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.

Dark Ambient Review: Rastakhiz

Review By Casey Douglass

We live in a world of judgement, a world in which our actions and motives are evaluated by those nearest to us, or even strangers who might hear about them. It’s not that surprising that judgement is a big element of many religious faiths, whether the judging we do ourselves, or the judgement we might receive when we die. Rastakhiz is a dark ambient album from Dodenskald, the title meaning Judgement Day in the Persian language.

Dark ambient is a fantastic genre for portraying enormous ideas, especially those that seem larger than life or more mystical in nature. I have very little understanding of Islam so I won’t be able to draw on the deeper meanings behind the track titles, although Google did helpfully tell me that Israfil is the trumpet-blowing angel who starts the Day of Judgement. I simply tried to go into this album open to any imagery that the music created, aware of my ignorance as to what might also be implied.

Rastakhiz, for me, was a peaceful album. Any moments that gave me a gentle jolt came from the way that a number of the tracks play with the timing of the music, an audio element pausing suddenly and then resuming a few moments later. I really liked this and it’s a tremendous way of rousing a drone-lulled listener enough to refocus on the track in question.

Opening track, Israfil’s Horn, is a great opening track. It begins with low, string-like notes and a shimmering melody. It’s smooth and lulling, and once you are used to the general pattern, it pauses for an instant and then resumes, in one of those ways I mentioned above. Horn-like notes begin to sound, backed by the metaphysical shimmer, a deep throb and a high whistle responding. This is a track that embodies the summoning of something, a bringing forth that is beautiful and also ominous.

At The Gates of Oblivion is one of my favourite tracks, as for me, it was one of the darkest. It proceeds with a slowly growing drone, one that’s soon accompanied by a warm reverberation and echoing windy scufflings. The “scufflings” almost sound like creatures hissing and sighing in a dark cavern. There are brief periods of low notes that start and stop, build and crest and fall. For me, these low notes add a note of mischievousness to the soundscape, of powerful entities watching across the breadth of the abyss, plotting how to entice people inside.

Another track that I really enjoyed was To Heaven And Hell, the last track on the album. This is a low, languid track that seems part funeral procession, part infinite hike into the afterlife. The deep tones are backed by a metallic pulsing shimmer, and once more, they stop and start at times. Near the midpoint, they’re also joined by melancholy piano-like notes, which adds an extra layer of delicacy to things. I wrote in my notes that I found this track to be peaceful yet provoking, and also desolate, yet warm and embracing, which is quite a range of emotion I know. A great track.

Rastakhiz isn’t like any other dark ambient album that I’ve ever listened to, as far as my memory allows at least. It offers a graceful experience of a looming end, and does it in such a way that the mind can appreciate the beauty and the horror, and maintain some kind of stability, even in the face of some of the biggest ideas and themes. If my review has piqued your interest, you can visit the Rastakhiz page on Bandcamp below. You might also like to check out my review of one of Dodenskald’s previous albums: The Book.

Visit the Rastakhiz page on Bandcamp for more information.

Album reviewed by streaming via its Bandcamp page.

Album Title: Rastakhiz

Album Artist: Dodenskald

Released: 22 Nov 2022

Dark Film Review: Apocryphal

Review by Casey Douglass

The way that a message is delivered is crucial to whether we believe it or not. We live in a time when ideas and perspectives are rejected not on the basis of their worth, but on the basis of who said them or dared put them forward. Apocryphal is a new short horror film from Josh Armstrong, one that deals with issues of mental health, drug addiction and marginalisation, depicting what happens when they rub up against extraordinary circumstances and consensus reality.

Apocryphal centres around three friends living on the fringes of society whilst trying to score their next drug fix. The film shifts through time between Oliver (Michael Southgate) trying to convince two detectives about a strange event that he witnessed, and the viewer being shown how said events unfolded. Oliver tries to plot a course through his life, attempting to get a job and to find a way to pay the rent, but the spectre of his addiction looms large. Oliver sometimes sees things that aren’t there, and the only friends who understand him or make time for him seem to be the two people that will keep him mired in the life that he is living.

The “event” in Apocryphal, the thing that causes Oliver to end up being interviewed by the police, is portrayed very well. I won’t spoil it, but it’s creepy, sci-fi and believably filmed. I particularly appreciated the lighting effects. The element that I most enjoyed however, was the questions that the film insinuates in the viewer’s mind, especially with regards to what is real and what Oliver thinks is real. My favourite moment is when the realities seem to bleed into each other, with Oliver seemingly saved by something that I believe was only “real” to him, if that makes sense. I didn’t expect such a lovely blend of reality twisting, and it was a nice surprise.

