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Band: Dead Man's Hill
Album title: Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water
Release date: 20 August 2021
Label: Noctivagant
Genre: Dark Ambient, Drone, Ritual, Neoclassical, Industrial
Tracklist:
01. Minnebron
02. White Spring
03. Chalice Well/Red Spring
04. Hertebron
One of the best-hidden gems of Belgian dark music must be Dead Man's Hill, a solo project of artist Bart Piette formed back in 1998. Even if Dead Man's Hill released quite some music already, he became a bit more known worldwide after the split album, The Circular Shades Of The Equinox, with Shibalba and Deathwalk. Dead Man's Hill is invigorating darkness for those who want to go on a sonic journey into the darkest places of their minds. His latest full-length, Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water, is maybe the gloomiest and the most haunting offering from Dead Man's Hill until now.
The music of this act has changed through the years, but the sideline point was always ritual ambient music. Sometimes leaning more towards pure ritual ambient, other times more into neoclassical, yet into industrial and even martial ambient side of things. The new album, featuring four epic tracks, is the most "dark ambient" release of Dead Man's Hill so far. As the title suggests, Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water is about the spirits of water. The sound of water is constantly present here, and I guess Bart made field recordings in the four mystical places. Two in Belgium and two in Glastonbury (UK), so hence the track titles. I suggest you check out those places by at least searching for them on Google.
Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water is quite a dynamic offering for a dark ambient album. Not only, that it explore four different places, but it also incorporates some musical elements that somehow make this one hell of a ritualistic experience. Those superb gloomy chants in the opener "Minnebron" are one of the ritualistic things. The sound of running water is used in the background as an instrument, a voice, yet covered with dreadful infinite drones, cold industrial sounds, mysterious ethnic shamanic instruments, like in the amazing "White Spring". The calm, evocative, and immersive nature of this flowing music is a good choice for meditation, and because of its multi-layered compositions, it also offers an interesting listening experience. It's gloomy, cinematic, and Bart infused it with specific energies of these springs, thus it evokes a slightly uplifting mood which is rarely experienced in dark ambient.
The biggest surprise here is the third track, "Chalice Well/Red Spring", which starts with melancholic neoclassical sounds of piano and strings. Later transforms into a haunting cinematic horror ambient thing with a captured beam of light that wants to break free from the underneath. In the last track, "Hertebron", you'll hear industrial influence lurking under the surface. Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water has been composed as a follow up to the water through the subterranean streams. This is where the inner temples are, and this is where the healing begins. The journey to reach it is a challenging one, yet mystical. I suppose it's a synonym for a personal inner journey. Only the devoted listener can experience the beauty and shamanic nature of this sonic offering. I suggest you close your eyes, put this album on high volume and concentrate, a whole new dark world will open up, and picturesque yet dreadful sounds will swallow you up into this dark sonic turmoil.
Musically speaking, Inner Journeys Through The Living Temples Of Water is more or less a pure dark ambient album with a surplus. It will best appeal to fans of the cinematic ambient, drone, ritual, neoclassical music, to those who like stuff like Archon Satani, Raison d'être, Desiderii Marginis, and to fans of the darkest and most cinematic things from the Cryo Chamber label. Yet, Dead Man's Hill's music is somehow unique, versatile and dramatic. It has a certain depth, structural cohesion, and throughout it is present an impeding sorrowful melody that makes it suspenseful yet very impactful and powerful.
The review was written by Tomaz
Rating: 8,5/10
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