I had not heard of Swiss solo-project Astral Silence, run by a guy mysteriously called Quaoar, before, but with this project there was a first contribution on a three-way split in 2009. Astral Journey, which this review deals with, is the first Astral Silence-album, and in 2013 the very same label, Kunsthauch, did release the sophomore full album, Open Cold Dark Matter. But first things first, and that’s Astral Journey.
Astral Journey is a six-tracker that lasts for fifty four minutes. With exception of the last song, all of them last in between nine and twelve minutes, and might give you an idea, in combination with the band’s moniker and the album’s title, what to expect. It starts with intrO, a long-stretched introduction, initially based on a hypnotic, minimal-ambiental wave of synth-melodies, and as from half of the track, an eerie drone on guitar penetrates the astral journey for a while, before re-continuing the way it started. With niX, the album carefully touches the sensitive borders in between Ambient and Black Metal. The track is mainly slow-paced, with a grim and rough lo-fi sound (probably little under-produced, for the mix leaves few room for individual instrumental grandeur), eerie melodies, abyssal screams and distant whispers. The whole is built upon repetitive and minimal melodies and structures, yet of a mostly psychotropic-mesmerising kind. hydrA goes on in the very same vein, with slowly-droning riffs, atmospheric keyboards, simplistic drum patterns (once again: ‘simplistic’ is NOT meant the negative way; on the contrary!...), screams from beyond, and minimal yet hypnotic leads. dysnomiE comes with a truly marvellous, yet immensely suffocative intro, and asphyxiating, hypnotic tremolo riffs, captivating the whole in a mostly funereal realm. It might be my ‘fave’ on the album, if such definition would be appropriate. oorT (with its 12:20 minutes of duration the longest astral journey on Astral Journey, and the most ‘varying’ composition on the album too) is, evidently, comparable, creating an integer yet brave adventure through atmospheres and dimensions transcending earthly wisdom. It comes with sort of spoken words, which fit extremely well to the dense, oppressive hymn. The short (3:12 minutes of length) outro intelligently called outro (minimalism in both aural performance and entitling of the compositions; it shows a well-though coherence from a creative mind!) is a piano track with floating, dark-emotive background keyboard spheres, and it beautifully closes another majestic Kunsthauch-epos.
For fans of Mal Etre, slowed-down Darkspace and even ‘Meridian-without-Emperor’, to keep it the Swiss way…
[note: why a review on an ‘old’ release? Actually, Kunsthauch, Dunkelkunst and 99 Screams Series, all acting under the same banner, did send us, and therefore I am truly thankful, quite some releases, both new and old; since all of them, or at least the majority, are worth being known / listened, I have no reason to not promote this excellent stuff!]