Dark Review – Call of the North

Written By Casey Douglass

Well it’s almost Xmas again, and with that realisation comes the battle against the consumerist soul and the frigid cold. Ugasanie’s Call of the North is set somewhere even colder but with thankfully fewer people around. Could this be just the dark ambient album to listen to after being out with the masses staring at fake snow and shiny baubles? Read on to find out.

Ugasanie known for his freezing desolate soundscapes is back with a new album taking us even further north to explore the concept of the unusual and mysterious phenomenon known as Arctic hysteria (also known as menerik and the call of the North Star). It manifests itself only in the polar night, and only when the northern lights shine. Man, as if under hypnosis journeys north. In this state of trance he is almost impossible to stop, he becomes aggressive, sings a song, mumbles, experiences hallucinations and persistently continues towards the polar star. It is not uncommon that these people end up freezing or starving to death.

In track 5 the voice belongs to an old yakutish man. The recording was made during an attack of polar hysteria. This field recording was recorded in a Yakutia group of researchers led by Eduard Alekseev in the 60s.

I think the above has to be one of the most intriguing album blurbs I’ve ever read. Arctic hysteria sounds brutal and rings true with so much of H.P Lovecraft's Arctic based fiction, even if in those, the madness seems to be caused by horror or elder gods rather than the North Star. Let’s take a look at the tracks.

The Tracks:

Without the Sun

A low drone builds into a blustery rumbling soundscape with the tinkling of chimes mingling with an eerie horn calling or signalling some event or warning.

Pulsation

This track seeps into motion, its low drone punctuated by strange distant noises and movements that linger on the edge of your awareness as the main tone emerges and the background deepens. Haunting. Some strange undulating sounds towards the end sound human.

Aurora

Light and dancing, this track meanders and undulates bringing to mind the shifting hues of the Aurora Borealis very nicely. Stray piano notes give the rumbling that then ensues a great contrast. This sounds sci-fi and majestic.

Call of the North

This is another seeming “sci-fi” track, it conjured images to me of a large spacecraft coming in to land or hover directly over my head, the lone siren/alarm noise hinting at danger and energy manipulations rending the air and blasting snow hundreds of feet up and away in a maelstrom of noise and vibration. The rest of the track made me feel like I was watching the landed craft and waiting for something to emerge.

Arctic Hysteria

This track is the one mentioned in the album description above, featuring the intonation of a Yakutish man. It is certainly a strange sound, even more so when the sound of dogs barking mingles with it. Is the man summoning something that the dogs do not like or fear? Or do they just sense his lapse into polar hysteria? The rest of the track feels like a response to his calls, movements and shiftings in the aether.

In the Waves of Light

Melancholy and sad, the stray notes fall into rushing movements that tinge everything with their own chiming seeking. Calls and vocals seem to sound from the midpoint of this track, answered by who knows what at the edge of consciousness.

Freezing

A gentle clattering starts this track, like an old generator on its last legs heard through the muffling wall of a log cabin, the last flickering sputters plunging everything into darkness save for the dancing flames of the fireplace that seem to die inches from the hearth. An otherworldly horn sounds as the atmosphere thickens with ice particles and stasis. Even though not the last track, it feels like an ending has happened.

Cold Wasteland

With the last impressions in mind, this track feels like a landscape without a viewer, or a conversation without people. Nature, forces and chaos in balance with eerie and light melodies that paint a picture of indifference to the listener.

Thoughts

Call of the North is another “smooth” dark ambient album, in so far as it’s not jarring as others can often be. This makes it ideal to chill-out to or to switch on when the snow is falling outside.

I enjoyed listening to it and felt that every track conjured up the feeling of cold and madness that was so ably described by its description. I particularly enjoyed the tracks that featured distant horns, and Arctic Hysteria which featured the man suffering from polar hysteria.

This album has come at an opportune time and meets the time of year with an icy handshake and a threat in its eye. If Xmas leaves you feeling bleak and exhausted, lower the lights and put Call of the North on as the wind molests the leaves outside.

I give Call of the North 4/5. Much like my Tomb of Empires review, I very much enjoyed it but my perfect dark ambient albums are less smooth and more sinister. Great none the less though.

Check out Cryo Chamber here to view more information and purchasing options.

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

Album Title: Call of the North

Artist: Ugasanie

Written, produced and performed: Pavel Malyshkin

Artwork and Mastering : Simon Heath

Label : Cryo Chamber

Released : 9th December 2014

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Dark Feature - Why Alien: Isolation Gets It Right

Even though I use the Dark Review icon above, the link on this page actually goes to a feature. I'm a cad I know! Alien: Isolation has been my game of the year, game of recent years even and I just wanted to write something that expresses my pleasure at finally having a good alien game to play. It also helped that I predicted what would make a great alien game at the beginning of last year before Aliens: Colonial Marines came out. The less said about that game the better. Anyway, click the link here to read my Alien: Isolation feature on Geek Syndicate.

