In more than two decades of existence (including a period of inactivity, for your information), New Risen Throne have never disappointed undersigned (I indeed), even-though I guess the releases from the last decade are far more convincing than the earlier ones (but then again, it isn’t but a personal opinion, of course). It’s the outfit of Italian musician Gabriele Panci, who writes, composes, records and performs all material himself, often with guest assistance by other (notorious) Ritual / Dark Ambient colleagues from all over our decaying globe.
Let’s get over to this specific release immediately. The Journey To Reach The Fathers is a very lengthy (more than ninety minutes of duration (!), carefully divided into nine chapters) conceptual album about afterlife, about what happens after death, about ‘a return to the origins of memory’, about our forefathers and one’s out-of-body, meditative, semi-levitating spirituality. It is, and I quote the label, ‘a monumental work of sonic transcendence, a meditation on death, ancestry, and the dissolution of the self’. It ‘unfolds as an inner passage beyond the boundaries of life, a transition into a realm suspended between memory and disintegration’. The Journey To Reach The Fathers narrates about man’s passage from mortal life into the unphysical, and therefor metaphorical, abyss of quintessence, origin and infinite emptiness, with the ‘father’ as essence, as, and I will quote once more, ‘both guide and archetype’. It places us, and our negligible reason of being, in confrontation with the purity of our roots, like a compendious, insignificant passage called ‘human life’.
This concept deeply feeds the aural side of the album, as so follows the atmosphere. An interplay of Doombient (this is the ultimate genre behind as from now on), field-recorded elements, Dark Drone Ambient, celestial soundwaves, martial patterns and hypnotic noise-scapes defines the aural explorations that define this cinematic experience. It’s a soundtrack for a ceremony that trespasses time and place, yet on a level of spiritual height.
The basement of Dark Drone and Sacral Ambient gets enriched by elements of Occult and Ritual Ambient, Martial Drone, Post-Industrial and meditative Electroacoustics. On top of the abundant layers of droning ambient, the whole gets enriched by industrial elements, diverse vocal effects (throat singing, haunting chants, sights, whispers and devoted choirs), resonant noise-samples (the Gate section includes some interesting sound-effects), belligerent percussive effects and multi-layered synth-orchestrations. It balances in between orchestral symphonic passages at the one hand, and rather introvert yet immersive excerpts of deep-essential purity at the other. This refers to a spiritual insight of knowledge, translated through really beautiful musical constructions. Despite the eerie, obscure core, The Journey To Reach The Fathers exhales fairness, honesty and an in-depth vision on these ceremonial-archetypical matters. At times, it does illuminate a darkened view, then again it does abate the heaviness of reality (and its confrontation). Yet still, the whole preserves a core of dark-esoteric, somehow purifying candor. …though, seen from a bleak, ghastly illusion…
Truculent drones, ethereal and soporific ambiences, blackened excerpts, ritualistic chapters, hypnotic and intoxicating spheres, orbits of gloomy murk, trancelike doom, shady waves of post-industrialized despondency (or anticipation, if you want to); this double-album trespasses the limitations of the expected.
The Journey To Reach The Fathers is available via the contemporary digital sources, evidently, as well as physically. The latter is a double-CD, an eight-panel digi-sleeve compact-disc, printed in an edition of (only) three hundred (300) copies. It comes with somewhat explicit cover artwork that is as disturbing as it is intriguing.
https://cycliclaw.bandcamp.com/album/the-journey-to-reach-the-fathers-2