Dark Ambient

Zwarte Dood – Waanzin [Belgium, Raw Black / Doom / Dark Ambient] (2022)

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Zwarte Dood is one-man raw black metal group that plays an absolutely harrowing mix of raw black and doom metal. Waanzin is the act’s third demo – though it’s remarkably different from the others. Waanzin is one twenty-minute long track that starts in a ghoulish dark ambient aesthetic before evolving into positively catastrophic metal with manic vocal invectives. The man behind this project is also the main creative force behind LVTHN, and it shows in both band’s haywire compositional style. Though Zwarte Dood is far more “off” than LVTHN; I don’t recall LVTHN’s music having a full-on minute of laugh-sobbing. Waanzin is a deeply discomfiting listen but damn if it isn’t powerful as all hell.

Waanzin by Zwarte Dood

Vintlechkeit – Is Vidder… [Norway, Black / Ambient / Drone] (2022)

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Self Released | 1-18-22

It’s been a weird week in the Chesapeake Bay. While we had a lovely month of suitably winter weather (with not a few days getting down in the single digits at night), we’ve been slapped in the face by weather that sadly can no longer be called “unseasonable”. And next week it’ll only be weirder, with highs like a late spring and lows like an late autumn. In times like these, I stick to my frozen vegetables: Paysage d’Hiver, DarkSpace, Arkhtinn, and Lunar Aurora – anything that can trick me into believing it’s actually a frosty wonderland outside (there’s a reason I no longer live in Florida). We can also add Vintlechkeit to that mix. Is Vidder… is just one part of a very, very large discography of instrumental black metal + ambient music – like a low-key (and lo-fi) version of Paysage d’Hiver’s Einsamkeit. These three Norwegians specialize in that kind of slow-burn (or slow-freeze?) type of dirge-ish but not necessarily depressive black metal, being more a long gaze toward an obfuscated sun. The first track is more guitar-oriented, whereas the second track is oscillating drone. It’s icicles made from frozen tears all the way down.

Is Vidder… (demo) by Vintlechkeit

Gaping Maw – Their Sigil was Etched in the Face of the Stars [US, Electronics / Dark Ambient] (2017)

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Self Released | 12-09-17

I do not know if I am seeing more electronic based dark music or whether or not I am drawn to it like opium smoke. Gaping Maw is a reconfiguration of an already obscure industrial black/sludge act called Witches Heart. By the look of the Bandcamp discography page, Witches Heart seems to have wrangled an aesthetic and is employing it like alchemy. Gaping Maw is a new project, one that attempts to ritualize the electronic aspect of Witches heart and present a demo (?) of artificial sound and simulated nightmares.

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