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Living In Others’ Heads

By Casey Douglass

Writing requires the ability to get inside the head of a character, to see their thought processes and motivations unfolding, their synapses firing and their senses collating. What can be useful in character creation is far less useful in the real world, as it just boils down to guesswork. I’m not saying empathy can’t be useful of course, but itself is just using your own mind to try to understand another’s feelings/situation, hopefully based on some decent facts.

It’s an easy trap to fall into, thinking that we know what someone else is really thinking or why they have done a particular thing. Sure, we can guess, but the danger comes when we forget that we are guessing. How many times have we not asked the cutie out because we fill our mind with thoughts of “He/she isn’t interested” or “I bet they are in a relationship” or others that flow from ear to ear in a self-defeating loop of misery. At other times, we might think we know what unknown individuals will think about our latest creative endeavour: “Nobody will like it!” or “People just aren’t interested in what I create!” being two of my own personal favourites.

Viewing the world this way seems to avoid a dose of pain or uncertainty. If you never ask the person out or actually release your creation to the world, you avoid a whole host of possible unpleasantness: rejection, embarrassment, criticism and other uncomfortable states. It makes the world seem safer and more predictable, and also seems to give you the illusion of control, even though in actual fact you are losing some.

How so? By letting your fear of others’ opinions dictate what you do, you are handing over any control you might have to an external factor. If these thoughts stop you doing something that, when first thought of, delighted you, you have quenched your candle of inspiration with the gloopy mud of despair. Can you hear it sizzle? Before long, it might not kindle itself at all, I mean, why bother!

I think all we can do in this situation is to try to bring a measure of mindfulness to how we perceive others. If you at least know that you are stacking things against yourself in this manner, you are better placed to account for those feelings and thoughts without being blindly swept along by them. You might not be able to adjust your course straight away but repeated awareness will eventually help you see how predictable your own mind can be. Once it loses the power to effortlessly drag you down, you gain some of that power yourself.

I have struggled with this mindset for many many years and I can only imagine how things might be now if I was less in awe of my doubts and more “Let’s have a go!” in my actions. I try to push the envelope when I can, doing things that I feel are risky creatively or are outside my comfort zone socially, and just try to see the world for what it is: full of people with a variety of views and opinions, that I have no right to project my own thoughts onto as if they were theirs. Unless you are a character in one of my stories...if that is the case, you are all mine have enough to worry about already!

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Lack Friday

No, the title isn’t a typo, it’s deliberate. We are now at Sunday and the news is still full of people who just couldn’t rise above and see what a crock Black Friday is. This isn’t aimed at normal, regular people with their heads screwed on properly, this is aimed at the greedy fuckers who practically assault people just to get their hands on a piece of crap that will lose all meaning to them in a few months’ time.

This used to be a purely American thing, but now it is increasingly hyped up in the UK too. But of course, we must all bow at the altar of consumerism or where would society be? Keep the sheeple happy with shiny baubles and glossy gadgets and they won’t notice how shit everything else is.

All of the build-up, all of the hype is designed to create such a feeling of lack (ahah!) that some can’t seem to bare it and just slide back a few notches on the old evolutionary scale. Did they have Black Friday back in caveman times? 80% off a new animal cloak? Free spit-shampoo with every purchase? Maybe people were just too busy with the little old issue of survival.

Now Cyber Monday looms, the day where websites cream themselves trying to recreate the thrill of Black Friday but in a virtual form. You just end up trading physical blows and cold weather for artificial count-down timers and hitting the refresh button of your browser. That’s if the websites even stay up long enough under the load. Lab-rats pushing little buttons to make a treat slide into their cage come to mind.

If you are simply looking for something that you have wanted for awhile at a bargain price, I do wish you luck. If you are just being carried along by the capitalist myth of buying happiness, you deserve everything you get.

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Dark Review – Outer Tehom

Review of Outer Tehom

Written by Casey Douglass

From the Ukraine's Oleg Puzan comes this thick drone album of darkest black, every track a perfect 13 minute summoning of elder gods forgotten in time.

I liked the concept of Outer Tehom as soon as I read the above blurb. All 4 tracks are 13 minutes exactly and anything that claims to evoke images of elder gods being summoned gets an instant thumbs up from me. Anyway, to the tracks...

The Tracks:

Black Arts

This first track opens with a deep vibrating drone, much like you might find some Buddhist monks chanting, if they happen to worship a dark god that is. It gives way to what sounds like an audio capture of some firebrand preacher warning and talking about demons. Then it all fades to a quiet deep pulsing and quiet rumbling that unnerves as much as it soothes. Towards the end of the track, tuneless chimes pierce the darkness, like a lone music box left playing its song as it winds down in a tomb.

