Tape

ISPUTINAW – THE ELMS ARMS [CANADA, DARK AMBIENT / DRONE / DUNGEON SYNTH] (2021)

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Manidoo Gathering | 12-21-2021

As you enter the thicket and climb the branches, the wind whispers, the stars flicker in the night sky, and the sun’s light reflects off of the moon. The nearby lake is patient and calm while the tributaries are alive and flowing. Isputinaw’s debut demo from 2021 is a portal to a scene of naturalistic sacrality. The second Manidoo Gathering tape consisting of ambient passages from start to finish, the first of which was Gawaji’s “Remnants of Agassiz,” “The Elms Arms” is a testament to the Canadian collective’s ability to conjure immersive aural offerings to Ojibwe animism. The demo consists of a unique combination of electronic styles combined with whispered vocals and a collection of field recordings. These three aspects feel like a representation of a relationship between humans, spirits, and the natural world. Hypnotic droning and the sound of footsteps seamlessly transition into the trickle of a stream and eventually into a crescendo of much louder synth, howling winds, and crashing waves.

“The Elms Arms,” while more mysterious than Gawaji’s earthly “Remnants of Agassiz,” is more grounded than Isputinaw’s cosmic dark ambient 2024 release “Made-Makadedanoo-Bagonegiizhig.” The variety of styles and thematic location in the collective’s ambient work is refreshing and shows flexibility yet they never stray from their strong central goal of creating aural landscapes about the current and ancient relationship to the land and the cosmos.

Olde Bard – Jewels Of The Spidercrown [US, Heavy / Black] (2024)

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Grime Stone Records 4-13-24

I swear to god that I was trying to start reviewing black metal again away from dungeon synth and ended up with a Grime Stone release. This is okay though as this label has been a source of wonderful pleasant sounding music and also what amounts to a basket of rats. Jewels Of The Spidercrown might be the later so enjoy. Olde Bard is from Massachusetts led by Johnny Ugly who was already noted for releasing Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by his other project Spectral Spectrum (cool name) also released by Grime Stone. While the vocals and music sounds like corpse paint clad figures in robes most of the pictures of Olde Bard look like clean cut young musicians who just happen to play first wave black metal and maybe have rats somewhere stowed away. Jewels Of The Spidercrown is a strong EP that shows a group of musicians who most likely can eat fire and play music that sounds like things burning in the background.

Enchanted Mail – I [Dungeon Synth / Noise] (2023)

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Ithildin Tape Productions | 8-6-21

Allow the noise to wash over me. Ithildin Tape Production has existed since 2022 as a repository for many projects made by US based musician Elminster. Enchanted Mail could be another Elminster project but at this moment it is going to take dedicated research as the roster and releases from Ithildin are many. I am just going to say it is probably another Elminster project. I do not want to disparage the work of Ithildin as for as many releases in their repertoire (60 thus far in 2023), it might not be possible to listen to everything. Ithildin embodies experimentation and with the amount of releases they do, this label / collective / artist pushes the boundaries of dungeon synth. I is the full length from Enchanted Mail which is described as a “Naïve dungeon synth inspired by pen and paper RPGs.” While the subject matter and approach might not be entirely novel, Enchanted Mail’s embrace of decaying noise and corrosive percussion is an interesting addition to the already expanse of sound for the style. The eponymous track “Enchanted Mail” sees the a lush soundscape of dungeon synth fed through a paper shredder and then transcribed through fax machine. Ithildin and their ilk deconstructs the sound of dungeon synth and through many variations and permutations works with the sound as an alchemist would drinking possible poisonous materials.

Arden – III [France, Dungeon Synth / Dark Ambient] (2000)

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Cauldron Music – CDR004

DS1e / DS2e — An adventure into dungeon synth of the 1990’s and 2000’s as it grew out of ambient, neoclassical, darkwave, medieval, and underground metal. Presented as retrospective album reviews and given edition numbers like RPG rulebooks.

I really wanted to put the genre of “Neoclassical” for this release but everything listed is either dungeon synth or dark ambient. What is neoclassical then if not gothic sounding chamber music? I might need to investigate neoclassical a bit more but in the meantime we are presented with the third album from French based composer Stéphane Flauder. Along with projects like Maelifell, Fin de Siècle, Al Amor de la Lumbre, and Par Hasard un Soir de Brume, Flauder helmed Arden from 1997 – 2000. Collectively Arden released one album, one demo, and two splits along with a collection of unreleased tracks and The entirety of the work is housed on the Bandcamp page and can be downloaded for free.

Arden leads our exploration into the dark period of the 2000’s for the style eventually known as dungeon synth. During the revival, the foundational records of the 90’s would be enshrined as well as the new projects recreating the sounds of the 90’s. The 00’s would be a period that would see less conversation and to this day remains a nebulous period of dark ambient, dungeon synth, neoclassical, and lofi medieval worship. Arden is all of that with little distinction for the sounds that would eventually have names and zones. III is the sole full length from Arden and the last release from the project. In a way this is the final resting place for the project and its dark and ominous tones are its sepulcher. While the project began as dark ambient, III explores repetition in lofi extravagance making compositions around ornate drum beats and ostentatious melodies. the production gives the entire production a feeling it has been sitting under cobwebs and dust for centuries. The vampiric synth aesthetic has been a popular niche for dungeon synth in the past few years and with Arden, we have a long forgotten vampire.

