Being a reviewer can be very harsh and confusing sometimes. But one needs to be open-minded and objective, on top of the unavoidable subjectivity that influences your opinion and preferences too, evidently. No, I won’t start any philosophical discussion right here. It’s just, well, it isn’t always easy to find words, or to express thoughts, when you have to ‘out-of-the-box-thinking’.
[I promised a (female) friend of mine from Oceanic ‘soil’ to write down my thoughts on this release; due to circumstances I haven’t had the time / energy yet, but since I try to keep up my promises, at least to those people that deserve this… Better somewhat later than never…]
I will keep it short this time, even though I am reviewing a truly magnificent act with the fabulous moniker Idylls Of The Last King. This review deals with a kind of compilation, which is dedicated – not just morally yet also financially – to the Republic Pilgrim charity organization, which tries to help youngsters from (Ukrainian) soil who are homeless, who are drug-addicted, or who have run away from their current life situation.
One of the most productive Dark Ambient artists lately must be Alexei Rojinski, the human being behind the Rojinski-outfit. Throughout a couple of years, (t)his project evolved from a rather Electro-based one into an Ambient-oriented act, balancing in between societal subjects at the one hand and obscure / spiritual / … ones at the other. …and everything in between. I mean, conceptually in the first place, of course.
I have to be honest. I did not know the band Sermon from the Izmir-region in Turkey, even though they were formed fifteen years ago. Yet then again, apparently they have not been that active / productive either, so these guys will forgive me my ignorance, I’m sure. They were active from 1997 to 2004, but didn’t release anything but a couple of demos. …and faded away into nothingness.
Even-though this guy from the French-speaking part of Belgium (Wallonia, the South of the country) is active as musician for about two decades, initially under the Planets Citizens moniker (rather EBM / Electro-Pop-oriented), I only noticed him about one year ago. It was under his moniker Rojinski that Alexei drew my attention.
I do know that these guys did finish a second album in the meantime, but I once promised to write down my thoughts on their debut, and since I am such sympathetic guy…
This album does not deal with the heroic warriors from Snake Island (got it?), but it is a new effort by a solo-outfit of Olga Kann, called Cryo Depth. I have been extremely impressed and overwhelmed before by her creations Alarm Call 1986 (dealing with the nuclear disaster in Chernobyl) or Monolith (FYI: both have been reviewed by undersigned; in case of interest, click on the link below). So, I was quite enthralled when she did finish a new recording, called The Haunted Stories.
Witch Haus In The Forest is a collaborative effort by two international acts, i.e. one from Belgium and one from Chile. Marc Ceulemans aka Brainquake is a very productive Electronic / Noise / Experimental musician from Belgian soil, active since last century and responsible for numerous releases, amongst which different splits / collabs (with e.g. Brazilian Noise project Ferra-Reto [related to Nailed Nazarene Industries] or Italy’s HNW outfit Rapace).
It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life (Joseph Campbell).