Apocryphal deals with themes of suffering, addiction, escape and loss, in a way that I felt was layered and nuanced, which was a fantastic thing to see. The opening voice-over says that the thing we all have in common is that we suffer, and that is definitely true. When it comes to my own mental and physical health problems and my urge to escape, I’ve never tried illegal drugs, but I’ve never had access to them either, so who can say how my life might have turned out if I had. When the world turns its back on you, when all the places that you can go to for “help” say that they can’t do anything for you, or worse, mistreat or disbelieve you, I can totally understand why drugs as a way to cope or escape becomes so alluring. Yet even knowing this, I can honestly say that if I knew someone was on drugs, and they told me that they’d seen something similar to what Oliver witnesses, I’d more than likely not believe them either, which is a prickly thought, but one worth being aware of.

Apocryphal was the subject of a successful Kickstarter project, so it’s great to see how a project can go from tentative beginnings to emerging into the world. The film is now being submitted to the film festival circuit, so I can’t give any idea about when and where you can see it just yet. I will embed the trailer below however. Apocryphal is dedicated to the memory of a friend of the director who passed away due to drug addiction, with any profits that the director personally makes going to the mental health charity Mind UK.

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Film Title: Apocryphal

Themes: Mental Health, Drugs, Addiction, Horror

Director: Josh Armstrong

Main Cast: Michael Southgate, Emily Tucker, Alex Arnold, Kaysha Woollery, Sam Terry.

Music: Reg Length

Distributor: Last Dog Films

YouTube Review: Control (PS4)

Hoping for a bit of paranormal-ability-fuelled adventure, I recently picked up Control for the PS4. I then made a video review about how I got on with the game:

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 :)

Dark Ambient Review: Dissolving into Solitary Landscapes

Review By Casey Douglass

Humans being forced to live underground due to some catastrophic event is always an intriguing theme; the experience of being held in a kind of artificial cosiness by the miles of rock around them and the technology that supports them. A notion that often goes hand in hand with it though, is the idea of someone wanting to return to the surface, even if it means suffering, misery and certain death. Dronny Darko and G. M. Slater’s dark ambient album Dissolving into Solitary Landscapes is rooted in just such a desire.

As is becoming a habit with me and Cryo Chamber releases, I can’t help but gawp at the album artwork before even mentioning the music itself. A blocky, angular black megastructure stretches into the murky depths, the only splash of colour the smeared white glass of what seem to be viewing pods or some kind of airlock. According to the album description, the weak light cast from somewhere above appears to be purely artificial, so any thoughts of glimpsing natural light through a cracked fissure on high seem to be quite mute. A moody and monochrome scene, but I have to admit, I’d happily go on a tour around such a location, as long as I could leave at some point. For me, this sets up a pleasing kinship with the hinted at protagonist of the album.

Below, I’ve looked at three of the tracks that stood out to me the most:

The opening track, The Infinity Bell Part 1, sets the scene nicely. It opens with a slow, sonorous chiming, one that’s framed by the sound of muted distant impacts, or the clunking of some kind of mechanism. There is a sigh-like flow of air and a warm, chant-like element. A raspy shimmer emerges, with a metallic scything sweep high in the air. Around the track’s midpoint, quiet radio-tones squeak and rustle in a nest of bubbling echoes. It ends with a lighter, windy feeling, suggesting a bit more space, or even the reaching of the surface. For me, this track conveyed the oppressive feeling of being deep underground. It felt both mechanical and vast, yet also hinted at a distant busyness or industry. Maybe the protagonist finds out what it’s like above ground by the end?

The next track is The Slow March of Extinction, and it carries the windy ending from the first, forward into new territory. This is a bleak, wind-blasted track, with a growing drone and bell-chiming tone soon joined by echoing footsteps on a stone floor. This feels like a ghostly track, the string-like swells, and the strange vocal calls, pushing their way through the ruined walls and windows of an abandoned civilization. If the protagonist does find any kind of breathable, liveable world on the surface, I think that this track provides a kind of reverse history lesson, helping the wanderer see what their future above ground might hold.

The final track, Dissolving Into Solitary Landscapes, rounds things off with a rainy, dripping echoing space. A low drone pulses and throbs, and there is a distant, rasping quality to the air, a little like a prolonged snarl. There is the feeling of static building, with boinging metallic plucks and chimes. As the track continues, a soft synth tone begins, with distant impacts pushing gently into awareness once more. After the midpoint, there are moments of a “flapping plastic build-up” and dispersal, joined by a stronger, wavering synth. This is another beautiful track of ruin and desolation.

The soundscapes contained on Dissolving into Solitary Landscapes include a mixture of drones, field recordings and gentle synth tones, all served up in a way that simultaneously seems to soothe and chill at the same time. There are muted or muffled crumps and impacts, sonorous chimes that throb in the air, and atmospheres at times, that seem sentient and watchful. There is a feeling of ruin and of menace, of sadness and of relief, and it’s a fantastic album to delve into on a cold winter night.

