In 2014, Sophia Uddin and I started a new ambient/experimental/drone/doom improvisatory duo we called Garmonbozia, based around using processed violin and electric piano to create ominous atmospheres. I am now working on releasing all of our recordings in a semi-archival series. Our first 2 duo sessions from the end of 2014 will be properly released this Friday, March 22:
STUDIO SESSION 1: October 8, 2014
The initial three improvisations were recorded at our home studio on October 8, 2014, with the intent of celebrating Halloween with some spooky music. I released them on Soundcloud around Halloween 2014. In that same session, we also tried performing a couple songs from Interior City, including album opener ‘Arrival in a Distant Land‘. This version became the framework for how we performed the song live with a full band. This was our first time experimenting with these patches, and we felt the results were successful enough that improvisations in this style became part of our repertoire. This proper album issue of the first session features a new mix, in addition to a previously unissued recording of ‘Arrival in a Distant Land’ with a few new overdubs (including the vocal take).
STUDIO SESSION 2: November 17, 2014
Our second session in this style occurred a little over a month later, yielding two more improvisations. Early this year, I decided to send the raw tracks from that session to Ryan Fitz-Henry of Australian bands Forecast Tomorrow and Solkyri. He used these tracks as raw material for his new collaborative album with Ryan Pracy, Forecast Tomorrow’s ‘Concussion’. They described this project on their Bandcamp:
This EP is a collection of experimental drones, field recordings and improvisations. It also features several guest appearances from friends of the band who share our sympathies for those in Palestine. Now on release of the complete EP, over 30,000 deaths have been recorded. The majority of this is women and children. The EP is presented for $1 on Bandcamp. Any amount you choose to pay will be donated to Act for Peace. We will donate everything.
Concussion II, III and IV feature guest improvisations by Gabriel Riccio and Sophia Uddin of The Gabriel Construct. Gabe has always been passionate about the freedom of the Palestinian people and wanted to contribute some of his project’s darker improvisations to the project, including his hypnotising keyboard work and Sophia Uddin’s haunting violin. We were more than happy to oblige and what resulted was inspiration for several more tracks on the EP.
Ryan Fitz-Henry used one of our November 2014 Garmonbozia improvisations as the basis for ‘Concussion IV’, and used some of the violin from the other improvisation in ‘Concussion II’. He also used the dark ambient piano improv I posted on Youtube in 2014 as the basis for ‘Concussion III’. Said improvisation was recorded in 2012 on a University of Pittsburgh practice room piano into a laptop microphone, so the recording quality was quite poor. I’m amazed at how good Ryan made it sound!
On the note of duos, the first song by my new black metal duo with Diogo Tabanez (who I previously collaborated with on a track called ‘Bleeding Lights’) went live today:
In a dark moonlit night, during a winter more north as the moon, within the deepest bowels of the northern forsests, fate wanted that a certain pursuer of dark alchemies, a necromancer of renown, a wizard of ill repute, knower of all that is grim, peddler of horrible curses and dark poems of the underworld, crossed paths with an indescribable creature. The dark mage asked the denizen of the undergrowth, “O ye of spiny hide and snouty visage, where dost thou hail from? What otherworldly secrets are kept in thine dark lair? How has thee been dealing with the divorce?” – to which the critter responded “I’m holding up, man, thanks for asking. I’ve been picking the guitar back up again and stuff, it’s helping me quite a bit actually. Hey, tell you what, how about we swing by my place and I show you some stuff I’ve been working on? We can even try and fit in some of those lyrics of yours, if you’re still doing those”.
The lich lord then let out a bellowing laugh, like the roar of a thousand-year-old undead dragon, and said: “Hah! A most fortuitous rendez-vous indeed, my barbed compatriot, for I have with me a slough of dark verses, veritable elegies of the underworld, cursed symphonies of fell madness… truly, Dom Satanas himself could have not come up with such execrable sonatas! Let us go at once, to shower this land with dark, and cold, and grim, and dark!”. The odious conjurer then whistled for his hounds of war, and off went the entourage to create the most blighted ballads this accursed world has ever seen. And thus was born ðøgeþístlr. The correct way to pronounce ðøgeþístlr is not to actually say it but instead to howl like a wolf in a night as cold as the dark.
Lørd Tenebröus (Diogo Tabanez) – Dungeon Synths, Samples, Whispers, Lyrics, Structure
Divorced Hedgehog (Gabriel Riccio) – Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Keyboards, Drum Programming, Riffs, Mixing
ᚨᛚᛖᚲᛊ ᚾᚨᚱᚢᛞᚨᚹᚷ (Alex Narveson) – Cover Art