Mortal Skin

Mortal Skin starts with a sensation of deep waves, building in volume as the soundscape fills out.

After a short while, a voice can be heard uttering uncaught words and raging. This whole track conjured a possession scene from various films to my mind, Evil Dead, The Exorcist, you name it, if it has a scene with strange intonation and bodily possession, this track will make you think of it.

Snake Hole

Snake Hole is a rumbling droning soundscape with plenty of distant echoes and sounds of vast distance. Strangely, it is one that flows past me with little of it lodging in my memory, like a dream fading quickly upon waking. No less enjoyable for it however.

Arcane Shrine

This track features howling wind and distant voices in conversation, bringing to mind a large temple with some strange rite occurring. As the listener, you feel far enough away to be safe but close enough to feel unsteadied by the rumbling vibrations coming from the ground. After a crescendo comes a lull with soft whispered sounds and pregnant silences before it builds once more. This pattern repeats a few times, the ante upped each time until a strange horn is heard above the growing silence as the track ends.

Thoughts

I felt the first two tracks were by far the strongest and most memorable. The drones of Black Arts and the demonic voice in Mortal Skin really provide something solid to focus on and enjoy. Snake Hole and Arcane Shrine are a little more sedate and spacial, and while pleasing, had less in them that appealed to my ear.

I give Outer Tehom 3.5/5, the two tracks that appealed to me the most doing the bulk of the lifting. Other tastes will beg to differ I am sure, but it was almost a case of liking those so much, that the latter ones really had a job to shine in their own gloomy light.

Check out Cryo Chamber here to view more information and purchasing options.

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

Album Title: Outer Tehom

Artist: Oleg Puzan

Mastering : Simon Heath

Artwork : Nihil

Label : Cryo Chamber

Released : 18th November 2014

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What Are You Holding On To?

By Casey Douglass

A short while ago, I listened to one of Alan Watts’ lectures. If you haven’t heard of him, he was a British philosopher who did talks and lectures in America during the 1950s, and brought many Eastern philosophical ideas to the West in a way that the Western mind of the time could understand.

In the lecture I listened to, he spoke about how, from the moment we are born, we are on a downward slope of flux, change and decay, culminating in our death. But some of us cannot deal with this and we cling to things that we think make us feel safer or more secure. He mentions the analogy of someone falling from a great height but still holding on to a rock as they fall. It conjures a comical image as to the futility of the act and we might think the person doing it to be a little bit mad. (The lecture name and where he was when he gave it escapes me sadly).

It is now that we can ask ourselves, what if the person is unaware that they are clutching something needlessly? There are many things in life that we are unaware of at any given time. If you are anything like me, you will almost certainly have eaten something at some point and been shocked when there was nothing left, yet having little memory of eating the whole thing. If we can do this over something as simple as food, it stands to reason that we might be doing the same thing when it comes to our thoughts and emotions.

As an OCD sufferer, I have always been aware that I am holding on to a great many things that others wouldn’t think twice about discarding. If I took Alan’s analogy further, I’m not just clutching one rock as I fall; I have used string and ingenuity to pull others nearer to me, fixing them together and have started building some kind of ramshackle house on the plummeting platform!

The “rocks” themselves are nearly all fear based, most featuring some worry of loss, hardship or some fear about the future or regret about the past. Awareness of this is sometimes enough to give you a little sense of release or space, even if you still cling tightly to them in every other way. As an example, I am almost certain that even if I collapsed on the street and was rushed to hospital, once there, I would still find my mind obsessing about whether I left a light turned on or my laptop on charge. It sounds strange to hear that even knowing something is worth letting go, that knowledge is sometimes not enough to allow the “letting go”. I fall into this trap regularly. If I find my life becoming more and more stressful, tiring and just generally less enjoyable, I know that it is usually because I am grasping too much.

One rock that I know I did inadvertently let go is the one which symbolised my dreams and fantasies. I just don’t seem to have them any more and when I think about that, I don’t mind too much. They drew me away from the present moment and gave me something fake and dazzling to compare my life to, which usually ended in me feeling terrible when the inevitable differences reared their heads. I don’t mind living in the moment, and after all, if dreams and fantasies stop making you happy or giving any sense of relief, they should be dropped just like anything else.

I doubt I will ever be able to let go of all the “rocks” that I have latched on to. I would like to think that the occasional awareness of the futility of the struggle might give me a measure of bravery, the desire to loosen some of the binding ropes and the will to let some just drift away, watching them mingle with the other falling debris around me.

Now it’s your turn. Have a think. What rocks are you holding on to?

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Dark Review - The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath

I look at I. N. J. Culbard's adaptation of one of my favourite Lovecraft tales, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, here on Geek Syndicate. It's awesome!

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