What got me into dungeon synth and dark ambient music
May 1, 2021 22:34:26 GMT -5
Google Bot, Yankeefan1955, and 4 more like this
Post by Fatal Rewind on May 1, 2021 22:34:26 GMT -5
With the two main dungeon synth threads in the last year and the synth concert last month, I've realized I never told my story as to how this happened
One day, many years ago, I came home from work to happily find a package from a heavy metal company waiting for me that had come in the mail. My happiness turned to confusion though, making me go "what the hell is THIS?" when all this stuff fell out of the envelope when I opened it. What was all this *stuff* when all I did was either order one t-shirt or one cd?
Included with the order was free heavy metal fanzines, one of which was The Grimoire of Exhalted Deeds.
First, explaining them.
They would later brand themselves as to being "brutal humor". If they didn't like an album they reviewed–especially if it was from a black metal band–they sure as hell as hell made that crystal clear, along with not mincing words. They'd say things like "this is from some gay *** black metal band that, if it came out like 15 years earlier, would've been fairly decent, but there's been like a million bands since that did a far more convincing job. So f you and anyone who looks like you if you actually like this, you bleep. Bleep. Bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep."
So, that’s the Grimoire, in a nutshell (minus the censorship, of course).
Then the second reason I went "what the hell..." was due to this thing on the cover, having an obvious prosthetic nose, obviously prosthetic pointy ears, and with his arms being spread, he had bat wings as his costume.
That was Mortiis, being one of the earliest, if not the very first dungeon synth artist ever, which there was an interview with him in that issue.
Sounding interesting, I went out and got his cd of Født til å Herske at a store without hearing one single note of it beforehand, having a bit of a sixth sense that I'm going to like something without hearing it first and I was right (I've yet to be wrong, and I don't like everything either!). I was lucky too, because even though I live in the fourth largest city in my country, I heard a radio dj say several years later we rank 16th as far as live venues, music availability and the like goes; not a real good ratio, so I was lucky to be able to get that as it was, as the only other time I saw an album of his (The Stargate) was also at a record store on that side of town, which was odd. Because the place I got Herske at was near a temp job that I was working at the time, which was like a 40 minute drive away. I never would've gone into that store if it wasn't for that due to the length of the drive. If you were into popular stuff, the only thing you needed to do back then was find the closest store with the best prices; not so much with underground stuff.
This led me to getting (through the mail) three of his four Vond cds, as well as his Cintecele Diavolui cd too.
Also on a hunch/my sixth sense, in a heavy metal mail order catalog, under their Dark ambient section, some dumbass Relapse Records employee stated that Swartalf's Candles Burning Blue cd was like Mortiis, so due to the unusual but neat-sounding title I ordered it without hearing a single note beforehand (seems to be a repeating theme here). You know, when only one out of six tracks only sounding very vaguely like said artist, that doesn’t mean it sounds like them period! Still got a lot of play from me though, even though this is the least enjoyed out of all my dungeon synth/dark ambient collection (although "The Shadow Gods" ranks as one of my all-time favorite dungeon synth tracks though).
Then, due to finding a web page with brief samples of several dark ambient and dungeon synth artists somewhere, I had heard of Desiderii Marginnis's Songs Over Ruins cd in the underground world and that page had "Solemn Descent" on it. WOW that woman's angelic vocals at 2:01! That got me to order that cd and I played it for six months. (Makes me wonder who else was on that page now, which, being an Angel Fire page [if I remember correctly], probably will be impossible to find somewhere, even if archived.)
Due to several reasons, I didn't listen to, nor get any dark ambient or dungeon synth cds for years and only got back into that in the last year due to being on Mortiis's e-mailing list forever, letting me know about the Dungeon Siege concert, so I sat through that and this year's, getting exposed to a lot of current artists that are new to me. Nice to be back, after all this time
With the rise of Emperor in the underground thrash metal world, I heard about how Mortiis played bass with them until he was booted out before their debut was released. So I'm sure I would have heard of him and gotten into him anyway, but who can say for sure? This is how my history unfolded though, and the future looks great with tons of new artists that I’ve been discovering for over the last year now.
So, thanks to whatever employee it was from either Nuclear Blast America or Relapse Records for putting that 'zine in my order, this is how my history with dungeon synth happened, as I could possibly have a great genre of music missing from my life if that hadn't happened.
