Dedicated To The Low Ways
When I was putting together my list of favorite records in 2024 I noticed, as per usual, there was a segment of music that was very similar in theme and spirit. All of these records were lofi and most had primitive looking album covers as if run through the copier for a few hours. This is the type of ambient and dungeon synth I love and perhaps was the lodestar which I navigated through the world of DIY synth. In 2021 I wrote a feature for Invisible Oranges called Raw Ambient where I talked about my favorite releases from labels like Verdant Wisdom, Windkey Tapes, and Acanthus (if you are this person who put out those 4 tapes in 2021 I want to talk to you drop me a line please). Since I had so many similar spirit releases and since I can do whatever I want with my site, I dedicated myself to celebrate this spirit of DS with its own article.
“Dedicated to the Old Ways” was a tagline on the back of a Thangorodrim “Taur Nu Fuin” shirt. The phrase was an evocation to the ways of 90s dungeon synth and its aesthetics. The phase today has become a snowclone with people having fun substituting their own variations. I even tried to make “Dedicated to the Mold Ways” work for this article and I just couldn’t do it. The low ways are something I joke about but it is near what I enjoy about this type of music: Low production, low volume, low overhead, low number of tapes available. While everything seems like it could be quiet and background music, some of these sounds are immense in presence. There is a quality of being understated that underlines releases more than others. While I enjoy all sorts of dungeon synth and related styles, and even have another article coming out about 2024, the dreamy liminality of these melodies will forever echo in my mind. This is music to walk among misty castles or along celestial roads. It is music which converses with the void with as few words as possible and reveling in the joys of silence.
I think I found this because others were talking about it, which made the experience even more genuine when listening to it. What Was Said In The Woods was a partially unannounced project from the creator of Foglord. I eventually saw it through a personal Instagram post and a post by Comfy synth Archives.I was so taken by this record, I even modeled the article image after its visual style. The title of the release is taken from an 1851 book which explores themes of nature, human behavior, and the supernatural. I am lucky enough to know the creator and where they live and this connection with the forest is not something that is created for show rather releases like this are genuine medications on verdant tranquility.
I have talked at lengths about Windkey Tapes and its creator. I guess I will continue to do so a little longer. Windkey Tapes put out three releases this year, A fantasy drone record by Dusklight, a lofi techno release by Athshean and finally a split between Keys to Oneiria (Evergreen) and Dream Chalice (Froth). Released in March of this year the actual tapes of Key XXII: With Chalice & Key (unknown in number) were announced and claimed quietly through word of mouth. The “10 panel j card with a handwritten note dedicated to the owner on the back” is a part of the project which underlines the ephemeral nature of the music. Even if you never see one of these tapes, the dreamy music through a name your price model is a great compromise as this feels more like buying music from ghosts.
Secular still feels like I am dreaming when I check the Bandcamp since an amazing lofi Berlin school record with obscure children’s book illustrations from the 19th century feels like something I made up while asleep. Secular made two releases this year and dedicated the first dedicated to Edgar Froese of Tangerine Dream. While there is an obvious embrace of lofi fantasy dungeon synth, the core of this records is in the stars and whatever lies beyond. Both releases according to Bandcamp was made onto an old tape and then made digital once again. The result is something which feels like it is detached from time and its minimal melodies haunt a world of night.
“The Feast of St. Silabreh is naive synthesized music reflecting on the metamorphosis of events and figures from the category of history into the forms of tradition and legend, and about the acts of subversion gathered under the definition of syncretism.” This is all I can post right now regarding the story of St. Silabreh. Since if I would it would take up an enormous space. This type of deep lore within an album is part and parcel for the work of Adam Matlock who has spent a considerable amount of time just making things and releasing them without warning before moving to the next. The Herbalists is the more naive of the par of releases which came out this year with the other being the more lush Assorted Mushrooms of New England vol. 2 by Mycolgia. The Herbalists is a dedication to capturing a feeling as this record though made with three keyboards was played live with no overdubs and probably partially if not all improvised. The result is a bittersweet music that is advertised as naive but for anyone who is familiar with the creators work it is anything but.
Phantoms of the Harvest was released on October 27thy of this year and while that time is ripe (hilarious) for autumn and Halloween themed DS, this release by Tree Gardner reverberated throughout the subsequent months. Perhaps it was the handrawn cover which looks like you were getting a personal drawing from the creator. Perhaps it was the fact this was recorded directly to tape and limited editions of these came in 14 split between 7 of each color. Perhaps it is because Tree Gardener captures the majesty but also the undertone of chill in these autumnal recordings. There is of course vibrancy in the melodies but also moments of solitary loneliness which evoke a complicated series of emotions.
So I might be breaking from the naive art theme with this one but this is okay because of two reasons. Silent Garden has a discography of amazing hardrawn art and is perhaps one of the very early styles which caught my attention to this style. Second, the cover art by D.N evokes Mort Garson’s Plantasia which is also reflected in the music. These two combinations combined with the ever short release from Silent Garden makes an amazing, if brief experience, which is as warm as that hallucinogenic wave of excitement .
I enjoy releases which dig a bit to find images to venerate. The cover for Autumn Sunsets was done by Paul Nash, a British surrealist painter whose depictions of both World Wars were both dream like and nocturnal as a collision of modernism into the natural landscape. Autumn Sunsets is three lengthy tracks of fantasy ambient if it lived in a world of broken machinery. While not fully dark ambient, the melodies in here are haunting but celebrate their isolation with tracks like “As the world sleeps, my spirit dances,” as if to say I am fine being awake while no one else is around.
Part of the reason why I enjoy this type of music is there is always a bit of showing rather than telling. What I am being shown is a soundtrack to a BBC documentary about the history of two preserved bog bodies from Jutland in Denmark. This soundtrack is a primitive performance of percussion, flute, and strings made by four people. What is not being told is how much of what I just said is true. I know the documentary does not exist rather just an idea where this music came from. As for the actually personal who worked on this. Who knows. It could even be the bog bodies to which this record was dedicated. there is more to this album that I am not even aware of and in its lack of information does the real experience begin.
Along with Silent Garden, the covers from Realm of Sleep had a tremendous impact on me as the covers from from this label in 2020 and 2021 had such a beautiful minimalism combined with bright minimal tint that I wanted to have every tape. I couldn’t. Sheter Ov Shadows is one of the projects from J. who had many but this one specifically is a drone based space music which is the sound of a cold night looking at the stars. To Leave Thy Light Behind is one of the few releases this year and still, somewhere beyond the stars, retains that sense of wonder which drew me in years ago.
I wrote up a blurb about Hermit Knight for that 2021 Raw ambient article as I was struck by the emotional depth of the project from the Weregnome creator. After seeing Hermit Knight at the Great Lakes Dungeon Synth and talking to the creator at length throughout the weekend, the work of this creator has fascinated me. Earthen Shield is a smaller project from the same creator which is on an even smaller label Esoteric Obfuscation Productions. The label is dedicated to minimalist synth which is still maximalist in scope and explores themes of mortality, loss, and remembrance. A lot of projects from this creator intrigue me but this one in particular caught my eternal fear of death and dying. this is perhaps why I was so fascinated since its music is so beautiful.