檳榔袋鼠 Betelnut Kangaroo – 天地頌 [Taiwan, Ambient] (2022)

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The Tidal Charm | 7-10-22

Complete the treasure map and solve its accompanying puzzle before Season 1 ends to find the hidden treasure TCX001, a private album on BC exclusively available to these treasure hunters.

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Absolutely charming. I wrote about a compilation from The Tidal Charm earlier this year mostly because I fell in love with it and if it was a school yard, I would be following this label around asking to be their best friend. We are going to be stepping outside the bounds of even dungeon synth but I feel this is where the spirit lies. Somewhere between ambient, new age, vaporwave, slushwave, and a dozen other names that only exist inside the internet, The Tidal Charm is a marketplace of the dreaming where tapes are made for people seeking dreamwave music. 檳榔袋鼠 Betelnut Kangaroo is listed as a Taiwanese artist making music in Guitar Pro 5 ( a popular tracker software in 2005). 天地頌 is a hidden wonderland of surreal synth, ambient landscapes, and enough sincerity that nothing feels like a farce. 天地頌 is a 2021 release but comes in a tape packaged together (?) with 浮咒 which doesn’t seem to be listed anywhere on the artists Bandcamp page. The tape comes with a quarter of a treasure map which seems to be a hidden album listed as TCX001. The Tidal Charm continues the tradition of esoteric puzzle music and even puts a time limit on the game which makes me wonder how many dreamy treasure hunters are out there. I will absolutely support ventures like this and hope there are more liminal games that are pushed out into the real world warping the fabric of reality.

Middle Ages – Reclaiming the Throne [International, Dungeon Synth] (2022)

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This whole thing comes with a paragraph of explanation. Reclaiming the Throne is a reissue / compilation of demoscene tracks that were ripped from a website in the 1990’s and put onto a tape. The tape gained a following and was known as “Caduceus – Middle Ages.” It wasn’t until 2020, that the true nature of this music became known to the internet record keepers and extensive work was put into tracking down the three musicians behind this work. The work formally known as Ranger Rick, Mateus, and Blackwolf. Reading the Youtube link for the original Caduceus rip, Blackwolf responds with:

This has been wild – I wrote “Seeds of Desire” for a demoscene music competition in 1995 (it placed 19th in the rookie division of MC3 out of…I don’t know how many, maybe 100?) and then find out 26 years later that it was put on a cassette that has a cult following in a genre I hadn’t really heard of.

This whole affair from the subterfuge, the longstanding misunderstanding to the internet reconciliation is made even better with the Dungeon Deep reissue which rightfully credits the artists and adds bonus tracks and write ups to the presentation. The joyous tracker based synth music makes the whole event feel like the closing credits to some lost Super Nintendo RPG and through arduous strife, the rightful rulers take the throne and suddenly the stormy lo-fi clouds part. Part of my love for this scene of music not only comes from the sound itself but the intesnse desire to archive and catalog music from the past decades. Dungeon synth has laid in the shadows and things like a bootlegged tape that gained popularity feels right when a group of fans reconstruct and credit the true musicians. This entire thing is wholesome and makes me smile all day long.

L A N D S R A A D – Fate; The Inevitability Thereof [UK, Dungeon Synth] (2022)

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Self Released | 8-1-22

Last year, I raved about L A N D S R A A D and their debut The Golden Path. This release kicked off a potential long series of Dune inspired dungeon synth which not only showed excellency in terms of composition and production but also a new avenue in terms of thematic source material. Dungeon synth is not relegated to the earth and the silent foundations of Berlin School / Kosmiche Musik becomes more apparent with each release filed under its name. the dungeon is just the beginning for a brave new world of space based progressive ambient. Fate; The Inevitability Thereof takes its inspiration, and namesake from the themes of Dune Messiah, Frank Herbet’s second book in the Dune series. More than just Dune DS, L A N D S R A A D feels like it is guided by the principles and precepts of Herbert’s universe. Fate, prophecy, power, and the zeal of faith all drive the topics of this record making it not just a tribute album but rather a space ambient record which shares the interests which constructed the book series. Fate; The Inevitability Thereof is a fantastic dungeon synth record which continues an interesting series that I felt was a novel idea at first but is quickly becoming something with unforeseen importance.

Astral Coroner – Leaching the Ancient Void [US/ Canada, Death] (2022)

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Self Released | 6-22-22

This is my everything. Deathgrind obsessed with topics such as aliens, skinwalkers, and quantum suicide. If this was a book, it would already be on my shelf but here we are and these topics comes through a death ray aimed at the listeners chest. Astral Coroner is from both the US and Canada with no members listed so if we were in the conspiratorial mindset, we could assume it is the work of other death metal luminaries making even more underground music. Even if this group is a bunch of Coast to Coast AM weirodos who probably have some documentaries about The Goblin Universe, Leaching the Ancient Void is a punch to the throat which never stops being fun.