Lustmord - The Place where the Black Stars Hang

Lustmord is the work of Brian Williams who used to be a member of SPK, one of my favourite industrial bands from the 80s. This was the first of his albums that I bought was the introduction to a whole new world for me of dark ambient. Up until then with people Iike Eno and others, ambient music had been predominantly melodic, harmonious and designed to create a relaxing atmosphere. The 90s was also the era of "New Age" music, a description that to me means bland, cheesy and unchallenging music, designed for aromatherapy sessions. 

Lustmord changed all of that and, as I was to discover, his previous album "Heretic" is generally thought of as the birth place of "dark ambient" which went on to become an entire genre of its own. Mr Williams doesn't seem to like the term and doesn't take credit for being it's originator and I don't know quite why. Perhaps he is just being modest.

This album is presented as a long form series of pieces which flow into each other and depicts a galactic journey through different hostile environments. Its extremely evocative and visual, very good to listen to on headphones. It transports the listener to a chilling and quite isolated space but at the same time is strangely tranquil.

It isn't for the faint hearted and some people wouldn't call this music at all. It has all the elements of horror or sci-fi film soundtrack and Lustmord has contributed to a number of movies in recent years.

This album is highly recommended.

Lauge & Baba Gnohm

New favourite discovery is Lauge & Baba Gnohm from Denmark who contacted me via facebook. They have plenty of stuff available on both soundcloud and bandcamp and have an accomplished sound, with melody and rhythm, swathed in a warm glow and gently understated. Good driving music, very soothing. I'm only going by the two albums I've checked out so far of which my favourite is Langbortistan. Check out the gentle electro bubbling of "Nordlys". Very restrained.

https://laugebabagnohm.bandcamp.com/

https://soundcloud.com/laugebabagnohm

https://www.facebook.com/LaugeBabaGnohm/

Steve Roach - Darkest Before Dawn

I have to mention Steve Roach though I know it may seem slightly obvious. I found out about his stuff a bit late I think so I had a lot of catching up to do and havent covered half of his back catalogue yet, I realise.

Steve Roach is a marvel, the master of long-form, amorphous abstraction with a substantial catalogue to explore and a range of styles covered since his earliest works in the 80s.

I will mention one favourite here and save others til later. Darkest Before Dawn.




This is one track over an hour long, no rhythm, no melody, just waves of rolling sounds, swirling around notes which blur and overlap around each other like smoke - your ears try to grasp it and it slips away and morphs into something else. And so it goes on, continuing to roll and swirl around the same poles. I find it dark, slightly spooky but  also mesmerising and calm. Deeply beautiful.

Highly recommended.

Sarana

One of my favourite ambient discoveries of all is sarana, the work of a self-effacing chap from Finland named Janne Särkelä. I cant recall where or how I first encountered his work but I was directed to the collection of his works which are available to download for free from the internet archive.

Sarana is a master of the long form ambient style and some of the recordings available on the archive are live performances which were recorded at chillout sessions at festivals in Finland, some are 4 hours plus in length. To me this was a revelation in how this type of beatless, improvised ambient music could function - high on atmosphere, creating a sonic environment to slip into and relax, continuously evolving and modulating, elements coming and going over long periods of time. Fascinating, hypnotic, mesmerizing and also secondary, furniture music for a mood, for relaxation, meditation, reading, working, thinking.

I made contact with sarana and we collaborated on two recordings which were improvised in real time using ninjam via our internet connection across hundred of miles. We have never met but I felt these musical exchanges were a real connection and I will always remember them with real fondness, as one of the best musical experiences of my life.

 
There is a great deal of sarana material available to download and enjoy and I recommend a few of my favourites here.



https://archive.org/details/sarana

Live at Pallomeri

Live at Sai Rave

Live at Konemetsä

sarana and Blu : May Session

Blu and sarana: November Session

https://soundcloud.com/sarana

http://sarana.biz/

Sundummy

A few years back I was listening to Drone Zone on SomaFM and they played a track by Sundummy which really caught my ears. On further investigation I found some of his recordings on the Internet Archive and downloaded them for free. Sundummy is the work of one individual named Forrest Hule and I have also been in contact with him directly and he has provided me with some private recordings. An excellent chap.

Sundummy is an exponent of long form ambient which is an extension of the work started by people like Brian Eno but there is something quite appropriate to ambient music to exist in an extended form, where sometimes a single track well last an hour or more. Having established it's main atmosphere it is perfectly reasonable to allow this to exist for as long as possible and thereby create a kind of inhabitable environments for the listener - a kind of environment which you can inhabit and relax in.

Sundummy uses guitars as sound sources which are processed with effects. There is nothing which sounds like a guitar in the finished track.

Anyway here are some examples of Sundummy's work which I highly recommend and some free downloads.

Sundummy - Might Voids Collide

Sundummy - Spanish Moss

Welcome

Welcome to my blog about ambient music. 

I've enjoyed ambient music for a very long time now and wanted to write about my favourites to share them with like minded people. My definition of ambient music tends to be low tempo, atmospheric, sometimes rhythm-less, shapeless, abstract and amorphous. As a genre it has wide variety and doesnt have fixed boundaries. 

Brian Eno - Ambient 4 On Land
My interest started with the works of Eno and Harold Budd back in the 80s so first album to mention is "On Land" which was number 4 in his Ambient series. It has a hypnotic, mysterious quality which hints at dark ambient, although back then such a thing was a distant concept.

Beats: None   Melody: None  Quality:Abstract  Tone: Dark-ish