Visit the Dissolving into Solitary Landscapes page on Bandcamp for more information. You can also check out The Infinity Bell Part 1 below:

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Dissolving into Solitary Landscapes

Album Artist: Dronny Darko & G M Slater

Label: Cryo Chamber

Released: 5 July 2022

Dark Ambient Review: Traveller's Tales

Review By Casey Douglass

The interactions between our memories and what our senses actually experienced is something that seems core to so much of our human existence. Ucholak’s dark ambient album Traveller's Tales toys with this concept by mingling technology, biology and the human yearning for exploration.

Traveller's Tales’ description frames the album as being set in the distant future, a time when humanity has been exploring what the universe holds, far beyond our own home galaxy. One of the key ways that information was gathered during this period was the use of neurotechnology to record what the early explorers witnessed and experienced. Some of these recordings became corrupted by the retrieval process, or by other means, with the resulting glitches mingling what the astronauts’ senses revealed with the darker workings of their own minds. The incomplete reports were dubbed Traveller's Tales, hence the very cool concept behind this album.

Part I opens with a sustained drone and a slightly fuzzy melody that roams from ear to ear. Ominous slow swells rise beneath, impact-like sounds heard through the mixture. After this opening soundscape, things become quieter, descending into a kind of “sad jazzy” feeling space, with whistling tones and scratchy microphone texture pops. A little later, the sound of a distorted radio voice emerges, with beeps and echoes making the space feel lonely. There are strange metallic chiming notes, an ear pulsing beat amidst a muffled clattering cacophony, and nymph-like calls in the air. Near its end, I thought the elements of the track conspired to hint at a kind of mocking laughter. Maybe the hapless astronaut featured in this recording crash-landed onto a featureless moon and lost him or herself to their own inner-critic as the voices on the radio faded to silence.

As desolate as Part I felt, Part II felt like a trip to a lovely paradise planet. There is a warm drone, the sound of waves, and strange bird-like tones that chirrup amidst metallic chiming notes. An element of discord enters by way of a distant drone that buzzes past, a speaker blaring unintelligible but somehow soothing words as it floats over. The words pulse and echo away. The soundscape changes into a deepening, fuzzy, bass-filled place, maybe signifying the coming of night. What sounds like a spaceship drive spinning up and taking off looms into awareness, and after this, things turn a little more twisted. My own impressions were decidedly insectoid, with electronic warbles and sweeps meeting mandible-like clicks and scrapings. Egg shell crackles and strange voices on the wind hint at an unpleasant experience for the astronaut. For me, this track depicted what someone accidentally being left behind on a hostile planet might experience.

If Part II was paradisical, Part III felt like some kind of trippy descent into Hell. It opens with a scale-sliding wah-wah type tone, with knocks and impacts echoing away into a vast space. There are beeps and the hint of a radio voice, and then things deepen into a quieter, brooding, droning environment. This new location feels bestial and chiming, with a kind of bouncing, scuffling quality. At this point, what came to mind was a spaceship entering an evil kind of hyperspace, much like the warp in Warhammer 40K. It isn’t all heavy and dark however, there are gossamer tones and what at one point seemed to be the space equivalent of sirens luring sailors to their doom. Maybe the astronaut in this traveller's tale was asleep in a cryogenic chamber while their ship travelled through something that triggered nightmares. Or maybe they really were in a nightmare and the sounds in this track are their mind trying to piece their reality together again.

The final track, Part IV, is a more beepy, beaty affair, with the space between memories and reality seeming its thinnest in the whole album. After the beat-laden, ear roaming radio voice opening, a xylophone-like melody begins with the sound of a ticking clock behind it. When I heard this, I wondered if an astronaut was remembering something from childhood, maybe lulled by the mechanical rumbles of the spacecraft, or whatever was being experienced. The melody suggested childhood to me anyway, but it could equally have been from a sad fun faire. The soundscape turns more crumpy and guttural after this, with whistling cries and agitated impacts and electronic flares. It seems like a scratchy, flapping space, and I can only guess what the astronaut is experiencing to bring about the sounds of this recording.

Traveller's Tales is a dark ambient album built around a concept that I really love. I find the whole idea of corrupted neural implant recordings from far future astronauts, decoded by scientists in the even further future, a fun thing to ponder. The tracks of the album all suggest different events befalling the hapless space travellers, and each track serves up a diverse mixture of textures and impressions. If I had to choose my favourite track, it would be Part II, as the way a paradise seems to turn into a fearful place holds the biggest emotional sway for me. If you enjoy your dark ambient with a futuristic sci-fi flavour, I think you’d enjoy Traveller's Tales.

Visit the Traveller's Tales page on Bandcamp for more information.

I was given a review copy of this album.

Album Title: Traveller's Tales

Album Artist: Ucholak

Released: 16 May 2022