All dungeon synth and dark ambient cds to date. Note how the Desiderii Marginnis is the one with the original cover. Haudh is my step forward to the present with modern day releases
One day, many years ago, I came home from work to happily find a package from a heavy metal company waiting for me that had come in the mail. My happiness turned to confusion though, making me go "what the hell is THIS?" when all this stuff fell out of the envelope when I opened it. What was all this *stuff* when all I did was either order one t-shirt or one cd?
Included with the order was free heavy metal fanzines, one of which was The Grimoire of Exhalted Deeds.
First, explaining them.
They would later brand themselves as to being "brutal humor". If they didn't like an album they reviewed–especially if it was from a black metal band–they sure as hell as hell made that crystal clear, along with not mincing words. They'd say things like "this is from some gay *** black metal band that, if it came out like 15 years earlier, would've been fairly decent, but there's been like a million bands since that did a far more convincing job. So f you and anyone who looks like you if you actually like this, you bleep. Bleep. Bleep bleep bleep bleep bleep."
So, that’s the Grimoire, in a nutshell (minus the censorship, of course).
Then the second reason I went "what the hell..." was due to this thing on the cover, having an obvious prosthetic nose, obviously prosthetic pointy ears, and with his arms being spread, he had bat wings as his costume.
That was Mortiis, being one of the earliest, if not the very first dungeon synth artist ever, which there was an interview with him in that issue.
Sounding interesting, I went out and got his cd of Født til å Herske at a store without hearing one single note of it beforehand, having a bit of a sixth sense that I'm going to like something without hearing it first and I was right (I've yet to be wrong, and I don't like everything either!). I was lucky too, because even though I live in the fourth largest city in my country, I heard a radio dj say several years later we rank 16th as far as live venues, music availability and the like goes; not a real good ratio, so I was lucky to be able to get that as it was, as the only other time I saw an album of his (The Stargate) was also at a record store on that side of town, which was odd. Because the place I got Herske at was near a temp job that I was working at the time, which was like a 40 minute drive away. I never would've gone into that store if it wasn't for that due to the length of the drive. If you were into popular stuff, the only thing you needed to do back then was find the closest store with the best prices; not so much with underground stuff.
This led me to getting (through the mail) three of his four Vond cds, as well as his Cintecele Diavolui cd too.
Also on a hunch/my sixth sense, in a heavy metal mail order catalog, under their Dark ambient section, some dumbass Relapse Records employee stated that Swartalf's Candles Burning Blue cd was like Mortiis, so due to the unusual but neat-sounding title I ordered it without hearing a single note beforehand (seems to be a repeating theme here). You know, when only one out of six tracks only sounding very vaguely like said artist, that doesn’t mean it sounds like them period! Still got a lot of play from me though, even though this is the least enjoyed out of all my dungeon synth/dark ambient collection (although "The Shadow Gods" ranks as one of my all-time favorite dungeon synth tracks though).
Then, due to finding a web page with brief samples of several dark ambient and dungeon synth artists somewhere, I had heard of Desiderii Marginnis's Songs Over Ruins cd in the underground world and that page had "Solemn Descent" on it. WOW that woman's angelic vocals at 2:01! That got me to order that cd and I played it for six months. (Makes me wonder who else was on that page now, which, being an Angel Fire page [if I remember correctly], probably will be impossible to find somewhere, even if archived.)
Due to several reasons, I didn't listen to, nor get any dark ambient or dungeon synth cds for years and only got back into that in the last year due to being on Mortiis's e-mailing list forever, letting me know about the Dungeon Siege concert, so I sat through that and this year's, getting exposed to a lot of current artists that are new to me. Nice to be back, after all this time
With the rise of Emperor in the underground thrash metal world, I heard about how Mortiis played bass with them until he was booted out before their debut was released. So I'm sure I would have heard of him and gotten into him anyway, but who can say for sure? This is how my history unfolded though, and the future looks great with tons of new artists that I’ve been discovering for over the last year now.
So, thanks to whatever employee it was from either Nuclear Blast America or Relapse Records for putting that 'zine in my order, this is how my history with dungeon synth happened, as I could possibly have a great genre of music missing from my life if that hadn't happened.
All dungeon synth and dark ambient cds to date. Note how the Desiderii Marginnis is the one with the original cover. Haudh is my step forward to the present with modern day releases