the scene. The wind begins to seem a little strong after a few moments, giving a sense of threat to the soundscape. An ethereal sound swells up and down, bringing to mind what it might be like to be sat near a meadow that an alien craft decides to land in. The rest of the track builds on this impression, the wet plopping sounds and creature calls sound stranger and stranger as a thrumming hum vibrates the scene, piano notes joining shortly thereafter.

Extra Tracks if bought through Baboom:

If you purchase Liminality on music site Baboom, you will get two bonus tracks to add to the already generous eight on the regular album. I give my thoughts on these below:

Unearthed – An undulating sound is soon joined by a kind of bell-tolling, the sounds pulsing in a pleasing fashion. A deeper noise joins them as things swell into what sounds like a string-based ominous soundscape, the odd scraping and footfall joined by insect-like chitterings. The strings come out very strongly as the track approaches the midpoint, their notes hanging in the air as other movements happen around them. The last third of the track falls quiet to plucked strings and a deep drone before reaching a haunting choral crescendo.

Beyond – A busy, insect-like noise looms near at the start of this track, a little like the listener pushing through some kind of bead curtain and emerging somewhere new. A ringing note oscillates around everything, a light hearted soundscape that isn’t as dark as the tracks that preceded it. Until something sputters into life, a thing that sounds like a Transformer trying to emerge from a dark cave. Things go quiet with a dark and brooding beat, swirls of activity dancing around the echoes. This is joined by strings later in an echoing electrical melody. A bit of a mixed feel to this track, unless it was just me and how I listened to it, a good listen none the less.

Thoughts

Liminality is another fine dark ambient album from Ager Sonus. In a broader sense, it’s great to see how his sound has progressed from his earlier compositions, the crisp sounding Interdimensional, moving on to the intriguing Shortwave and now onto Liminality.

In Liminality, we have a collection of tracks that for the most part, all start out in a disarmingly pleasant way and yet by the end, most of them have twisted into something a great deal darker and more grimy. Each track is also a great piece of audio tourism, whisking the listener from one location to another after the dying notes of each track have faded.

I give Liminality 4.5/5.

Visit the Liminality page on bandcamp here or Baboom here for more information and prices.

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

Album Title: Liminality

Album Artist: Ager Sonus

Release Date: 30 September 2015

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